I got a bit behind with my zen cross-stitch, it’s actually called Enlightenment and it’s a mystery SAL which publishes the next section every two weeks. Last time I showed you I’d just finished part 7, but I then neglected it whilst I concentrated on finishing my gorgeous Zoe box…
Gosh, I just checked and this was six weeks ago!
Anyway, over the last week I dug it put again and cracked on with the next two sections, plus a little more…
I like the colour scheme of this sampler, especially the border, but I’m still a bit disappointed that as a mystery SAL it has been so predictable – I’m pretty sure I could finish it now if I wanted to, but I’ll be good and wait for the instructions to come out! I’m going to make it into a cushion when it’s finished to go in our guest room.
I’ll be linking up with Kathy’s Quilts tomorrow for Slow Stitching Sunday, please follow the link to see lots more hand-stitching.
Happy new year! Hope you had a good one, I managed to stay up til midnight but I think we were in bed by quarter past!Anyway, I decided to try and write my last nineteen for 19 post a bit more promptly. I’m pretty pleased with how it’s gone, it’s given me something to focus on whilst not fretting if one challenge wasn’t going to get done (or even started!!). So here goes, hope you’re sitting comfortably…
1 scrap quilt; this is one I haven’t even started, but I’ve got plans for this year and lots of inspiration from a new facebook page!
2 tutorials; another non-starter!
3 sessions a week in the garden; This works really well, it got me outside much earlier in the year than I would have otherwise and with a garden like mine an early start makes a huge difference.We had the open garden in July, which although we chose the wettest weekend of the year it still managed to raise a good amount for charity.
4 workshops; I’ve attended three embroidery ones at Fabbadashery, though I still have to complete two of the projects, I’ve also been on a stained glass workshop and a gardening one. I also ran a quilting workshop!
5 presents; I made three bags for Christmas presents, they had pretty robins on them, I also made a small out of a leftover scrap of robin fabric. I embellished a cardigan for my mum too.
6 quilts; I finally finished my Down the Rabbit Hole quilt in December, three years in the making! I think that puts my tally at seven!!
7 new patterns; I’ve just made a Skye Wrap, so that’s 8 new patterns;
8 kits; I think I’ve made seven so far this year, unfortunately I’ve bought more than that so mt stash hasn’t gone down!
9 mini embroideries; in December I made another two pages for my Stitchbook collective and I also embroidered a robin for a card, bringing my total to 13 I also stitched 16 mini embroideries for Advent SAL…!
10 things; I haven’t got any photos yet, but I made my son two sets of curtains in December- I decided I really don’t like making curtains – especially heavy woolen ones! This brings my total to fourteen with the three bags I made too.
11 cross-stitch smalls; I went a bit mad with smalls this year, I made another one last month which brings my total to about 15!
12 pages in my book; I finally started this project in November, I didn’t get any made during the Christmas rush but it’s one of my priorities for next year.
13 clothes made; I made another dress last month and also a wrap, which pushes my total over the target to 14! After a slow start with this one I finally got there!
14 drawers organised; I’ve had a huge sort out in my sewing room over the last couple of weeks, I’ve sorted patterns, buttons, threads, fabric- I’ve definitely reached this target, though unfortunately my sewing room doesn’t look any tidier for it!
15 minutes tidy-up after each session; mmm, ditto last comment!
16 books; this has been my most successful target this year, not just because I smashed the target with over 30 books, but more because it changed my habits, I found a space for reading in my routine and stuck to it.
17 blog posts per month; December was the only month I didn’t make this one, usually I exceeded it, I also realised over Christmas that I had just written my 1000th post!!
18 walks; my walking buddy and I walked the Cleveland Way last year, together with practise walks we managed 21 walks, which is nearly 2 a month so not bad!
19 Splendid Sampler blocks; I made these and lots more so I could finish the quilt.
So quite a productive year! I’m a little bit crafty with these challenges, making sure that quite a few overlap, so a new pattern is also clothing, a thing is also a present, lots of quilt blocks make a quilt…I’ve just added things up and altogether I’ve made about fifty different things, which sounds a lot, but it’s actually only one a week, OK some take an awful lot longer, but others were just an evening or two.
I still haven’t finalised my Twenty for 2020, but I think this will be my last year as the numbers are just getting too big, even for me, I’ll have to think of a different challenge after that!
I’ve admired Skye Wraps for a while, they’re a pattern from Cool Crafting, (the home of Luna Lapin!!) and they keep appearing on my facebook feed. I finally bought the pattern at the Harrogate Show in November. Whilst sorting out my sewing room I found a length of light-weight blue and purple wool which I felt would be pretty good as a wrap, it had plenty of drape and it was the sort of weight which would work as an extra layer indoors. Even better I found a leftover length of Liberty lawn which matches pretty well.
It was also a nice simple sewing project to sew on my new sewing machine!! My 20 odd year old Janome was starting to make funny noises and I wanted to get one whilst it still worked, rather than waiting til it goes bang with a puff of smoke (like the last one did!!) So I spent the last few months looking at different models, deciding what features I wanted. I went to the Harrogate show with an open mind but pretty much set on a Janome…and came home with a Brother Innovis 1800, it was a good deal anyway and then I got an extra £100 off as I bought the show demo! It’s a bit scary though!!
I’m having to learn from scratch – it threads up different to my old one, everything is different, so the instruction manual has been out quite a few times – I have now managed to get it to thread the needle after three failed attempts!
So, back to the wrap! It’s basically just a lined rectangle with buttons down the side. One useful feature is that the lining is cut slightly shorter so it makes like a one inch facing strip. What this means is that when turning the wrap the right way round it’s much easier to get the corners neat as there’s not so much bulk.
The pattern calls for three large feature button, and by large it means about 1.5″. I had a rummage in my button box, there were some smaller blue buttons, but nothing so big. Then I noticed a pack of three large wooden buttons, I’ve no idea where they came from – I’m pretty sure I didn’t buy them! I decided colourwise they looked OK, I would have preferred blue or purple, but actually the brown wood worked. I also noticed they were very light, buttons of this size can be pretty heavy and that could change the drape of the wrap.
Buttons chosen, I just had to make the buttonholes. I found the buttonhole attachment, found the right page in the instruction manual. The first thing I read was maximum size 1.1″!!!
I pulled out my old Readers Digest Complete Sewing Guide – it’s a gem is this book, worth getting if you spot one in a charity shop as it goes through all the different techniques you need when sewing – different seams, collar styles, zip insertion…and buttonholes! This was written before machines had automatic buttonhole feet. I was thinking of just refreshing my memory on how to do a machine buttonhole, but the first type described was a bound buttonhole (three different methods were given – I chose the easiest!!). I decided that would be rather nice in the Liberty lawn. I had a practice first with a scrap and it looked OK.
I made three bound button holes on the wrap – one useful tip in the book was to do all the buttonholes at the same time – each stage stitch all three, it makes it easier to get an even finish, rather than completing one buttonhole and then moving on to the next one.
The only bit I changed on the buttonholes was the finish on the back, the book just suggested trimming the edges neatly. I wasn’t keen on the raw edge and as Liberty lawn is so fine I decided to slip-stitch it under.
I can see me making a few of these, they’re an ideal make from short lengths left over from skirt or dress making.
This is definitely the final finish for 2019, so I wish you all a very happy 2020!
I started this little cross-stitch back at the start of November, it was a kit I bought at Bonds in Farsley – three for £5, I found two pretty blue designs and was struggling to find a third kit for my bargain price. The assistant pointed this one out, it’s got a sort of old-fashioned quaintness about it. I also thought that as the flowers are more peach/orange, it will spread from summer to autumn for my smalls display! I think it was a Lanarte kit, I saved the pack for this moment, but having just totally reorganised my sewing room I’ve mislaid it!
I changed the aida provided for some evenweave linen, not sure what colour this is officially, it’s an off white, light stone sort of colour. It would have been fairly quick to stitch if I didn’t have so many other projects on the go, as it was it was December before it was finished and it had to wait til last night to be made into a small.
I found some green quilting cotton in my stash and played around a bit with trims before I finally decided on the narrow ivory lace and the beige tape. Having stitched it together and stuffed it I felt it needed something else. I tried some buttons in the corners but that didn’t work, so they got unpicked.
This morning I decided to try beads, I fished out my bead box, had a rummage and found these lovely amber coloured beads, they’re from a mixed colour set from Hobbycraft and they’ve proved very useful over time. I found some tiny green ones which were a similar shade to the cotton as well as the flower bead. Ideas began to formulate…
I stitched an amber bead in each corner, using a tiny green bead to help secure it. For one top corner I went through the amber bead, then picked up just over an inch of the tiny green ones, the flower and finally a peach mini bead, I then threaded the needle back down the line of green beads as far as the amber one. I then picked up another good inch of green beads, finishing with a bright blue one which had escaped into the green bead pot, it just happened to be the same shade as the flower jug. I added a bird charm before returning back through the line of beads and securing the thread back in the small.
Job done! It’s just enough to finish it without overwhelming the design, the beads aren’t quite so bright as they look with camera flash! I think this will be the last cross-stitch finish of 2019, it will be all ready when summer and autumn 2020 arrive!
Towards the end of November I saw a mystery Christmas stitch-a-long advertised. It was a freebie by Hugs and kisses, it was only for Advent, so I wouldn’t be committing myself to a long project, and a little bit of stitching for Christmas would be fun! I signed up!
I have to admit that I thought it would be a mixture of embroidery and quilting, sort of stitch an embroidery, make a block, so by Christmas we would have something made and I would have used up some of my Christmas fabric stash. It turned out it was just little embroidery blocks and as yet no instructions on what to do with them, having said that, they are very sweet and I have enjoyed stitching them.
They’re all designed to fit in a 2″ circle. I stitched them all in DMC 115 which as you can see is a variegated red. As you can see I’m a bit behind, I’ve got 16 stitched. I also managed to stitch one on the wrong side of the fabric, so my logic said stitch another one on the wrong side, it won’t be as noticeable if there’s more than one!! Hence there are two stitched on the wrong side!
I think these are my favourites so far…
I quite fancy making a table runner from them, but I’m open to suggestions and ideas – I am planning to make the other eight.
In the meantime, hope you have a lovely Christmas and a very happy New Year x
Last night I finally finished making my last Christmas present! It’s for my mum, I do find it difficult buying presents for someone in a carehome, for birthdays I usually take her out for the day to a quilt show. I felt for Christmas she needed something to open. In the end I asked some of the carers if there was anything she needed – a cardigan.
I looked for a pretty cardigan but couldn’t see anything I thought she would like. I then hit on the idea of buying a plain one and titivating it. I bought a soft, cosy navy blue cardigan in one of the shops in Otley.
Last night I finally got round to embellishing it. I had a perusal on Pinterest and decided to concentrate the embroidery in the neckline/centre front area. I chose a variegated DMC thread 4030 which is all pretty shades of blue and green.
I started with a big daisy in the corner, decided I didn’t want anymore quite so big so I sort of zig-zagged them along the neck and a little way down the front. I did struggle when it came to making the other side look the same- mirror images are clearly not my forte! By this time I was getting a little low on thread, as I was using all six strands together. It needed some infilling between the flowers. I found some DMC 4025 which is a darker version and just used three strands to add leaves and a few french knots. I tried to make it a sort of wavy line of leaves and flowers.
Having embroidered the front, the beige buttons looked completely wrong. I found some buttons in my stash which matched colour and size wise perfectly, I just worried that they were too plain. I decided to stitch them on anyway – if my mum commented I could easily change them, I just knew I didn’t have chance to visit a button shop before Christmas.
Once I stitched them all on and stood back, I liked them, so hopefully she will too.
It’s surprising how just a little simple stitching can change a ready to wear cardigan into something much more personal. I think she’ll like it.
This weekend I finally got round to decorating a pair of gingerbread houses – one for us and one for my son – daughter wants to decorate her own 🙂 I don’t make the gingerbread, these are kits from the local supermarket. I used to get the Ikea ones,but these taste nicer and it saves a trip across to the other side of Leeds to buy one. I used to make about 15 or 20 and sell them at work, now it’s just for us.
I like them without any sweets, concentrating on the icing instead. I add a few cake decorations though, the usual silver draghees, I also bought some pretty silver stars and some white and sparkly grey snowflakes…
I feel these houses don’t actually have to be that neat or perfectly iced (luckily!) I follow the imprints for doors and windows, making the front windows a little taller…
…and covering the back door with a Christmas tree. I infill with squiggles and swirls and spots of icing.
The designs change each year but my favourite bit is usually the roof! The tile pattern is imprinted, so I just need to follow the lines.I then added the shell piping, dots and snowflakes….
,,,and I always have icing loops hanging under the eaves.
In contrast James wanted sweets and he wanted to buy his own, so rather than getting ones which are vaguely to scale, he bought M&M’s and Haribos!
I did my best!!!
I also decorated two Christmas cakes, one for us and one for James – Helen didn’t want one. The traditional Christmas cakes here are rich fruit cakes, ideally made about 6 weeks in advance so they have chance to mature. They’re covered in marzipan first, I then used a thin layer of fondant icing to cover the cake.
To decorated ours I made a round imprint with a pastry cutter and used it as a guide to place 12 gold candles with silver balls in between. At first I just sprinkled some tiny gold stars over the cake and tied a bow round the sides but it didn’t look quite enugh. I then cut out some stars in icing and arranged those round the candles. Much better!
James cake used a circle of silver candles. I tried imprinting snowflake stamps but it didn’t quite show up enough and with the sparkly grey and white snowflakes it still looked a bit naff! I cut out some snowflakes instead, two different sizes, and arranged them around the cake, adding silver and grey ones more randomly. It looked much better. A twinkly ribbon finished it off.
In case you’re wondering how my experiment went with the oasis free advent ring went – not good! In less than a week it looked pretty dead! I thought about removing the very dead bits and replacing with artificial – something I usually do with the oasis one in the last week. However I was worried that the dry hay of the base was not a good mix with candles and matches!! I was thinking I would have to buy an oasis after all when I started getting all the Christmas decorations out.
I found an artificial swag of folliage and lights. I decided to have a play. I wound it a couple of times round my candelabra. It looked a bit thin, so I started poking other artificial and dried natural decorations in, such as pinecones, poppy heads. They’re not particularly fastened in, just arranged – if I turned it upside down they would all fall out! I just kept going until it looked OK.
I think it looks really pretty, whilst I like having the natural wreath, this does save using oasis which is totally non biodegradeable. Whilst a lot of it is artificial, most of it is five to ten years old, having been used every Christmas. Hopefully it will now get used for many more Christmases.
It’s time for a very happy dance! I have finally finished my Down the Rabbit Hole quilt!
Getting ready for the great unveiling!!
I started this quilt back in January 2017, it was a BOM by Sarah Fielke, my main aim when I signed up for it was to learn how to do needle-turn applique. It was great for that, Sarah gave excellent instructions and videos on how to do it. It’s a gorgeous design and I finally finished it in about March 2018. This is the quilt just as I had finished piecing it, it’s lying on the frame of the long arm quilter.
I had decided mid way through the quilt that there was too much hand sewing on this quilt to turn round and send it off to be machine quilted. It’s a big quilt, about 96″ square, so there’s no way I could quilt it on my machine either. I decided I would hand quilt it…
….there were several times over the last 18 months when I questioned that decision!! However, I did take it to a long arm quilter to be machine basted, I just didn’t have the floor space to spread it out on, so at least it was securely tied for the months I took to hand quilt it. She used a very fine quilting thread and although you can still see the lines at the moment, I’m happy they will disappear after a wash or two.
I’ve learnt a lot over the 18 months it’s taken me to quilt it, to be honest if it wasn’t for Kathy’s Hand Quilt-a-long then I think it would still be in a heap somewhere. Just knowing I had to write a post about my progress meant I at least spent an evening working on it, so huge thanks to Kathy!
My quilting has improved a bit during the 18 months, I’m very glad I chose a very busy backing fabric as you can’t actually see very easily where I’ve missed stitches or they’re not very even.
I tried various tools – I tried metal thimbles, leather pads, wrap-around thimbles, I eventually settled on a Clover silicone thimble which Kate kindly sent me, together with some Birch needles which also saw me through the project. My final bit of quilting having finished the big border, was to return to the centre, I’d not finished the Dresden circle in the middle. I quilted a daisy sort of shape along the spokes.
Having finally reached the end of all the quilting, I still had to bind it. My original plan was to bind it with the backing fabric, I knew I had enough left. When I laid it next to the quilt though I felt it was too busy. I started playing with pieces from my stash, in particular the pieces left from making the quilt. I felt it would be better with a green binding, I tried the mid green first, which wasn’t quite right, then I found a small amount of a dark sage green. It looked perfect and there was just enough.
It took me a couple of evenings to stitch the binding down – I use 2.25″ strips, folded in half. I machine stitch the front and then hand stitch the back.It takes a while to hand stitch the back but it’s the only way I get a neat finish.
I also remembered my plan to use buttons for the rabbit’s eyes, instead of trying to applique tiny circles…
The last thing to do was a label. Last year Sarah Fielke (the designer) came over to the UK for some workshops. I went to one of her talks and asked her to sign a piece of fabric. I then back-stitched over her signature and added my initials and the date before stitching it to the back of the quit.
I’m really pleased with my quilt, I love the design and the colours have worked out pretty well. It’s a learning piece when it comes to hand-quilting, there’s good bits and not so good bit’s! I can’t say I’m a great lover of hand quilting at the moment, but perhaps it was too big a project for a first time in 25 years. It’s so big that my family couldn’t actually hold it right out without fear of it trailing on the ground! What I can say is it hasn’t put me off and I’m already considering hand-quilting another quilt!
I’ve already planned my next project- but you’ll have to wait another three weeks to find out. All I will say is I have show it before 🙂
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.
I have just finished my Zoe box and I absolutely love it! It’s gorgeous, I love the colours, the design, everything!
The Zoe box was a mystery SAL by Faby Reilly, she released part of the pattern every two weeks and the final construction instructions were released last week. I’ve made quite a few of her designs now and they’re always a pleasure to stitch and a beautiful design.
So, lots of photos!
Last time I showed you it I’d just finished all the cross-stitch, I wasn’t sure what the two little squares were going to be…
I gave it a good press and cut out all the pieces with a 1cm border. We started with the main box. The pieces are stitched over Timtex to give the structure, it’s a bit like ultra thick vilene. The back-stitch border was used to whipstitch the pieces together. Whip-stitching two pieces together wasn’t too difficult, but when it came to the corner where it all needed joining up then there were four pieces to whip together at the same time, I found it hard to get as neat a finish as I would like.
I’m really pleased with how the base worked out, it was meant to be plain but I stitched my initials and the date on it and surrounded it with some of the back-stitching from the leaves.
I love the inside of the box with all the pretty stitching on the sides and the bottom. It isn’t easy to photograph as the camera wasn’t sure where to focus!
With the base complete it was time to make the lid. This was a little more fiddly, just because it was smaller. I also decided that rather than trying to whipstitch together the four layers of the sides and the lid I would whip-stitch the lid and the sides separately, I then joined them together with ladderstitch. I found I got a neater result that way.
The two little squares as you can see became a very pretty biscornu. This is stitched to the centre with a sparkly bead on the top and a pearl button inside.
…and the inside…
So here is the finished box, isn’t it just gorgeous!
…and the other side…
I love the way the seasonal colours follow down the sides from the biscornu to the lid and then the sides. I’m so pleased with it. If you fancy stitching it the pattern has now been released on Faby’s website!
Faby is starting another SAL in January, it’s a monthly one called the Anthea SAL – each month a seasonal pattern will be released which can either be used as a calendar or (as I will probably do) made in little cross-stitch smalls. As you can tell, despite telling myself I wasn’t going to do any SAL next year, I’ve fallen for it, it took me all of two minutes to see it and buy it! So if anyone fancies joining me, follow the link to Faby’s website. By the way, I’m not on any commission here, I just love her designs.
I still haven’t worked out why it’s called Zoe, I know it’s going to be a ‘doh!!’ moment when someone puts me out of my misery!
I’ll be linking up with Kathy’s Quilts on Sunday for Slow Stitching Sunday, so follow the link then for lots of hand-stitching.
I’ve got a bit behind on my posts again – a mixture of Christmas and sewing I think! Anyway, I decided it’s time I shared my November update for my Nineteen for 19 challenge. I’ve got to that point in the year when some will get finished, but others are clearly not even going to get started – there’s always next year!! I’ve put the ones I’ve finished in italics – pretty good going I think!
1 scrap quilt; this isn’t going to happen this year but I have great plans for next year!!
2 tutorials; I never quite get round to writing a tutorial, I think this has to go on the ‘must try harder’ pile!!
3 sessions in the garden; November tends to be a quite time in the garden and the weather was too inclement to try much tidying up, I did get out a little though.
4 workshops; completed 🙂
5 presents; my tally at the end of November was still four. I gave my rabbit to my great nephew at his christening at the beginning of the month, his parents loved him.
6 quilts; No finishes in November, but I’ve made seven so far with another almost there.
7 new patterns; I made a coat using a new pattern this month, not a total success, but OK for dog walking! This brings my tally up to 7, so I’ve just reached my target.
8 kits; I finished another Stitchbook Collective kit and also the cute Christmas Mouse. So altogether I’ve made six kits this year – and probably bought another eight!!
9 mini embroideries; I’m classing my stitchbooks as mini embroideries – they’re less than A5 size, so that’s another two, making a total of 10.
10 things; I finally made myself a new handbag – it was well overdue! This brings my total up to 10, so another one completed.
11 cross-stitch smalls; I finished another autumn small, a pretty freebie by Thea Dueck, this brings my tally to about 14.
12 pages in my book; I finally started this one, it’s a book of lots of my mums needlework, hopefully now I’ve started I’ll keep going, though to press I just have the two pages completed.
13 clothes made; I made two coats last month, although one was reversible, but I think it would be cheating to call it three! Anyway it brings my total up to 12, so this one is going to be completed by the end of the year.
14 drawers organised; I finally sorted my beads out – I seem to have somehow ended up with thousands of beads – I think I’ve been given lots over the years as I’ve never been that into beadwork! I used to have them in the round pots which screw together to make a tube. I’ve gradually moved over to boxes of individual pots, I much prefer them, I can easily organise them according to colour and I can take a pot out if I’m using them for a project. The tubes aren’t going to waste, I’m using those for buttons- it’s much easier to see what I’ve got in those tubes. I just need to reorganise the boxes I keep them in now! I’m counting this as two sorts, so my tally is now 13, almost there!!
15 minutes tidy-up each day ; mmm, must try harder!!
16 books; I’m beginning to lose count, but I think I’ve read 33 books!
17 blog posts; I just squeezed in this month with 18 posts!
18 walks; it’s not been walking weather this month, but my tally is 21.
19 Splendid Sampler Blocks; completed earlier in the autumn.
Not long to go before the end of this challenge – next year will be my last one as I think the numbers are getting too high 🙂
thecraftycreek 