Boy Oh Boy!

This past week I got a lovely surprise when one of my blogger friends Jenny, placed an order through my etsy shop for 25 tissue covers for a baby shower. The colors she requested were chocolate brown, cream and blue. I knew exactly what fabric I wanted to use. These fabrics are all from Sweetwater's "Pure" collection. There are some fabrics that definately scream "boy" to me but I didn't want to use those for the tissue covers because these shower favors are for women even though it's a shower for a baby boy. I love that there are hearts and roses and tiny flowers as well as stripes and tiny polka dots!

And because Jenny is such a sweetheart (she made me the cutest apron and you can see it here) that I wanted to send her just a little something extra with her order. Since I am participating in the Craft Book challenge, I decided to use a pattern from the book Sew, So Cute by Mary Engelbreit. I used some of the more masculine co-ordinating fabrics from the Pure collection to make the patchwork front panel for this bib. I love it and I hope she does too :)

A Charming New Home

Lately I've been seeing blog posts from ladies all over the net taking part in "sew alongs" from everything from dresses, to pillows, to full sized quilts! ( A totally insane  brave friend of mine is actually doing a denim jeans sew along!) I thought it might be fun to pick out a craft book and see how many people would be interested in going through it and doing the projects and then posting pics every week or so. Well yesterday I stumbled across the Craft Book Challenge and her idea is even better than mine! (shocking...I know ) All you have to do to participate is do a project once a month from a craft book you already own! There is a flicker group and a link-up so you can see everyone's projects! I love this! No pressure to get something done and mailed somewhere and then wait to see if that person is happy or not. Nothing to swap, just the joy of sewing things that maybe you've been putting off or maybe haven't had time to do. I posted a while back that I have a new obsession with craft books and this challenge is perfect for me! Today I made this cute fabric box from the book, Sew Pretty Homestyle to house my tiny collection of charm packs. (yes...I only have 3!) They look kinda lonely in there....maybe I should get a few more, just to fill in the box a bit? 

It's quick and easy and FTS :) I did however, change the pattern a bit. I used heavy weight iron on interfacing instead of fleece and I made this box to my own dimensions to fit my charm packs. I used the basic design in the book, but tweeked it.  I love charm packs and I think they are just too wonderful to hide away somewhere in a box, and if they are out where I can see them I'm more likely to be inspired to use them. My only problem is that now that I've done my one project for this month's challenge......what am I going to do until next month??????