Whimsical Woodland Mug Rug Swap

I have been sewing my heart out whenever I get a chance and I have many things I want to show you. For this post I am going to focus on the things I made for the "Whimsical Woodland Mug Rug Swap" over on Instagram.

Inspiration finally struck and I came up with this little mug rug. I have reverse appliqued adorable Heather Ross gnomes into a little mushroom house and garden.

The actual mug rug for the mug rug swap. :) To reverse applique I just put my gnomes face down on the back of the project, stitched around them and then carefully cut away the fabric from the front. The edges will fray and become fuzzy over time. I like this because it's like we all have x-ray vision and can see into the mushroom and the flower bed and see the little gnomes that are hidden in there.

A closer view. I found the quote "Trust not in Sprites nor the Motivations of a Gnome" when I Googled gnome quotes. I think it's a line from a movie? Anyway, I love it for this project.

I just sewed this little needle book up this afternoon. Remember I said in this post that I wanted to make one for the swap? So here it is.

This is a pattern in the book "Scrap Quilt Projects" from Vivebooks.

Here is the back.

I also decorated a tea towel for a swap extra.

This swap is going out in the mail on Tuesday. I think my partner will love it. I hope she will! :)

I am happily linking up this finish in the Q1 linky for the The 2015 Finish Along. This was number 9 on my list of goals in this Q1 goals post.