As I'm sure most of you are a lot like me, you collect fabric. But if you're cheap like me you can't buy a yard of everything you love so you settle for half a yard or a fat quarter. And then they sit in your stash and you wonder what to DO with them. I mean really, it's too much for a patchy quilt but too little to make any sort of clothing item. NEVER FEAR! I have found the perfect solution! This week's Free Friday is brought to you by the lovelies at the Purl Bee. Everything about these baskets says "I'm slouchy but cute, oh-so-fashionable AND totally-functional. You should ADORE ME!" I've made three of my own thus far and have two more planned. They're stinking addictive.
The blue one was my first, done to hold all socks and keep them cozy. The shrooms are for my mother's kitchen. Apparently rolled up dishtowels will be stored there until she can think of something else to stash in it (like the GIANT honey crisp apples that are in it now). The bright one is well...just for fun. I needed to make myself a REALLY cute one so I could feel alright about giving the mushrooms away. I do get to keep some of the stuff I make, sheesh guys, give me a break.
1. The yardage for the linen is for a 60" wide fabric. This does NOT work for 45" wide. What I did to remedy this wasn't ideal but it works. I used 1/2 yd. pieces so after cutting the 12" wide strip for the sides I took the skinny left over bit and pieced it into a 13" square to cut the bottom out of. It adds more seams to sew through on the edges (which is a pain on the fingers) but you can't see it cause it's on the bottom and you're not wasting fabric this way.
A quick note, on the bright one I actually used a fat quarter and cut it in half giving me two 19" x 11" strips. Sewed it together on the short edge and just cut the other side pieces down to 11" works just fine and I got to use a fabric I love! (picked a plain solid I had lying around for the bottom)
2. When sewing the seams you have to do on the machine make sure the interfacing is on the top. it moves faster across the feed dogs and it'll warp your cotton on the top. Simply flipping it over fixes this easy.
3. On my last basket side piece I stitched the end that goes into the open hole slightly smaller than the open end. This made it lay flatter as I stitched up the side and I didn't have to worry about working it in.
4. I don't know if they forgot to mention it or what but clip your corners on the sides and all the way around the circle (but not the opening). What a nightmare stitching through bunched up interfacing would have been. Ick! It should look something like this:
And here's some shots of extra stuff I did to mine:
I'm not going to lie, this triple stitch was a Pain (with a capitol P mind) in the TOOKUS to do. But it turned out to be such a cute little detail it was worth it.
And this was just because I had some left over thread and nothing to do with it really...and about 20 free minutes as I finished up the show I was watching/listening to.
Well that's all for today folks. Enjoy!
And if you'd like to send me pictures of your completed baskets or links to them online I'd love to see them, along with any more tips, tricks, or suggestions on what to put in them.
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