Ikea AGEN Children's Armchair Cover

The AGEN children's armchair from IKEA looks great in the photos on their website so I made a special trip to IKEA to purchase it.

Because of the 'special trip' I bought it, otherwise I may have passed. It didn't look very comfortable and was in desperate need of a cushion or cover.

It took a couple of goes to get the pattern right. The first was hideous and I binned it straight away. This was the final result:

...and possibly after all my hard work its still not very comfortable because Alyssa spends no time sitting in it. It looks cute in her room however...

My First Quilt

I have no idea the correct process for making a quilt. My first attempt involved sewing two pieces of material right sides together along with the cotton batting on one side and then turning it right sides out. Dah da. A quilt! The cotton batting moved and the whole thing warped a bit, and then my hand stitching at the top fell apart.  So, last week I took to it with the scissors. 

I still have no idea of the correct process for making a quilt. This one has seams down the centre to help secure the batting inside. I really need to take a class. It's on my to-do list.

I ran out of material so it doesn't tuck down the sides. I did buy the fabric with nothing in mind. When I do that, I never seem to have enough. 

The first thing I made for my baby's room...

About 3 weeks after I found out I was pregnant I went out shopping for baby girls clothes. Apparently that is quite common... to shop for your baby even before you know the sex. I didn't have to sell them but I did have to keep the fact that we were having a girl a secret from my partner. I lasted only 3 months. It was supposed to be the whole time but I let it slip. I credit myself for being able to keep secrets, but that one was WAY too big. Plus, I didn't want everything while and yellow and I wanted to start sewing...

I found a second hand sewing machine on Gumtree, bought some fabric squares from Spotlight and made a bib, burnt myself (still have the scar on my knee) & decided not to count that one. I put the sewing machine away and it didn't come back out for three months.

In that time I found a beautiful birdy mobile on madeit.com.au. It was expensive. I decided to copy it. The one I made is a complete copy, not to the exact detail - I didn't have a pattern - but if you find one similar then that's probably where I sourced my inspiration. Two weeks later & a change of fabric half way through it was complete.

I still didn't particularly like the fabric choice. They were the squares left over from the bib-fabric-shopping. But it was made and I wasn't making another one.

This was the first item for Alyssa's room and influenced everything that happened after that.