2020 Wk 9 Play date fun

The lovely Tara from Crafty Church came to play today.  She brought this panel she had made at a class where she learnt to draw and write with a sewing machine, and we turned it into a cushion

While Tara was sewing her projects I was cutting t-shirts to size for a T-shirt quilt for a customer.  I wanted (needed) a quilters square 15 inches square, but don’t have one and couldn't find one to buy - so I butted a 12.5” square to a 2.5” ruler and topped them off with an over lapping 4” ruler: worked a dream and no duct tape residue when I pulled it all off!

This cushion is going to be gifted with a pack of fabric pens so it can coloured in - put to add to the pizazz Tara wanted to add bright pom-poms. . . It was a fair amount of flaffing to get it right but doesn't it look great

Come on Tara - show us how chuffed you are!!!

2020 Wk 8 - customer, fabric and crochet

Crochet fun - the blanket I started at Jackie’s has grown - I'm on at least the 4th colour (the jury is undecided whether the first few rows are a different colour)

And Lisa’s first Persian tile has been done - isn’t this lush!

Mum has just got back from visiting my brother in Oz.  She picked up a jelly roll of Australian Fabrics . . . I need to clear the decks so I can get stitching!

I was asked to embroider a logo and company name onto some tabbards.  I don’t know what I was thinking when I quoted for one small logo for each one.  That covered the girl, but the writing was bigger, and more annoyingly on a wide pocket stitched down the middle.  I had to unpick the sewing, embroider, and then re-sew the pocket!  Dope!!!  Anyway it’s done , delivered and paid for now!

I went on line shopping for green (grass and trees) fabric for a project , somehow these other colours fell into the basket🤦🏼‍♀️

2020 Wk 7 - in Ireland with Dennis (and Jackie!)

Storm Dennis has hit Ireland and means it’s too blustery and too wet to venture outside - so sewing and crochet has mostly featured this the weekend!

So what have we made?

I was given a load of shirt fabric and brought over what seemed like far too much: we cut it into 4.5” x 8.5” bricks and stared sewing - each fabric is different so no auditioning.   It’s made about 1/4 of a king sized quilt so far, it’s lucky there is plenty more samples left at home so we can do some more next time we meet up

We made some cork baskets (some hand sewing needed)

We made a Pepper Pig quilt for little miss L - to be delivered tomorrow

We learnt that two FQ packs from Aldi cut into 8.5” squares just needs two extra blocks to made a flimsy that fits an Ikea fleece with *just* enough left over to make 2” binding and hardly any waste!

I’ve learnt a new crochet stitch and am making this blanket (waiting impatiently for the first colour change!)

Jackie’s Tunisian crochet

And my travel project has been more chambray hexies!

2020 Wk 6 - hexies and hexies

The lovely ladies at Chertsey Museum (all SIXTEEN of them!!!) were working on modern hexies today - no paper templates, we just started with circles and a bit of clever folding gave us these perfect hexies

 I’ve been in a chambray hexie state of mind - tacking and stitching these yummy fabrics together ...

To add new cuffs to a denim top

At Knitting and Stitching show last autumn I bought a few sheets of “Happy Fabric” - stuff that can be cut to shape and ironed on to fabric.  I didn’t really have a plan for it, and busy the time I did I realised I didn’t have the right colours!  What’s a girl to do?  Buy more of course!

I now have my Christmas 2020 t-shirt ready!

And finally a few photos showing the 21st century problems I had getting a photos of the new cuffs😂

2020 Wk 6 - Just checking in

I have received all the January hexies (no theme)  from from the UKQU Hexie Swap group

And have made the next groups of flowers for the February Mardi Gras theme

They all have a small silver mask embroidered in the centre hexi

I have embroidered this design twelve times for church

And this bag has been re purposed - I love the design and the fabrics, but the colours didn't go with any coat, jacket or cardigan that I own! 

A friend commented that she loved it -  "just my colours" - so that prompted me ... I used up the left over squares from the Janet Clare / BFL Quilt and made myself another one in exactly "my" colours

And I added a deep slip pockets for credit cards, keys or phone

And the crochet has grown: I'm finally on the second ball . . .  but it's misshapenness is becoming even more obvious!  I hope blocking can work miracles!!!

2020 Wk 5 - catching up

The lovely Amo messaged me to ask if I was ok - I hadn’t realised it’s been so long since I blogged!

Thank you yes - I’m fine.  It’s just that all of my little jobs (which are independently sometimes busy, sometimes quiet) got busy at the same time🥴

However when I thought about it, I do try and spend an few hours with husband through out the day and that usually involves the TV being on but me sewing or crocheting - so there has been some progress!

I made six hexie flowers for the FB hexie swap I’m a member of

My hexi rounds quilt has reached a natural pause as I’m out of hexies

I’m teaching a modern crewel class in a few months and have been playing with a sample - it’s tote bag and I’m having fun filling the random circles

The Plus Quilt has grown a bit

And in other news, Husband has re-varnished the garden table

And Lisa has finished her Ferris wheel crochet - isn’t it great!

2020 Wk 2 - memories quilt

I’ve finally stitched together what looks like a fairly basic quilt

The Janet Clare fabrics really spoke to me and with her help I created some FMQ embroidered blocks of images that I associate with holidays with my father.  I added some embroidery machine designs I created that also “belonged” and put them all together this afternoon

The fabrics show very nautical images - lots of different boats - and trees and red cottages, and birds and seaweed from the island, and weather; particularly wind and rain which the west coast of Norway is well known for

There are ten or eleven embroidered squares - this Viking ship and the rose are reminders of his memorial service 18 months ago.

 These are the FMQ blocks from before

Now I just need to find time to bind it!!

I have also finished the temperature embroidery, (difficult to photograph 15 foot x 2 inches!)

 And the Red Velvet crochet has grown a bit

And a final gingerbread man has finished some weaving - and will be a pressie for a young lady who helped me with a weaving project!

2020 Wk 1 - Hexie Round

The Hexie Round is getting really rather big - to sew one hexie on at a time is a lot of holding a big flimsy, so I've been making it easier for myself.

I have tacked what feels like a zillion pieces, and sorted them into light and dark - and here are the darks for the next round.

I've stitched them into rows about a dozen hexies long (wide?) - the next round needs 14 on each side

I've now speed-dated the strips - first attempt:

But these two blues are too similar to be next to each other

So I can slide the row along and separate the blues. 

I can add the extra hexies to the row or to the flimsy, and I'll probably do the same with the two circles of light hexies - speed-date them and add them to the darks then add all three rows to the flimsy in one go

And I thought I'd share some of my gorgeous Christmas pressies

And the prayer weaving we did at the Christingle service on Christmas Eve

And the penultimate gingers - two of these for Niki's teacher friends