Simple iPad Cover Tutorial

This is a simple yet elegant cover for iPad. If you know the basics of stitiching, then you are ready to go. I made a cover before 2 months for my iPad. Hubby dear took it to one of his clients' office and his client was impressed. He wanted an iPad cover and hubby passed on this request. The first one I made was a quilt block I learned from a friend and I didn't have patience to repeat it. So I went for this simple design and prayed to God that hubby likes it. And yes, he loved it. 

Recently I added a walking foot to my machine accessories and was so happy to use it in this project. With the usual presser foot, it is very hard to quilt all the three layers but with a walking foot, it was so easy. I love this. For thew batting I used the regular sponge sheet. If you want you can go fro cotton batting but it is optional.

Materials Required:

For The Main Body:

1 Main Fabric  - 25" * 10"

1 Lining Fabric - 25" * 10"

1 Batting - 25" * 10"

For The Flap:

2 Main Fabric - 10" * 6"

1 Batting - 10" * 6"

A small piece of velcro

A fancy lace which suits the main fabric

Attach one part of the velcro in the main fabric( forgot to click a snap) Place the main fabric and lining right to right and place the batting below the lining.

Stitch 3 sides leaving one side open. The side with velcro must be stitched. The other side must be open.

Now turn the fabric inside out and turn out the corners neatly.

On the flap pieces make a U cut to shape the flap.

Now on one main fabric, place the velcro's other part and stitch leaving 1 1/2" from the edge.

Place the fabrics right to right, place the batting below and stotch leaving the straight edge open. Give small cut marks along the stitch line. Be carefuland avod slicing the stitch.

Now turn inside out.

Fold both the open edges of the flap and main body. Insert the flap inside the main body and pin it.

Though it may not look very neat it is OK.

Stitch along the line.

Now on the lining, draw lines. This is the quilting lines you are going to make to secure all the three layers and make the cover neat. I went for uneven spaces between lines. You can do however you want - vertical lines, criss cross or evenly spaced horizontal lines.

To make the flap different, I made some vertical lines.

Now it is time to quilt. This is my new walking foot. Stitch on the lines .

Keep on folding the quilted side to make it easy for stitching.

All done. I successfully completed all the lines..

Now fold the main body as shown and stitch the sides.

Stitch a lace along the flap's curved edge.

And the iPad cover is ready..

Enjoy!!!

My daughter was so happy to hold it...

Happy New Year 2014

Happy New Year to all my readers. I know this is a very belated wish but it is better to be late than never. I have been stitching a lot but am never getting enough time to click and post them. I made a frock for my daughter for this New Year and she just loved it.

The frock was inspired from a gown I saw on Pinterest. The body was made with printed cotton and the skirt part with satin. At first I wanted to do a step wise post but as I had only half a day to finish this frock, I couldn't concentrate on clicking the steps. Next time I will post another frock with instructions. Till then, Bye!!!

Tote"lly Desi- A Secret Tote Swap at Desi Quilters

It has been long since I posted here. But still I am actively stitching a lot and teaching a lot. In the Desi Quilters group, there was a Tote Swap and I took part in it. Every member created a mood board/ picture collage with what they like and it becomes the inspiration for her secret partner to make a tote for her. We were not aware of our secret partner until we finished the project. Only at the time of shipping the tote, we know about the partner who made a tote for us. I was assigned with Damayanthi and had to make a tote for her. And I was not aware of the member who made a tote for me.

Here is Damayanthi's mood board:

To buy materials, I took my Ipad to the shop. Then with the help of this mood board I bought some fabrics. Made a simple tote according to this mood board.

Here is my creation for Damayanthi according to her mood board.

And here is my mood board:

Caroline was my secret partner and she made a wonderful tote for me

She also sent me a lot of hand made goodies along with the tote.

Thanks a lot Caroline. I am loving it all.

We had a nice time making the tote and I hope my partner enjoys the tote I made...

Patch Work Ball 2

This patch work ball is the second one of the two patch work balls in the QAL(quilt along) organised in the group. Amalie who taught us this Pentagon patch work ball taught this triangle patch work ball and she  asked us to hand stitch the pieces rather than machine stitching them. It uses paper piecing .I used this technique in the previous pentagon ball. You need a little patience to make this and it will be done in a day. I used two printed contrast fabrics. You are free to use any number of fabrics. 

You need 10 pieces of triangles in each fabric and it makes a total of 20 triangles. First cut out 20 triangles measuring 2 1/2" on the three sides. Make use of your high school geometry lessons to draw out the triangles. After cutting out 20 pieces in the chart paper, cut out triangles from the fabrics. The fabric pieces must be larger than the paper pieces by 1/4" on all sides. If you are not comfortable with 1/4" then make it slightly larger. 

Cut out the chart paper and fabric triangles.

Place a paper triangle inside the fabric triangle. Fold it as shown.

Now fold both the sides towards the centre and press it with your fingers.

Secure the fabric with thread. Knot it when all the three corners are done.

Now you get a neatly finished triangle.

Finish the other 19 triangles the same way. Arrange the triangles as shown. This is the way you are going to stitch up the sides.

Join adjacent sides using whip stitch. While joining be careful not to stitch the paper pieces. The needle should run only through the fabrics.

The stitched triangles look like this. Keep the stitches tight so that very little of the thread shows.

Stitch as arranged. Now you need to stitch the sides of triangles next to each other. 

When you stitch together the adjacent sides, the ball will be formed.

This is after stitching up the lower triangles.

Now join all the remaining sides except two sides. That is for flipping and filling.

Remove the paper pieces.

It looks lot better with out the paper pieces.

Turn it inside out.

Stuff the ball with the cotton or synthetic stuffing.

Thread a needle and insert it at the joint. Take a stitch to one side.

Take a stitch on the other side. Keep on repeating the stitches in the zig zag fashion.

Align the corners correctly for a perfect finish.

Finish it with a tiny knot. The patch work ball is ready..

You can view the works of all the other members of the group at the Desi Quilters Blog

Strip Quilted Mat

There are challenges for every month in Desi Quilters. The rules will be given at the start of the month and we need to make a quilt according to the given rules. For the month of October the challenge was to make a strip quilt. Any quilt involving strips qualify for the submission. I saw the method of paper piecing a strip quilt blog at FITF blog. I used that method for the 8 blocks which form the centre of the mat. Both sides of the centre piece are strips of different colours matching the centre piece. The quilt is completed with batting, backing and binding. This is the first time I am using batting and I was nervous. Though the finished mat looks good, it needs some fine tuning. May be I will get the finishing works perfect in my next quilt.

The quilt measures 34" * 36" and I will be using it for meditation after yoga. The fabrics used are printed cotton. The backing used is also printed cotton and the batting is also cotton. I finished the quilt with a 3" wide binding.

Cut out strips of fabric. I used four printed and one solid white. For the blue strips, I used 1 1/2" strips and the yellow and orange strips measured 2". The white strip measured 1 1/2". Cut out 8 paper squares measuring 8" * 8 ".

In the centre of the paper, stick the white strip diagonally using gum stick.

Stitch the darker blue strip placing it right to right on the white strip.

Open the seam and iron it out.

Now place the lighter blue strip right side facing the darker strip and stitch.

Open the seam and iron.

Continue until you reach the corner of the paper.

Stitch the orange and yellow strips to the other side of the white strip.

Now turn the block and trim the fabric to the size of the paper square.

Your block looks like this.

Now remove the paper from the block. It will be easy to remove as the paper is perforated with the stitch.

Press the block and it is ready to be stitched.

To get an idea of the finished quilt, arrange the pieces on the floor. Now stitch all the pieces together.

Cut out batting and backing fabric to the size of the finished piece.

Pin all the sides and centre before stitching.

Stitch the sides and along the lines of the blocks.

Finish the quilt with the binding.

The backing fabric seen after folding over the quilt.