Sewing Creations

There is so much choice on the market these days of different types of fabrics.

Here at The Crafty Yarn Shop we love Cotton Fabrics and Polycotton Fabric, especially the prints.

Some people love to create patchwork projects or make quilts, which can be basic simple designs to very intricate projects taking a great deal of thought and months to create.

We visited a quilt festival earlier this year and was amazed at the designs people had created, very artistic and some simply beautiful quilts.

For anyone who loves fabric and sewing but may not feel ready to produce something like a quilt, there are plenty of magazines and websites showing various quick and easy things to make to get you started and give you experience of sewing, following patterns and creating things for yourself. Once you have made a few things, your confidence will grow and you will want to try more an more things, this is how you learn and move on to more complex things.

For myself as it’s been a long time since I did any sewing, machine or by hand, when we started selling fabrics at The Crafty yarn Shop, it got my love of fabric juices flowing again and I have made a couple of simple things to get myself back into sewing.

The first thing I made was a simple cover for my Yorkshire terriers bed. He has a dog bed with removable base. The base was covered in fur, which during summer he has found quite hot to lie on so I made a slip on cover, which was basically an oblong piece of cotton fabric, which I folded over and one end about 5cm right side over and tacked it into place, then in folded over the other end so it was level with where I had folded over the opposite end and tacked each side into place.

Although this was done on the right side out so seams were all showing, I was going to cover seams so it didn’t really matter. Normally you put right sides together and sew inside out, so when you turn your item the right way round the seams are on the inside and unseen.

I found a contrasting cotton fabric I wanted to use and cut the length I needed to go round the cover and made it about 4cm wide.

I then turned in a small seam and sewed them up all along both edges. I then folded this in half and ironed it so it stayed folded in half. I then covered the seams of cover and sewed all the way round, which resulted in my dog cover having a lovely binded edging.

The base then slid in and the piece that I had turned over was like a pillar case, so one end fitted in there and was covered up, lovely and fitted, and more importantly cool for my little yorkie in summer.

Cotton fabric is so versatile and great for numerous projects, dressmaking, craft items, bedding curtains, great for kids clothing, covers, patchwork and the ever popular quilting. I’m going to make a patchwork tablecloth next, which I am just planning out and will blog about once its finished.

We stock a range of printed cotton fabric in our shop at https://www.thecraftyyarnshop.co.uk/fabric/type/100-cotton

So why not take a look and see if you are inspired to create something yourself and get your creativeness flowing.