.

I've had a really hard time with darts, too.
For me, the two things I have to watch are the "angle of attack" and the last couple of stitches.

you want the angle towards the end to come in very slowly (in most cases), and when you get to the end of the dart, run a few stitches as close as you can get to the edge, like one or two threads over from the fold before you sew off the edge of the fabric.

Hope this helps!

Ever since my daughter started kindergarten last fall I've learned to love my 6 1/2 hours of "free" time during the day.  It's amazing how quickly those hours are spent up running errands and cleaning, though.  I swear there's some kind of magic there, but I digress. 

Some how I occasionally manage to fit some sewing time in there, an important thing for my sanity and perhaps someday make some kind of tangible profit from.  I woke up yesterday with the best intentions of getting a couple of things I've finished up on Etsy and start a few new things.  I had the house already tidied up, didn't have to go anywhere, and had a stack of fabrics calling out to me.  I was set!

Until, that is, my daughter's teacher says she has a little project for me.  I love to volunteer for the school as much as I can, so of course I agree to help out.  The project is to recover the classroom floor pillows.  (There's a huge iron bathtub in the classroom full of these pillows, it's so great for the kids)  so I spent my precious 6 1/2 hours shopping for the fabric and notions, ending up well over the cash Mrs. H gave me, and planning out the pillow cases.  I sewed all afternoon, and well into the night, but I managed to get all but three of the pillows finished!

NEway, on to the pictures!

Here's a big stack of them.  There were 3 big pillows that I finished before dd was out of school and the aforementioned 3 pillows that weren't yet done when I took the pic, but you get the idea.



I did zippers on the covers so they can be removed and washed easily.  This fabric was so fantastic. nice and sturdy for the kids to jump and sit on, and such fun bright colors. 

Oh, a little advice! If you're covering cushions or pillows for kids I highly suggest using a few hand stitches to hold the zippers closed.  curious little hands just love unzipping!  I did this for these pillows before I dropped them off.



This is just a little detail shot I did of some machine embroidery over the felt I used to make shapes on the pillows.  I used all the shapes from their shapes worksheet.  there were eight shapes total, from circle and square to rhombus and trapezoid!  so fun!




So that's my big Kin-D-Garten pillow project story.  Sure, I ended the day way behind my schedule and having spent money without making any money, but it was totally worth it.  The kids just went crazy when I dropped them off this morning (by the way, Daughter and I always ride our bikes to and from school, you should have seen me riding down the road with a stack of pillows on my lap all the way up to my chin, and a big bag of pillows on my back.  Good fun, good fun.)  Mrs. H was really happy, too, and that's great because she is just the best, grooviest K teacher ever!

Thanks for looking!

Hi
This is my first completed project post on Craftster and my first time sewing a hoodie.  It's not really Panda inspired in that it looks like a panda or anything, I was just diggin' on some cute Panda pictures over on deviantArt the other day and thought how much they rocked the black and white.  I just so happened to have a couple of choice hunks of stretch knit and a nifty print in my stash and thought it would be nice to have a lighter weight hoodie for the warmer weather coming up (but I'm in Portland, it can rain at any moment, so a hoodie is a must for me).  I whipped this up a little yesterday and a little today.

Front with the hood down:                 Front with the hood up:               
               
   

Huge Kangaroo pocket for keys, wallet, etc.


Back:


It is short sleeved, with the long black sleeves removable depending on the weather.

And a little bonus, I embroidered this little 2inch Panda patch while my little one played on the playground today.  I hid it in the center back, right below the hood, so you only see it when the hood is up:


How did I do?  This is my first time, so be gentle.

and thanks for looking!