Tutorial: Adding Snaps/Poppers using Prym Pliers

I often use snaps, especially on shirt dresses like  this one, this one, this one and this one.  I used to add snaps using the bendy plastic tool the manufacturers include in the packet or with a hammer and a metal thing but it was hopelessly hit and miss and they are not the easiest thing to pick off once they've been hammered in.  So, I invested in some Prym Vario pliers from a local shop and although it was a few pennies- around £12, it has been worth it.  This is my technique and you can also find this tutorial on instagram under the hashtag #sewingtutorialfittingsnaps

1.   I used 10mm snaps for the Liberty and Chambray Alder dresses- the fabric is light and anything bigger tends to be too heavy and drag the fabric down.  I buy my snaps from the Trimming Shop on ebay.  They have a great selection and are very helpful if there's a query or problem.  I always order more than I need as some are always sacrificed in the process and the odd one can be dented.  There is a male 'sticky out' half and a female 'hole' half and each has a corresponding prong section. I would advise you to label the sizes if you keep a selection of snaps.  You can see some plastic white covers on my pliers- they came with a set of snaps some time ago and don't come with the pliers.  Instead you get piecing tools for attaching metal eyelets.  I bought some jersey snaps like these a while ago and they included the white plastic attachment tools that will hold the snap parts in place without damaging them.  You need these to successfully attach the snaps.  Mine are a little large for 10mm snaps but they work fine.   

2.  Sort the snaps.  I am going to work with the two parts of the top female snap first. The top pearl prong section corresponds to the female 'hole' ring. At the bottom of this pic you can see the pieces arranged from left to right showing the right side and wrong side for these snap parts.

3. I mark where the poppers will go on each half of the button placket using a pencil dot.  On the right side of the placket that will be on top when the snaps are fastened together (usually the right placket as you are wearing the garment on female clothing), push the pearl snap prong in with your fingers keeping the pencil dot centred under the snap.  The prongs will protrude on the wrong side.

4.  Line up the wrong side of the female 'hole' part of the snap which will go on the underneath of the button placket.  You can see that on the wrong side of the snap the outer circle edge is not as rounded as on the right side.   Rest it against the prongs and hold it together with your finger and thumb: the pearl snap is underneath on this pic as I have flipped the placket over so the wrong side is on top.

 5.  Carefully place the pliers around the snap halves (I prefer to have the pearl snap on the bottom), squeeze gently to check that they are engaged and then squeeze together slowly and firmly.  Repeat for all the pearl snaps needed on the placket.

6.  If it goes wrong at this point- e.g. a prong escapes and doesn't sink into the female ring part of the snap, carefully prise the snap halves apart with a small screw driver and start again.  You might be able to reuse one or both halves of the snap but more likely, you'll need fresh snap pieces!

 7.  Now for the male 'sticky out' snap and its corresponding prong section!

8.  Insert the prong ring on the underside of the remaining placket- usually the left as you are wearing the garment for female clothing; the prongs should protrude on the right side and the placement mark pencil dot should be in the centre.

9.  Place the male sticky out section on top of the prongs and hold with your finger and thumb.  I have changed one of the plastic plates on the pilers for the one with a hole in it to receive the male section.  Place the pliers carefully around the snaps (removing your finger and thumb first!), gently squeeze to check that the sections are engaged and then squeeze as before, slowly and firmly.

Here is the male section attached.

10.  Once all the snaps are attached I squeeze each one again just to make sure they are secure.  I usually open and close them fairly gently- they seem to get more secure and established with wear.  Then could always be replaces too if needs be.  When I wash a garment with snaps, I tend to do the snaps up and turn the garment inside out- it stops the pearl or painted part of the snap getting scratched. I hope that has been helpful!  I love the clean finish snaps give.  They are handy on children's items too- I used one on this bib for a friend's baby.  

Obviously, you need to take extra care that the snaps are very securely attached.  The pattern for the bib is from Amy Morinka's  'Zakka Handmades' book (reviewed here), a very useful book for quick gift ideas!

Fabric Covered Buttons in Five Easy Steps

I have been doing a little pattern testing for someone (results to be shown very soon) and part of the pattern involves buttons and instead of my usual buttonhole cop out of using snaps (see here and here) I  could see how the  print would be perfect for fabric covered buttons.  I have always feared these.  My experiences with covering metal buttons have not been good- having to paint the metal to stop shiny metal showing through.   This version using Sewline plastic self cover buttons, is a breeze.  The only downside is the button shank is a little high- OK for a dress, not so good if it was a shirt or blouse.

5 Steps to Fabric Covered Buttons

1. A circle template is provided on the back of the packet.
2. Draw round and cut out, centring or fussy cutting pattern/motif if desired.
3. Using polyester thread for strength, stitch line of running stitches 1/8" from the edge, pull and drawn in around button securing the thread in the fabric folds with stitches and knot.
4. Place the plastic washer dimpled side down on to button covering all raw edges.
5. Place button shank on top of polyester thread spool and press- this secures the washer.  

The fabric I used was Flumes from Sarah Watson's Luxe in Bloom range for Art Gallery fabrics, you might find some at M is for Make.  Courtney at Seamstar sells larger plastic self cover buttons.  I used 15mm-5/8" from ebay.

A post about buttons but also about sewing machines.  I have had a few sewing machines in my life and my most recent, Janome Horizon 7700 has been the best but I have also learnt that no single machine will do everything.  The Horizon is a beast over different thicknesses, a wonder with its accufeed system and a pleasure to quilt with.  It does have its downfalls.  The zipper foot is way too chunky and the accufeed foot will put bag and pillow zips in much more efficiently than the standard zipper foot every would. The buttonhole feature is truly disappointing.  Its overly automated so that a single step of a 4 step buttonhole can't be isolated, it automatically sews an entire buttonhole and is not consistent in this.  It also prefers to work out the size of buttonhole through a sensor system- these always come out too big for clothing and smaller buttons.  

The sensor system is very sensitive and if slightly jogged during a series of buttonholes- e.g on a shirt- random small and mishaped versions appear (see above)- very frustrating when sewing on fine fabric like lawn which doesn't take to kindly to constant unpicking.   I have a potential solution, involving a Featherweight attachment, just awaiting delivery...

Liberty Home Mini Quilt

Nova and Jo have been hosting the Liberty Scrap Challenge all through 2012 showcasing beautiful projects and tutorials featuring Liberty lawn.  The master list is here, a great resource with the gift making season upon us.  October is my turn  and I just snook in on the last day of the month!

I wanted to do a  foundation paper pieced design as Liberty lawn is an amazing fabric to piece with.  It has strength, vibrancy, and print variety whilst being incredibly lightweight and reducing bulk on seams.  Any of you who have paper pieced with linen  and dealt with the humps and bumps it creates surely know what I mean!  I have kept the design simple, suitable for a first time paper piecer and you can foundation or freezer paper piece.  You can find beginner resources here and at Sew-Ichigo and there are a wealth of videos on Youtube.  Techniques can vary but the principles remain the same.  As all these pieces are square/rectangles it makes for an ideal project to learn basic paper piecing an conquer any fears.  If a mini is not your thing, the house block could be used to make multiple terrace rows or just singularly for a little zip pouch. 

 Liberty Home Mini Quilt

You will need:

Home pattern sheet: To print correct size, open link, look for print icon top left corner and check 'actual size' is ticked.

Liberty lawn scraps including pieces suitable for fussy cutting windows and doors, roofs, path

Linen/light neutral scraps for house walls

Liberty lawn blue print: 2 1/2" x 11 3/4" for sky

Liberty lawn print for border: 2 strips 2"x 9 1/2", and 2 strips 2" x 14 1/2"

Batting 14" x16'": a cotton rich poly blend makes hand quilting a lot easier e.g. Quilter's Blend

Backing fabric 1 Fat Quarter

Assorted thread for hand and machine quilting

Finished size 11 1/2"x 14"approx.

Use 1/4" seams throughout.

Foundation Piecing

1. Print pattern and cut out pattern sections A and B allowing 1/4'' around both pattern pieces for seam allowance.

2. From your Liberty Fabrics fussy cut 3 windows 2" x 2" and 1 door 2'' x 2 3/4''.  The finished windows will be 1" x 1" and the door 1'' x 1 3/4''.   I have allowed a generous seam allowance for pre-cutting the fabric which is often a good idea for paper piecing. 

3.  Foundation piece sections A and B, trim seams as you sew to 1/4''.   Press each seam as you sew,

4. Join section A to B.  Remove paper, press seam downwards.

5.  Repeat steps 1-4 to make 2 more houses.

Freezer paper piecing

1. Print pattern.  Lay waxy side of freezer paper on top and trace with fine permanent marlier, e.g. Pigma Micron 01.

2.  Cut  out section A and divide int o separate pieces.   Freezer paper will be ironed to the reverse side of fabrics.  You will need to add a 1/4'' around edge of freezer paper when your cut the fabric out.  

3.  Join pieces in numerical order.  Once section A is complete, repeat same process with section B.

4. Join a to B.  Remove paper which can be reused for further houses.   Press seam down. 

5. Repeat steps 1-4 to make 2 more houses.

Assembling Mini Quilt

1. Join houses together in a row of 3.  

2. To create a path/pavement: Randomly piece small Liberty scraps that are at least 2'' wide.  You can improvise here.  Trim to make a strip 1 1/2" x 11 3/4".  Stitch to the base of the houses.

3. Add a 2 1/2" x 11 3/4" blue Liberty strip for the sky.  Stitch to above roof of houses. 

4. For border, add 2 strips  2"x 9 1/2" to sides of mini quilt.  Add 2 strips 2" x 14 1/2"

5. Press and baste or baste spray to batting.  Hand quilting can be added at this point. 

6. Trim excess batting. Place on lining, right sides together, and use as template to cut lining.   Keep mini quilt and lining right sides together and stitch around edges using 1/4" seam and leaving a 4" opening to turn through. Turn through, press and slip stitch opening closed.  You can add stitch-in-the-ditch quilting to hold the layers together e.g between the houses.  Bury the thread ends.

Your mini 'Home' quilt is complete!

Giveaway in exchange for a tutorial!

If you have a Liberty Scrap Challenge idea, Jo has a bag of Liberty scraps all ready for you.  Leave a comment describing your idea at then end of this post and I will pick one next Wednesday and Jo will send you the scraps-  open internationally so don't hold back wherever you are in the world and 

worry you wont be expected to post a tutorial until next year!    You are of course welcome just to comment normally without an idea so I don't feel too lonely in this post!

Guesting at Quilt Story-Hexagon Handle Holder Tutorial

Today you will find me at Quilt Story,with a Holiday Tutorial starting the gift making season with an each project.  Heather and Megan have a great list of contributors- check them out here.

My tutorial is for a hexagon handle holder: a quick and easy make and perfect for scraps- especially those with a kitchen theme.  Let me know what you think over at  Quilt Story.

318 Bee Table Runner

I have had a little mini stack of bee blocks waiting patiently to become a table runner,  I was in 318 Patchwork Bee a little while back and my theme was "Afternoon Tea".  I always had these blocks in mind for this purpose and now it is sitting on my table it makes me smile and think about all the people who made a block or two- Ayumi, Tamiko, Charise and Leila.  Simple construction, sashed with Kokka teapot print linen and mini fussy cut squares, I quilted it without backing...

Then added the backing to make a combined backing/binding blanket style edge.  It is an easy finish so her is a quick tutorial if it is new to you!   After the quilting, attache to a backing at least 1 inch bigger all round.  I use 505 spray and a few safety pins.  For a finished 1/4 inch bound edge, trim backing over hang to just over 1/2 inch from the edge of the runner all round.  At the corners, pencil a 1/4 border from edge of runner and then draw a  45 degree diagonal across the corner- just like the pic!  Trim this off with scissors.  

Fold the freshly cut edge in so it fits behind the corner of the runner.  Press the long unfinished backing edges  firstly towards the runner, and then turn the folded edge so it forms the binding around the runner.

Pin the binding on the front at each corner.  Hand stitch the mitred corners using ladder stitch- (Search on youtube if you are not sure what this is! It is a very useful stitch).  You can then stitch the rest of the binding down, by hand or machine- up to you!  I chose a small zig zag to add a bit of zing!

We have a smallish table so this is a narrow runner- it now lives along the back edge by the wall with my radio and cup of tea permanently on it!

And it constantly lifts my heart, thankyou to the block makers...loving your work! Left to right, tea pot- Tamiko, Cherry cup-Ayumi; Teapot/cup- Leila; Milk/Sugar- Tamiko; Tea/cup- Charise; Kettle-Ayumi.

If you like a bit of paper piecing, Leila's new house pattern can be found here, and Charise's Spool Starburst is here.

Lasso and white out your pics

If you have ever wanted to know how to make your photos look like this:

-all cut out and on a white background, and you have Photoshop Elements   (a budget version of Photoshop) this is a technical tutorial from an utter amateur.   All these photos link to Flickr where you can see them a little bigger.  I have PSE 8, an older version but I am hoping the principle is the same with PSE 9 and 10.

Here goes.... 

1.  Save the photo you want to edit to your desktop

2. Open Photoshop Elements, you do not need a new file just the programme open.

3.  Drag your photo from the desktop and into the working space or grey area in Photoshop elements

4.  The photo is quite small at this point and you need to zoom in.  The short cut on a mac to do this is to press command cmd key and the + at the same time, the more you press+ the bigger your picture will get- much easier to work in detail on it.  To reverse, press command and -.  You can also chose the zoom options under the view menu selection at the top.

5.  Choose the polygonal lasso tool from the tool bar at the side.  you can see it highlighted as the 6th tool down on the top in my toolbar selection.

Now place your mouse where you want to start cutting out or outlining your shape.  I have a spool block here that I want to cut out from the ironing board it is on and place on a white background.  Click where you want to start, each drag and click continues the line.  There is no 'undo' option with this tool so go slow!  If you want your line to be perfectly straight, hold the shift key down whilst you click and drag.  

6.  The lasso needs to make a completed loop around the object.  When you get close to this a tiny circle appears to show the loop is complete, click at this point and the line becomes active and will flash!

7.  Go to Select from the menu bar at the top, and choose 'Inverse'

(Edited to add)OR- there is a  very clever trick passed on from Alison at Little Island Quilting.  Check the colour palette on the bottom, of your tool bar- you need the background colour- the right square on the colour picker to be on white- now instead of 'Inverse' press 'Delete'- white background!  If you like method this you can skip stage 8- go straight to 9 and 'Save'.

8.  From your tool bar on the left, the bottom icon in my tool bar choses colour- click on it and a palette of colours comes up.  I chose white.  There are 2 squares on this tool, the active colour is the square that is on top, make sure this is right, the little double arrow next to it will switch the squares around.

8.  Now, go to Layer from the menu bar at the top, choose 'New fill layer'.

In the box I call this layer by the colour I have chosen, "white", check the opacity box at the bottom is set at 100%. and press OK

9.  Your photo should now be cut out and on a white background

Now all you need to do is save.  You can go to File and save as a photoshop file, or you can chose 'save for the web'  and save as a jpeg/Gif- whatever is your preference.

I really hope that works for someone out there- Lynne, Angela, Lu, Katy or anyone else.  That is how I do it- there may be much slicker ways, but this works for me!

Teapot Fancy Cozy Tutorial

*25TH OCT 2020 EDITED TO ADD: My Teapot Fancy foundation paper piecing pattern will soon be available in my Payhip shop.  Once it's ready, I'll add the link here!  Meanwhile, the cozy template is available for free at Payhip and you can make it with a block of your choice or a favourite cotton fabric.

 This is a very exciting week, I have a pattern published in Fat Quarterly Magazine.  This issue is all about piecing and there is a huge range of piecing patterns from simple to advanced.  My pattern is for a teapot block and I have written two ways to piece it- freezer paper template style and foundation.  It is a great pattern if you are new to piecing as I take you through both methods step by step.  I have designed a simple tea cozy for the finished blocks but you could make it with a different block or just out of patchwork fabrics.  This cozy should be big enough for a 4 cup teapot. 

Finished size 9" tall, 12" wide.  

You will need:

2 blocks/fabric pieces  14" x 10" wide for back and front.  If you use the FQ teapot blocks you will need to add sashing to make your block up to this size

Fabric for lining- 2 pieces each measuring 14" x 10" wide

Batting/Wadding 4 pieces  each measuring 14" x 10" wide

Fabric scrap for hanging loop

Binding strip 1.25" x 26" wide cut across width of fabric

Basting Spray- I use 505

Usual Sewing Supplies

Pattern template (free) here

1. Making the  Cozy Front and Back

 Make your quilt sandwich with 1 piece of batting and your quilt block.  Spray the batting and lay your quilt block on top, repeat for the other block.  Quilt blocks as desired. Find centre point along the top and bottom edge of each block and mark with pins.  Place pattern on the centre pins and using a pencil or erasable marker, draw round pattern piece, flip over the centre and draw round again. You should have a semi-circle type shape.

I added a little had hand sewn detail around the spout for steam after I had drawn round the template to make sure it would fit.  Cut out the semi circle and zig zag round the edge of front and back.

2. Making the Cozy Lining

Repeat the process in step one for the lining.  I kept my quilting simple and wide so there would be lots of space in the batting to trap heat and keep the tea warm!  Use the template, cut out and zig-zag as in step 1.  You should now have a front and back outer and front and back lining pieces, 4 pieces in all.

3. Making the Hanging Loop

From a scrap cut a bias strip 1.25"x4".  Fold in half lengthways so the long edges meet, press.  Open out, bring the long raw edges into the centre and press along the folds so your strip looks like the picture below.

Bring the folded edges together, press again and stitch along the edge.

On one of the outer cozy pieces, find the top centre point, loop the bias strip and place either side of the centre point with the loop facing inwards.  You can adjust the size of the loop to whatever works for you!  Stitch the loop to the top of the cozy stitching within the quarter inch seam allowance.  

4.  Completing the Cozy

Taking the two cozy outer pieces, place right sides together, pin around the edge and sew using a quarter inch seam all around.  Repeat with the lining but sew a scant 3/8"seam.  This will make the lining a little smaller so it fits nicely inside the cozy.  Clip curves on the outer and lining seam.  If you are nervous about cutting into your seam, place a pin just in front of the stitches to stop your scissors snipping your stitches.  Press open the last 2 inches of the seam at the bottom edge of the cozy on the outer and on the lining (see picture below).    Turn outer cozy the right way out and lining so the wrong side is out.

Place the lining inside the cozy outer, wrong sides together.  Pin at the pressed open side seams.  Stitch all around the bottom edge within the quarter inch seam allowance, about eight-inch from the bottom.  

5. Adding the Binding

Follow my Single Binding Tutorial to add binding around the bottom edge and to complete your cozy!

The teapot beside my cozy was my original inspiration for the teapot block!