Happy February, sister dear! I figured it was about time to share what I have been doing on my end. Over the past several weekends, Miss PJ and I have been keeping ourselves busy with home decor projects. A few weekends ago, during an evening of dinner and watching the guys game, Miss PJ said that she wanted me to help her design something to hang on the wall, to keep the remote controls out of the little one’s reach. A thought hit me (you know what happens when I get ideas, lol), and I pulled out the new machine mom bought me for Christmas.
Meet Miss Elinor (yes, I name my machines). Granted, she has purple and pink flowers, and her functions are on the plain side, but she has a working button holer, and she gets the job done. We get along very nicely. However, she doesn’t like Katie, and gave her fits for trying to use her the other night. But, back to my story.
Once I got Elinor out, I pulled out the 20 yards of satin stripe fabric I bought in Millersburg. As it’s the hunter green, it goes perfectly with Miss PJ’s living room. To make the remote control holder, we grabbed the cable remote that matches hers, and measured. After we cut the fabric to the size that we needed, we found that there was enough left over to make a holder to contain all fo the game controlers they have. Here is what we came up with.
This is a simple holder, made with four pockets, one for each remote. We folded the fabric up from the bottom edge, after hemming the bottom edge. After sewing the outter edge of the pocket together, I flipped it right side out, and finished the hem around the top edge. Then, we measured where the individual pockets were to be, and I ran a stitch down the marks. To make sure the remotes would not get lost in the pockets, I ran another seam about an inch from the bottom, also serving to leave a decorative feature along the bottom. Lastly, we added black ribbon loops to hang it from.
With the left over edge fabric, we created a single pocket to hold all of the game controls. This was made the same as the other pocket, but without the divisions.
After making the remote pockets, I looked up to see her old cutains. Another thought hit me. Can you see the trend? Her old curtains looked old, dusty, and washed out next the rest of the room. Well, they had to go.
As Miss PJ liked the design of her old curtains, we decided to use them as a template for the new ones. Using the same fabric, we laid the old one on top to trace around, leaving 1/4″ for a seam allowance. And, Miss PJ decided that she did not like having 2 on the larger, center window, so we measured and made it one.
Here are her new curtains. She could not find tassels in the same color, so we attached lighter ones until darkers one could be found. Granted, she tried to dye them, which was an adventure in itself. She purchased dark green Rit dye. She placed the tassels in a plastic ziploc bowl, added hot water, salt and some of the dye, and sealed the bowl. When we decided to take them out of the solution, they were a cross between a navy and a black. At this point, PJ decided to try a little bleach to lighten then up a little. By the time she was done, they were slightly darker than the original sage color they came in. Now we know that you really can’t dye tassels reliably.
As I was working on PJ’s curtains, she pulled out some fabric she bought to make slip covers for a couple of small pillows. She purchased some quilted cotton print fabric, and bridal satin. She made these like a conventional pillow case, but put small, round velcro closures on the opening to hold the case shut. She added small tassels to the corners, which she also tried to dye, then bleached, and they came out to a shade of silvery grey.
Here are the finished slip covers. As you can see, she used the satin for the back side of the covers. She used a half a yard each, for these, and the was plenty of scrap material left over, as these are small pillows. I may be making some for my house.
While we were making the curtains and pillow covers, Miss PJ cooked up a new recipe. It was very interesting. It was Chicken and Apple Pot Pie. This recipe is from Rachael Ray’s website. While it is very good as is, we were thinking up ways to make it different. We have decided to make it again, very soon, and with the little additions we have thought of. I’ll let you know how it turns out.
I also come up with several home decor ideas to brighten up my home for the different holidays, and it all started with a half a yard of St. Patrick’s Day fabric I picked up, not knowing what to use it for. Here is what I have come up with.
Here, I have a half a yard each of St. Patrick’s Day and Valentine’s Day fabrics, and you can see a Fall placemat in the back ground. I decided that my tv stand was a little bare, and that I couldn’t keep the fall placemat in the coffee table year round. I have decided to use two different fabrics for each holiday, and I will be making a tv stand runner, and a placemat for the coffe table. I may expand this to other furniture pieces later.
Here is the finished Valentine’s Day tv runner. Wow! I didn’t realize that my tv stand was that dusty. Anyway! This is a half a yard, and all I did was hem it all the way around. It fits the top of the tv stand perfectly. I will be changing it with each holiday/season.
Here is the placemat for my coffee table. This was made with a half a yard of fabric. I placed the store bought placemat on the fabric and cut around it, leaving a 1/4″ seam allowance. I placed the wrong sides facing each other, and stitched around, leaving a opening on the one of the short ends to turn right side out. I clipped the corners, and flipped right side out, using the tips of my scissors to push out the corners. I place my needle setting on the “right” setting, placed the edge of the fabric at the right edge of the presser foot, and stitched all the way around, sealing the holes in the process. I, then, placed the needle setting to the “left”, leaving the fabric in the same position, and stitched around a second time, creating the double hem effect of the store bought placemat.
Here I have the finished tv stand runner and coffee table placemat. The one with the large shamrocks is the tv stand runner, and the one on top is the placemat. As I said, I will be doing this for all the holidays/seasons, and as easy as the placemats are, I may start making my own placemats for the kitchen table. So, I will be making a paper template for the placemats, that way I don’t have to haul another one out to use everytime I want to make some. I’ll post the measurements I use to make the template, once I get it drawn out.
Well, that’s all for the sewing fun around my house, for right now. But, I’m sure we will have plenty to post about, especially with the wedding dress plans we have been engrossed in lately.






























