October Designs

I started blogging as a public platform for my sewing, but I haven't been posting about sewing. My bad. I do sew, almost everyday, but then more important, exciting, fill-in-the-blank things happen and I blog about that instead. And since I don't even blog about all the things we are doing, sewing posts fall by the wayside.

To rectify this, for now, I thought I could put together an October applique montage.

Here is a three pumpkin design I did for an adorable little boy that belongs to one of Matt's coworkers.

I thought it turned out great! I loved being able to use three separate fabrics for the "orange" pumpkins. I mean we all know how much I "love" orange (bluh) so I am I always looking for a way to take that lovely color down a notch.  All kidding aside I do love to work with fall colors, they all play off each other so nicely....almost like someone designed it that way in nature or something.

Next I did a simple pumpkin design for a friend who wanted to be able to attach the design herself to a jumper. The thought being that she could then switch it out for another seasonally appropriate design later. One jumper, multiple seasons. Genius! That is why I did this one on felt and then cut it out. The curly cue vine may get sacrificed, as I'm not sure how to cut that out anymore.

And finally I made my own child a pumpkin that she could really appreciate. Cinderella's pumpkin carriage!

I altered this design a bit from it's purchased form. It had a window in the middle, which I deleted because I wanted her initial on the carriage and it didn't work on top of the window.

** Side note, most of Wesley's things only get a W not her monogram. I am not against monogramming. Quite the opposite. I just gave my child the worst possible combo for a monogram W's are wide and her middle name starts with an E which is skinny. So when you try to place it you've got a wide, swoopy W in the middle and another one on the left, then this skinny little E on the right. It looks completely unbalanced and so I always end up deleting the other letters. I am on the lookout for the perfect monogramming font that doesn't have the swoop OR makes a "fatter" E.

Back to the design, the wheels could have had fabric in them but I left them blank. My reasoning being it already had four different fabrics working and sometimes perfectly cute appliques are ruined by one wrong fabric choice. It is harder than you think to find 4 or 5 adorable fabric prints that coordinate perfectly! I have learned to err on the side of caution and incorporate solids and simple prints like dots or gingham. But then I see designs online with mixed prints that turn out so great?!?! Maybe I'll get better with time. My favorite is when people (Beka!) just give me fabric and tell me exactly what they want, then I don't stress about my fabric choices.

To wrap up, here are some pictures of my favorite model in her new fall shirts, ready for Crimson Tide domination and going to the ball!

Happy Fall Y'all!