Enlarging a Zip!

I can see all of you thinking the woman's gone mad!  You cannot enlarge a zip!  I needed a 24" (61cm) for a large cushion cover, they were not available in the shop I work in so I thought two 12" (30 cm) zips will work! 

Pin the zips with the top ends facing each other and overlap the spare fabric at the ends.  Insert the zip as you would normally.  Complete the cushion cover in the normal way.  You can put them in closer together if you wish I wanted the zips to fit exactly to the fabric.

This works for bags and cushions

Patchwork

Like everything, if you want something done well then take it slowly and carefully.

I always press fabric I am going to stitch together first,  the pressing with the iron seems to stick the pieces together. Add the next piece after you have pressed the seams flat.  As time goes on you will find this becomes easy.
Press the seams flat add the next piece and so on........

Get to know your machine.  The instructions in my book to make a patchwork square says machine a scant quarter of an inch.  I don't have a quarter inch marked on the needle plate, so I marked the first pieces of  fabric a quarter inch in from edge with pencil and placed it under the presser foot and placed the needle on the mark by hand then carefully machined a line of stitches.   As you see quarter of an inch takes me to the one of Feed Dogs.  Each sewing machine is different so find a mark you can remember. 

If you are machining a lot of squares at the same time machine them in a chain - Slowly and Carefully Do Not speed your way through the process as this can distort fabric and make the stitches uneven,