Happy Hippo: sewing a garland for charity

Hello you! So how was your week? Did you do anything special? Or are you, as I am, looking forward to a long weekend?

Besides enjoying the lovely weather we had for a couple of days this past week, I really wanted to finish up the garland for Happy Hippo Foundation. For the birthday boxes they provide to underprivileged children up to age 12, the lovely Annemarie from Ladybug & Co and one of her friends came up with the idea to start sewing garlands to add as an extra to the birthday boxes, so their birthday could be even more festive! And it's a lasting and reusable item as well, yay!

On her blog you could download the templates to three different patterns and instructions were provided how to make them (all in Dutch). Goal was to gather 300 garlands.

As I do not know if my garland is for a boy or girl, I decided to use a red polka dot and a bright blue starry fabric, and a white bias tape. A fresh and happy looking combination I thought. 

Following the instructions I cut, sorted, sewed, turned inside out, poked, measured, pinned and sewed some more. And then my garland was finished! I took our lil B-boy out for a walk to the postal office yesterday and sent my contribution to Happy Hippo to the provided address.

I knew the goal of 300 garlands was almost complete and thought, would it not be great if mine was the 300th one. And what do you know, today I got word that my garland actually was no. 300 ~smile~

Some 30 more garlands can be sent in for this charity, so if you have some fabric left hanging around your house (scraps are great for this purpose) and feel like some sewing, sign up!

Wishing you all a lovely weekend!

Love,

Maartje

Makes by Maartje: Flag Garland

Hi again!

Hopeyou are doing well on your end of the world! Thanx for stopping bytoday and read up on my blog.

Inthis post I wanted to share my flag garlands. I made them to matchthe playpen mat and made two because I had enough flags to do so.Both have flags which measure approximately 10 x 12 cm and areattached using bias tape. One has seven flags and the other one five.

Ichose to make rectangular flags, as the playpen mat also has arectangular shape. The longer one I used to hang on the playpen. Theother one is now in the nursery, on the memo board.

Myidea for the one on the playpen is to iron the letters of our son'sname on it. That will be done later though, since he isn't born yet.Of course the husband and I already know his name, but will not shareyet ~smile~.

Asfor making the flags, I used a cutting mat and rotary cutter (which Ilike to call my fabric pizza knife ;-) ). It is an incredibly fastway to make same size rectangles with straight edges. Putting theright sides of the fabric together, I sewed three sides of the flagswith a regular straight stitch, leaving an opening to turn. Using oneof my crochet hooks, I pushed out the corners and ironed them flat.Then, using bias tape, I sewed the flags to the bias, one by one,without pinning them. As the flags are so small, this was no problem.I did adjust the sewing speed of my machine, allowing me to sewstraight. When I finished step one of sewing them together, I took ashortcut in folding and sewing the back of the bias tape, to avoidthe use of pins.

AgainI ironed the flags, folding over the bias tape and ironing that aswell. Forgot to take pictures, so I cannot show you. I do hope youunderstand what I mean. If not, do not hesitate to drop me an emailat makesbymaartje@gmail.comI would be very happy to help you!

FinallyI sewed the bias tape to finish the garlands and hung them on thememo board and playpen.

Thiswas a very easy and fun to do Make. It actually gave me enoughconfidence to sign up for a charity project, making a birthdaygarland for Happy HippoFoundation. My blogging friend Annemarie is organizing this andhas some information about it on her blog which you can find here.It is in Dutch but that might not be a problem for all of you. Goalis to make 300 garlands which can be given in a birthday box tounderprivileged children so they can have a lovely birthday party.More on that in another blogpost!

Ihope to have inspired you to make your own flag garland. It is an ideal way to use those left over fabric scraps and it makes for a great present for any newborn or just as a (birthday) present ~smile~.

Sofor now, thank you for stopping by for a visit!

Xoxo,

Maartje