Lots of good stuff springing up!

So happy to be blogging on a sunny Sunday! It is up in the high 50's here, and our little family spent the morning out in the garden. We still have lots of cleaning up to do, but I'm really looking forward to the growing season. Heck, I'm just looking forward to spring in general, as you can tell by my latest pattern cover.

Case Study: Tailored Totes is your pretty standard, classy tote bag, but with some fun (and practical) twists. This bag come in one (perfect) size, but has pocket and strap options galore. I've included pencil pockets, crayon pockets, little phone pockets...you name it! But the best feature, in my opinion, is that this bag stands on its own...literally! Like the other two Case Studies (Basic Boxes and Boxy Bags), the design is built around EVA foam inserts (also known as foamies), which are lightweight and give amazing structure.

I'm in LOVE with the prototype above! I made it out of three of my most favorite Sis Boom Fabrics, and customized the pockets to exactly my needs. I took it on a trip to Home Depot yesterday, and it sat perfectly upright in the front of the cart. When we stalled on the weed-whacker aisle (yawn), I could reach in, grab my phone, and check my email without rifling through my purse and potentially stressing out loss prevention associates (yah, I've worked big box retail). PLUS - it sits totally upright wherever I drop it...the floorboard of the car, movie theaters, public restrooms...you get what I'm sayin' ;). I just love having a bag that is super gorgeous (thanks to the fabric), functional, and durable!

SO!...right about the time I was optimizing this pattern, Jennifer sent me some precious yardage from her newest line, So St. Croix. Well, I just NEEDED to make the ultimate bag out of it! I used Genevieve Toile, Nancy Ironwork, and CARLA dot (blushing and grinning and jumping up and down) as the lining.

You can actually win this great bag! My awesome friends Cathy and Marlo put together a fun contest on the Scientific Seamstress Facebook fan page. Here are the details:

Suggest this page to friends and WIN! Carla's latest "Case Study: Tailored Totes" will be available for sale next week. In the meantime, we are going to run a fun contest so you can win a copy of the eBook before you can buy it! And as the SUPER GRAND PRIZE, one fan will win the gorgeous bag on the front cover! Here is how it works...

Invite as many friends as you like by clicking on "Suggest to Friends" on the left hand side of the screen. Then, come back here and let us know how many you invited (we don't need names, just a number :) ). Whether they join or not, each invite = 1 entry to win the eBook and the "cover model" tote bag!

Now here is the fun part....all of the new fans are going to be entered in a drawing, and three will win a copy of the Tailored Totes eBook. We'll ask them who referred them to the page, and those people will win the eBook as well! So the more friends you convince to join in the fun, the better your chances of winning the eBook!

The drawing will be held next Monday, 3-9-10, at noon EST...let's go get the word out about these fun, easy to sew patterns!!!

On the subject of Sis Boom, here is a sneak peek from our next collaboration! Our sweet tester Stacey made this gorgeous top from Blue Casey Scroll (swoon!!!!). We are just waiting on a few more photos from an incredible photographer, and then it will be available for sale, so stay tuned!!!

In the meantime - lookie...SNOWDROPS!




...and CROCUS(ES)! I'm so thrilled that the mounds of snow are melting away, and these beautiful little flowers are popping up to say "hi!" - spring has sprung!

Clean Sweep...

With all the projects I've had in the works, my sewing room has been getting progressively more and more cluttered and well...downright dirty. It was really starting to get to me (and other members of the household), so I decided to do a big spring cleaning in there yesterday. The room is small, which is bad and good...bad in the sense that it closes in on me when I have too much stuff out, but good in the sense that if forces me to deal with the mess as it happens. Problem is, I tend to just put up the big stuff and let the little stuff (like buttons, beads, pins, and dust) stay wherever it lands. I've been putting off the vacuuming because I really didn't want to suck up any of the good stuff with the crevice tool. Yesterday I decided something had to give, so I went a little crazy ripped out all of the carpet.

Underneath the icky carpet (which was passable when we moved here, but quickly became beaten down and sullied with gatorade and tacky glue) was what every homeowner hopes to find in an older house...nice hardwood floors! They could stand refinishing, but that doesn't make a shred of sense in this room. In fact, I think the floor is absolutely perfect for a work room! I'm looking forward to adding some scratches and paint blobs of my own in the coming years :) .

The room feels so much warmer, and I love that my chair's wheels are actually functional! I know I'll deal with the little bits and bobs better now that I can just sweep them into to a pile and sort, too.

I love my bare floor...now I'm ready for a bare yard! Come on spring!!!

Dolly Hugs for Haiti

Yesterday a.m. I was getting my daily dose of Craft Gossip, and I came across a post about something very bright and beautiful. The Dolly Donations Blog offers free patterns and instructions for making sweet dollies to give to charities. Spearheaded by Sarah Hanson, a talented and energetic artist, the drive brings crafters from around the globe together to provide comfort to children in need. Currently, they are working to make 181 dolls for the Abundant Ground Foundation, which will provide the dolls to Haitian orphans.

I used Sarah's pattern to make six little sweeties (3 boys and 3 girls) to donate. They were so fun and simple to put together. It was a dreary day in Maryland, but the bright fabrics and cheerful smiles brought sunshine to my heart!

Louie helped me pick out the fabrics and hair colors for the boys, and also helped with the stuffing process. I love his choices! We used a soft denim for the legs, so they are all wearing jeans. Doing the project together really gave us the opportunity to talk about helping others, and to count our blessings.

The girlies are all decked out in Sis Boom dresses and stripey stockings! I had so much fun with their hairstyles. I used pompoms for the pink and yellow haired girls' "puffs" and a fun mix of yarn for the purple haired girl's ponytail.

These dollies are made from a very soft and cuddly flannel. I used my embroidery machine to stitch out the faces prior to cutting the fabric. I digitized the faces myself - the girl has long eyelashes and a dainty mouth, and the boy has an impish grin. If you have an embroidery machine, and would like the files, I'm happy to share (bear in mind they aren't perfect, I just don't think like a digitizer when it comes to jump stitches, etc.). Just drop me a line (carla(at)scientificseamstress.com) and tell me what format you need :) .

The donation deadline is March 31st, so you still have lots of time to sew up some sweet dollies for this cause. For inspiration, check out the Dolly Donations Flickr Pool. This is such a wonderful way to reach across the world and give a warm hug to a child. And just by looking at your finished creation, you will feel hugged back a million times over!

Walls of a feather....

I'm still working on decorating the upstairs bath, and I'm trying SO hard not to be too matchy-matchy. A bathroom is such a tiny room (relative to the rest of the house), and it is really easy to go overboard with a theme (I know because I've done it with pansies, leaves, boats, and fish). In this bathroom, the wall adjacent to the shower was blank except for two towel racks. I wanted to stick with the regal peacock theme, but also keep it pretty simple. I looked online for prints and decals, but couldn't find the dimensions/look I was after. So I just broke out the acrylics and painted a simple feather on the wall.

The nice thing about flexible, organic things like feathers is that they don't have to have a set shape or color, so your drawing skills don't have to be perfect. I used a real peacock feather as a "live" model, and it really helped me with the proportions etc.

I added gorgeous Sis Boom Stephanie Paisley Appliques to some peacock blue hand towels and hung them on the towel racks below the feather.

If you look closely, you can see I added a family monogram over the applique. I tend to like dainty fonts that get lost in terry cloth, so putting them on fabric is the only way to go. It gives a bit of a quilted appearance to the applique, too.

Before I go back into the bathroom (still one more wall to do, you know) I want to give you a heads up about some GREAT giveaways going on across the blogosphere...

Desi over at WeeShare did the sweetest review of the Sis Boom Sophie Tunic, and is giving away three patterns from my Etsy Shop. Isn't her little daughter the cutest??? The drawing will be held on 2/22, and she gives you lots of ways to enter. She has scads of great giveaways going on all the time, so check her out!

On the Sis Boom Daydreams blog, Jennifer is celebrating the release of her much anticipated So St. Croix line with a Fat Quarter giveaway! You have until Sunday the 21st to enter. Not one, but three lucky winners will get fat quarters representing the entire line (18 slices of heaven in all). This is gorgeous, gorgeous stuff folks!!!

My good friends Kim and Kris (the talented chicas behind YouCanMakeThis.com and SWAK embroidery) are "dishing out" a series of free, fun, and very educational videos over at their new blog, The DIY Dish. Get on over there to find out how you can enter to win a Janome sewing or embroidery machine - wow!!!