2019 Week 21 Crafty Church

May's Crafty Church was possibly best described as ambitious!

One of the crochet ladies had two necklaces that she reckoned had been done by crochet - could they please work out how they were made so she could make some to sell on the WI stall

I am know we are only 8 and 10, but w saw this pattern in a magazine and have decided to make a dress and a skirt!

Um - OK!  I did the explaining-the-pattern bits and we got everything cut out but poor mum and granny had to take over as we'd run out of time

EDIT: The dress now looks like this!!

Others were working on crochet blankets, patchwork sampler quilt and all sorts of other things!

We also had some girls teaching themselves string art

And I was working on my paper foundation pieced blocks

2019 Wk 20 - The week that was

I have a finish!!!!!

The new delivery of washing line rope is white rather than off white and I didn't feel the love - but I eventually did feel the need to make a new rope bowl!

The bowl started off a bit square: I used a piece cut off the Liberty Society Kantha Stitch along piece when I made it into a bowl (and then gave it as a gift without a photo first :-(

I used the square (still with its stitching) and started the zigzagging around it

I then used the rest of the embroidery threads from the kantha stitching as occasional wraps to give the bowl some colour (using this method to avoid ends and knots)

I then decided to finish off the top by wrapping the rest of the thread around the top coil.

If you are thinking about having a go, my best advice is DON'T!!!  I had no idea how much I needed so I had miles of thread all getting knotted.  Finally I wrapped the thread onto clothes pegs after threading them through holes in a sheet of cardboard to keep them in the right place

They still spun and twisted like I don't know what - not worth the effort!

Last week at Richmond and Kew quilters one of the ladies showed a lovely EPP hexi quilt she made.

The lovely randomness is due to her making flowers and the joining them rather than making lines / rows

Just a few bits of information for you to dwell on ...

• It took her six months.
• She made it all from stash
• she hand sewed it - back stitch
• She didn't use any templates

Do you want to read that again?

She used a die cutter to cut the hexagons then started sewing into flowers and then into widths using backstitch and not quite sewing to the edge of the fabric so she could inset the next piece

The pic isn't fab, but she brought along the brown strip as she'd decided not to include it so I could check it out!

Finally - the new bathroom floor is lino: the old one was wood decking tiles from Ikea.  They were going to be thrown away but we've started taking them apart as himself says he might make me a new garden table from the blocks!!!

Pretty eh?

2019 Wk 20 Days for Girls

I did a Corporate talk about Days for Girls today.  I think was even more scary because a good friend and a daughter actually work there and I desperately didn't want to let them down!

I did my talk (it went well) and then the staff helped pack kits for us - and what a load they did!

As they started to run out of components they carried on packing - and adding a label noting the missing parts (starting with 'missing two knickers) 

(all pics can be clicked on to enlarge)

And ending with "missing two knickers, 7 liners 1 x pod" . . . that means the bag only has a shield, a bar of soap and a flannel LOL, but it means we are ready to fill them as we make the rest of the stuff on Saturday!!!

And the other side  of the project is the distributing!  Here is Briege with some of the local ladies!  These ladies make the kits at Local Enterprise units.  They learn a skill and can support their own families, and the kits can be 'sold' - not necessarily to local ladies, but to individuals and groups like you and me and my Stitch group, to then be donated to local hospitals, schools or villages - isn't that great!

2019 Wk 19 - since last time

Since the last post  . . . The Chertsey Museum ladies made fabric baskets (thank you Plum)

And Briege has been busy in Kisumu (near Nairobi) handing out our Days for Girls Stitch bags

The cat has been happy sitting on the first half of my rainbow flowers hexi quilt (grrrr) while I finish sewing the other half of the hexie flowers - now to sew the rest of the flowers on!

And I have been inspired by Instagram's #libertysocietykanthastitchalong  So I have sorted some scrappy liberty squares and some liberty hearts (thank you Amo) and some lovely embroidery threads and have been stitching to my heart's content.  Before stitching . . .

And after stitching happily for a few hours . . .Look at the difference!

 And a different version of Kantha stitching (or stitch doodling!) - this is my sample fabric basket made for the Chertsey Museum class, now finished

Annnnnnd, I have also been working through this pile of spotty strips . . . 

. . . making these blocks (foundation paper piecing) . . . 

. . .  which will eventually look like this - curves with just straight lines!  I will scan the template and add it when I get a chance

2019 Wk 17 - old stuff and new stuff

A lovely memory came up on a friend's FB page: her now 8 year old still sleeping under a quilt I made when she was a baby . . .

Followed by a new post to FB . . . of a *very* old quilt!  I don't even remember making the quilt but I recognised it straight away as I made myself a similar one (which later became the family camp quilt / poncho).  I has to ask Elaine when her son was born so we could date it - 1992!!!!

 Thankfully my patchwork skills have improved a bit since then!!!

The Stitch ladies were busy a few weeks ago

And husband has been busy in the bathroom!

A leaky shower 

drove him to remove the old bath / shower cabinet

replace it temporarily with a spare shower cubicle from the shed (everyone keeps stuff like that in shed don't they?)

and then start planning the new room (no we don't have a second bathroom!).  So now the spare shower has gone, and the new floor has gone down, and hopefully the new shower will be in place before I smell too much!

Hand sewing has seen this all pieced, and put away until I love it again

The advantage of the bath unit being banished is that we got a skip - and cleared all sorts of other junk out too.  The patio may not be perfect but anyone who has seen it will agree this is much better that usual!

And the garden is looking positively gorgeous!