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Congrats to yesterday’s winner, Lisa Lee, on winning Day 23’s daily giveaway! Congrats too to Day 22’s winner, Elaine. We will be in contact so that you can claim your prize.
It’s Day Twenty-Three of National Sewing Month! Don’t forget to visit Seams and Scissors every day to find daily giveaway opportunities and sewing ideas! To enter today’s daily giveaway, find the contest rules and leave a comment below. Also look out below for details on how to enter our National Sewing Month grand prize that includes a BERNINA 215 Sewing Machine! Too see the daily blog posts, projects of the day, and more National Sewing Month details, click here.
Today’s National Sewing Month post is brought to you by Maris from Sew Maris!
Hi there! I’m Maris from Sewmaris.com, and today I want to show you a really quick, fun project that you can customize to suit your needs, and you can also simplify it if time is short.
The project I want to show you today is my handy sewing machine foot pedal holder. I have a couple of machines with hard plastic covers, and no slot for the foot pedal and electrical cord. Since I don’t want to store those items on the machine bed and risk scratching the, too plastic, I decided to make a quick and simple holder for these items. I am giving you the complete instructions to bind the outside edges, but feel free to change up this foot pedal holder. You can change the size of the rectangles if you need a larger or smaller holder, and you could skip the bias binding around the edges and serge or zig-zag for a super-quick edge finish. You can use fusible fleece and skip the machine quilting step, too! Make it your own in any way that works for you.
Supplies:
1/3 yard quilting cotton
1/3 yard lo-loft batting (fusible or not)
1 fat quarter coordinating print (optional)
8-9 inches of ¼ inch elastic
1 pkg extra wide double fold bias tape
Velcro, snaps, or small buttons
Matching thread
Cutting out:
2 rectangles 8 inches wide X 10 inches tall (quilting cotton)
1 rectangles 12 inches wide X 9 inches tall (quilting cotton)
1 rectangle 12 inches wide X 9 inches tall (fat quarter, or quilting cotton)
1 rectangles 8 inches X 10 inches (batting)
1 rectangles 12 inches X 9 inches (batting)
Instructions:
1. Sandwich the 8×10 inch rectangle of batting between the 2 quilting cotton rectangles of the same size. Fuse according to the manufacturer’s directions, or lightly quilt to hold all 3 pieces together. This is the back of the foot pedal holder. This piece measures 8 inches wide by 10 inches tall.
2. Sandwich the 9×12 inch rectangle of batting between the 2 quilting cotton rectangles of the same size. Fuse according to the manufacturer’s directions, or lightly quilt to hold all 3 pieces together. This is the front of the foot pedal holder. This piece measures 12 inches wide by 9 inches tall.
3. Using a coffee cup or small bowl, round the lower corners of both the back and front pieces.
4. Cut a length of bias tape approximately 8 inches long, and insert the top edge of the back of the foot pedal holder into the center fold of the bias tape. Stitch close to the open edges of the tape.
5. Cut a length of bias tape approximately 12 inches long, and insert the top edge of the front of the foot pedal holder into the center fold. Stitch close to the open edges of the tape, forming a casing for the elastic.
6. Cut approximately 8 inches of elastic, and insert the elastic thru the bias tape casing of the front of the foot pedal holder. Stitch elastic at each end of the casing to secure.
7. Place the foot pedal front piece on top of the foot pedal back piece, matching the rounded corners and the side edges. The casing edge will be about one inch below the top edge of the back piece, and the bottom edge of the front will be longer than the bottom edge of the back piece.
8. Form small pleats along the bottom edge of the front foot pedal piece, and pin the pleated front piece to the back piece. Adjust the pleats as needed until the front and back bottom edges are the same length.
9. Using a very scant ¼” seam allowance, stitch around the foot pedal holder, securing the front to the back. Trim close to your stitching. You are almost done!
10. Extend one edge of bias tape approximately 7-8 inches above the top edge of the foot pedal holder, and continue sandwiching the outer edge of the foot pedal holder in the center fold of the bias tape all the way around, and extending the bias tape approximately 7-8 inches on the opposite side as well. The bias tape extensions are the straps to secure the foot pedal holder to your sewing machine handle.
11. Fold the ends of the bias tape extensions to the inside to create a neat edge. Stitch the bias tape extension/strap, continue stitching all around the outer edge of the holder on the bias tape, and continue stitching to the end of the second bias tape extension/strap.
12. Stitch small strips of the rough side of Velcro on the ends the bias tape extensions, and small strips of the soft side of Velcro on the side edges of the foot pedal holder. (Alternatively, you could apply snaps or small buttons + loops to secure the straps onto your sewing machine handle.)
13. Pop your foot pedal and power cord in your new holder, and attach to your sewing machine handle. Enjoy!
Don’t miss all of Maris’s amazing projects at Sew Maris!
Also remember to check out the Project of the Day right here!
To enter the daily giveaway, leave a comment below telling us:
What is something you cannot keep organized?
Official Rules for Daily Contest
- There is a maximum of one entry per person. The entry will be based upon a comment left on this blog post. Duplicate comments will be deleted and are not tallied.
- Winner will be selected at random from the comments on this blog post below.
- You have until tonight, September 23rd, 2014 at 11:59p EST to leave your comment on this post. Comments posted after that will not be counted.
- Contest open to anyone 18+ in US and/or Canada.
Enter here for the National Sewing Month 2014 Grand Prize Giveaway.
AllFreeSewing
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What can’t I keep organinzed? I’ll start by saying my life is one great big mess, then move on the more important things – closets, fabric, bookshelves, silverware, yarn, tools, the pantry, anything.
My husband and are both a bit messy, so there is mail on the kitchen table. But the sewing room is my biggest challenge. It seems that everything I don’t know what to do with ends up there! Along with my sewing magazines and works in progress, as well as fabrics and patterns.
It is my fabric. I have bins and shelves and buckets. I never know what I have, I buy duplicates all the time. I pull one fabric and six others fall down. It’s crazy. Its a good thing I love to sew.
Honestly I should just say me but I would say the “stuff” around my machine. The scissors, pens, rippers, all those gadgets.
I’d say closets are the worst place in our house. Just can’t seem to keep them organized, esp the bookshelves.
My sewing stuff!
Closets, dressers, bins, my life!
Food in the pantry and fabric scraps are things that always seem to be disorganized.
All my little crafting gadgets. Double pointed knitting needles. My problem is, I craft and sew all over the house instead of one central location. 🙂
I cannot keep my bathroom drawer organized, no matter how hard I try. Thanks!
My patterns
My small sewing notions, they tend to be left wherever I was using them.
Paperwork is my worst disorganized mess – my late husband was the organizer and I got lazy – I used to pay the bills and balance the checkbook and he would file all the paperwork. Now it just accumulates…. My other mess is the table top in my weaving room; it collects all the magazines and accumulated patterns, misc. yarns, notebooks, etc. I usually spend one week a year clearing it off and putting everything away. My sewing area is fairly new space and hasn’t had time to get too disorganized.
I cannot keep myself organized when I am deciding on a project. I have the fat quarters all over the place, and then I might start another project. Everything sits on chairs by my sewing machine and table. If I want to clean the room up for someone coming over, it’s a job.
Because I live in a small apartment, it’s hard to keep everything organized. I have things all over the house and one closet that you have to open very slowly!
Fabric scraps – they pile up and fall over.
I have a hard time keeping paperwork organized. There is TOO much!
I just can’t keep my fabric organized. Either it’s too big to fit in whatever I have to keep it in, or it gets separated from the pattern or other fabrics I buy to make a project. So, fabric, everywhere.
Thread and bobbins….always a jumbled mess…
needles
For the lady that cannot organize her needles: Make a little felt ‘notebook’ with pages with pockets, mine is cell phone size pages and cover. The pocket should reach about 2/3 the way up the ‘page’, so you can see size info on package.
I have trouble keeping up with scrap organization. When done with a project I cut pieces to usually used sizes for quilt blocks, or strips and then ‘sort’ them into various sized zip loc bags by size. I have too many UFO’s and their scraps and scraps I have been given have run away into my closet. Time to chase them down; I would love an idea for what to put this ‘organized’ group in to be able to identify easily.
Hi Sue, I store my needles in small plastic pill bottles. They are clear plastic with snap on lids. I then label them per sizing. They store easy in my thread drawer because they are the same size as a large spool of thread.
When it comes to sewing, my thread is something that I can not keep organized. I have organized and re-organized and have still not found the perfect storage and organization that works well. It is the regular sewing thread and the thread meant for my embroidery machine. On the look out at all times.
My purse! I do try but then I need to get something out and it is a mess sgain. My wallet is organized though!
I can’t keep my embroidery floss organized. I have totes and totes of it and I never can find what I need so I end up buying more.
Have you tried grouping by color and putting each color group into a see through container (zip lock bag) then all individual container into one large container? Then when looking for a particular shade of color you will only have to look through one group. Another suggestion is what my husband used to do. He used small envelopes and put the number of the floss on the white envelope. Then stored all the envelopes numerically in a box. Just a thought.
I once read an article on organization that saved my life.It said that there wasn’t anything wrong with piles. If you knew what pile something was in then that was sufficently organized. I’m not incredibly tidy but I can generally lay my hands on whatever I am looking for. I tidy when it all gets to me but everything get untidy sometimes. What bothers me most is when I tidy and others mess it up. I love my grandchildren but after several hours of playing dressup, the downstairs is a mess and I’m trying to rein in my irritation. Tidy is worth ruining my relationship with my grandkids! Thanks.
Obviously I meant Tidy ISN”T work ruining a relationship. Thanks
worth.
I tend to have an unorganized sewing room…I’m one of those people who likes to “see what’s there” because “seeing” is inspirational….soooo, that means I don’t like to stash in cabinets or drawers where things are out of site……messy but creatively inspiring!
My office and sewing share the same space. When I and working on paper stuff it migrates over in the sewing stuff. Then when I sew things are all over. I can’t find anything without a lot of frustration !
I need to separate them but I am afraid it would mean two rooms a total disaster. Oh woe is me!
i was given a Brother SE-350 and a singer serger. I haven’t learn how to sew yet and I don’t know what to organize the accessories yet. Could use your help.
Paper/receipts etc in my office. Storage closet, and my sewing supplies
,
My sewing room is the hardest for me to keep organized…I’m constantly having to clean it up to get any thing done. Otherwise I’m usually pretty organized.
My classroom- I spend several hours a week sorting through papers.
Definetley fabrics a sewing supplies.
I cannot keep my kitchen bar clean. My boyfriend thinks it is a drop zone for everything. I keep moving his mail, to his office, keys to the key holder, and as the King of “The King and I” says etcetera, etcetera, etcetera!!! LOL
My fabric stash! I have my larger bits in a plastic bin, all my scraps in a giant reusable shopping bag, AND my itty bitty scraps in the first drawstring bag I ever made. They always seem unorganized.
Are we talking organization in general or just in the sewing room? In general it would be my kitchen because I am a kitchen gadget have to have person. In my sewing room it starts with my bobbins and goes to my hand sewing needles.
fabric-I keep getting into it and messing it up
Things I can’t keep organized : My mind ! Sew much to sew , So little time !
My fat quarters! I take them out of their storage container, look through them, then leave them in little piles.
I cannot keep my clothes closet organized no matter how hard I try.
My thread is what I can never keep organized!
What a fun, easy project. Sewing machine pedal covers would make great Christmas gifts for my quilting friends.
I cannot keep my fabric organized to save my life. I love all the colors mixed together on top of my sewing table. It is my dream one day to organize it all. I also cannot keep my daughter’s toy area organized either. I feel like it lasts for an hour if I pick it up! Thanks for the chance at a giveaway! <3
My kitchen pantry. Terrible! 🙂
Everything? Fabric for sure
I cannot keep pantry/cupboard in order…tho Husband is pretty much the reason! lol BUT…my Sewing Room is all my fault,,,threads, fabrics, patterns, books etc…just seem to migrate alllll over! 🙂
My fabric scraps. Thanks for the chance.
My whole sewing room needs organization.
Just about everything! My biggest issue is my clothing. I have no closets and no room for wardrobes. My clothing sits around in large shopping bags until I need it.
My craft studio is always crowded & a mess!! We just moved about 6 months ago to a much larger house & I have about twice the space & still can’t seem to create the working space that I would like it to be!!
My fabric is the main thing that I can not seem to get organized.
My fabric stash.
I think maybe paperwork, books, etc.
I would have to say ..all of my crafting..from paper crafts to sewing projects..no craft room so my dining table is usually covered with anything but dining. my house is small and haven’t figured a way to organize and store all of the supplies and equipment I have collected..especially since I bought my home 6 yrs ago.
would love the money to organize whole house and make a dedicated space that isn’t dining inspired
………………Those plastic dishes and lids that multiply when you close the cupboard door!
I have a hard time keeping my fabric organized in the sewing room. I keep them in tubs and then have to dig through for my stash.
My fabric and my yarns need organizing, but especially all my quilting stuff!
I can’t seem to keep my craft room organized. It helps that my hubby made a shelving unit for me to organize my fabric, but it does not take long for things to end up all over the place. Maybe it’s just me, but it seems like the mess just multiples on a daily basis. I like the idea of the scrap baskets. I might have to sew up a few of those.
only one thing? ok, my scissors and cutting tools. alwasy looking around for them, patting a pile of fabric or patterns to see if they are under it.
It would have to be fabric. I just made a string quilt and fabric is everywhere.
I have a terrible time keeping my drawer of notions straight. Used to know exactly where the buttons, needles, hem binding, etc. were, but I’m convinced poltergeists come in the night and disorganized everything!
Pretty good at organizing most of my sewing things, except –FABRIC– I have run out of storage space and have fabric stuffed in plastic bags and tubs and stacked in closet, but hard to see what I have, then I have an awful time getting something out of a middle tub or bag without an avalanche!! HELP——–!
my fabric is tough to keep organized I quilt & sew garments & gifts…
Definitely my fat quarters
I havent’ been able to get one of those thread spool racks yet. but I did get my hubby to drill holes in a couple pieces of board, glue in dowels that were broken in half and way to go the thread spools are fitting nicely over them. it helps to keep the thread separated and from been all thrown somewhere together.
I cannot seem to organize my scraps of material so I have a better idea of what sizes of scrap can be used for certain projects.
I have trouble keeping yarn organized. I have 1/2 used skeins and whole skeins and balls of yarn. I never seem to have enough of the left over yarn for one project.
I did make a wonderful thread holder for my sewing room and it works great!
Not counting closets, I would say my collection of sewing thread is my most unorganized mess!
Thanks for a great giveaway.
Can’t figure out how to keep my fabric scraps organized
I have a problem keeping my bobbins from multiple machines separated. Each machine has different bobbins. Frustrating!
We took a colored marker and put a colored dot on the back of are machines, then put a dot on the bobbin. Each machine has a different color dot and the bobbin dot matches the machine it goes to
I am the lady who cannot keep the bathroom draws organized, bobby pins every were, hear times, make up, brush, and the hot iron, blower dryer cords. OMG If I could just keep them organized that would make under neath my cabinet accessible. Right Now it is like a jungle!
In the official rules, it says that it must be posted Sept 23, 2014, How can that be when today is June 17, 2015? Can I still enter?
I have another question. I am madly gathering up material, denim, etc., and have a lot to send, but have limited funds. Is there a way to send it and not go broke with the shipping charges or postage? I would even be able to gather a lot more within our community but again, the postage or shipping charges are devastating. Can you help at all?
Thank you.
I cannot keep the things I need when I’m sewing within a comfortable reach. I don’t have enough room next to my machine for a table, etc., so I’m constantly having to get up to reach something. I’ve thought about some kind of hanging thing, like a shoe bag, but don’t know if that would work. What do you think?
I’m always messing with my sewing stuff so thats no problem, the mess is in the kitchen. So unorganized , terrible ! I’d rather be sewing any day !
My family laundry all in the mess mode every time
My sewing room has a lot of sewing items in it. In addition to 2 Babylock Sewing Machines and 1 Babylock Serger, an ironing board & iron, I always keep in the state of readiness, I have hundreds of yards of material, 100 + patterns, several configurations and types of squares, and various measuring devices, more than 100 spools of serger thread, embroidery thread, specialty thread, several different kinds of scissors and all the typical items needed to do just about any project. Everything stays reasonably organized. My problem is bobbin thread tangling. Yes I have a hundred+ bobbins because I may use the same color in 3 different thread densities. I have tried the pink bobbin clips, cling spools of overlap plastic to secure each bobbin, bobbin trees, & multiple bobbin zipper bags. No matter what I do, I end up wasting a lot of time cutting the tangled bobbins apart, throwing away a lot of thread since it just can’t be untangled. If anyone has a solution to the bobbin fiasco, please let me know.
I found the baby size pony hair scrunches work best and if you buy the multi color batch they can be coordinated to the thread color (not a perfect match but green to green red to red pink to pink and so on…I bought them in pastel, bolds and glitter/shinny so I could identify my embroidery threads with the shinny ones. I like you have tried and wasted my money on many items in search of the right fit for me and these are great…I also use my pedi-foam toe guides from my pedicure salon for my white threaded black threaded and gray threaded bobbins which I reach for all the time and these to work great for a tidy place to keep several bobbins in a narrow space. Hope this helps save you some thread as that was my driving force too. I find that until I find what works for me I continue to try and buy but once I used these I’ve stopped looking for a better mousetrap as they say
Help! I am a sewing notion hoarder and I can not find anything when I need it. It is actually quite funny but I can not control myself when I find new awesome buttons, fancy lace, new gadgets to make sewing “easier”, zippers in a beautiful new color and threat to match! Anything and everything sewing. Heaven help me when I find a box of notions at a garage sale or flea market that belonged to some little lady that no longer needs them.
We will not mention the fabric collection I have at this time because it is just too painful. LOL
My biggest problem is the “Sewing room”. I own five sewing machines and they are in different areas of my cellar. I also own a serger and embroidery machine. I have four cabinets with fabric. I have been working on getting everything all located and organized in one area of the cellar. Some day it will be done.
I too have 5 machines 3 sergers ( two singer’s one is set up with black thread one with white for overlocking seams and prepping fabric for washing) the third one is a Babylock Evolve which I keep set on the cover stitch function to save time rethreading and setting up. Two sewing machines one Bernina with embroidery (my fav) and a Janome. I find the organization of the sewing room is ongoing as I add another machine I have to reconfigure the whole thing. Fabric is the easiest to get out of control for me so I’m trying in earnest to stop adding unless I know what I’m using it for within a certain period of time (a year or so) as a lot of my fabric is outdated and now as I look at it I’m hoping it comes back in style or a project comes along that is perfect….fat chance I’m finding. At present I have gotten it down to manageable and it feels real good not to have the battle for space in rearranging it all the time which is so necessary to know what you have. Sewing is much more fun without all the hassle
.
Keeping my cutting table free of stuff which I tend to load up then like the kitchen sink need to clean it off before I can start working. It’s used for wrapping gifts, stacking anything I’m not taking the time to put back, patterns that need ironed and repacked and usually projects that are in the works. It’s too large for a junk drawer but doesn’t know it.
Can’t keep my sewing room organized ..always have several things going at once !!
I can’t keep the side table beside my chair organized. I clean everything off, and it looks great. By the end of the day it is piled in stuff again. My knitting, the book I am reading, the day;s mail, snack food.Flyers from the paper. What should I do?
I can’t seem to organize all my patterns no matter how hard I try.
I cant seem to keep my fabric organized! I find myself constantly rearranging it by, color, strip sizes, etc. Just yesterday, I bought yet another. Set of clear organizing drawers and I am planning on hauling out all my fabric once again t try and organize it!!! AUGGGHHHHHHH!!!!
As a quilter and sewer, I find the most challenging issue I have is, keeping all the different pins separated and organized. I use so many different sizes, etc. My fabric is all organized on boards (home made) that are acid free and behind closed doors so the sun does fade them. Every winter I spend time reorganizing my sewing room since new items are added. I have to have things in there place—–yes, I’m a little OCD. But organization is the key for me.
My fabric scraps are so so unorganized. It takes me forever to find things.