New to Shades of Berry

Introducing Passport Covers!

I was playing around with my pattern for business card holders (check out a post about those here) and decided it might be fun to make a cover for passports. I don't have a cover for my passport so I thought I'd take a stab at it and make myself one first - if it was a disaster, no harm done. Turns out it was not a disaster! Check out the one I made for myself below and further below that, the ones I made for my Etsy store.

I am getting some serious mileage out of this chevron fabric.

I love this rainbow button.

And for the store:

This one has a vintage "Lansing" button I found at an antique store.

And because I can't stop myself from saying it... I put a bird on it!

Inexpensive Fabric Organization

A couple months ago I found this idea for fabric storage on Pinterest. I followed it to the blog it came from which lead me to a company that sells fabric storage plastic cards - very cool and innovative. Only problem - they are way expensive (around 2 dollars each). Especially if you have a ton of fabric to organize. So I put this idea on the back burner thinking it will probably never happen and my fabric will continue to sit on shelves in my sewing room about to topple over.

I wish I was writing this post saying that I finally did something about it and my problems are solved. But I didn't. I do know someone who figured out a solution though.

My sister organized all her fabric this week using comic book cards. She found the idea on this blog and this method costs only 10 CENTS EACH! She found the comic books cards in packs of 100 for $10 at a local comic book shop in Lansing, MI. She bought the "classic" comic book style rather than the current - classic cards are 10.5 inches tall (current are smaller). It took her a whole day to do this much, but I think she would agree it was worth it. Maybe I will get to mine this summer... She recommends that the work is completely worth it!

This method even works for scraps.

Approximately 230 comic book cards later...

1 Yard Garment Bags

When I was at my sisters house a few weekends ago she was making these adorable garment bags for her daughters and her daughters dance friends for their recital in April. I want one me sized! I don't think I could make a dress bag with 1 yard but I do think this size would be great for skirts, suit jackets with folded pants, or shirts.

 

The pattern comes from this One Yard Wonder book - which I had checked out of the library back in South Carolina and loved, and my sister just stumbled across it on Amazon. Very cool projects. There is a second book out now too, and I think this particular project came from the second book. All you need is a yard of fabric, zipper, and thread of course. The A detail she put on the front takes a few more supplies - a coordinating fabric, iron on for applique, and she used an A button - but you could easily make an A out of felt and sew it on as well.

Putting in the zipper was where my knowledge was useful. It makes me happy when I am able to pitch in and help my sister do something - it is so often the other way around! You can see some of the steps below, basically round the corners and add a zipper - leave a hole in the top for the hanger. The second bag she made was this wild blue zebra print.

One more time with the final product: