Written by Ali Burdon of Very Berry Handmade

FEATURED SUPPLIER! – Stitch Me Lane

Jennifer Gilmour has a background in sculpture, but is also a stitchaholic! She designs patterns, makes some of her own clothes & sells her lovely handmade wares on Folksy at Shop Stitch Me Lane . But she also shares her passion for fabric in another Folksy shop – Stitch Me Lane Fabrics.

Jennifer stocks a good selection of quirky and colourful fabrics by popular makes such as Robert Kaufman, Michael Miller, Alexander Henry, Timeless Treasures and Westminster.

The prices are excellent – ranging from £2.10 to £2.99 for a Fat Quarter, and according to her feedback comments, she is also a specialist at getting your fabric in the post as soon as possible.

Jennifer currently has a sale on so that she can make room for new stock, so there’s all the more reason to go and see what she has available.

FOLKSY FINDS! - Fabric Covered Buttons

Click the images for more details of how to get your hands on these gorgeous supplies!

Sewing Tips! – Buying quilting cottons

If you are new or new-ish to buying quilting cottons for making homewares, accessories or patchwork then it can all be a bit confusing. Fabric is sold in all kinds of measurements, bundles, packs and collections. This isn’t a definitive list, because some individual shops and manufacturers have their own names for fabric packs, but here’s a quick guide to some of the more commonly available packs & measurements.

Fat Quarter (FQ) – a quarter of metre (or yard) of fabric measuring around 50x55cm (18×22″), i.e., half a metre of fabric cut from a bolt and then cut in half parallel to the selvedge. A Skinny Quarter is just a quarter of a metre cut from the bolt & measures approx 25x112cm or (9×44″).

Fat Eigth – is not surprisingly, half a fat quarter.

Charm Pack – a pack of 40 or more 5″ squares of different fabrics (often from one designer’s or manufacturer’s collection).

Layer Cake – like a charm pack, but the squares are 10″.

Jelly Roll – a tightly rolled pack of 2.5″ strips of lots of different fabrics (often from one designer’s or manufacturer’s collection).

Bundle – a themed collection of Fat Quarters put together by retailers. The themes can be colours, tones, designers, collections, patterns…

This article was kindly written for the Folksy blog by Ali Burdon of Very Berry Handmade

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