Love Nest Giveaway!
Well, these gorgeous bolts have been arriving at my house for the last couple of weeks, and I finally have a bit of time to sew! Hooray! To jump off all this sewing fun, I’m giving away a Love Nest™ fat quarter set. All 12 luscious fabrics mailed right to you…how’s that for fun? Leave [...]
The 2010 Carina Gardner Blog Summary
2010 zipped by, didn’t it? Looking back, it was such a big year for me: a little first grader, a brand new preschooler, my first fabric line, getting comfy in our new home…it was a fun year and to celebrate, here are some of my favorite blog moments from 2010. Enjoy! 1 – Iron-on graphics [...]
Reversible Ballet Bag Tutorial
I woke up this morning and ached for a bit of sewing. Just a little. I just wanted a quick little project that would brighten my two little girls’ day. Here’s what I came up with: Using the samples I have from Love Nest™ (due out Jan 2011), I made both Siri and Flissa a [...]
Coquette Quilt-Free Pattern
It’s taken me a little longer than I wanted it to, but here it is! Instructions for putting together the Coquette™ Quilt. It’s meant for the beginner to intermediate quilter. I love this quilt because it is very forgiving for us newbie quilters. None of the seams line up and all of the blocks are [...]
Love Nest Samples
It’s happy day when fabric arrives at my door. Today it was samples from my Love Nest™ Collection for Northcott™, which should hit quilting shops in January. You may recognize this collection from it’s Scrapbooking Glitter Pad debut at Hobby Lobby a year ago. Siri and I went through the samples trying to decide which [...]
Coquette Photoshoot
Last week we had the photoshoot for Coquette™. I was so happy with the photographs (shot by friend Susan Haglund). You can see many of the photos in the first issue of our newsletter. It took us two-weeks-of-crazy (that sounds like a country song) to get ready for this shoot. I don’t think I’ve sat [...]
Coquette Crazy
If you saw my studio, you’d know exactly what I mean. There is fabric everywhere! This morning I had a meeting with photographer Susan Haglund as we mapped out the photoshoot this weekend. Lot’s of stuff a-cookin’. This is my quick stop into my blog to say, “hello!” and let you know about a couple [...]
Coquette Giveaway Winner Announced
Hello all! I know you have been anticipating today’s post. I won’t delay it by telling you that I finally finish my Coquette™ quilt and was thoroughly amazed at how long it takes to get it machine quilted. So give me a few weeks and I’ll get the pattern, instruction, and photos up for you. [...]
How to Make a LumJum Body Pillow-Free Download
What IS a lumjum you might ask? Growing up with a Chinese mom meant that we had some pretty weird words for some of our favorite things. However, the most loved item that my mom made each of us was a lumjum, aka a cylinder body pillow. Growing up, this was the lovie we all [...]
Pillow Pet Party
Last night, my girls went to a pillow pet party. It was a cousin event and involved (of course) all of their pillow pets. Siri reported that they decorated cupcakes and watched a movie with popcorn. I got there this morning as they had all changed into bathing suits and headed out for some water [...]
A Big Ol’ Fabric and Paper Giveaway
You can image how excited I was when Coquette™ came to my door today! It actually got dropped off at my old address and has been sitting there for 4 days! I’m so happy to have it at my house now, filling up my tiny studio. It’s amazing! You can find Coquette™ by going to [...]
Happy Fabric Flowers-Just Add Velcro
I was invited to a craft night with a whole lot of mid-western gals. Who knew there were so many Minnesotan’s in Utah (escaping the cold no doubt)? The theme was t-shirts so I brought T’s for the girls and myself with tons of fat quarters, lace, and buttons. Inspired by Whippy Cake’s headbands (introduced [...]
Two Little Birdies
Northcott™ sent me these fun pictures of Love Nest™. I was thrilled to see the first bolt of the line, which goes on sale in a week and will ship out January 2011. Please send the link of the brochure (on the side bar) to your local quilt store to carry this line!!! Simply copy [...]
Sneak Peek-New Fabric Lines
Just taking a quick blog break from getting together not one, but two fabric lines that I’m shipping off tomorrow. One of them you’ll recognize, one of them you won’t. Snicker, snicker…can’t help being a tease! Sadly enough, I gotta run. No chit chat for me. Promise I have a couple of cool projects around [...]
Find My Free “Stuff” Easier
Recently, I included a link above called “free downloads.” If you have clicked on it recently, then you know that I’ve now made it a little easier for you to find the free patterns, free downloads, and free printables on this site! This new little page can be accessed from the top navigation bar (free [...]
Felicity Fabric Flower Pattern-Free Download
I’ve been making these fabric flowers for a couple of weeks now and named the little pattern after my sweet little red-head. I first made this pattern for Siri’s ruffle dress that I’ve been working on (pinwheel and pearls in the center), but I also like it with the big button on this shirt featuring [...]
Quilt Market Day 2 | Celebrity Sighting
Here’s a recap of today’s celebrity sightings (in between the many meetings I had today!): Jen Allyson, Heather Baily, me, and Deena Rutter. With Lizzy House I went Anna Marie’s book signing at Treadle Yard Goods in St. Paul. She’s really as nice in person as she is on her blog. Couldn’t help myself! I [...]
Print on Fabric with Your InkJet Printer
Would you believe that that the fabric in that little shirt Siri is wearing was printed on my INK JET printer? Nuts, huh? I needed to make a mock-up of my fabric Love Nest™ which won’t come out until January 2011 so I decided to try this little trick. The shirt turned out beautifully and [...]
Working Draft of a New Pattern
We’ve been a busy crew here at the Gardner house the last few weeks! Among other things we had family pictures taken (by the amazing Susan Haglund).Good timing too so that I could get these amazing photos of Siri wearing the first draft of a pattern I’ve been working on. Don’t you worry, I’ll be [...]
Sewing with A Ruffler
I have to take a little minute to chit chat about my new Ruffler. This amazing little device can save you minutes, nay hours of hand-gathering! I got this little baby when I started working on a children’s pattern with an absurd amount of ruffles (I just can’t help it! I adore ruffles!). The ruffles [...]
Quilting Class
I went to Quilting Class Day 2 yesterday. I’m finishing my quilting homework today. I am impressed with the simple tricks I’ve learned. Most importantly is I’m figuring out I don’t know ANYTHING about my old college sewing machine. Don’t you hate it when you think you’ve just been zipping along jut fine, to suddenly [...]
New Beginnings
I took the first day of a quilting class today at Elaine’s Quilting Block here in Salt Lake. Yes, a new beginning for me to really learn the techniques of quilting correctly. I quilted with my mother as a girl, but wasn’t feeling very confident on making one on my own. So I bought new [...]
Bear With Me…
Bear with me as I take a moment to get a little personal. Today something wonderful happened to me. Something I have been waiting to happen for a long time. Today, I went into my day job as an Communications and Event Director and walked out as a freelance designer. I have been transitioning for [...]