Thank you to everyone who entered my giveaway and participated in the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day event.  I had a lot of fun reading new blogs and the comments on my giveaway post. 

The winner for prize package #1 is: ♥Duff (comment made on May 23, 2012 7:52 PM)

The winner for prize package #2 is Beth (comment made on May 23, 2012 8:10 AM)

The winners have been sent an email and have 48 hours to claim their prize.  Thank you again to everyone who participated.  Check in from time to time for new tutorials and new giveaways. (hint, hint)

It's been a long week and I have been up to my eyeballs counting new inventory of sewing labels that arrived last week.  Back in 2008 with the help of some of my online friends, I started designing sewing labels for the home sewist because the only ones I could find were less than cute or stylish at the fabric stores.  I wanted to have a wide selection of stylish and universal labels to add to my sewing projects, so why not just do it myself.  And so that is what I did and designing labels slowly turned into a business.  (I ran out of storage space.) Four years later, I'm still putting my designs on labels to share with the creative crafters out there in addition to my other artistic pursuits. 

Since I recently completed inventory on new designs, I thought I would try something different and do a giveaway on my blog. 

There are two prize packages comprised of two different groups of 25 labels.  Each group has 5 different designs of sewing labels. There is a mix of woven, flat and fold over labels as well as satin printed fold over labels.  There will be two separate giveaways consisting of 50 labels total in each drawing.  I have divided the labels into four "collections" with a different theme and designs in each group.  Click on the photos for a closer view.  Instructions are below on how to enter the giveaway.  I would love for you to follow this blog but it's not required.  I have several new tutorials in mind to share soon, so check back often.

The first two collections for Prize Package 1 :

"Hip Collection" Consists of 25 labels, five of each design.  All are woven labels.  The heart is a fold over style with a design on each side.

"Patterns Collection". Consists of 25 labels, five of each design.  Four out of the five are woven labels. The chevron labels on the top right are satin fold over.

The "Critters" Collection. Set of 25 total, five of each design. Twenty are flat, woven, sew on labels and five are satin printed fold over labels, (the bird).

"The Nature and Blooms Set"  Consists of 25 labels, five of each design. All are woven labels, the mushroom is a fold over style with a design on each side. Side note: It is perfect for sewing into the seam of a messenger or tote style bag.

 To participate,  Use the rafflecopter widget below to enter  leave a comment in the comment section telling me which collection you like the best and what you would use the labels on.

*One extra note - These labels have already been manufactured and cannot be altered in any way.  I can create a custom design for the purpose of being made into a clothing label, but I cannot make the actual label itself nor facilitate the making of the label.


I will be selecting TWO winners.  This giveaway will end on Friday, May 25th, 2012 at 5PM PDT.  Those outside of the USA are welcome to participate. I seem to have made almost every mistake possible yesterday when I posted this on the Sew Mama Sew site. I listed it under domestic shipping only but I will ship international.  I will announce the winners on Saturday, May 26th.



** This widget doesn't work with my blog format. Of course I find this out AFTER I set it up. I'm sorry.  Go ahead and leave a reply in the comment section. Everyone who has entered with the rafflecopter so far will still be counted. I'm going to shut it down and let you use the comments section.

a'>http://www.rafflecopter.com">a Rafflecopter giveaway


This promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Facebook, Blogger or any other groups or identities.

• You must be 18 to enter.
• VOID where prohibited.
• You must leave a contact email if you reply to the post as a "no-reply", otherwise if selected, you will automatically be passed over and a new winner will need to be selected. 
• If the winner does not claim their prize within 48 hours of being contacted, a new winner will be selected.
• The prize package will be shipped within two business days once winners have claimed their prize. 
• Once the winning item is mailed, it is out of my hands as far as liability and I cannot be held responsible for the item being lost or damaged. 
• By participating in this contest, you release the host (Night Owl's Menagerie) from any type of liability.

Thank you for stopping by and thank you Sew Mama Sew. I'm looking forward to reading and discovering some great blogs this week.

**UPDATE**  To find this pattern go to Craftsy to Elysium patterns.  Elysium Patterns


I apologize for not updating this post.  I had so many problems with the internet and more that I did not update this post.  I hope I can be forgiven or at least given a pass for now.
Please go to Elysium Patterns to download this pattern. Please use this for charity or personal use.  Thank you.

During the month of April, our friend Kristy at Hopeful Threads ran a Dress A Girl project where she challenged readers to make at least 100 dresses by the end of the month.  This was a fantastic project that resulted in over 300 dresses donated to the Dress A Girl Around The World organization.  Kristy really rocked that project and inspired me to start making dresses for little girls in need thousands of miles away. 

I started looking for a dress pattern that would be not only fast and easy to sew but did not require much fabric.  Confession time. I have a slight, well, okay a big fabric stash that consists of one yard and under fabrics.  This always poses a problem when I need to sew larger items and I end up going to the fabric store and buying more fabric for that project and maybe just a bit more because it's pretty.  Sound familiar?  Another confession.  I do not like the pillowcase dress. Feel free to throw tomatoes, it just doesn't appeal to me at all. I wanted to sew some sturdy, modest but cute dresses that would not require a lot of fabric and I didn't want to mess with buttons, snaps, elastic, drawstrings or zippers.  My long list was starting to sound like John Cusack's big job monologue in Say Anything. But I digress.
I was being selective and looking for the perfect dress which I was not having any luck with.  What does one do when they are being picky and nonproductive? They whine to their talented pattern making friend of course.  My friend Carisa of Elysium did not hesitate to help me draft a pattern for charity.  She took my drawing of what I had to have in a dress and turned it into an adorable, fast to sew and modest dress called, The Good Deeds Dress Pattern.  The pattern takes about one hour to make.  It doesn't require much fabric and has no snaps, elastic, buttons, zippers or any type of fasteners.  The only requirement is bias tape, thread and fabric.  It's quick and easy.

We didn't quite make the April Dress A Girl project deadline, but the dress is available now to download.  The link to the pdf is here on my blog but make sure you check out Carisa's blog for updates and to read her side of the story on how we came up with the dress.

Also in the weeks to come, please check back here and on Carisa's blog to see tutorials on how to embellish the Good Deeds Dress Pattern with pockets, ruffles and other cute additions. There are a lot of ways to fancy it up and make it unique. Stay tuned for those tutorials.

Carisa's usual policy is to welcome individuals to sew and sell garments made from Elysium patterns. However, this pattern is geared towards charity and goodwill sewing and as such she kindly asks that garments made with this particular pattern not be sold for profit. Feel free to make a dress for your daughter, grandchild or next door neighbor, but please be ethical and keep this pattern for personal use only. Also, please note that this pattern is the intellectual property of Elysium and sale or reproduction of the pattern itself is prohibited. And last, if you know someone who would like to download the pattern, please be kind send them a link to us and not the pattern itself.

We would love to see the dresses you create.  You are welcome to post pictures in the Elysium Patterns flickr pool http://www.flickr.com/groups/elysiumpatterns/. 

I hope that you will feel inspired to make dresses for Dress A Girl Around The World or a similar organization.  If you have seen the pleased look on your own child when you make an outfit for them, imagine how a child who's never owned something new would feel to be handed a pretty dress made just for them that they can keep. 

The Good Deeds Dress Pattern   

This pattern is currently unavailable because we do not have a place to host the file.  Please be patient.