She Loved Well

The start of this year has proved to be especially challenging.  January brought shock, disappointment, anger, and bitterness.  As I was working through the emotions of January and progressing along February dealt another "sucker" punch.

A dear precious friend died suddenly and unexpectedly.  I can count on one hand people who truly know me and love me still - she was one of them.  She truly knew how to love people.  By God's grace He allowed me to spend time with her before she passed and to be there in the final moments as she transitioned from this life to life eternal in the Lord.

I am left with her memory and to ponder how to live without her love and friendship.  Every now and again I think she died too soon and then remember and swallow the bitter fact that God makes no mistakes.

I know in time the tears and pain of not having her here will subside but until then I must trust that God is still in control and work through the grief.

Sewing has been my "hiding place" but not as of late.  I have had to force myself to sew and it has not been pretty but I am pushing on.  My friend had several sewing machines that her family did not know what to do with and I offered to sell them on their behalf.  I did get all 3 of her machines sold and decided to make a couple of sewing machine covers as gifts for those who purchased the machines.

How I Did It

The first cover was for a Janome HT2008 sewing machine.

The fabric I used was from my stash.  It was denim fabric that I had gotten from my local sewing store in the home decor section.  The cotton fabric I used as lining was also from my stash.  I was not concerned I about matching fabric I was concerned about using my stash.

I used Bosal "Sew In Foam Stablilizer" to give the cover stability.  I normally use "headliner" but did not have enough on hand for the cover.  Headliner is cheaper and much wider.

I took ideas from a couple of different projects to create this machine cover.  The projects came from one of my favorite sites that I use often - Sew4Home.  The projects I used were Sewing Machine Cover with Decorative Stitching Accents and Sewing Machine Cover.

As you can see in the photo's below I serged the edges because the denim fabric frayed rather easily and to sew in the stablizer.  As you can also see I did not concern myself with the color of the serger thread.

I used Artistic Suite Premium to create the design and the butterfly was a design that came with the software I believe.

Below are the pockets before I sewed in the sides.  I ended up rounding the top corners because it was much easier to sew in than the rectangle.  I admit struggled with the measurements.  I thought I followed the instructions but some of the pieces were too big.  For the top stitching I used a Sulky 12wt Blendables thread.

Below are pictures of the completed cover.  I covered the edges with binding from a jelly roll that I had on hand.

The lining.

The front side. The make the top handle I used some cotton webbing that I had on hand.

Up close of the front pocket.  As you can see the pocket is a little crooked but I did not notice it until after I had completed the cover.

The back side.

A side view.

I was generally pleased with the cover even though it was not perfect.  The young lady who bought the machine absolutely loved it so that's what counts.

Adding the sew in foam stabilizer made for an extremely tight fit even though I called my self adjusting for it's thickness (about 1/4 inch).

I will show the next cover in another blog post.