Etsy Shop Love: Pen and Paint

I long long time ago I came across a gorgeous print that was floating around the interwebs. Sadly this print wasn't credited to anyone but a gorgeous lady tracked its owner down and it turns out that it belongs to the lovely Lindsay of Pen and Paint.

Please check out her blog because it is one gorgeous, gorgeous part of the interwebs!

Anyway, Lindsay also has a fabulous Etsy store. And if I had unlimited wall space ALL of her prints would be coming to live with me.

Here are just a few of them and some of them may or may not be coming to live with me (sshh! Don't tell my husband)

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Note: Please don't pin these images from here, pop on over to the Pen and Paint etsy store and do it from there. 

Etsy Shop Love- CATHRINEHOLM PRINTS

I found a new Etsy Shop to lust after and just had to share!

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I think a few of them need to come and live with me, but I can't decide which ones... 

{Tutorial} Super Easy Place Mats {Part 2}

Yesterday I showed you how I made the 'quilt sandwich' for my place mats now I am going to show you how I made the scrappy single fold binding for them.

What you need:

Charm Squares or scrap fabric
Rotary Cutter or Scissors
Ruler

How to:

Cut strips to 2.5 inches wide.

Sew the strips together end to end

Fold sewn strip in half  and iron flat.

I made a rookie mistake here! So please disregard the fact that I have stitched the binding onto the back! You should be stitching it on the front. I have no idea why I did it this way!

Now it's time to sew your binding to the front of your place mat. Start in the middle of one of the long side remembering to keep a longish tail for joining the binding. 

 When you get to a corner fold the binding away from the place mat at a 45 degree angle and then fold it back in line with the edge (hopefully the next photo explains it better)

Now start to sew down your binding. When you get to your corners, sew up until the corner then flip the folded binding in the other direction so that you don't sew down the overlapped binding for the mitred corners.

 Flip the place mat over and pin/clip the binding in place making sure to fold the corners correctly. Then start sewing it in place. You could hand stitch it if you like, but I'm too impatient for that.

 And your done!

Now it's time to do the rest :)

The coasters pictured are made using this tutorial. And for Part 1 of this tutorial go here.

{Tutorial} Super Easy Place Mats- Part 1

This tutorial is very photo heavy so I am breaking it up into two parts. Today we will be making the top of the place mat, the 'quilt sandwich'  and quilting it. Tomorrow I will walk you through how I made the scrappy binding and the binding of the place mat.

Please note I made a rookie mistake with these place mats. I have no idea why I did it the binding the way I did! But I stitched it down on the back first instead of the front... as I said ROOKIE mistake! I'll explain it all better in the next part of this tutorial.

What you need:

18- 5 inch x 5 inch squares in print fabric (I used Good Fortune Charm Squares)
18- 5 inch x 5 inch squares in plain (I used a linen fabric)
Fabric for backing- I used some quilters calico

How to:

Choose your fabrics and arrange how you would like them to be sewn.

Then sew right side together with a 1/4 inch seam allowance starting on the top row, moving left to right.

Press seams either open or to the side, which ever your prefer.

Pin the two completed rows matching up the seams and then sew the rows together.

Press seam.

And now you have the top of your place mat finished in super speedy time. 

Do the same with the remaining squares. Below are my 6 tops waiting to be basted and quilted.

When making smaller projects that require batting I try to use up my batting scraps. I showed how I join them the other day over at And Sew We Craft.

Cut your backing to size and layer it right side down. Place batting on top then place the quilt top (the place mat) right side up.

Now because the place mat is only small you won't necessarily need to baste it. I did for the first one but then didn't bother for the remaining five.

Quilt which ever way you like. I free motion quilting mine because it is pretty fast and I was on a limited time frame. 

Then all you have to do is square up you quilt sandwich by trimming up the edges.

Then repeat with the other 5.

Meet me back here in the morning and I'll show you how I made the scrappy binding and how I finished them. 

Part 2 can be found here!

Bedside table re-vamp

I just found this post in my draft folder! It was all done and just needed an after photo! So yes, the watermarks are different on the before and after photo's but this project was done while we were still in QLD and before the blog renaming...


B and I have been together since we left school. I bought my first house at 18 and we pieced together that house with furniture from my childhood bedroom and bits and pieces my family and friends gave us.

B came with the clothes on his back and hardly anything else. Our couch was one he picked up for $45 from the Blue Nurses Garage sale that happens in town once a week. We steam cleaned it within an inch of its life and then had to sit on blanket after blanket just so it had some padding.

When we moved into this house that we built in 2006 we needed to actually buy some grown up furniture. But one of the items that you wouldn't class as grown up furniture that actually joined us on our move was this bedside table.

This little three draw thing is probably about 40 years old. I am pretty sure it was my mothers and then it was mine as a child. It was white back then, I painted it yellow myself when I was in my early teens. It has been Cadens bedside table for the past few years, but the yellow paint it really starting to show its age.

I asked him what colour he would like me to paint it and straight away he said red. So red it is.

We (I of course mean me!) set about stripping the aged yellow paint off and getting it ready for it's brand new look.

Then we smoothed it out with some sandpaper and prep it to be re-painted in Caden's colour choice.

Yes, it doesn't have any handles yet. It did, I left them outside to dry and Angus, our black Labrador ate them... Next time we are near a hardware store that doesn't charge the earth I will grab some.

Etsy Shop Love

I was doing some browsing on Etsy, just like a do pretty regularly and came across this funky little ceramics store. 

Don't you just love these mugs with a sense of humour?

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or maybe a cheese plate?

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I think I just found the perfect gifts for some birthdays that are coming up!