Zakka Zippies

You're back! Hi there and thanks for stopping by. I am very excited to have so many new friends lingering from the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day. My butt is numb from all the computer time this week trying to make it to all the blogs participating in giveaway day. Honestly, after all that surfing, reading, posting, oohing and aaahing, wouldn't it be nice to win just one teensie giveaway? Fingers crossed! I can't wait to call upon the RN generator later tonight and find out who wins my mini selvage quilt (oh! are you here looking for the giveaway post? Keep scrolling, it's a few down there and you have until 9 pm Pacific time to enter).

So..... Zakka Zippies. Yes, this is what I made from the leftovers after finishing this on retreat. I love making zippy pouches, actually. These are going to be for sale in the members boutique at my guild quilt show in early June.

To make these, I free cut my scraps with scissors into random pieces, sewed them together into a fabric 'sheet', sliced the sheet and inserted some longer strips, then cut rectangular sections the same length as the zippers I wanted to use (umm, was that clear?). Most of the Japanese linen sections were bordered with a natural organic cotton/linen blend.

In some cases, I felt like adding a little more zip to the zippy, so using my machine's triple straight stitch and a light blue Aurofil 30 wt thread I topstitched a 1/4" from the seams. I like the weight of this stitch and by extending the stitch length to 3.5, you get a Sashiko-y sort of machine stitch. Nice.

That's not all folks! More retreat finishes coming. In the meantime, tune in tomorrow to see who wins the selvage mini and what the heck is on the back!!