How To Re-Cover a Folding Chair

I have a confession- I'm a trash-picker. It must be something genetic I got from my father because he is the master of finding tarnished treasures. It helps that he has a variety of tools and experience to make even really damaged items like new again. I don't, so I only retrieve things that can be fixed with hand tools and elbow grease.

In this case, I found a folding chair sitting next to the dumpster. It was a perfectly fine chair except the fabric on the backing was ripped. It's such an easy thing to fix! Of course, you could always just decide you'd like to spice up some regular folding chairs, too.

Doesn't look like much now.

 There are screws that hold the back rest and the seat in place. Just unscrew them and the two cushions will come right off.

Gross.

The chair itself was pretty dirty, so I cleaned it up before I put the newly covered cushions back on.

Here are the back of both cushions, where you can see how the original fabric was stapled in. Rather than unstapling the current fabric and padding, I decided to simply cover the new fabric over the old. It's a lot quicker and easier this way.

I had a fun upholstery fabric laying around leftover from another project I decided to use. I set the cushions over top of it and cut out a piece big enough to fold over the back.

Mending An Old Bra

I'm going to get a little personal with you and talk about my bra troubles. I have a few every-day bras and they no longer fit. As you wear a bra, the band stretches out a bit as the elasticity breaks down. That combined with the fact that I've lost 20lbs recently means I have some really ill-fitting bras on my hands.

They don't look quite as nice as they did when I bought them three (yes, three) years ago, but they still get the job done. I am on the bustier side, so I need quality bras. Despite the fact that I like to think of myself as a thrifty nickle, I buy mine from Victoria's Secret. They make some very excellent and well constructed bras and they last. In fact, there's nothing wrong with the ones I have other than the fit

I have absolutely no desire to throw out perfectly good but too-big bras and shell out $60 or more on a couple new ones. So, instead, I devised a plan to make the old bras fit again. Queue the seam ripper.

The first step is determining where you bra doesn't fit anymore. For me, it was riding up in the back, which is a sign that the band size is too large. If you've recently lost some weight like me, this is likely your problem. For other issues, check out this excellent bra trouble-shooting resource. As the page suggests, you should clasp the bra tighter but even with my bra clipped at its tightest, it's still too big. The not-so-secret solution I decided on was to make the band a little smaller.

Grab your bra, and look at the closure. Most likely, it uses a hook and eye closure, like this:

It's much easier to remove the eye tape section, so take your seam ripper and carefully undo the stitching that holds it in place. You may have to rip some stitches across the top and bottom, as well.

How to Make Bias Quilt Binding

When I first started quilting, I bought pre-made binding because I had no real idea how to make my own. The palate was limited almost entirely to solid colors, and it was depressing. Somewhere along the way, I learned to make my own and it's my favorite quilting trick.

It's my favorite because most fabric collections have a print or two that would make fantastic binding. It matches the colors of the collection already, and you can use it to show off a print you liked and used a lot or one you didn't get to use at all. I also think using a print instead of a solid can really make a good quilt into a great quilt.

Now there are some distinct advantages to making continuous bias binding. It's more durable than straight grain binding, and it's incredibly useful on curves. I use it for almost all my projects. The best part? It's really easy to do! The first time you make it, it can be a little tricky to visualize exactly what to do. I made this tutorial with tons of pictures to help clear up some of the confusion at a few of the steps.

First, you'll need some yardage. How much depends on how much binding you need and how wide you want to make it. In the example, I use a 1/2 yard piece and cut it 2 1/2" wide. That gave me about 11 yards of 1/2" binding. If you make it wider, you'll end up with less binding, so plan your yardage accordingly.

Ready? Let's go!

Iron your fabric before beginning and then lay it out on your workspace with selvages on the sides (instead of top and bottom). Trim off the selvage edges.

Now you want to take the top right corner of the fabric and fold it over to give you a 45 degree angle, just like this:

You definitely want to make sure it's lined up properly along the bottom. I like to press it to give it a nice crisp edge, but you don't have to. Cut along the fold line.

Now take the triangle you just cut and slide it straight over to the left side. What you want to have is the two selvage edges next to each other, like this:

Ironing Board Revamp

My ironing board is tired. I bought it on clearance to use at college about 6 years ago. It's a mini one, that stands only about 10 inches high and is about 36" long. It has been perfect for use in my sewing room, because it folds up easily and has a hook so I can store it in the closet.

Just the perfect size for pressing blocks.

But I noticed the original fabric is looking rough- yellowed and covered with little bits of old fusible interfacing residue. I didn't want to chuck it, because the frame is still perfectly fine, so I decided I'd make a new cover for it. It was a quick afternoon project and now I have a lovely looking ironing board again.

The batting underneath didn't look good, so I replaced it, too.

 This is what is looked like when I slipped the cover off. It had a string that held it tight, so I pulled that out to reuse. Then I ripped out the seam that had held the string and flattened it out a bit.

I seem to have an affinity for bright colors, don't I?

 I went to iron it flat when it dawned on me that I had just taken my ironing board apart. Duh. I tossed a towel on top of the frame and it worked out fine. Good thing I thought this project through before I started, huh?

3D Pinwheel Blocks Tutorial

I had a lightbulb moment a few days ago when I opened up the fat quarter bundle of Indian Summer fabrics I bought for the twin baby quilts. Initially, I wanted to use a charm pack, but I couldn't get the number of each pattern that I wanted with them, so I opted to just cut what I need from the fat quarters. They were all folded up and it occurred to me that instead of traditional pinwheels, I should do 3D ones!

The fabrics I'm using for these quilts- all but 5 in the collection

In order to make these 3D pinwheels, you only need 8 fabric squares of any size you like. Mine all were 5"x5". If you use a charm pack, these blocks will fly together, because all the cutting is already finished! But, the larger your starting squares, the larger the block will be. My finished blocks were just over 9".

I decided to use the same background color for all the pinwheels, for the first quilt that is the pink.  Next you want to pick 4 coordinating fabrics to be the pinwheels- I chose all different ones but you could do them all the same if you'd like.

The pink floral is the background for all the pinwheels.

You want to fold each piece in half, (corner to corner) press, and then fold them in half a second time and press to get small triangles.

Press them all in half (the circles are my ironing board)

Then all in half again, to get small triangles.

I spent a good while just pressing all of the pinwheels for both quilts (there are lots of them). I like to watch TV shows while I sew, so I just popped in the first season of The Wire (It's the best television show ever made, bar none) and pressed triangles for a couple episodes.