Christmas Gifts 2015

This may end up being a few posts, but for now, I'm posting the pictures I have on the card currently in my laptop!

These are the gifts I made for my MIL & SIL!

I decided to make them after having pinned this idea (version 2) over a year ago, and starting on my own bag in early December. Just to get to the point where the main parts of my bag were put together took the better part of 3 hours, and lots of input from my friends at the church's Ladies Craft & Sewing Night that I hosted! It was the first time I'd ever worked with interfacing OR done a pleat, but I learned so much! This project also combined my 3 biggest fears about sewing: gussets (no big deal at all), pleats and interfacing. Here's what I posted on Instagram about the progress on mine last month:

To be fair, none of these are perfect. But neither am I! I was intentionally wasteful with my "Paris" fabric (which I've had since last Christmas, planning to someday be brave and do this project), and I went ahead and cut it specifically so that the Eiffel Tower was centered. But I'm okay with that! In reality (and as we discussed at the craft & sewing night), I'll likely never use that same fabric for the same project again, anyway. So it's okay to be a little wasteful, and freeing not to have to line everything up so I'm saving as much fabric as possible! I like the pictures of my bag because they show the depth the other pictures don't (because I'm a Christmas picture slacker!)

I'll share more as I go...

Leah's bag - in front

Ashley's bag

This is the inside of Leah's bag:

That's my Kindle, in the custom 7.5" tablet pocket

My iPhone looks so small in the custom S5
pocket!

Now for the inside of Ashley's:

There's my Kindle again! Ashley doesn't currently
own a tablet, but I'm sure she will someday,
or she can use this pocket for other random
stuff!

Ashley's custom S5 pocket & the other one, to
be used for pens or whatever she wants.

These bags were a lot of fun to make! I learned a lot about interfacing! Allow me to educate you as best as I can....

1) Interfacing is $1.37 per yard at Wal-Mart. The same (Pellon 808) interfacing is twice as much at any other fabric store (I got a lot of mine at JoAnn's). I have problems shopping at Wal-Mart, but for half the price for the same exact product, this may be a better option. When price is a concern, go for the cheapest.

2) Buy twice as much interfacing as you think you'll need. If you're anything like me, you'll mess up (I did, on my bag and Ashley's), and you'll have to pull it off and start again. Interfacing is mildly forgiving, and in my (limited) experience, you'll want backups.

3) Interfacing is not very wide! Again, purchase more than you think you need.

4) No matter what, do not purchase interfacing (at least, not medium - 808ish -) interfacing if it is wrinkled. No matter what a clerk tells you, it will NOT iron out completely flat! I ended up having to pull up soooo much interfacing because it caused the fabric to seize up and adhere to the wrinkles instead of ironing the interfacing flat. I know, I know - maybe my iron was the wrong temperature. Perhaps. But I don't think that was the case, since I tried it on 4 different temperatures (and I have a top-of-the-line iron). So when you buy it, make sure it's nice and flat. If the bolt that it's on is obviously wrinkled, get a new one. You're the customer; it's your money, so get the right product the first time!

5) Never, ever iron interfacing against the sticky/ shiny side. Essentially, the shiny side adheres to the fabric. I accidentally got about 1/4" tucked under the side I was ironing on mine, and it burned and smelled awful. Thankfully, I didn't make a bigger mistake! But make sure you iron on top of the interfacing - the NON-shiny side - with your fabric facing you upside-down. (Blech, that's super confusing, so if you're confused, email me!) 

On to the pleats!

You can't tell when you look at the bag, but it's about 1/4" off-center on the pleat.

I learned that you have to line everything up perfectly on the pleat, otherwise none of the rest of the bag comes together right. It looks beautiful no matter what, but make sure you get everything lined up to the 1/8" in if you're doing a centered pleat!

About the bows...It truly is the most beautiful part about these bags! To say that the bows weren't necessary would be a lie! They make the bag what it is! I absolutely loathed dealing with all the interfacing and the seams on the bows, probably because I'm inexperienced with interfacing. And I was making this bag twice, lol. But it was worth it!

I'm pretty sure my MIL & SIL liked the new handbags, and I may be selling them in my shop sometime... soonish... we'll see.

This is Leah, opening her bag!

Ashley, checking hers out after she unwrapped
it! (I missed the actual unwrapping, because
my daughter was pining for my attention!)

I gave them the option to share/ swap, but they were equally thrilled with the colors/ patterns I chose for them. To quote Ashley, "Nope; I like my chevron!"

I felt like I had a little bit more liberty with Ashley's to go a bit bold, but with Leah's I wanted to be professional, since she's always on the go for her new career! They both suited each of them perfectly. :)

Stay tuned for more posts about Christmas! (And Maui, and other stuff, lol)

Pantry Organization for FREE

Yup, you read that title correctly!

I did not pay anything to get one of the shelves in my pantry organized. But it absolutely had to happen. At least, I had to get the process started.

Granted, it doesn't all look beautiful, but it's good enough for now! I was just using what I had on hand to make my life easier - AKA, not struggling with my 12 Winco Large bags from the bulk foods section!

Yeah, I can't even make this up. It was bad!

 Here are some essential tools I used for this process:

Canning funnel, label maker

You do not have to have either one of these items for pantry organization! It sure makes life easier, though. And I can't remember what I did without my label maker. But I digress....

Anyway, I pretty much just eye-balled everything I had to work with. I knew I had a bunch of odd-sized jars in the garage that I would eventually like to re-purpose for things like tealight holders and various other things, but for now, they served a greater purpose - holding the random contents of my pantry. I pulled all that stuff together in the kitchen as I needed it, and it seemed to work just fine for me. Others might have preferred to bring it all inside at once and set it all out. I also had our black canisters that we got for our wedding that were needing to be cleaned out and re-used for other foods, and that helped tremendously.

Essentially, I would look at a bag of whatever I had - flour, powdered sugar (seriously, who needs 3 random bags of that stuff?!), chocolate chips, cocoa mix, etc. - and then tried to estimate how much space I'd need in a container for it.

Victory #1! Powdered Sugar in a
re-purposed baby oatmeal
container!

Next, I tried to be logical about the type of container I was using. If I had a container with a pour spout, I'd put something finely ground in there if I could. If not, I tried to put things that come in small sizes in (like oats). Some items didn't require labels at all!

See that? I didn't even care to waste
a label on it! A Sharpie worked
just fine!

I may have committed chocolate blasphemy here:
I combined the 1/2 bag of Winco brand chocolate
drink mix (leftover from Christmas gifts) and the
1/2 container of Nesquik.

Again, I didn't have to label
everything. These are oats. Duh.

Yes, I had to resort to one plastic baggie, sigh!
But at least the chocolate chips are sorted, and
easy to measure/ pour!

Next, I started labeling stuff!

I ended up with something that looks like this

I haven't decided yet where everything is going in the pantry. But it's a lot better than it was before! And I eliminated 14 bags! If I can do it, ANYONE can!

So, to summarize, this is what I did:

1) Bring out contents of pantry to be organized
2) Decide which containers will be filled with various items
* Optional - measure by pouring into measuring cups before deciding on containers. 
3) Start filling things up! (Don't be discouraged if you have to pour out and re-pour. Keep a couple bags on hand for this. Ziploc gallon-sized works great, or your bulk bags will work, unless you're using a product like sugar, which takes on the flavor properties of anything it's exposed to). 
4) Label everything. A Sharpie, white paper and tape will work just fine. You could also get super fancy and print labels from your computer, laminate them, cut them out, and hang them off your containers with baker's twine.
5) Decide how you'll organize your pantry with your newly sorted and combined foods!

One thing I will note: I did this at a time that I wasn't cooking or baking, and therefore already frustrated by not being able to find anything.

My next steps of this project will be using my small canning jars for items such as my bulk spices, baking soda and baking powder (took a page from Ree Drummond's book for that one!)