The Betsy Travel Bag Blog Hop

HOLY COW YOU GUYS GUESS WHAT???

TODAY IS THE DAY!

The long-awaited Betsy Travel Bag is finally here!  You can buy your presale copy TODAY!  I can't even begin to tell you how exciting this is for me.  This bag is about 8 or 9 months in the making and it really does feel like I'm having a baby!  What will all of your Betsy's look like?  How will people like the pattern?  What if no one likes it?  Will it get along with everyone's sewing abilities?  I'm so nervous and excited and downright giddy!

{the original Betsy Travel Bag, made by me for Elizabeth Dackson/Don't Call Me Betsy}

Do you remember how this bag came to be?  If not, click here for the full story (and here for the details not covered in the story).  Check out Elizabeth's post on her bag, the original bag, here.

Since that fateful day (hardy har), I have made three other BTB's and have at least five more in the works.  One is a two bag order, and I'm not entirely sure I can reveal the details of that one just yet, but I will tell you this: these two bags are going to be insanely spectacular, out of this world.  This person is a very popular fabric designer and you are going to LOVE the line I'll be using for them!

{Betsy Travel Bag number two, my own personal bag}

For my bag, I used one of my all-time favorite fabrics by Echino.  I dream of living in England someday, so anything that has the Union Jack, London, Double Busses etc on it has me written all over it.  This is the bag on the pattern cover.  OMG I SAID PATTERN COVER!  Seriously, I am so excited about this pattern, can you tell??

{finished measurements are 20" wide x 12.5" high x 6.5" wide}

{the inside of the bag, nice and roomy with two pockets and a key fob that is sorta camouflaged by the lining}

The third bag was a very special bag.  I got to make it for one of my very best friend's out of her first fabric line.  She's a little bit rock 'n roll (don't tell her I said that because she's really just as goofy and dorky as me, SH!) so I decided to add some metal studs and use all gold hardware.

{the dynamic duo!  Katy and Me at QuiltCon 2015}

  

{Betsy Travel Bag number three for Katy Jones/I'm A Ginger Monkey}

{those studs gave it an edgy flair}

{Betsy, as seen in Katy's Priory Square/Art Gallery Fabrics booth at Fall Quilt Market 2014}

The fourth bag isn't quite finished yet, although it's almost there.  I only need to finish the binding and the lucky recipient will soon have it in her crazy talented hands!  I'm really loving how this one is turning out, and I know she's excited about it, too.  

I love that you can use big or unusual prints (hello Kokka, Tula Pink, Echino!) with this bag.  It has tons of pockets, lots of space, an easy space for stuffing and then accessing your book, wallet, airplane tickets etc.  You don't have to set your bag down every time you need to get into it, you just unhook a zipper binding and reach in.  Easy peasy. 

I purposely designed this bag to be floppy and squishable instead of stiff.  I didn't need it to stand up on it's own.  I DID need it to be easily stuffed under the seat in front of me on an airplane, or squashed into the last available space in the trunk of my car on a long road trip.  I wanted it to open up wide so it was easy to pack and unpack.  I also needed to make sure there was an inside zippered pocket to store my laptop, magazines, flip flops or even my dirty laundry.

{bonus key fob (in blue) so you won't lose your house keys while you're out of town!}

Most of all, I wanted this pattern to be easy enough for a confident beginner or an intermediate level sewist to be able to accomplish.  If you can sew a straight line, you can make this bag.  Even if your lines are a little bit wavy, don't worry about it!  The big prints will hide that!  (I've tried to think of it all, haha!) Even if you're not sure you can sew this bag confidently, don't worry too much about it.  We are hosting a Betsy Travel Bag sew-along on Rebel Craft Media's blog starting April 2.  There will be tons of participants (oh geez, I mean I hope there will be!) lots of helpful hints and inspirational pictures to browse and we'll be giving away two copies of the pattern! Use the hashtag "#thebetsytravelbag" on Instagram to play along.

You can purchase the presale pattern starting March 17, 2015 by clicking here. Presale purchasers will receive the supplies list which will give you two weeks to gather your hardware, fabrics, notions etc.  Speaking of hardware, we've made that pretty easy for you.  Claudia, of Snuggly Monkey, has put together a Betsy Bag Hardware Kit just for you. Click here to view/order one.

We have a pretty spectacular blog hop lined up for you.  You'll get to see Betsy through the eyes of the makers, pattern testers, owners and supporters! 

Happy Reading, Sewing, Supplies Gathering etc!

-Kristi

The Betsy Travel Bag Blog Hop Tour

March 17

Day One:

*Rebel Craft Media*

www.rebelcraftmedia.com/blog

*schnitzel & boo*

www.schnitzelandboo.com

*Snuggly Monkey*

www.blog.snugglymonkey.com

March 19

Day Two:

*Daisy & Jack*

www.daisyandjack.blogspot.com

March 21

Day Three:

*I'm A Ginger Monkey*

www.imagingermonkey.blogspot.com

March 23

Day Four:

*Stitchy Quilt Stuff*

www.stitchyquiltstuff.com

March 25

Day Five:

*Libby Dibby*

 www.libbydibbystuff.blogspot.com

March 27

Day Six:

*Euphoria Jessica*

www.euphoriajessica.blogspot.com

March 29

Day Seven:

*Karri of Berries*

www.karriofberries.com

March 31

Day Eight:

*Rebel Craft Media*

(photo round up)

www.rebelcraftmedia.com/blog

Tutorial: CatStar Block

You might remember that I hosted a mini quilt swap? Yeah? Well, this CatStar Block was from that swap. I saw it under the hashtag and had to compliment it's maker, Janda, on how cute it was. She made it up out of her own brilliant head! Isn't she clever? There were a lot of requests for a tutorial on it but since she doesn't have a blog, she had to say no. So, I offered to help out.

I've decided to host a little #halloweencatstar quilt-a-long. Are you interested? One lucky participant will receive a Halloween trick-or-treat bag, stuffed full of goodies,from me! You must complete your Halloween CatStar block in order to be entered in the drawing, though. Let's get going, shall we?

You will need four colors of fabrics, in three shades each, and two different background fabrics for a total of fourteen fabrics. Fat quarters and charm squares work great. 

Using my photo above as a guide for color/fabric reference, cut the following:

Chevron (large polka dot) 

-four 4" squares

Background (small polka dot)

-fourteen 4" squares

-four 1 3/4" squares

Cat A right ear

-one 4" square

Cat A left ear

-one 4" square

Cat A face/forehead

-two 3 1/2" squares

-two 1 3/4" squares

Cat B right ear

-one 4" square

Cat B left ear

-one 4" square

Cat B face/forehead

-two 3 1/2" squares

-two 1 3/4" squares

Cat C right ear

-one 4" square

Cat C left ear

-one 4" square

Cat C face/forehead

-two 3 1/2" squares

-two 1 3/4" squares

Cat D right ear

-one 4" square

Cat D left ear

-one 4" square

Cat D face/forehead

-two 3 1/2" squares

-two 1 3/4" squares

{it helps to label everything}

{don't pay too much attention, I switched things around a bit after I took this pic}

Begin by making the center of the CatStar Block. Get your 3 1/2" face/forehead squares for the center cats and the four 1 3/4" squares. Place the small square in one corner of the large square, right sides together. With a fabric marking both, draw a line from corner to corner.

Stitch on this line,

Trim seam to 1/4".

Flip the corner fabric back and press.

Do this for all four inner star cat pieces.

For the outer star cat pieces, you will repeat the above process using the remaining four 3 1/2" face/forehead pieces and the four 1 3/4" coordinating pieces. 

You will also need to repeat this process for the four 4" background corner pieces and the four 1 3/4" outer star cat for heads.

I feel like I'm speaking gibberish so here's a pic of what the layout will look like:

To make the ears, you'll need to make half square triangles. With right sides together, match up one ear with one background square. You'll be doing all the ears at this time, so go ahead and match them all. Draw a line from corner to corner, right down the middle of each ear, then 1/4" away on each side. The first line (the one that is now on the middle) will become your cutting line. The other two are stitching lines.

Stitch directly on the line, adding a new square pair (teehee) after the last of the line is sewn & without cutting your thread or picking up the presser foot. This is chain stitching.

When you've reached the end of the ear chain, turn it around and stitch the lines on the other side. Snip the threads to separate, then use your rotary cutter and acrylic ruler to cut them in half.

Carefully press the half square triangles open, making sure the seam is towards the darker side.

Your Cat Star should look like this, after laying out the ear pieces:

Repeat the Half Square Triangle chain for the chevron pieces:

Now it's time to put it all together. Stitch four squares together, forming one block.

{this is where I messed up my inner star cats. I didn't notice so, my end result looks like calico cats. Oh well, it works.}

Now, stitch the blocks into rows.

And finally, stitch the rows together to finish your Halloween CatStar Block.

If you want to participate in the #halloweencatstar quilt-a-long, please be sure to use the hashtag and tag me (@schnitzelandboo) and Janda (@jrm0501) on Instagram. Don't forget, there's a sweet prize for one of our participants!

If you love this block, leave a comment and stop by Janda's Instagram feed and tell her. 

Happy Quilting!

-Kristi

PS thank you IG @actsofcraftiness for catching my lack of info mistake!

*finished size of CatStar is 18"

*please use Halloween inspired colors and/or fabrics to count for the drawing (but also know that Halloween is not limited to black and orange!)

*deadline to enter your Halloween CatStar is October 28, 2014 because that's my birthday.

{the original CatStar Block 

by Janda Wilden}

In Progress and Other Fun Stuff

A few months ago I was asked if I'd be interested in working on a custom baseball themed quilt. My first reaction was "as long as it's not a Yankees quilt!" followed quickly by my second reaction of "OMG I get to make a custom quilt??" Turns out, it's a new baby quilt for a boy born to a Red Sox FANily. Heck yeah!

 

We decided on a two sided/reversible quilt. I'll keep the second half a surprise for now (unless you follow me on Instagram). Here is the first side in progress, a cheater herringbone half square triangle pattern:

And now finished:

(Say hello, Fenway Frank!)

I shared a tip with my IG friends/followers while working on this quilt. If you decide to recover your ironing board any time soon, or you need to make yourself a pressboard (check Katy Jones/I'm A Ginger Monkey's blog for a little pressboard how-to) consider using flannel instead of regular quilter's cotton.

The flannel helps the fabric "stick" which practically eliminates that whole stretching-on-the-bias-as-you're-ironing thing. Pretty cool, huh?

Let's see...what else? Oh! I am an overachiever and have been assigned TWO Schnitzel & Boo Mini Quilt Swap Partners! Here is what I made for them:

And:

Do you like? The arrow quilt person has to wait until Friday when I can ship it (yes I'm the swap mama and I just threw myself under the bus. I'm a late sender! A horrible example! I meant it when I said we understand that stuff happens!) The star quilt person is out of town so I'm hanging onto it until they get back.

I joined another swap-don't tell my husband-because my friend Trudi (www.trudi-quiltingprolifically.blogspot.co.uk) told me to. I'd probably jump if she told me to, that's how much I adore her. Whatever ;) We had to make mosaics for our secret partner so this is mine:

Lots of good stuff there, huh? Isn't that sunshine zipper tab the cutest? And the darling little stamps with the envelope blocks? Not to mention the potty mouth embroidery?! >sigh<

Anyway, things are busy as usual around here. I'm chipping away very slowly at my to-do list. My Bee's have been sadly neglected and I haven't made it to a Guild meeting in three or four months. 

What have you been up to?

Happy Sewing!

-Kristi-

Modern Medallion: week two

Last week my friend Angela came on to guest post about my week for Crystal of Two Little Aussie Bird's Modern Medallion. I was SO VERY thankful to have her help because I was in Michigan without internet! ACK! Lucky for me, Angela is not only a brilliant writer but she's also a brilliant quilter (and friend!) This week I am home and she is out of town. 

I added the Plain Jane border to my New York Beauty Contest medallion. I used a hot pink linen which I think looks really good. I'm still working on my Drunk Geese border, which is apparently quite a challenge for me!

I cut 80 3" squares and 80 2 1/2"x3" rectangles and sat down to get to work.

Oh. Crap. I just cut 80 rectangles at 2 1/2"x3" not 2"x3 1/2". GROAN. Fine. No big deal, we'll just set aside those mistake rectangles and use them elsewhere...like maybe in my schnitzel & boo Mini Quilt Swap partner's quilt...

After a little digging, I came up with a piece of white linen with a silver tinselly thread stripe throughout. Perfection! 80 rectangles cut the right way AND NOW we're ready to get started.

(Actually, I like this better!) I'm still pretty new to quilting, I've always been a garment/3-D sewist so the whole Modern/Wonky thing is something that I'm just not used to. I dunno, maybe it's the angles. I finally had six geese sewn together but not after seam ripping three times. I'm eleven geese into it now and I'm still trying to get my thoughts around how to do it wonky not wrong. It's getting easier as I go, but I had to call it a night. I'm just too tired I think. I'll pick it back up tomorrow but for now, this is where I am:

I have decided that going with just two fabrics, instead of several different low-values and several different colorful scraps, for the Drunk Geese was perfect for me. I love that Crystal's pattern gives us the freedom to do whatever we want. We're designing and creating at the same time. That's pretty dang cool. The uniformity in color will tone down the wonky geese in my quilt, which is great for me because I have plans to get crazy with those awesome little pluses. Here's a close up of my progress: 

I do love me some animal print! Especially zebra!

Anyway, check out Angela's post last week for the links to check out everyone else's progress. You should also definitely scroll through the #modernmedallion hashtag on Instagram. There are some seriously awesome quilts happening over there! I'll update during the week as I get the chance!

Happy Quilting!

Kristi