Traveling in Syracuse and a sneak peek

I left home this morning for a work trip up to Syracuse, NY. Normally a trip to central New York at this time of the year is to be avoided due to frightful, nasty winter weather. This winter the weather is so strangely mild. I did not even have to pack my snow boots and parka!

I landed here to find that my afternoon appointment had canceled and needed to kill a couple hours. So to my trusty map app on my iPad and looked up fabric and quilt shops.

I found two promising stores: Feminine Touch Fabrics and Calico Gals. Both were on my way towards my next stop and my hotel. Lucky me.

The first stop, Feminine Touch Fabrics, a small independent fashion fabric store that was filled with an interesting array of fashion fabrics, trims, and an area of home dec fabric. It was not a big store but they had a very interesting assortment of fabrics at excellent prices. They lady working, Amber, was very nice!
I purchased a very summery printed 100% linen for 6$ a yard. Will make a great summer dress!




I would go back to this store. Even though there was not a large selection they had some very interesting items. A hit or miss that is worth stoping into. I just would not go after dark.... Did not seem like the best area to me.




The second shop I stopped at, Calico Girls, was a nice quilt shop. But not very memorable for a traveler. They had a nice but normal selection of quilt fabrics and a nice layout and selection of BabyLock and Bernina machines.
Of course I had to buy something! I have been wanting to make covers for my machines but have not been inspired by anything that I had in my stash.




They did have a nice selection of Moda precuts and I bought 2 charm packs of the Zanzibar skins. Those will be fun to work with! The lady at the checkout was quite nice and chatty, we found out that we both own Symphony's and spent a few minutes chatting about our favorite features. That was fun.

My latest project sitting at home on my work table has left me in love with my new Evolution serger! Here is a sneak peek...



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Location:East Syracuse,United States

Craftsy online classes

Just a quick question...

Has anyone out there taken any of the Craftsy online classes?

If so do you recommend? Or have any other feedback?

Thanks!!



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A Home Dec Project: Mail Organizer

It seems like I haven't gotten to any fashion sewing in a very long time! That will have to change :)

With my daughter moving back in and our little home being tight on space we really had the need for a mail organizer. I looked about at some at the office store and they were just all so blah and ugly.

I decided to make my own to hang on the wall just inside my sewing room from the front foyer. The space is perfect for it, the key rack is next to it and the dog leashes hang below.



I based my design loosely off a project in the book One Yard Wonders and from an article in the UK sewing/crafting magazine Making.

It measures 23 inches high by 13 inches wide and each of the 3 mail pockets measure 6 inches high and 13 inches wide. I added grommets to the top for hanging.



The base/backing is stabilized with a piece of peltex and heavy duty iron on interfacing. Each pocket is stabilized with heavy duty interfacing.



When i sewed the pockets on I pushed in the seam at the top opening by 1/2 inch to create a little pleat for rom for the mail.

Since this fabric is busy already with lots of neat details printed on it, I decided to leave the embellishments to a minimum and just did a gold leaf foil initial for each of the three pockets. This way we all know whose mails goes where!






Keeping my fingers crossed that this nifty addition keeps the mail from ending up all over the house :)



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