Why do I use production offcuts in my sewing?
Certainly not because it is cheaper. It is the challenge of combining something splendid from given materials, and the good feeling of saving material headed for the tip.
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Stories & guides
Violin case repair
Last school year, I repaired my grandchild's violin case. The loops meant for attaching the backpack straps had torn off. She cycles to school, and it’s impossible to ride while holding the violin in your hand. Naturally, the violin and case—which belonged to the school—went back at the start of the summer. Now that the new school year has begun, she has been issued a school violin and case again, but this one is in even worse condition than last year's. So, I undertook the repair once more. This time, I decided to replace the entire back panel—including the piping—and cover the torn section at the end of the case with a leather patch. I used reflective tape for the top layer of the piping. The video condenses six hours of work into three minutes. If anyone finds themselves in need of a similar repair, I will be able to take on a few jobs starting in February 2027, and I can handle a few at a time during the summer break.
Choosing and caring for a patchwork quilt
Quilt sizes by age, the materials we use, what sets the price of a quilt, and how to wash and dry it so it lasts.
A young sea dog's quilt for a grandchild
Thirty five of the most exciting ships of all time, transferred onto fabric and set among striped and checked dress shirt offcuts, for a grandson starting school.
The patchwork rug THE JOURNEY, A GREEN FOOTPRINT.
Four weeks of work on a rug where animals and people walk together around our green planet as one whole, made entirely from industry's leftover textiles.
The patchwork hanging THE SEASONS
A month of sewing: "The seasons and the dates of the Estonian folk calendar", 260 x 210 cm, with every season's birds, flowers, festivals and characters.
The patchwork rug SUN WHEEL
A round patchwork rug 310 cm across for a seaside village nursery hall: eight pointed stars, the sea with flounders, a passing ferry and an enormous sun.
Three quilts and 80 little bags as prizes for the dance competition
Prizes for the Estonian women's and girls' folk dance competition: 80 little bags and 3 large quilts, two in national skirt stripes and one with eight pointed stars.
The launch of the Patchwork Quilt 100 publication
The album "Patchwork Quilt 100. My Estonia today" was launched at the University of Tartu Library, with all 100 panels and their makers inside.
A homemade quilt frame
My quilts and a quilt frame I made myself, begun at an adult woodwork class: knobs turned one by one, slots cut and everything sanded by hand.
A present for the shelter dogs
The grandchildren's nursery is collecting Christmas presents for shelter dogs, so we sewed mats from fabric scraps together. Mathias chose the colours and cut the edges.
A portable changing mat. Plastic or cotton?
Every changing mat on offer is plastic, nylon or PVC and can only be wiped. So I made a washable one in linen, cotton wadding and flannel, with five pockets.
Who is the real beneficiary of a craft business?
A letter demanding data on my company's "real beneficiary". A micro business with one board member and no employees, so who exactly benefits here?
A waist bag for children
Why are children's waist bags on sale so big and bulky? A new model just large enough for money, a bank card and a phone, with a belt to go with it.
When a pet is bored, or mending horse rugs
What does your pet do when it is bored? Mine are hens. My daughter's horse, though, practises wriggling out of his rugs, so another pile of them came in for repair.
Baby quilts with bears
Another working day behind the machine gone before I noticed. No pattern would come, so it became small squares. How do you like a quilt this colourful?
Natural or synthetic material?
How far do you prefer natural materials? I cannot wear synthetics at all, which is why I put so much emphasis on the materials in my quilts.
A patchwork skirt and quilt from dress shirts (part 2)
Now the quilt: 240x240 cm to lay out so that every size of piece stretches and no two neighbouring colours quarrel. A memory quilt of the client's father.
A patchwork skirt and quilt from dress shirts (part 1)
A big bag of a client's dress shirts to become one skirt and one quilt. Step by step through the skirt: cutting, tapered panels, gathering and four hidden pockets.
Notebook covers, a special order
A wife wanted notebook covers for her husband's 9th wedding anniversary, with embroidery she commissioned herself. She measured his notebook in secret.
A calendar, electronic or on paper?
Our choir moved to a Google calendar and I resisted to the last. Meanwhile, 50 new linen and cotton notebook covers are up in the web shop.
A patchwork dress for the gas grill
My husband got a gas grill for his birthday and then ordered it a dress. Made in one go from artificial leather offcuts, with a zip for airflow.
A reflection on 1 September
A sweet day, and pure nostalgia for me. But seeing all those parents buying supplies, I am glad that annual murder of the wallet is in my past.
The new school year approaches, with a diary or without?
The approach of 1 September still gives me a happy nervousness. And a question: how many people still use a paper diary, and what size is it?
Estonia 100 or Estonia 101?
A change from roses: blue, black and white. A few months left of this beautiful centenary year, and the question of whether to make tricolour gifts next year too.
When does school start?
The town was full of children with satchels last week, although it is only the middle of August. When does your child start school?
A skirt and bag, a set.
A slightly more festive set for myself before a trip to the international quilt festival in Birmingham: a skirt and a matching bag in leather and artificial leather.
A cuddle quilt for a grandchild
Cotton fleece instead of synthetic, with an embroidered name, ribbon loops full of little characters at the edges, and a bag of its own to carry it in.
A handbag for myself, in leather and knit.
A roomy shoulder bag at last: a piece of my patchwork skirt jersey on the front, the rest full leather, with a magnetic outer pocket and two inner pockets.
The Patchwork Quilt 100 project (part 3), the panels at the Estonian National Museum
A day in Tartu at the Estonian National Museum, where the makers' shared birthday present to Estonia reached its second stage. And the story of my panel for the book.
The Patchwork Quilt 100 project, the Dance Festival (part 2)
Sixteen folk dancing girls framed by 52 different striped fabrics, with eight pointed stars in the corners. The most labour intensive small piece I have made.
The Patchwork Quilt 100 project, the Dance Festival
A hundred makers are giving Estonia 100 patchwork panels of 100x100 cm for its 100th birthday. I joined on the first day and got number 4.
A quilt in the Morning Star pattern
Our little patchwork circle picked one block to work with together, the Morning Star. A king size quilt from my leftovers: 2400 pieces and 75 hours of work.
Screens for a nursery
Covers for six nursery screens with a puppet theatre window: 12 covers, 96 pockets, each group's own striped fabric and letters cut from woollen felt.
Greetings for the new school year
Greetings for the new school year.
A homemade cuddly toy
The shops are full of cuddly toys, but a homemade one is still homemade. Carolin drew the dog, cut the pattern and named him Krissu.
Not a patchwork quilt but a quilt with patches
My little artist designed a baby quilt for her brother her own way: no squares, no strips, just the animal pictures she chose, appliqued straight onto grey starred fabric.
A quilt with tractors for an extendable bed
Numbers and creativity do go together: 48 m of strips, a calculator and a spreadsheet, and four tractor quilts for my youngest grandson.
Making a quilt, using one commission as an example
A 235x235 cm quilt as a present for a grandmother, from agreeing the pattern and colours to the name appliques and a backing pieced from leftovers.
Car seat covers
A commission I refused a year ago and was talked into after all: covers for the front seats, patterned from an old sheet and finished with corded binding.
Repairing chair seats
Eight chair seats: fabric, foam and a staple gun, half a day's work in theory. In practice three working days and a staple gun that gave up.
Just some reflections
A year that began with an enormous quilt and carried on with bags, repairs and car seat covers. Plus a look at everything a workshop this varied has to store.
Mending a horse rug
A fleece horse rug with three proper tears, mended with thin woollen felt and a three step zigzag. It blocked my washing machine first.
Caring for and choosing beanbags
Three years on, the school's 12 beanbags come back for servicing: emptied, washed, repaired and refilled. Plus fabric or artificial leather, which to choose.
A sales room in my studio
With the last child moved out, another room was free. Over Christmas we redecorated it, and now the finished products have a small white sales room of their own.
On selling chicks and hatching eggs in 2017
In 2017 I am offering neither hatching eggs nor chicks for sale. See you next season.
Carolin's designer bag
My granddaughter arrived knowing exactly what she wanted: a denim shoulder bag. She chose every last detail herself, and I was simply the help.
The quilt Sunset
Fourteen days of work on the largest and most complex quilt I have made: a sunset over water, 2.5 x 2.6 m, built day by day from a few hundred metres of fabric strips.
Patchwork patterns that speak make the eyes shine
An article about my work in the local paper Harku Valla Teataja: the patchwork room under the roof, how a quilt is designed, and the stories the fabrics tell.
Terry and the accessories for his little house
A dog who refuses to sleep on straw gets a foam base mattress with a zipped cover and two washable five layer wool top mats.
Black and white, with a little red too
A larger than usual play quilt in black and white, 155x155 cm, with little red hearts hidden underneath and a tiny cuddle quilt with cars to go with it.
A shelf of gift sets and corporate gifts in the web shop
A new shelf in the web shop: gift sets and corporate gifts. And a question for you: what present would make your heart sing when you move into a new home?
Ready for the autumn season
A room full of products ready for sale: simple, practical water repellent bags from upholstery offcuts, in four sizes, to test whether price or availability is the real obstacle.
This year's young birds
My own chicks are now 2.5 months old and the finest of all these years: tufted heads and the whiskers typical of a rumpless Araucana.
A summer mood in the patchwork room
Nobody has marked the start of a holiday in the calendar and there is no holiday pay, but I am enjoying the summer to the full. If I want to sew, I sew.
Rhubarb juice, a drink and a cake
The kitchen is the last place I would spend my free time, but here is how I make rhubarb juice with blackcurrant leaves, a summer drink and a quick cake.
Quilts with cars, planes and helicopters
Quilts for boys needed pictures I cannot draw, so I found an illustrator. Plus a step by step account of how I make fused appliques.
The beauty of flowers in June
On the day parliament discusses banning glyphosate, some thoughts about a poison free garden, the bees that have vanished, and pictures of what is in flower.
On sewing a patchwork dress
Step by step: squares cut into trapeziums, sewn into tiers, gathered and attached to a bodice made from an old orange sweatshirt.
Making a patchwork skirt
After years of thinking about it, I finally made a patchwork skirt, and a patchwork dress too. To my surprise it is many times quicker than sewing a quilt.