My love affair with Amy Butler

I was first introduced to Amy Butler by Amber a few years ago.  I love both her patterns (which are so easy to follow) and her fabric.

One Christmas I made all the women in my family one of her reversible swing bags, this is where I was first introduced to perhaps my favourite of her fabrics - Morning Glory in Linen which is part of the Lotus range.

The next thing I tackled was her Barcelona Skirt, again so easy and looks so effective.  I have made two of these, one in purple/brown/white and the black/white one below.

Since then I have used her fabric and patterns often.

Amber made me this bag out of her Style Stitches book for my birthday last year.

At the end of last year I made her Frenchy Bag out of Joel Dewberry:

And then her Birdie Sling out of Tanya Whelan:

A few weeks ago, during Sew Club, I made a Gum Drop Pillow out of the Lotus range of fabrics:

This is in my lounge and to match it, I am currently making my first ever quilt!  Amber's mum is teaching a group of us how to make lap quilts (more on that to come) but here's one of my blocks, again in the Lotus range:

So there you go.  Still so many patterns and fabrics in her range to try.  Also rather exciting is her husband's range of fabrics.  I have a few charm packs of the Curious Nature range coming and I plan to make a quilt for Oscar's bed with this, pretty neat eh!

Till next time
Melissa

Holiday Projects

Don't you just love the school holidays? Long lazy mornings where you take your time getting up and sorting breakfast...pj's til lunchtime at least once... play dates, parks, picnic lunches. Not a lot of time for sewing.

In the second week of the holidays the kiddies spent a day with their grandparents. It was my holiday, my sew day. I was really excited and had 4 projects all cut out and ready to go.

Fortified with a hot chocolate after dropping of the kids and I was all set. I had at least 4 hours of sewing ahead of me.

I made a 2nd peasant dress for me from SisBloom. It is really easy to sew and looks great. I made mine in chiffon to go over t shirt and jeans.

Then I completed two nappy wallets for a couple of friends. I fixed a cape for my nephew and made a start on Macie's shorts.

Since this wonderful day of sewing I have been busy with the demands of the children... sewing demands that is. Macie was keen for her shorts to be completed so she could wear them over her new purple tights and Cullen was gifted a Darth Vadar mask on his day out with Nana and Grandad so he desperately needed a cape to match his cousins.. like now mum!

So we tootled off to Evans' in the Hutt to use my $25 credit ( I can share that I was not at all planning on using my credit for a cape but when needs must...)

Lucky for Cullen it was a sew club night. So after using my afternoon to cut out the cape, I took it and my trusty overlocker to sew club where I completed it. All less than 24 hours after he had asked for one. I left it on his bed end for him to find in the morning and wa-la we had Darth Vadar swoop in for a two day visit. Here he is with his sister proudly showing off her new shorts from Clever Charlotte.

(gee whizz how many chins does that little one have??!!)

I hope your holidays have been filled with fun.. and sewing too! A xx