easter basket sewing

I've had the pleasure of spending a little more free time making things again lately. I've missed sewing for fun, when I'm so busy doing all the other activities involved with running Oliver + S.

This is a linen basket from the Zakka Sewing book. It makes up really quickly and easily. The size is great: a little smaller than 4" square. It could easily be enlarged for other purposes, but I'm planning to make more of them in this size to hold random sewing bits near my sewing machines at home and at the studio. (More images of project from the book here, and I blogged about the book a while ago here.)

I decided to repurpose this project to make an Easter basket for Tsia. Add an embroidered face, button eyes, and two sticky-up ears, and voila:


Just the right size for a few little springtime treats for S, who already noticed it and sneakily informed me she wanted, "Santa (Santa?) to bring me a little bag. One with ears." So subtle, she is.

I guess the surprise with this Easter basket will have to be the contents therein--about which she's already asking.... (That little heart tin is a smelly soap from Oilily. Yum.)

If you'd like to make your own Easter basket based on the pattern from the book, here is a download of the face and the ears that I used to make mine. You'll need some stiff interfacing for the ears, which get sewn into the top edge of the bag. Use the notches on the base of the ear pattern as a guide to help you fold approximately one third of the outside edge of the ear toward the center before you stitch it into place. The fold helps the ears to stand up and gives them a little dimension. Hippity hop!