Adorable! I love the way you did the eyelets on the boots, too.

The pictures are tiny, but it looks awesome! The church is definitely a church - great job!

That is a simple, yet absolutely fantastic idea. I love it! I love that you have the crayons and the coloring books together, but each with their own space.

There is someone on etsy who makes beautiful soft-sided playhouses that are designed to be placed over a card table. So, the actual playhouse doesn't have any poles or hard pieces, you basically just drape it over the card table for the structure. It would probably be easier to do it that way than to insert rigid pieces, and it would be easy to store, too.

So cute! Johnny Depp on anything is always good, right? It's funny though, I don't remember him being so young on that show! I guess that's what happens 20 years down the line. I was just thinking how hot Christian Slater looked in Pump Up the Volume, also, and thenl I recently saw a picture of him from that era and was mortified that he appeared to be about 14. This whole getting old thing sucks...

That shirt is adorable! I love the style, and you did a great job sewing it!

Hmm, sounds like I need a t-square. I took a beginner's quilting class one time, and the teacher was really good about teaching how to cut even strips using two rulers, essentially the same way as a t-square, but it just doesn't seem to correlate to larger pieces.

As for the pieces from pants - I think you can get a reasonably good sized piece from one. Sometimes, like if I find free clothes or super cheap (like 10 cents/piece) clothes, I will look for larger sized skirts or dresses, because you can get a lot of fabric from just one item. Or, I'll just piece a bunch of smaller pieces together and then trim to size. You know that great pattern from a plastic bag that's on craftster? My favorite bag made from that pattern, I used cargo pants cut up, and so I had ready-made pockets inside the bag. Worked great!

Mary

Oh, and I wanted to add that I like to reclaim fabric from old clothes, so for example, right now, I want to cut a largish piece from a pair of men's trousers. Obviously, that is not quite the same as using fabric straight off the bolt, so I think that may help add to my confusion. Would your method be the same if you are cutting up an existing item?

My sewing skills are very piecemeal, I've just sort of picked up different things along the way but never really been "taught," so this question could have a very easy answer.

If I want to cut out something large - like, at least 2x3', but even up to the size of curtains, what is the best way to measure that and cut it to the correct size? I'm reasonably adept at folding fabric and cutting it using a rotary blade and two large rulers, but that is for smaller sized pieces. It seems like whenever I try to measure something big, I get messed up. I've tried the "snip and then tear" method, but that doesn't always give you a straight edge.

So, let's hear it, what do you do?

Thanks!

Mary

Thank you, thank you, thank you. I noticed on the comments section of the article that someone said you could watch the video, and so I looked and looked for it, but couldn't find it. Thank you so much for posting that! It really is so simple when you watch the video, but I never would have figured it out from the article. They definitely did not explain it well!

I am off to make my yoga bag!

Mary