2021 Week 39

 These are some of the photos from the making last weekend with Jackie: boxy pouches and semi circular ones

and a vinyl one for crochet and knitting markers

A frined / ginger fan recently ran the Windsor Marathon so I made her a ginger to commemorate it!

I was back at Chertsey Museum on Friday for the second class since lockdowns began.  We had some great show and tell from last month

And they all did really well making these pouches from an Aneela Hoey book 

I finished the straps on my bag from Jackie

And I found the remaining September Hexies - some had been attached to the flimsy I'm making with them

I've made some Gingers too: breast cancer week ios coming up soon, alkong with a children's mental health campaign

 

One customer ordered a ballerina and a book reader

 

and another order a set of the 2020 Christmas Gingers

meanwhile I am working on 2021 Christmas Gingers

2019 Wk 44 - Irish Retreat

I managed to spend the weekend at my very favourite place - Jackie's!!!  The saga of the flights showed the carrier as so utterly incompetent you wouldn't believe me if I told you! Suffice to say they eventually issued the tickets that I had paid for three weeks earlier, refunded the monies they shouldn't have taken (5 debits totaling > 3 x flight costs), gave me two apologetic chunks of compensation, and I managed to get to Dublin at the planned time!

So what did we do???

We spent a lot of the weekend in this awesome room!!!

We made two nappy clutch bags (we finished the hand sewing on the other one first as it had to be gifted, and it never made the photo session!)

A quilted pocket on the outside (phone?) and a clipped strap so it can be clipped to a buggy or pram

and two zipped mesh pockets on the inside for nappies and wipes.  All machine washable

We also made these sewing tool cases: two big zipped pockets outside, and I think I counted 29 pockets inside - some zipped, some slip, some vinyl, some mesh and some quilted.  We used Annie soft and stable, and in places there are at least three layers plus fabric, vinyl and zip - and now we have to add bias binding.  I really love the design, but we've made a sheet of notes as to how to do it differently next time (it doesn't need quite so many pockets (5 of them are zipped!) or quite so much padding!

We also made some more boxy zip-on-top pouches, trialing different types of stabiliser.  I think my old favourite of fusible fleece was best

Based on the nappy clutch and the tool case, and the Sewing Folio we made from Aneela's book we then designed our own caddy.  ("Design" might imply thinking about it in advance but don't be fooled!)

We used Aneela's rough size, and used another design from the book as inspiration to make one vinyl pocket with zips at both ends, then stitch through the middle to make it two pockets

Two vinyl pockets got added to the other side (one zipped, one not), and a zipped mesh pocket

And it folds into a clutch great for holiday / travel projects.  Mine will be for hexies, and Jackie switched the slip in vinyl pocket to a padded pocket with stitching to create small sections and will use hers for her knitting needle set that has interchangeable needles and circles of different lengths

What else?  While Jackie and her sewing machine were battling the layers in the tool case, I cut a whole load of 6x10" squares from a pack of Kaffe Fassett fabrics.  She's going to make the shadow box quilt ... and I tidied up the remains and cut myself a whole load on 3 inch squares to make something like this 

We did get some fresh air over the weekend.  Jackie's youngest, Paul, plays hurling for the local team.  They were playing against the "two-time All-Ireland club champions" in the quarter finals and beat them!!!!!

It was a very exciting match (and traumatic for other reasons), and I've got a bit closer to understanding the game!  After my first match six years ago I described the rules here

Finally though I had to leave.  On the two flights and some occasional chatting-and-hand-sewing sessions I attached all the hexies I had brought, so I'm now ready to join these to the hexi round

2019 Wk 41 - Working with Jackie

Working (ie sewing) with Jackie . . . and shopping with Jackie at the Alexandra Palace Knitting and Stitching show makes for a pretty fab weekend!

We made a couple of 'Fold Up Sewing Folio's from Aneela Hoey's Stitched Sewing Organisers book (we had to put an elastic strap on as we didn't have enough fabric for the fastening strap)

And these Stash and Go drawstring bags

(the mint zippie was a repair for oldest daughter)

The lovely Kathy sent us instructions on how to make her Japanese Eco market tote bag and we made these

These pouches came from this blog and although they took more than the promised ten minutes, they were really quick to make

These Handy Fold-up pouches also came from Aneela's book

and prompted this larger i-pad sized version

And finally we made Emmaline's retreat bag (just one got photographed!)

Not bag for really just a day and a half of sewing as we also spent a day at the Knitting and Stitching show!

I bought some great iron on plastic from Happy Fabric (this is my first test piece)

and some felted sheets to line some tube mittens

Some additional shades of pearle quilting threads, and some Advent calendar ribbons, together with some felt that is a bit more 'gingerbread man' coloured

And a skein of sari scraps with should allow me to make a scarf like this one

2018 Wk 32 - Sewing with Jackie

Despite starting with a tidy sewing room, Jackie and I soon descended into the "organised chaos" that is our usual working state!

Most of the time there was at least two projects on the go, plus Lizzy the embroidery machine doing her stuff, and probably something else needing unpicking!

We made another zip up tray pouch - pattern from Aneela Hooey  We love this design! (and this will get finished!) 

And Lizzy was put to good use while we made an embroidered taggie for baby Leah, and a ring cushion for Claire who gets married at the end of the month

We made four project bags, inspired by Running With Homemade's Lama Drama field bag with zippy pouches

And we made big bucket bags based on Ashley's  Around Town bag

As well as all the making I decided to carry on with the bobbin winding that I'd been doing at Chertsey:  I have far too many threads: mostly those small ones that come with sewing kits and are useless thread - I thought if I wound them onto the bobbins I'd bought for the Chertsey class (yes, I bought far too many, but they were really cheap!) I could make some more bobbin necklaces - the empties are in the middle - quite a quantity reductions!

And don't the bobbins look so pretty!

2018 wk 7 - Irish retreat

I’m at Jackie’s for a lovely long weekend.  Sewing has been a bit slow but chat and catchup and cuppas has more than filled any gaps!!!

We made cork boxy pouches


We made a leather zippy pouch and coin purse


We made a blocking octagon so these yummy crocheted octies can be blocked before being joined


And we’ve worked out a way to join these La Passigalia cogs


Jackie had made a knitting project bag (from Attic 24) but it stretched as stuff was added.  We folded a length of fabric into four, then drew around the bag also folded in 4 and ended up with this shape.  We’ve stitched into a lining shape and are now joining it to the bag.