2024 April

 I have a few customers who make patchwork quilts and are very organised about wanting labels for them, so I've been doing some designing and stitching

I made some fabric bowls as a sample for a class, now I just need to get some fabric that can be suitably fussy cut

We had made pincushions-in-glass-jars at Chertsey museum, and some came back for show and tell

as did a finished purse

And for April we all made felt rabbits thanks to Stephanie who led the class

A future class (I hope you are impressed how organised I am!) involves crayon pictures which then have the wax iron out of them and are then over stitched

These are my samples

The top one is based on a stained glass window in my grandmother's house which is now at my aunt's  It isn't a typically Norwegian scene but I though it would be easy to copy.

My favourite is Hamish!

One of my favourite girls in the village is representing England in the World Cheer Leading championships.  Its a bit demeaning to call it cheer leading - its more like synchronised gymnastics if you want to watch their GOLD MEDAL performance it's here.  I am beyond delighted for her!  The training and dedication from all the girls is incredible.  Me?  I just embroidered on t-shirts for mum and dad!

I bought a tray / table from Ikea, in the as-seen section.  It was all black and a bit scratched.  The lovely Hayley drew on some flowers and we did some painting together

And I finished it off and poured resin over to seal the paint

Talking of Hayley, as well as being a fab artist, she is also the queen of charity shops!  She bought a half square triangle bed sized quilt (if you're not a patchworker it's made up of squared made up of two triangles)

She bought a fleece blanket and a gilet (to get the zip) and made this fab jacket for less than £15!

Lisa has been making too - this hexi flimsy was 90% finished but she wanted to move on to something else (husband is the same - 90% is good enough?) so I added the final row of not-hexies to give a straight edge

This is another one she has been working on since she her own sewing machine at Christmas - this got layered for quilting and she tells me she's done half the echo quilting (and is finding it boring!)

Niki is happier creating with food that with fabric - she and George have bought a pizza oven so we had a lovely afternoon trailing different bases, tomato sauces, cheeses etc.

Although I'm really please with the kitchen since we got the new doors and work surfaces, it's not big enough for the stuff I've got, so a while ago (during that year when we couldn't go anywhere or see anyone) we put up some cupboards on top of existing cupboards to make more storage

 It was never lovely, the various layers of cupboards came from different ranges to suit our plans and everything was off set for a variety of reasons, but it did make a LOT of storage.

So a few weeks ago, the washing machine came out of the downstairs loo (that space is needed for something else), the spare larder unit that came from Lisa's kitchen and the assortment of white units came down and went up in a new configuration

 

Once the larder unit door is replaced with white it'll look OK, I just needed to find homes for all this stuff 😳

That's my April in a nutshell, I'm hoping for sunshine and blue skies in May - what do you reckon????

The one where I made some stuff

I'm starting a new job tomorrow and decided I needed a new pencil case, so I made myself this

 

I also designed and test stitched a logo for a customer's towels,

 

And I worked on some HSTs sewn by the ladies in my church house group. One of them is about to adopt three young siblings so I thought they should have a quilt each - this one just needs the binding finishing, two more to go!

 

And quilted!!!!! Get me!

 

Now time for an early night ready for work tomorrow!!!

 

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The one where I did *more* machine embroidery and some quilting

You really don't expect *more* photos of preschool uniforms I hope?  I'm getting a little fed up with them - 44 down, 31 to go!!!

However the HST and Strings / £7 quilt has moved along and now looks like this

I've done some liberated (free range) quilting in the solids . . .

using a lovely variegated thread . . .

However, my drawer of fabric strings doesn't seem to have gone down AT ALL!!!

The one where I worked on a £7 quilt

Not much time for sewing today, (appointments in town and a visit to mum), but I did get the solid & strings HSTs stitched, trimmed and pressed.

I'm really happy with how it's looking

And just for a giggle - I took this pic of mum and a fish we caught near her home ...

 

 

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The one where I did some quilting!

I'm not a quilter- I'm a patchworker! But very occasionally I feel that a patchwork is asking to be quilted!

For a long time some ladies at my church house group have been stitching HSTs together. They are not necessarily comfortable with a needle and thread, and some of the stitches are bigger than I would choose, but I'm all for encouraging them! After laying out the design and sewing the squares into strips on Friday, I got them assembled today and that's when they started asking to be quilted. I'm on holiday, and have the time so I decided to listen and start quilting.


Liberated echo quilting, nothing fancy, but I'm really pleased with the result


Just the binding to be hand stitched and then it's done. It's for one of our ladies who had a baby girl last summer ... 1st birthday pressie!

I also managed to finish the Gay Pride bag

And I've finished and embroidered a quilt for a cousin who has just had a baby girl, Annie

Now back to embroidering school uniforms!

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The one where I finally did some sewing!

School finished yesterday! And not just for the summer in my case, but forever! I have resigned- I felt it was better for the school that I left at the end of a year, and could leave everything ready for my replacement, rather than either giving notice during the hols and not going back or going back for a few days or weeks in September and leaving things half done.

The parents and staff were very kind - I got lots of lovely cards and gifts! And today I got to sew!

This pile of HSTs stitched by the ladies at church

Have been stitched into strips

 

And this tshirt has been rescued from a charity shop to be made into a bag

 

Tomorrow? More of the same!!!!

 

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Tempting Triangles

I've never been a big fan of HSts, but it seemed a good project for the ladies at a Church House Group to tackle.

Assorted abilities, but over the last few months we made this, and on a recent Sunday we gave it to a lovely lady in the village, who, like the quilting on this, holds everything together!

I have experienced a deep, but unexpected love of HSTs!!!!

I don't know that I'd want to machine a whole pile of them, but hand stitching while chatting with friends and drinking coffee is a whole other matter!

As the original HST project was totally finished they wanted to start a new one, and this last Sunday must have sewn 50 or so together!  This time I used odds and ends of charm packs - the charms that didn't make the final cut in whatever I used the rest of their family for - and added white.  I'll ask them what arrangement they like best:

Flying Geese

ZigZag

Or like this

Looking good eh?