Pattern Binder

I'm setting up a binder to store all my patterns in. I just don't like its appearance - white plastic with some advert on it. I'm not into plastics:-)
I took a piece of old fabric and pinned it around the binder to find out the size. When I took it off, I marked with chalk, what I found.

I decorated it with my new beloved tambour needle:-) I draw the picture with a piece of chalk, I took inspiration in gothic windows. I worked like this with the only difference - my work was facing the right side up, I pressed the needle from below.

When I had the decoration done, I could sew the cover in marked lines and dress the binder up. First I sewed the vertical seams, then the horizontals.

Getting it on the binder was quite a puzzle, but finally...

Twisted Hairdo

Just having fun playing with sister's hair:)
I made these three French braids on the top of her head.

I crossed the side two. At each one I took a strand of side hair and twisted it once around the braid.

I laid each braid back from where it came and tucked it under. By the way, you can see that the French braids are decorated with a golden cord.

I bent the braids down and tried to hide the ends under. Not perfectly succesfull:-D

Here it is - heart shaped knot. Enjoy!

Upholstered Frame

Sister's wedding. She got married a while ago, you may remember her daughter's little dress:-)
Two months later, I found me thinking about what to give her for her nameday. I knew that I hadn't hand her over all the photos I made at the wedding. I printed three nice photos and bought a frame. Quite boring. But what about giving her a photo in a frame from the fabric they'd had their their wedding costumes made of?

I measured everything on the wooden frame, cut these pieces, decorated the silver fabric with the golden one, folded in and sewn the inner edges.
Then I glued these, folding in a small part at the corners.

I glued the inner of the frame as well, let it breathe for some ten minutes and pressed together.

I ironed the seam allowances in at all sides.

I had to make a small cut in the seam allowance near the glued part.

I used one of my favourite stitches (whatever its name is :-D) that is very comfortable to make. I laid the pieces as they should finally be (pinned them together at the backside) and sewed them together in this position.

I did a few stitches at the same place to toughten the seam at the corner before changing direction.

Pinning the pieces for the corner seam. How easy to sew:-)

Wedding photo in wedding coat. I hope the brocade will remain them of their day for a long time.

Pilgrim's Bag

If you once were on a period event, you may know the wrong feeling when you move in the costume among people and have to have something modern at you. In my case CDs for the dance, paper tissues, writing pad with notes or so.
Actually couldn't find any luggage at women except the pouches and bags worn at the belt, they are so small that you can't take anything but tiny things. The only usable luggage was seen at medieval pilgrims. Not ideal but better than a plastic bag.

As you can see, I prepared one big piece, a long rectangle and two small pieces - one of them was sewn to the basic piece as an inner pocket.

I folded the upper edge of the small pieces, but the big one was of a complicated shape.

Luckily, now I know how to. I cut a pattern out of paper, put it inside and ironed the edges over it. It's just about steam violence :-) You can make the fabric do almost anything you want to when you have enough steam.

I sewed those pieces together (the narrow rectangle was sewn to a circle and used as a handle and bottom at the same time) to form a bag and made the fastening features. I made this stripe and used a part of it as a buckle holder. The piece in strange shape was used to cover the end of the fastening stripe.

Like this :-)

The finished bag.