Charity

Hopeful Threads: Fluff for Foster Care

Published April 23, 2013

Farmer Frog and Pilot Frog went for a walk one sunny spring day. They brought along their pet caterpillars to enjoy the fresh air. Their conversation bubbled over with excitement about the mission they’d been assigned, knowing that their new jobs as friends to little ones in foster care would bring smiles to faces and joy to hearts!

Pilot Frog hoped that his trip to Hopeful Threads would lead him to the perfect little boy for him, maybe one who loves helicopters and pretending to fly!Pilot Frog’s green caterpillar would be making the trip with him. This little caterpillar dreamed of finding a new home with a little one who would love to cuddle with him day and night.Farmer Frog was looking forward to a much longer trip all the way to Canada! There, he would settle down in a brand new foster home and wait expectantly with the family for a child in need of their love and his companionship.Traveling with Farmer Frog, of course, was his yellow caterpillar. The yellow caterpillar was filled with anticipation of becoming a special lovey to a wee one who would share playtime laughs and bedtime snuggles.Heehee! I couldn’t resist writing a silly little story to go along with these guys. Aren’t they cute little stuffies? I sewed up the frogs using Bit of Whimsy’s Fritter Frog pattern (the Daddy Frog version). The sweet caterpillars were knit by my 15-year-old, Samantha. (I keep telling her that she needs her own creative teen blog!) She used this pattern Lion Brand Cuddly Caterpillar. Pilot Frog and his green caterpillar are shipping out to Kristy at Hopeful Threads for this month’s Fluff for Foster Care project. In the same spirit, Farmer Frog and his yellow caterpillar will be packed off to my friend, Jamie, in Canada where she and her husband are just beginning the foster family journey.

Posted in Charity, Hopeful Threads, Knitting, Sewing/Crafts | 3 Comments

Bibs, Bibs, Bibs!

Published March 11, 2013

I cannot possibly thank you enough for sharing your time, your talents and your fabric by sewing so many bibs for last month’s Hopeful Threads Dinner for 2 project! Opening your packages has been so much fun! It’s so cool to see the love and care that was put into each bib.Over 160 bibs are packed in a suitcase, ready to fly off to China where they are going to be a huge blessing to the children at Hidden Treasures Foster Home. (No worries, though, if you haven’t shipped your bibs yet. You can still send them, and we’ll make sure that they make it over on the next trip!)I’m working on a little “Thank-You” gift that I hope to have for you tomorrow!

Posted in Charity, Following Jesus, Sewing/Crafts | 4 Comments

Upcycled Grown-Up Bibs!

Published February 20, 2013

This month’s Dinner for 2 project at Hopeful Threads is all about bibs. If you’ve been reading along, you already know that here in Florida, we’re collecting handmade bibs for the Hidden Treasures Foster Home in China. (You can read more here: Big Kid Bibs for Hidden Treasures.) The project is actually called Dinner for 2, though, because over in Louisiana, Anita is collecting bibs for the residents at Grace Nursing Home! I couldn’t let the month pass by without sewing a few adult bibs to send her way.

Remember how I said that I had collected a pile of thrifted men’s button-down shirts in anticipation of the Upcycled Men’s Shirt Challenge at Project Run & Play? Well, guess what I did with the extra shirts? I turned them into bibs for a few of the men at Grace Nursing Home! First up, the plaid dress shirt version:Here’s the fun-loving, novelty version:Finally, the casual flannel shirt version.
Aren’t they fun? Using thrifted shirts in good condition saved on fabric costs and gave them a more grown-up look! Sewing them was really easy, too. I scaled my Big Kid Snap Bib pattern up to adult size, using my husband as my model. For each bib, I cut the front and back body from the front and back of a men’s large button-down shirt. To add some absorbency, I also cut a hidden body layer of flannel. Before I started sewing things together, I stitched the button placket on the front shut. For the wraparound neck piece, I used coordinating fabric, cutting the same three layers. Once I stitched each neck piece to each body piece, I just followed the instructions from the Big Kid Snap Bib pattern, making the diameter of the neck about 7 1/2″. Easy peasy, right?

I had planned to just blog about these adult bibs, but I couldn’t resist drawing up a pattern for you to use. There’s still time to add to the collection heading to Louisiana! You might even want to sew them for other things, too! Wouldn’t they be perfect for the tasters at a chili cook-off or maybe the contestants at a pie-eating contest or even just for the grown-up messy eaters at home? Okay, here’s the link to the pattern: The Grown-Up Bib. This is only the pattern. For the instructions, you’ll need to go download this pattern and follow the steps I mentioned above: The Big Kid Snap Bib.

If you sew for Dinner for 2, be sure to add your pictures to the Flickr album, and if you haven’t already entered the It’s a Snap Source Giveaway from Monday, be sure to do that, too!

Posted in Charity, Sewing/Crafts, Tutorials | 7 Comments

It’s a Snap Source Giveaway!

Published February 18, 2013

Guess what?! When the folks over at The Snap Source heard that we were joining with Hopeful Threads to sew bibs for two different charities this month, they offered to send me THREE SnapSetter® Starter Sets to give away! How cool is that?
I love using the SnapSetter® for clothing. The snaps are high quality, affordable and long-lasting, and applying them is fast and easy! Simply position the snap components and fabric in between the layers of The SnapSetter® and hammer into place.
How many things can you think of that could use snaps? (Snaps, by the way, are far easier for little hands to manage when dressing themselves than buttons. My six-year-old, Jamie, requests them on all of his camp shirts!)Each starter set comes with the standard size 16 SnapSetter®, six open-ring snap sets and 40 capped snap sets! And, did I mention, that THREE people will win?To enter, just follow the instructions on the Rafflecopter below! I’ll announce the winners on Monday, 2/25, and the winners will have 48 hours to respond. Both domestic and international entries are welcome!
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Posted in Charity, Giveaways, Hopeful Threads | 169 Comments

The Big Kid Bib: Serged & Snapped in Seconds

Published February 8, 2013

Have you peeked over at the Dinner for 2 Flickr Group lately? There are some seriously great-looking bibs showing up already, bibs for kids and adults alike. Have you sewn a bib or two yet? What are you waiting for? A quicker method of sewing perhaps? Do you have a serger? Well, then the Serged & Snapped in Seconds Bib tutorial is just for you! (Okay, so it really takes minutes, but seconds make up minutes and without seconds you don’t get the alliteration.)

Let’s get started! First, hop over to this post: Hopeful Threads & Dinner for Two. Read all about why we’re sewing bibs this month, print the Big Kid Snap Bib Pattern and get your three fabric pieces cut out: I have a front piece of cotton quilting fabric, a hidden inner layer of cotton flannel and a backing piece of PUL. (This method works well with PUL because the slippery side is hidden when you serge. Ripstop may be too slippery, but you can certainly try it!)

Grab a glue stick from your school supply closet or your junk drawer. A fabric glue stick will certainly work, but regular glue stick is cheaper and easier to find, and as long as it’s washable, it works just as well. You do want a glue stick that is new and not gummy at all. It needs to spread quickly and in a thin layer.Rub that glue stick all over the shiny side of your PUL. You want plenty of glue so there won’t be any slipping and sliding. Carefully place your hidden layer on top, line up all the edges and smooth it out.
Now glue the wrong side of your front fabric piece to the top of the flannel using the same method. It is much easier to spread the glue stick glue on cotton quilting fabric than on flannel. Flannel leaves icky fuzzy stuff on your glue stick. Check to see if you have any areas where the fabrics are overlapping and square them all up. Now you’re ready to serge. Just one second before you head to the serger, though. Do you have one of these baskets? These beautiful colored spools of Woolly Nylon have been sitting in this basket since Joanns clearanced them quite some time ago. If you have a basket like this, you might consider pulling one of those pretty colors through your upper looper. If you don’t, white will work just as well! Now, off to the serger! The seam allowance is 1/2″ so you want to cut off 1/2″ or close to that with your serger blade. It’s hard to keep that exact when you’re going around curves, but get it as close as you can. I started and stopped my serging at the back of the neckline since that’s the spot that will be least likely to be seen when the bib is worn. Zip, zip, round the corners, and all you have left to do is add the snaps.Refer back to the pattern for snap placement. Press the snaps in place. And you have a bib ready to send off with love to a sweet little one who will be so excited to receive it! Now wasn’t that fast?! Fast enough that you have time to make another one? Super! Go serge some more!

Posted in Charity, Following Jesus, Hopeful Threads, Sewing/Crafts, Tutorials | 4 Comments