Serving Through Sewing

"No time is better spent than that spent in the service of your fellow man."  That quote rings true to me and today, I'd love to get you thinking of ways you can use your sewing talent to bless others.  Below is a list of six organizations that need sewers who are willing to give of their time and create specific projects.  If you're up for a little challenge, choose at least one of these groups and make something for someone you don't know.  When you're done, I promise you'll feel good inside. Service just does that to you! 

Skirting The Issue- Sponsored by Simple Simon. From July through August, sew any size of a skirt for girls in your local foster care system.  These skirts are a blessing to girls throughout this system so they can have something new for back to school. Below are a few tutorials that can help you create a cute skirt:

Free skirt tutorials:

Easy Back to School Skirt, a Refashion & Tutorial

Flock of Birds Skirt

This year Simple Simon has also added quilts to their list of handmade items to donate to the foster care system in your area.

Sew Powerful- Sponsored by Liberty Jane, asks others to sew cross body purses for girls and women living in Zambia. Below is a link to teach you how to use your scraps to make this project.

Using Scraps to Make a Cross Body Purse for a Good Cause

Primary Children's Hospital- Sew monsters, safe sleep sacks, or medical play dolls as shown in the photo below.  You can even make no sew soft blankets.

Feel free to go to this post and download a free pattern and tutorial on how to use fleece scraps to make a few monsters:

1 Million Pillow Cases- "American Patchwork & Quilting is challenging quilters, sewers and crafters to help us reach our goal of donating one million pillowcases to local charities.  Many charities can benefit from the donation of a pillowcase and the challenge gives you the opportunity to donate and make a difference in your community."

The Linus Project- "Provide love, a sense of security, warmth and comfort to children who are seriously ill, traumatized, or otherwise in need through the gifts of new, handmade blankets and afghans, lovingly created by volunteer "blanketeers."

Humanitarian Quilts- Make a quilt that will be given to those in need.

If you know of any other organizations that you think should be added to this list, please leave me a comment or send me an e-mail and I'd be happy to add them.  xoxo Grandma

Skirts for Skirting the Issue & a Free Bird Pattern

It's that time of year when seamstresses across this nation turn to making skirts.  Simple Simon and Company sponsors a project called Skirting the Issue. All the skirts donated to this project are given to girls in foster care.

My niece and her 9 year old daughter came to visit me for a few days.  I explained to this cute 9 year old a little about this project. She was impressed and wanted to be my model for it. 

This magenta colored skirt (pictured above) was pretty simple, so I decided to step it up a notch and add a little fun. 

See that cute little bird? I had a little too much fun creating the pattern for it. The pattern is a good one for using your scraps. It'll add a whole bunch of pizzazz to a simple skirt. 

If you'd like to use this simple design too, download it here.  Then cut out the three pattern pieces.  Layer them together onto one side of a skirt using either a glue stick or fabric spray adhesive to keep the pieces in place.  I added some tear away stabilizer behind the design.  Next, machine embroider the pieces onto the skirt using a zig zag stitch.

To mark the legs onto your skirt, use bright yellow thread and hand stitch two three inch long lines.  Then hand stitch the lower bird feet lines. Once those are in place, machine stitch right over these basting stitches.

  

The finished bird should look something like this when completed:

I had a lot of fun machine appliqueing this design onto several of these skirts.  I love that Simple Simon and Company sponsors this project every year.  If you have time, why not sew a skirt to donate to your local foster care program?  It'll really leave you with a good feeling if you choose to participate in any charity project. You have until August 15th to get your skirts sewn and donated to this cause.  xoxo Grandma

You might like these posts:

Flock of Birds Skirt

Skirting the Issue Sewing Night