12 Days of Jennifer Paganelli Inspiration

I am excited to be Day 10 of 12 days of inspiration by Jennifer Paganelli! Seriously, we could go on forever on how Jennifer and her fabrics inspire us! Pictured above is my JP stash & I could come up with so many combinations using her fabrics. It's so distracting! I met Jennifer online through Flickr, I think. She had commented on something I made that had bits of her fabrics in it and I was blown away at her kindness. I soon discovered that her style was my style and we were fast friends. I love how she loves to mix color and pattern and everything she does is happy & colorful.

I designed my sewing room around her fabrics. Wait, that picture doesn't look lived in! See below for a true, working sewing room!

Anyway, you can see how much Jennifer inspires me. She is kind and generous to everyone and so supportive to the handmade community, I am truly amazed! For my inspiration piece, I decided I wanted to feature something I've been making lately. Mug rugs are not new items, but I really love finding colorful & artistic mugs and designing mugs rugs to match. They make great gifts as I don't think they have to match a person's home. They are a stand alone gift!  Here are some mugs I purchased from Anthropologie

and one from Cost Plus

And here are the mug rugs I made to match them

I used a West Indies print called Matilda and bordered it with Claudia and then Jane and made a binding out of Sally. All I need to do is pop some Starbucks Via packets or some tea bags and I have a cute gift set.

For this one I used Claudia in the center and then did a log cabin style around it in Dana, Maggie, Danielle, Matt's Tux, Nikki, Matilda and Velentina. The binding is Luca. I love how most of the fabric names are people's names! I still have 2 more mugs to match up, and I'm looking forward to it since there is only 7 days until Christmas! Yikes! The mug rugs take about a half hour if you're using scraps. The center square is approximately 3" & then I add 1 1/2 to 2 1/2" strips until I think it's done, around 8-9" finished size. Here is the list of bloggers and the days that they posted or will post:

December 09 Sew Pretty Dresses
December 10 Sweeter Than Cupcakes
December 11 Sweet Baby Jamie
December 12 Hickity Pickity  Handmade Dress Haven
December 13 Tabbo Designs 100 Billion Stars
December 14 Heavenlelgh Blessings Boutique
December 15 Scientific Seamstress
December 16 Sweet Baby Jamie
December 17 Hold It Right There
December 18 Sew Fun By Monique
December 19 Small Town Girls Clothier Marie Madeline Studio
December 20 Granny B's Clothesline Lilac Lane by Melissa Stramel

Got Girls World??

I received my Girls World book last week, but haven't been able to blog about much lately!! I had a weekend visit from my mom, so I wanted to catch up on orders so I could enjoy her visit (which I did), and now I am back catching up again!! Here's why I love Girls World:

*There are 4 dress patterns that go from size 2-14, so my 13 year old can still wear one of the dresses

*There are gorgeous frills & feminine touches for the girly girl, but the Tallulah Halter Dress has simple lines for girls like my Holly who want less ruffles. I can see making quite a few for her for the summer, can't wait to do that & post about it! (I think Jennifer needs a pattern for moms in that style, hint hint!!)

*Being more of a 'home sewer' I was drooling over all the projects under the Home section~ Holly loves the Patchwork Memory Board & wants to make George the puppy! I need to make the Birthday Banner~ really!!

*There are no sew projects~ lamp shade, headband and the ingenious "Ambassador of Goodwill" badges.

*Yay, a quilt pattern, pillow pattern as well as an amazing Canopy with Pinwheel Strands for your bed

Can you tell I LOVE this book? The photography is amazing, I love seeing her fabrics in action & combined. After I look through it, I am truly inspired to create!

You can see my journal & notecards in the background, all happy colors to add to my desk. :) I really love the quilt I recently made, so with the scraps I made a mug rug so I can see the blue, fuschia & orange combo every day. Hopefully, that catches you up with what I've been up to lately!