A Seaside Cushion

Posted on April 8, 2022 by craftycreeky

A work colleague of mine has just made the big move to an island in the Outer Hebrides, an enormous change from the busy city life in Leeds. A friend suggested as a leaving present it would be nice if we could give her something more personal, such as a seaside quilt…I gently pointed out how much I would want to sell my seaside quilt…maybe a cushion instead!

I decided to enlarge the cottages block from my seaside quilt and machine embroider it. The seaside quilt design is in a book of the same name by Kathryn Whittington of Patchwork Katy This is the original hand embroidered one on my quilt….

It wasn’t as easy as it looks to enlarge it, especially the cliffs bit. I drew it out and then traced it onto the bondaweb. To fix them onto the background, the ones at the top of the hill need to be attached first as they all overlap slightly. It was only when I got to the last house, the one at the bottom, I realised that my cliff wasn’t too steep! In order to lower it slightly I added some steps to the bottom house!!

I’m quite pleased with my set of steps! The cliffs aren’t so great, but I added some waves with a shiny rayon thread.

With the basic panel made to about 10″ square, I needed to add some borders to make it a useable cushion size. I added a 1″ red border and then a 2″ dark blue border. I found some dark blue batik which worked well for the backing, I made a button closure with some wooden buttons and the cushion was finished.

It was her leaving do last Friday and she loved it, it will hopefully remind her of happy times and friends in Yorkshire.

Posted in Machine embroidery, Quilting | Tagged , , | 10 Comments

Leatherwork

Posted on April 7, 2022 by craftycreeky

I do like a good workshop that gives me the opportunity to try a new craft, I’ve never worked with leather, so when a workshop by Diamond Awl was announced at my Skipton Stitchers meeting, I was interested to try it. Jason Young-Stocks and his wife Louise have a leather workshop in Saddleworth on the very southerly edge of Yorkshire, they teach people how to make a range of leather goods from purses to handbags using traditional methods. One of our members had already attended one of his two or three day courses and made a beautiful handbag.

At our meeting we were making a coin purse. Jason had previously cut out the basic leather shape with the needle holes already made, this is the thick and firm weight of leather, not the pliable leather you can stitch on a domestic sewing machine. There was a choice of colours but as purple wasn’t there I kept it simple and chose a brown leather.

Jason was a great tutor, explaining and demonstrating each process in turn. Our first task was to gently sand the edges with a nail file, removing any residue from the cutting process. We then used a very sharp tool a bit like a chisel to bevel the edges, we had some scrap leather to practise on, getting used to the angle needed to bevel the edge. Here’s a photo of my friend cutting her bevel…

We could then colour the raw edge with a special pen a bit like a wide felt tip, the colours were pretty subtle, especially if the leather was dark like mine. The raw edges were then polished with a Japanese traditional product whose name I did write down but now can’t find! It does make a gorgeous finish to the purse.

Now came the tricky part, learning saddle stitch. I must admit when Jason first showed us I thought I’d never get the hang of it as there are about six stages to each stitch! We started with a long length of thread which was quite thick and very strong, we threaded a needle at each end and put our purse in the wooden clamp.

Having practised in small groups we could then stitch our purse together. Once I got the hang of the different steps of the stitch I did get into quite a rhythm, the saddle stitch needed quite a lot of tension to pull the stitches tight and three weeks later I still have the scar from a blister on the crease of my little finger where I held the thread!

Having stitched across the opening edge we then had to stitch the sides together, which was pretty fiddly at first as we tried to line the holes up. Our purses were complete, we also then had the option of embossing our name or initals on the purse. I decided to put my initials and found it’s definitely harder than it looks, mine is distinctly wobbly, though that probably suits me really 🙂

It was a great workshop, everyone went home very satisfied with their lovely coin purse. Jason was a great teacher, very patient, we also discovered that we attended the same three schools just four years apart, so we had a great chat reminiscing about all the different teachers we could remember.

If you are within striking distance of Saddleworth and interested in learning a new skill, I would certainly recommend a Diamond Awl workshop.

Posted in Serendipity, Skipton Stitchers, Workshops | Tagged , | 5 Comments

Wednesday’s Wander Round the Garden

Posted on April 6, 2022 by craftycreeky

The British weather is well known as variable, over the last couple of weeks we seem to have had most types so the poor plants don’t know whether they’re coming or going! Mother’s Day weekend (26th and 27th March here in the UK) was beautiful, warm and sunny, we even ventured out with bare legs and summer dresses on! The blossom on the cherry trees around Otley was looking very pretty, my magnolia stellata was just starting to open it’s delicate flowers…

I have a gorgeous white camellia by the side of the drive and that was looking beautiful too…

Then on Thursday morning we woke up to this…

By the afternoon most of the snow had gone but I really thought the delicate blossoms would be a brown and soggy mess. Some of the camellia blooms have been lost but to my surprise the magnolia is still looking beautiful. You can see it in the last photo of this post, still brightening up the garden. This is one of my favourite trees in my garden, I tried to reproduce it in embroidery recently for my embroidered garden book…

I’ve lots of rose bushes in the garden so one of my first tasks in the garden this year was to prune them all. At the top of the garden along the back fence I planted a rosa rugosa hedge many years ago, it hasn’t been the success I’d hoped as the trees on the old railway line behind have grown and block too much light out. I’ve got two types of rose there, what I call hedgehog rose, which has lots of softer prickles on it’s stems, I can cope with those! The others are more of a traditional wild rose, they have evil thorns!! They are really hooked and sharp so they catch on everything and hook together! Well I decided I’d had enough! The evil ones are going!! I’ve started digging out the roots and sorting out the bed on the left of the path. I’ve replanted some shrubs and perennials which had outgrown their space such as my magenta flowered geranium. I’ve still plenty of room to fit the occasional purchase I might make at the Harrogate Flower Show at the end of the month!

Elsewhere in the garden early flowers are giving some welcome colour, the trees are just starting to show a hint of new leaves and lots of perennials are starting to push their shoots up. This camellia by the conservatory seems to have survived the snow reasonably well, the lovely silvery leaves underneath are brunnera Jack Frost, together with a greener one which appeared a couple of years back, that one is even starting to flower already. They look a bit like forget-me-not flowers.

Another favourite at this time of year is the Pasque flower, or pulsatilla vulgaris. I’ve got purple ones and maroon ones, the buds are pretty, all sort of fluffy, the flowers are beautiful and then the seed heads are really pretty too. I used to have a semi-circle of them around the patio but I seem to have lost a few over the years so I really need to plant a few more.

There’s lots to do in the garden at this time of year, I’m still tidying up and weeding at the moment as well as trying to sort out the back hedge area. It keeps me out of mischief! The garden is just starting to green up and fill out a bit after the winter’s rest. This is the view from upstairs today, as you can see, the magnolia is still shining brightly…

Posted in Garden | Tagged , , , | 8 Comments

Dancing Round Catbells SAL

Posted on April 3, 2022 by craftycreeky

I can’t quite believe it’s been two whole weeks since I last posted, I’ve been doing a lot of stitching but issues at home have meant I’ve had little time for posting, so I’ve a few posts to write over the next few days! First off is of course my Peppermint Purple blackwork sampler which I’ve turned into an image of Catbells, a fell by Derwentwater in the Lake District which I’ve climbed many times and has a special corner of my heart.

Three weeks ago I had started the border…

What I hadn’t realised as I merrily stitched the first border is that in the centre of the border there was meant to be a block which has one stitch less…so when I reached the first corner I was one stitch out! I can imagine quite a few people made the same mistake! There was no way I was going to undo half a side so I fudged it with an extra short block at the corner, I don’t think it’s noticeable.

I wanted to incorporate the name of Catbells in the border and I decided to do it within the width of the main border, I then stitched my initials and the year at the bottom.

After fifteen months of stitching it was finally complete… definitely time for a happy dance!

I’m pretty pleased with it, it was my first try at blackwork and the free annual sampler SAL from Peppermint Purple was a great way to try it. I learnt a lot how pattern influences the effect of the colour, there are blocks I would change another time. I did a little more outlining round the reflection and I think it shows up just enough now. If you fancy trying blackwork I would certainly recommend Peppermint Purple, the 2022 SAL is now in progress but with just one block released each week there’s not too much to catch up on.

If anyone is wondering, the fabric I used is overdyed so it’s soft blues and green’s in a sort of linear wash which worked well for the landscape scene, I have no idea where I got it from which is a shame as it’s worked really well for this. The threads I used for the filler patterns in the corners were Weeks overdyed threads which have a subtle variegation, the rest were all standard DMC threads.

Last Saturday I took it to my regular framers, Artworks in Otley, They always do a great job, they helped me choose a couple of mounts and a surround and I collected it yesterday. The mounts are a very light soft green and a narrow outline from the mount underneath of dark grey/green.

I love the finished piece, the frame and mounts compliment it beautifully. I just need to find somewhere to hang it.

Catbells has been the muse for several of my embroideries over the years, here’s just a few…

Catbells

This SAL is organised by Avis from Sewing Beside the Sea, we post our progress on a chosen piece every three weeks, it certainly helps to keep me focussed on longer term pieces! Please follow the links to see everyone else’s progress…

Avis, Claire, Gun, Constanze, Christina, Kathy, Margaret, Cindy, Heidi, Jackie, Sunny, Megan, Deborah, Sharon, Daisy, AJ, Cathie, Linda, Helen

Posted in embroidery, Peppermint Purple 2021 SAL, Stitch-a-long | Tagged , , , | 16 Comments

Seaside Quilt HQAL

Posted on March 20, 2022 by craftycreeky

I’ve not managed as much as I had hoped on my seaside quilt, I’ve been concentrating more on my Peppermint Purple blackwork, trying to get that finished. Both of these are perfect for sitting in front of the TV on an evening with my OH.

The seaside quilt is a design from the book of the same name by Kathryn Whittingham, it’s hand embroidered on raw edge applique. The book is available from Kathryn’s website, Patchwork Katy, (together with her Cottage Garden quilt book, my favourite quilt ever!) I’m quilting it with the clam shell shape, which started off as waves in the sea, but really shells are just as apt. It’s a nice rhythmic shape to quilt, I mark the semi-circles with small dots from a silver gel pen, I like using that as it shows just as well on dark as well as light fabrics. The picture blocks are quilted just under 1/4″ round the inside, hopefully that will be enough.

Three weeks ago I’d quilted about a quarter of the quilt…

I’m probably now just about a third quilted, so not much further, but not bad for a couple of evenings work. Last night I was quilting up by the lighthouse again. I started here as it’s in the middle and originally I was quilting round each rectangular border. I soon decided to just continue the clamshells across the border so last night I pulled out the first bit of quilting I did round the light house border and replaced it with clam shells.

I’m using a quilting hoop that’s mounted on a base, I think it’s called a lap hoop or a table hoop, I find it works best for me as the base makes an open working area underneath which I find helpful for the hand that’s working from the back, and the risk of catching the wrong bit of fabric is reduced!

I haven’t quite decided how to quilt the pair of stars at the bottom right (and the top left) The clam shell won’t work there as the triangles are a different size. I might just go round the inside of the picture block and stitch in the ditch round the stars. Last time I was also pondering how to quilt the border, I was quite taken with Kate Chiconi’s idea of wavy lines to look like the ripples on the beach, so I think that’s another decision made, thanks Kate 🙂

Hopefully next time I share this quilt I’ll have made a bit more progress. I’m enjoying the hand quilting and it’s such a happy quilt to work on!

Hand Quilt Along Links

This Hand Quilt Along is an opportunity for hand quilters and piecers to share and motivate one another. We post every three weeks, to show our progress and encourage one another.  If you have a hand quilting project and would like to join our group contact Kathy at the link below.

Kathy, Margaret, Deb, Nanette, Sharon, Karrin, Daisy and Theresa

I’m also linking up with Kathy’s Quilts for Slow Stitching Sunday.

Posted in Quilt-a-long, Quilting, Stitch-a-long | Tagged , , | 13 Comments

Monday’s Meander Round the Garden

Posted on March 14, 2022 by craftycreeky

We’ve had a dry few days and it has been a bit warmer too so I’ve managed to get quite a bit of tidying done in the garden. I started trying to tidy and weed at the same time so I could get each area looking good but it was taking too long in that a lot of shrubs need pruning now, not in a few weeks when I get round to their patch of the garden. So for the time being I’m concentrating on tidying…

Tidying is doing things like cutting or pulling up all the old leaves and stems on the perennials such as paeonies, geraniums, brunnera or sedums. I haven’t finished yet as I’ve most of the roses to prune still and some clematis, but it does look better, my OH took two big car loads to the tip!

The hellebores in the garden are taking centre stage at the moment, I’ve quite a few now as they do seem to like my soil, I’ve white ones, black one, purple, pink, speckled…but my favourite is the deep pinky red one, I just love the colour…

The pinky red one looks particularly good next to the hebe next to it, it picks out the purple edges on the leaves, This is part of the Amber and Amethyst garden, looking over to the autumn border. It’s looking a lot tidier than it did this morning. I’ve trimmed all the hellebore leaves, so the flowers are much easier to see. I still need to weed and decide how many of those self seeded foxgloves are staying round one of my roses!

The pond area looks much better too, though the snowdrops are past there best now. A few weeks ago we pulled the overgrown flag irises out of the pond, they had just got too big, you couldn’t really see the pond anymore! I’ve still some plants round here that are a bit thuggish which I tried to reduce a bit last autumn, so it will be interesting to see how it pans out this year.

One of the hellebore flowers was accidently chopped off, so I floated it on my mini water feature down by the patio. It reminds me of our holiday in Bali as they used to do this in the hotel we stayed in…

So the garden overall is looking much more looked after, though there’s still an awful lot of work to do over the next few weeks. This is the view from an upstairs window with the patio below, the Amber and Amethyst garden on the left with the autumn bed behind and the lawn, pond and summerhouse on the right. Hopefully the more spring-like weather will continue a little longer.

Posted in Garden | Tagged , | 4 Comments

Peppermint Purple SAL

Posted on March 13, 2022 by craftycreeky

Well I’ve started my border, and now I’ve decided which border pattern to use it’s moving on fairly quickly. This blackwork pattern is last years free SAL from Peppermint Purple, Claire (the designer) did suggest a lovely colourway but I decided for my first try at blackwork I’d make it difficult for myself by making it into a picture of Catbells, my favourite place in the Lake District. Three weeks ago I’d just finished the main square…

My original thought for the border was to include the names of natural features on or around Catbells, such as Manesty Woods, Hause End, Derwentwater. These would be stitched with a leaf border in between the words. I started trying to plan it out, found a pretty leaf border in a book I’ve had for years, but when I started to stitch it it just didn’t look dense enough to look balanced with the rest of the piece. Never mind the fact that working out the spacing of the words was frazzling my brain! I’ve still to undo the bit I did so you can see what I mean.

I decided to use one of the borders Claire from Peppermint Purple suggested. I’ve used two colours, a darkish grey for most of it but a soft grey- green for the middle. I needed a colour that wasn’t too overpowering round the lighter areas, but held it’s own round the darker bits. I’m pretty pleased with it so far and it does grow surprisingly quickly. Here it is so far…

I’m still planning to add the word Catbells at the top and maybe my initials and the year at the bottom, both stitched within the lines of the border. I’ve just need to unpick the leaves so I can carry on round the corner. Hopefully I can start polishing my happy dance shoes soon!

This SAL is organised by Avis from Stitching by the Sea, we each post our progress on our chosen projects every three weeks, just often enough to keep the motivation going! Please follow the links to see what every one else is stitching.

Avis, Claire, Gun, Constanze, Christina, Kathy, Margaret, Cindy, Heidi, Jackie, Sunny, Megan, Deborah, Carmela, Sharon, Daisy, AJ, Cathie, Linda, Helen

Posted in embroidery, Peppermint Purple 2021 SAL, Serendipity, Stitch-a-long | Tagged , , , | 13 Comments

Sewing Room Cross-stitch

Posted on March 6, 2022 by craftycreeky

We’ve just had a few days in Derbyshire so I packed a little sewing to do in the evenings. I was strict with myself and only took one project, the sewing room cross-stitch. This is a design from Stony Creek Collection. I’ve been putting off all the gold and silver thread stitching as I really don’t like cross-stitch with metallic threads, so I packed my threads and left myself with little option but to do the metallic bit…it worked!

Last time I shared this project with you the sewing machine just needed all the metallic stitches and then back-stitching and I’d started the patchwork blocks on each side…

The sewing machine is now complete, I’ve finished all the metallic stitching and the back-stitching, I just need to do the back-stitching on the thread and the pincushion and then ‘thread’ my machine with purple thread. I’ll probably do the thread bit last as they’re long stitches so I don’t want it distorting in the hoop I’m using.

Isn’t it cute!

I also finished the patchwork blocks on either side, though I still have the back-stitching to do on the left hand ones as I didn’t have the right colour with me. The one on the bottom right niggles me a little as I feel it’s trying to be a log cabin, but actually the way they’ve drawn it that would be a tricky block to stitch!

In my last post I asked for suggestions for a quote for this piece. The pattern uses a quote from the bible; “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with the might” I fancied something different. There were lots of excellent suggestions and in the end I chose one Laura suggested. Laura finds lots of lovely and inspiring quotes to include in her posts on her blog LC’s Cottage, so I wasn’t surprised when she came up trumps, thanks Laura!

I changed the font too from an old-fashioned one to my standard one which is clear and simple. The variegated brown thread in the border is DMC4000, I had trouble buying it here in the UK, I finally found it on Lakeside Needlecraft, I still haven’t worked out if it is discontinued or just not usually available in the UK. It looks like a very useful colourway with dark brown and grey, particularly for nature inspired embroidery, so I might try and buy some more next time I put an order in.

I love the bottom border of reels of cotton, I still have all the back-stitching to do there too. Next to be stitched is the words “Sewing Room” at the top. Then I’m on the homeward straight, I’m enjoying stitching this now I’ve got the metallic out of the way!

Posted in cross-stitch, sewing room | Tagged , , , | 11 Comments

Tuesday’s Totter round the garden

Posted on March 1, 2022 by craftycreeky

Our garden has been sorely neglected over the winter, though if you’re going to neglect a garden it’s the best time to do it and the local wildlife will thank me for it! We seem to have had storm after storm recently but over the last weekend we managed a few sunny hours so I managed to get out and start the big tidy up.

I’ve started pruning the roses, starting with the standard rose and the climber down by the patio, I tidied the beds up and put a thick mulch of homegrown compost down to feed them.

I’ve got quite a few hellebores around the garden, if I find a plant that likes my conditions then I tend to buy one in every colour! I’ve got pink ones, purple ones, almost black ones, white ones and this pretty speckled pink one.

The daffodils are just starting to open, I tend to buy the little ones as they seem to stand up to bad weather better.

Up by the pond the snowdrops are in full flower, they look so pretty and seem to be spreading wider every year. These snowdrops came from my mum’s garden so I’m always pleased to see they’re happy. I think she in turn was given them by a friend who always had a glorious show of snowdrops. Snowdrops can be fussy things in that they prefer to be moved in the green, it’s not usually as successful just to plant bulbs.

Hopefully we’ll have a few more nice days as I’ve an awful lot of roses to prune and beds to tidy up!

Posted in Garden | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

The Seaside Quilt HQAL

Posted on February 27, 2022 by craftycreeky

I’m making good progress hand quilting my seaside quilt. It’s living in our lounge at the moment with all the necessaries on a stool next to where I sit. I don’t usually watch much television (the only programme all year I make an effort to watch is the Great British Sewing Bee!) but my OH and I are trying to spend a bit more of our daily lives together rather than me squirrelled away in my sewing room and him watching (usually war films) on the computer in his office, which also seems to be the warmest room in the house! I can’t just sit and watch so I make sure I have some kind of sewing project in the lounge to keep my hands occupied!

The seaside quilt is from a book of the same name by Kathryn Whittingham of Patchwork Katy, it’s a lovely cheerful quilt. I’m quilting a clam shape across all the little squares and block borders and then just quilting inside the seamline of the picture blocks. I find it a simple shape to quilt as I can just work across the row from right to left. It’s actually meant to be waves across the quilt, but it could be either and still fit in with the seaside theme.

This is where I was three weeks ago…

I’m using a Gutermann variegated thread in light blues and greens for everything so far, I’ll probably change colours for the outer borders but I haven’t decided quite what I’m doing there yet.

The only parts of the quilt which won’t fit in with my clams are the two pairs of stars as they are based on a four by four square patch, using 2″ squares where as the rest of the quilt is in 2.5″ squares. I might either stitch in the ditch round the stars or just inside.

You can see the quilting much more clearly on the back. I’m having to stab stitch a lot of it rather than making a few stitches at once, I’m going to use a different wadding in future for hand quilting.

I’ve now quilted about a third of the quilt, ignoring the main borders! All of of left lower quarter is quilted and I’m working my way up the right hand side. You can see from the hoop marks where I’m working now…

Any suggestions for the quilting of the borders gratefully received, though they ideally have to be workable in one direction! Hopefully next time I share my progress I’ll be well into the top half.

Hand Quilt Along Links

This Hand Quilt Along is an opportunity for hand quilters and piecers to share and motivate one another. We post every three weeks, to show our progress and encourage one another.  If you have a hand quilting project and would like to join our group contact Kathy at the link below. Kathy, Margaret, Deb, Nanette, Sharon, Karrin, Daisy and Theresa

I’ll also be linking up with Kathy’s Quilts for Slow Stitching Sunday

Posted in Quilt-a-long, Quilting | Tagged , | 12 Comments