It’s three weeks since I last showed you my Finery of Nature cross-stitch. This is a Dimensions cross-stitch kit I bought at an Embroiderers Guild meeting. I’ve changed the fabric from black aida to a soft duck egg blue even-weave. I’ve made reasonable progress over the last couple of weeks, this is where I was three weeks ago…
Since then I’ve stitched some french knots on the lily of the valley and I’ve started stitching a few of the metallic high lights. The pattern supplied gold thread, however I felt with my change of background I’d be better with silver. I have to say I’m still not convinced, I’m debating whether or not to undo the silver and replace with a suitable floss. It’s also couched down with the silver thread which is fiddly. I’m tempted at the moment to just do back-stitch with coloured floss. I might decide after I’ve stitched more flowers so I can try both ideas out.
I’ve also started the border, I’ve almost stitched three swirls and there are thirty-two altogether! This is why I’m trying to stitch them as I go along, rather than leaving them all to the end!!
This stitch-a-long is organised by Avis from Stitching by the Sea, we post our progress on a project every three weeks, it’s a great incentive and motivator. If you would like to join us please contact Avis. In the meantime please follow the links to see what everyone else is sharing.
A couple of weeks ago on facebook a cute cross-stitch design popped up, well it was an instant impulse buy! The design is by the French designer Dany Chevallier, it’s called Ambience Printaniere, which I think would translate as Spring Air. I thought it was pretty and cute without being twee! Just right for a spring project. It’s a pair of designs, the second one being a rabbit with a daffodil.
It’s not taken long to stitch at all as it’s a pretty simple design, I think the simplicity is half of the appeal, the daisy and the iris are particularly effective. The only thing I changed was the colour of the rabbit, it was actually meant to be slightly darker, I had doubled up on this lighter skein of DMC in my stash so I decided to have a chocolate brown rabbit and I also gave him a white scud instead of a brown one, a rabbit has to have a white fluffy tail! He’s still fairly chocolaty, in fact he reminds me of some dark brown rabbits we used to have living in the fields behind us. There used to be lots of rabbits, the path would be littered with them if we walked the dogs on an evening, I think myxomatosis has reared it’s ugly head again as we rarely see a rabbit now.
I used my favourite bee fabric to back it. It crossed my mind today that I’ve used this fabric for lots of cross-stitch smalls, but I find it difficult to place in a quilt, I think it’s hovering between blue and green, so it doesn’t actually go with either. It’s perfect for my smalls though! Here’s a photo of the fabric matched with another cross-stitch small.
I decided with the simplicity of the design I didn’t want anything too fussy to trim it, I made some cord using a variegated DMC thread in soft shades of green, blue/grey and beige, it blends in nicely.I started and finished the cord at a corner, so I decided to make it into a tassel and add some dangly bits, namely some beads and charms. I found a rabbit in my stash and also one saying ‘wish’. I thought this was quite apt for spring and the hope of new beginnings.
My second finish today was the great tits card I made for my OH, it’s our wedding anniversary tomorrow, so I thought I’d better finish it!. I glued some batting onto card and then glued the cross-stitch round the back. I did the same with some quilting fabric on a larger piece of card and then glued the two together. I left it under a weight to dry overnight. I was a little disappointed this morning to see it wasn’t very straight across the top of the cross-stitch. This is the disadvantage of gluing, but when I’ve laced such pieces it’s ended up too bulky, I could almost do with doing a mixture of the two methods! Anyway I decided a bit of judicious trimming would hide the wiggly bit, I made some cord to go around the cross-stitch and added a navy blue ribbon bow. It looked much better.
I had placed a long length of ribbon between the cross-stitch and the backing and I used this to sellotape the cross-stitch to a card, I can then just tie it in a bow at the back afterwards.
I think he will like it! If I get a good response I might stitch a blue footed booby bird next year!
I’ve just finished the second block of my Coming Home quilt. This is a block of the month by Sarah Fielke (the same designer as my Down the Rabbit Hole quilt). On the last day of each month she releases the next pattern instructions and videos showing us how to do it. Sarah’s quilts always have a fair amount of needle turn applique so she demonstrates how to stitch different shapes. Last month it was circles, this month it was stars!
Last time I showed you this quilt I’d just finished the centre square with its eight houses…
This month we had to make four side sections, extending the central star. It took me ages to work out fabrics and colours, that bit of quilting doesn’t seem to get any easier! I’ve now got a spare applique star in grey and teal and several spare triangles! I don’t think it helps that after stitching blocks for the Splendid Sampler and also to a degree my Spring Wreath quilt, these triangles and squares seem huge, they’re like 4-5″, so any fabric makes a big impact. My design wall is so useful for this kind of predicament as I can try the colours out and stand back to look at the effect. This was my wall whilst I was still trying to decide!
The points on the stars were the hardest bit to get neat, trying to stuff the seam under such a tiny area. I’ve also decided I really don’t like cutting out triangles! My template seemed to find any excuse to move! I think I’m going to try a bit of tape underneath next time, see if that helps.
We could stitch two sides on, the top and bottom sections will be added next month when we stitch the four corner blocks, they’ve got appliqued flowers on. So my quilt is progressing nicely, it measures nearly 33″ across. I’ve just got to patiently wait another fortnight for the next installment!
I’ve got five new smalls to show you, one new one and four recycled ones, a fluffle of rabbits and a gaggle of geese, oh and a sheep too…
I started this cross-stitch about three weeks ago, I’d grabbed the pattern and flosses when I was just about to go out, not realising until it was too late that to get the finished size I wanted I would have to stitch it over one thread, not my favourite cross-stitch!!! Luckily I had it with me when the train I was on was stranded for five hours…you can really get a fair bit done in five hours!! It gave me the push to keep going with it and a couple of days ago I finally finished it. This is where I was when I last showed you…
It’s a lovely design by a French designer called Il Est Cinq Heures, it’s a freebie and I thought it was very cute. Cute without being twee! Of course with such tiny stitches I made a few mistakes, the main one being the little red cart, it’s meant to be about four stitches wider, so my flowers are a bit squashed together! I love the sheep with his swirls on his fleece, the little rabbit is very sweet and the allium flowers at each end just finish it off. It was meant to have clouds in between the words as well, but I’d had enough of tiny cross-stitches by then so I moved the butterfly along and made the birds fly a little higher!
My bee fabric matched perfectly, bringing out the blue too. The design was also meant to have a zig-zag of cross-stitch along the bottom, so I added a length of ric-rac instead! The blue cord made from two shades of DMC floss just finish it off.
A few weeks ago we had a big clear out ‘under the eaves’, our general dumping area, I think every home has one! I still have boxes of my children’s clothes etc so I had a bit of a sort out. I’ve kept all the ones I made and a couple of special ones and given lots to charity. In amongst the clothes I found some bibs I embroidered and a nappy pin cushion. Yes I used terry nappies, way back then I was very uncomfortable with disposable nappies that would still be on a rubbish tip when their grandchildren were born. Roll on 20 years and despite all the discussion about plastic waste there is very little mention about disposable nappies, most of which will be wrapped in a single use plastic nappy bag!
Anyway, I’ve climbed down from my soap box…I decided that as these bibs would realistically never be used again as they were looking decidedly past it, I would make the cross-stitch into smalls. The bibs were terry with a strip of aida across the bottom, so I trimmed them down and found a fat quarter in my stash that matched perfectly.
I made the bouncy rabbits one first, I was planning a few buttons under the length of vintage broderie anglais, especially as I found a Peter Rabbit button which was used first on my kids clothes. However I couldn’t get it to look right so I made the cushion a bit smaller and it looked much better.
The biggest one is the geese and teddy. For this one I did manage to use an old baby button of a duck together with some pretty simple ones.
The pincushion was looking pretty shabby so I took it apart, the little duck was on the back. It’s pretty small so I added three rows of embroidery at the side and stitched on the blue fabric. A length of blue check ric-rac just finishes it nicely. At the moment the mother goose has just been made into a simple pad with a fresh blue back, I haven’t decided yet how to trim it. I feel it needs a little something, either blue cord, ricrac or mini pompoms.
I’m pleased with my new smalls, just in time for an Easter display!
I’ll be linking up with Kathy’s Quilts for Slow Stitching Sunday, a celebration of all things hand stitched, why not follow the link and see what everyone else has been making.
We’re over a week into March, where does time go! I thought I’d better do an update for my Nineteen for 19 challenge…
1 Scrap Quilt I’ve not started yet but I have decided I need to organise my overflowing scrap boxes a bit, maybe into colours.
2 Tutorials; nothing as yet, but thinking things over!
3 sessions in the garden; I did pretty well in February, starting to weed and generally tidy up, I had a good clearing session on the rose bed by the lawn. This beautiful hellebore was definately flower of the month and it’s still looking great well into March!
4 workshops; I’ve got three booked at Fabbadashery in Halifax, I had to cancel one for May as I realised I’d double booked myself, however I’ve now booked for July and September with the same tutor. She gave us a talk at Embroiderers Guild about Bethlehem Embroidery and I was so inspired I booked two workshops!
5 presents; this remains at one, my niece loved the baby quilt and baby Logan is gorgeous, I’ve had a few cuddles!
6 quilts; Just one finished the one above at the moment, but I’ve got three on the go and I need to make one for a charity auction, I’ve a week off work soon so I’m hoping to make a start then. I’ve half made a quilt for the Care Leavers Christmas Dinners, but it is still waiting to be quilted.
7 new patterns; none as yet, although I’ve added another two to my stash!!
8 kits; I finished my mandala this month, I love it, it looks so pretty. So my tally is two kits stitched.
9 mini embroideries; we started our Travelling Sketchbook project at my Embroiderers Guild, so I stitched a chickadee to start my book off. I’ve got to stitch something about maps this month, I’ve a few ideas floating round!
10 things; I’ve started making some fabric boxes for my sewing room to put patterns in, I’ve only made one out of four so far so I haven’t shared them yet. However I did make a cushion from an embroidery I did years ago. With the block book I made last month my tally is now two.
11 cross-stitch smalls; In February I managed to stitch two cross-stitch smalls, one was for an wedding anniversary card for my OH, the other was a quick little heart to stitch for Valentines Day. So my total for the year is five already…they’re quite addictive!
12 pages in my book; I haven’t started this project yet, though I think I have worked out in my mind how I’m going to do it.
13 clothes made; I’ve been buried under curtain fabric for the last few weeks, so no chance to sew clothes for me… I made a deal with my son a couple of years ago, he fit a bathroom for us (he’s a plumber) and I would make curtains for his new house. Fair deal!! He finally got organised to buy some fabric last month! Two pairs of curtains, seven drops, 14 metres of woolen fabric…it’s the sheer weight of fabric that makes curtains hard work, one curtain had a total of 12m of fabric, including the lining! I’ve made all my curtains for various homes since I was in the nurses home aged 18, but I still find them hard work!
14 drawers organised; I had a bit of a sort out in my fat quarter stash this month, I donated some to the care leavers quilt day and reorganised the rest, spreading them out from two drawers to three, so I can have a batik drawers, plains and novelty drawer and the rest colour sorted. So I’ve sorted two drawers so far this year.
15 minutes tidy-up at the end of a sewing session; I’m getting better at this and it does make a difference!
16 books; I finished West with the Night last month, I’m going to write a joint review with Circling the Sun which I finished last night, as they are both about Beryl Markham, a biography and an autobiography. My tally for January and February is two.
17 blogs a month; I just made this, with exactly seventeen posts…but it was a shorter month 🙂
18 walks; My tally remains at three as I’ve not managed any this month! We had one planned last week but several things were against us so we went to the seaside instead! I’m off to the chiropodist on Tuesday so hopefully things will improve and I can get back to walking.
19 Splendid Sampler blocks; I stitched five this month so my total is nine so far, a pretty good start as I’m nearly half way on this challenge after only two months!
Another busy month sewing wise, though I was busy with sewing that didn’t count towards a challenge, like curtains! It was quite amusing on facebook as James was clearly very keen for me to concentrate on his curtains – everytime I posted a photo of something I’d made, such as my mandala or the baby quilt he would post two words… “Curtains Mother!”
There’s still quite a few challenges that I’ve not even made a start on so I think I need to concentrate my mind a bit.
Over the last few years an increasing number of gardens have opened in January and February for people to see the snowdrops. I rather like the idea of going to visit a certain flower, it’s a bit like the Japanese going to see the cherry blossom (though no where near as spectacular!). This year my Women’s Institute arranged a visit to Goldsborough Hall to see the snowdrops.
Goldsborough Hall is a stately home which is now open to guests, it was originally built in the early 1600’s, it was passed down through the generations until 1756 when it was bought by Daniel Lascelles and became part of the Harewood Estate. It’s most famous resident was Princess Mary, daughter of King George V, she married Viscount Lascelles and lived there for their early married life. During the war it became a school and later a nursing home. After closing it laid empty for a couple of years before being sold in 2005, it’s been restored by it’s current owners to a family home, but they do weddings and guest accommodation etc.
The 12 acre gardens are mainly woodland and parkland, under the trees is just a mass of snowdrops.
I have to confess, I’m not a great connoisseur of snowdrops, I can appreciate there are different heights, size of flowers and very slight colour variations, but they are all just very pretty to me!
There were lots of named varieties…
…but I mainly enjoyed just seeing them en masse.
Last week my walking buddy and I changed our plans for the day and instead of walking up Pen-y-ghent we went to the seaside (via plant nursery and fabric shop!!) and came home via Kirby Lonsdale as we had been told the crocuses in the churchyard were worth a visit.
We were not disappointed! The churchyard is just covered with crocuses and daffodils, it looked beautiful. We spent a very peaceful few minutes just wandering round looking at the blooms.
Some of the houses and buildings in Kirby Lonsdale looked really interesting, we will have to return when we have a little more time and maybe slightly warmer weather!.
I’ve just finished another block for my Spring Wreath quilt BOM, this is a gorgeous design by Andrea Walpole of Raggedy Ruff Designs. It’s been a very steep learning curve as I’ve not tried free machine embroidery before but Andrea’s instructions are great and her best bit of advice is ‘Just take a deep breath and go for it!’
Just to remind you, the first block was the family of rabbits, this sits in the centre of the quilt…
The second block was a deer, very cute, I think this one sits bottom left on the quilt…
This month it was a pair of foxes, it was actually easier that the two previous blocks as their eyes are closed!! Once the block was pieced and the applique cut out using freezer paper, the embroidery bit doesn’t actually take that long, an evening or so. I’m not nearly as terrified by the embroidery bit as I was on the first one, I almost enjoy that part!
As you can see the quilt depicts British wildlife, Andrea’s love of the countryside and it’s wildlife shines through her designs, the animals are beautifully drawn. I’ve decided it’s the detail that makes these quilts so wonderful, both with the shapes of the fabric cut and the embroidered detail. For example, the dandelion seeds that are floating away haven’t just got a white fluffy bit, they have the brown seed dangling down too, the butterfly wings have veins and coloured spots.
I’ve got squirrels to do next and then an owl. After that it’s ‘just’ the floral border swags that bring it all together.
It’s the first Tuesday in the month so it’s Windows time, the photographic challenge organised by Wild Daffodil. I was a bit more organised over the last month and actually looked for some windows to photograph!
Last week my walking buddy and I purportedly set out to do a practice walk up Pen-y-ghent, however for various reasons we abandoned that plan (whilst en route!!) and went to the seaside instead! We managed to include a garden centre and a fabric shop, so my OH was somewhat perplexed when I came back from a ‘walk’ with two plants and two lengths of fabric!!
Anyway, I digress! On the way back we called in at Kirby Lonsdale, a lovely old village on the border of the Yorkshire Dales and the Lakes. We had a good mooch round, discovering lots of fascinating old ginnels and back lanes.
There was a market on in the village square, but along the back lanes into the older part of Kirby Lonsdale we found it’s second market square, complete with market cross. It’s very unusual for villages to have two. This one was a livestock market, the streets next to it are still called Horsemarket and Swinemarket. The original weigh house is still there, you can just make out the outline of cobbles in front marking the edges of the weigh platform.
There was an interesting building on the square which if I read the information board right was the old police station.
We followed the ginnels round to the churchyard. The church is a fascinating mix of architectural styles. Parts of it date back to the twelfth century but various bits have been added on and changed in most centuries since, so there is an eclectic mix of styles.
This mix of styles was particularly noticeable with the shapes of windows and arches…
There is some beautiful stained glass in the church, it always amazes me to see the detail in stained glass windows, it’s one of the times that the more you look, the more you see, I love the vibrant colours of this window and the tiny flowers and mushrooms on the ground…
These are the bottom panels of larger windows, just look at the detail of those flowers…
This photo challenge is organised by Wild Daffodil, she has some lovely photos of Forde Abbey, please follow the link to see lots more photos of windows.
We’ve been pretty busy in the garden over the last couple of weeks, I say ‘we’ as when my OH offered to help sort out the compost area last weekend I nearly bit his hand off! He loves the garden, he just doesn’t particularly like gardening!
The area he wanted to work on used to be the chicken run, it has a raised rose hedge along the fence but the rest had just been dug over. As you can imagine from years of chicken poo, the soil is pretty good there! I used it as a temporary bed for plants I was moving round, but the weeds had started to encroach. Last year he built a pair of compost heaps from scrap wood we had lying around and we needed a proper path across the soil to get to it, not just a row of wobbly slabs which were gradually getting buried!.
My original plan was a path down the middle with split log rolls either side to edge the path, gravel underfoot and old stone slabs in front of the actual compost heap. We toddled off to the garden centre and bought 4 log rolls, two different heights as the rose side would need to be higher.
Last weekend we cleared all the weeds out, moved any plants I wanted to keep and rotavated the bed. I have a mini rotavator, I think it’s called a cultivator officially. I love it, it almost makes my soil look like a tilth… almost!!
This weekend I started trying to lay the path. I began moving the soil to either side but it didn’t look quite right. I then had a thought! In front of the rose hedge is a railway sleeper on top of a row of large stones, it actually makes a neat edge. I decided to have the path next to the rose hedge instead, it immediately felt right!
I leveled the area off and then my OH came and helped dig the trenches for the split log roll and position them. They have to be buried about 50% to be stable. The two larger rolls stretched round the compost area and half way down the path, we then swopped over to the shorter ones as height wasn’t quite as critical there. We’ve still got to put the last one in at the end, maybe next weekend! I still need to trim the membrane back and we’ll top up the gravel too but we’re getting there.
Today I put some plants in. I’ve been gradually collecting a few here and there over the last month. I’ve ordered two roses from David Austins, one is a large shrub called A Lark Ascending, it’s flowers are a beautiful soft shade of apricot. It grows to around 5′ so it’s going in the middle. The other one is a very pretty smaller apricot one called Sweet Dreams. They will hopefully help the bed to blend in with the Amber & Amethyst garden in front. I’m aiming to have the border mainly autumn and winter interest, so I’ve planted some evergreens, hellebores and erysimum. I’ve plenty of space to add more plants!
I had a good tidy up round the pond too, I’ve not finished this area yet but it is looking a lot neater. Hubert the Heron is standing a little straighter too, he looked like he was going to fall into the pond before!
I cut back the hellebore leaves, so the flowers stand out more now, there were a few touching the soil so I picked them and now I have a pretty vase of hellebores.
One of my new purchases was this gorgeous rhododendron, I just love the colour. I’m hoping it will contrast nicely with the lime green pieris behind. There’s a very pretty erysimum just infront which is almost the same colour. They are planted quite close but by the time the rhodie gets to any size the wall flower will have died off! The perennial wallflowers are great as they flower their socks off, often all year, but they are fairly short lived, especially in our soil. I think I’m doing well if they last three years.
These miniature daffs in a pot came from my mums garden, they look really pretty and cheerful.
I’ve a lot of work to do in the garden this month, I’ve to finish tidying up and prune all the roses, I did a rough count and I reckon we have about 25, not including the 30 odd foot of hedging! From a distance the garden is starting to show a bit of life, there’s a smattering of daffs round the patio with quite a lot still to flower. In the next few weeks the garden is going to change so quickly as the fresh, green growth appears, I love this time of year.
It’s a good job I’ve got this three weekly post to write for the hand quilt-a-long as I am struggling a bit to find my mojo with it at the moment! At least with the post to write I did over a couple of hours last night…and then I take a picture and think actually I’ve done quite a lot…I just need to keep at it!
Three weeks ago I was doing a mini happy dance having finally quilted all those little houses…
I’d just moved on to the next border, stitching a few rays on the outer quarters of the sunflowers. There’s quite a lot of rays here, fifteen to be exact! I found my hera marker was great for giving a faint line for me to quilt a long. Last night I finished all the rays of the first flower, stitched a little further along the straight,narrow, purple border and moved onto the flower in the middle. I’ve quilted in the ditch round the outer edge and I’m planning to do the same around the inner ones too. I’m still undecided about whether to do another line a similar distance out from the flower, we shall see.
The lines straight across are the machine basting lines, they are gradually disappearing as I remove them after quilting, hopefully they will completely disappear when the quilt has it’s first wash.
This quilt was a Sarah Fielke block of the month two years ago, every year she has an on line quilt competition for anyone who has completed one of her BOM quilts that year, it doesn’t have to be the BOM that’s just finished. My Down the Rabbit Hole wasn’t ready last year so I’ve entered it in this year. Well, the on-line quilt gallery has just opened and you can vote for your favourite three quilts, there’s some gorgeous quilts to look at, both Down the Rabbit Hole and also last years BOM, it always fascinates me seeing quilts in different colourways. Please follow the link if you want to have a look.
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.
thecraftycreek 