2017 Wk 17 - Mostly Trees and Orange

I've been working, on and off, on my Wendy Dolan treescape.
I attacked my naked appliqué with paint

Hmmmm, not feeling the love!

This has taken me right out of my comfort zone, but I have been encouraged by Plum's version of a more architectural themed design

(Stolen from Plum's blog - hope she'll forgive me!)
So I started with FMQ

And some hand stitching, and now it's looking like this

More flowers are growing on the hill!
Meanwhile the embroidery machine is *still* working hard - the dark red tops have been done, and I'm now on the orange ones!

I'll be back when there is something other than flowers or embroidered orange tshirts to show you!
UPDATE
The flowers are finished! Good night

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2017 Wk 16- mostly boring

I been embroidering uniforms for what feels like weeks - and I'm about half way through!
However the advantage of having to be in the room while the machine is countering away is just that . . . I have to be in the room so I might as well do *something* between each item

So I've almost made a second tunic dress, this time with a V neck (it will get hemmed soon)
And in case you think I'm exaggerating - here's 65 of the 115 items this time!

Back to work tomorrow for a rest!

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2017 Wk 16 - Mostly Recycling

Today was Crafty Church day, and also World Earth Day

So we decided to look at recycling projects

I had my selvedge and denim quilt

Tara shared a lush necklace made from stretchy velvet.

Did you know that stretch velvet cut in one direction curls to show the inside, and a perpendicular cut encourages it to curl to show the outside

Worth knowing if you want to make a lush necklace!!

Tara cut several lengths about 1" wide, stretched then until there was no stretch left, joined the ends in one section and wrapped one length around the joints.

It makes an awesome necklace!

Lynne decided to recycle a badminton racket as a fun garden ornament for the autistic garden at the school where she works


Hope you are well and happy, and had a great WEDay

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2017 Week 15 - mostly out of our comfort zone

We started the Wendy Dolan treescape but then found ourselves hindered by the lack of paints, so these have been put away for another day

So instead we started work on the next section of Jackie's Small World.
Let's just take a minute to love what she's done so far ...

The next section needs mini hexies, mini dreson plate pieces and FOUR mini New York Beauty blocks! Gulp!

These, plus two more became this . . .

and will go with these on the final panel. (We are rather pleased with ourselves)

I can't wait to see the end result!
Now sadly I'm at the airport ready to fly home. Thank you Jackie - as always I had a wonderful time! Love you xxx

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2017 Wk 15 - Mostly Perfecting Pouches

As well as finishing the binding on our wall hangings we have made a new boxy pouch each.

We've made several similar ones over the past years:

But these went together better than the rest!
I use the blue one in the bigger photo to take my electronic stuff on holiday - chargers, plugs, cables etc. I also like to take a three way extension lead to make it easier to access sockets, and to give me more rockets. It also means I only need one uk-to-other converter and I can use my own uk plugs. BUT . . . the extension lead doesn't really fit in the blue pouch, so we custome made one.
Jackie already had some fabric she'd quilted for a long forgotten project, so this was quicker to make than it looks. It all came together perfectly (with no instructions or plans!) We cut the top and bottom to 1/2 A4 size which would fit the extension lead, and cut a piece of quilted fabic the right length for for the front and two sides - the zip luckily was the right length for this! We cut a 1.5" strip off the long edge of the fabric and stitched the zip in between these two strips. I pinned these in place on the base so I could see how much would be needed for the back . . . Pretty much exactly what was left over! We added this section of quilted fabric for the back and stitched it all together and it fitted perfectly. The fusible fleece wadding helped, as did the decision to love the raw seam edges inside! They can be overcast if needed, but for now it (they, there are of course two) do their job perfectly!
Either we are getting better or . . . Actually, let's just say we ARE getting better!!!!
Tomorrow - something new! We have a Wendy Dolan book and kit so we are taking ourselves out of our comfort zone to make a tree scape !!!

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2017 Wk 15 - Mostly chuffed with ourselves

Hello from Ireland! Only a short trip this time - just two nights so packing in as much as we can.

We made two of these today

And it's twin

They were inspired by this page which someone photocopied for me (sorry, I can't credit the original magazine)

But we decided to change so many bits that it's only 'inspired by' rather than using the instructions!!
We used IKEA skirt hangers, and added thread strips

We added a removable thread catcher

And a vinyl pocket along the bottom

We are rather pleased with ourselves !!!! What next?

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2017 Wk 14 - Mostly 15 Minutes of Fun

Hope you love this as much as I do!

I've had a busy week working at both admin jobs, and a big delivery of polo-shirts and sweatshirts to be embroidered, so no dedicated sewing time, but in 15 minutes of sewing most nights my black and white charm squares progressed from this

to this (stitched in pairs) (I love love LOVE my "cutting gizmo")

and then to this

and then I have established they can progress to this

I wasn't sure if it would work as it involves a bit of a bodge with the embroidery machine, but I have proved to myself I can make perfect circle porthole applique without the struggle of sewing any circles myself - yippee!!

I just need to finish all the customer embroidery (and join all my two square blocks into four patches) then I can start to plod through my own embroidery and make this fun quilt I have in my head

2017 Wk 14 - Mostly Chertsey (lino printing)

The Chertsey Project this month was lino printing.  A first for most  - but we managed some great results with only two plasters needed!!!

If you click on the pictures they will go to full size.

We had bunnies,with and without carrots

geometric shapes

and flowers and bees carved from the lino blocks

 And one girl used magic blocks instead of lino blocks.  We heated the blue foam on the iron plate (about 35 seconds) then pressed it onto knotted rope.  The details of the rope came out fab in the foam, but not when we added paint and pressed onto fabric.  By the end of the 90 minutes we have managed to progress to making a positive impression by using a second heated block pressed onto the original, and then painted the positive and used the negative to ensure the fabric was pushed against all the paint!  We were rather please with ourselves!

2017 Wk 13 - Mostly Mono

I've finally had a bit of time to spend in the sewing room - mostly tidying up!!! I haven't even unpacked the linens, but thought I just might cut unto the black and whites!
So this . . .

. . . has become this!

180 black & white and white & black charm squares!

At some stage they will become 45 four patches, which will then have a shot of colour added to each one. (Some are spare as I have no idea whether my cunning plan will *actually* work!)
Fed up with the monotonous monotone I also had a quick play with the flag fabric I picked up - and made two zippy pouches, one for each set of travel plugs we have!

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