Changing my blog name and Address!

Hello Everyone,
I have moved everything over to my new blog Mara Creates,   I no longer Secretly Stitch, and have my sewing machine out on the dining room table a lot of time.  I have moved all of my content over there, and will slowly be spiffing it up, for a big reveal on November 1st, when I have my first project in a magazine, so exciting!  See you around.

Said WIth Love Advent Calendar

Hello Everyone,
From the title you probably guessed I am getting ready to Celebrate Christmas Early!  And I am so excited that it is only 3 months away, can you believe it?
Are you ready to celebrate?  Do you have a hand made Advent Calendar to help you celebrate, or would you like to make one?

This is the Advent Calendar created by Anne Boundy of Said With Love.

Anne is hosting a Sew Along to make your own Advent Calendar, it is a relaxed Sew Along and there is no pressure, but I know I will be so excited to hang mine up on December 1st, here are the dates for the Sew Along.

Our Sew Along Schedule

26th September – purchase the pattern (a PDF will be emailed to you), select your fabric and start cutting
3rd October – start making the pockets
10th October – finish all the pockets (there are 25 of them to make!)
17th October – make the tree main section and borders
24th October – sewing on the buttons
31st October – catch up
7th November – quilting and binding
14th November – round up of the sew along
If you are on Instagram you can show your progress with the hashtag #SWLAdventCalendarSAL

I must admit my favorite part was decorating the tree, it went from this

to this.

added some buttons on the tree with metallic thread and little puffed up presents underneath.

The big buttons were fun to put on too, especially with my button pins, haha.

Taking photos of it was hard, since it does come out to a fairly large size, I had to stand on a chair in order to get a full picture of it and our little stray kitty was wondering just what I was doing.

I have it all packed up right now and can't wait for the next 68 days to pass so I can hang it up properly.

I was a pattern tester for the Said With Love Advent Calendar, but I do love this pattern, it is charm pack friendly and you use all of the little pieces of fabric, and this will be a family treasure.
Are you going to join us in the Sew Along?  You can find the pattern here.

FABulous Home Sewn

I want to introduce you to my friend Fenna of FABulous Home Sewn, go on over to her blog and browse around, she sews lots of things for her kids, she has 5!!
You can read more about her in the Canadian Pattern Designer Blog Hop, where she was featured this summer as one of the Great Canadian Designers!
And she makes the most wonderful patterns that make up great gifts for children or even for yourself, she is working on a handbag right now the pattern should be out soon and it looks fantastic.

She is giving one of her patterns above, the winners choice, to my 4 Kids Christmas Swap Participants, who made their mosaics and posted them on IG.

Drumroll.......And the winner is: Threehoneybees,   Congratulations!!!

Here are a few more pictures and some links to more of what I have made with her patterns, I have the Perfect Petal Purse and the Pirates Treasure Wallet, all of her patterns can be found on Craftsy.

 It is so hard to find something to sew up for boys, I have made these for my nephews and 2 for my son, the picture below shows it in action, he loves being able to pay for things by himself.

I have made 4 perfect petal purses, now I cheat a little when making them, I sew the interfacing onto a strip of fabric when making the leaves and then I sew the strips right sides together around the cut out leaf interfacing and then cut the leaves with my wavy rotary cutter, it makes making this purse super easy and can be done within one day and looks super adorable!  See more pictures here, with that change to the pattern.

 A BEE-autiful Sunflower Perfect Petal Purse, I just doubled the petals on this one.

Do I have any money?

More photos can be found here, here, here and here.