Embellished Tea Towels

I'm not sure if I mentioned it or not but the company I work for was bought out in July by a new company.

 

For those of you that don't know I am a fabric sales representative and have the honor of visiting quilt shops encouraging them to buy the fabric for the company I represent. 

 

Before the sale I represented one line of fabric and now I have three.

 

Along with the buyout came a President that is very much present and involved and there are now weekly conference calls.  Our main headquarters are in New York so these conference calls are rather early.

  7:00 a.m. for me on the west coast. 

I am not a morning person.

  Especially at 7:00 a.m. but I am a team player plus Jim gets up at 6:30 and can I also say naps are GOOD. 

 

Last week Scott, our president, shared the idea we should bring a little something at each appointment.  He liked the idea of coffee or doughnuts. 

 

One of the reps mentioned she embellished tea towels for her shops.

 

I do make mug rugs and leave at shops I don't have appointments at as a way to introduce myself which have my business card attached.

 

 

 And  I also have made a few shop samples of bags for some of my stores but I don't normally leave a little something at every shop I visit.

 

Today I focused on making tea towels.

 

I found this great tutorial by Lil Luna. 

 

And of course I might have done a little bit of tweeking. 

From three  1/8" cut of fabrics you are able to make two tea towels.

You can also use three fat quarters and make 4 tea towels.

 

I cut 4" the width of the fabric to make two tea towels.

 

Since each purchased tea towel is unique I waited to trim. I bought my tea towels at Tuesday Morning and TJMaxx and the cost per towel was about $2.00 each.

 

 

 

Once you sew your strips together you can trim them 1/2" from the edges before sewing.

 

 

I  turned in the top and bottom 1/2" and sewed rather then 1/4" twice.

 

I also stitched in the ditch down the center seam.

 

 

 

 

I made 14 embellished tea towels today.

 

I am ready to hit the road this upcoming week and start showing our fabric lines that are being shown at the October market in Houston..

 

Don't know of the sweatshop, ME, is going to be able to keep up with the pace of manufacturing.

 

.