A Play Date

A good friend came over today for a play date of crafting.

Not a lot of crafting took place, but a lot of talking, oh and quite a bit of eating.  You know how it is.

What I did achieve was some garment embellishment for my friend.  She had bought some cute overalls to wear while tending her farmers market stalls, but they were too short and just looked a silly length.  Would we be able to do something?

I’m sure we could.  Let’s see what is in the stash that would be suitable.

Ta da!  The sunflower fabric was one of the first patchwork fabrics I bought, well over twenty years ago.  I had used some back then, but still had plenty and it isn’t something that I naturally gravitate towards.  It was, however, perfect for this project.  They will look rather fun when she has her stalls.

While I was playing with sunflowers, my friend did achieve a small amount of her crochet rug.

After the garment tweaking, I did a little of my slow stitching, and I had also done a little at my stitching morning on Friday.  This is where I am up to.  I said it would be slow progress, and it is. I am having a bit of fun with it.  No stress or perfectionism involved.

The overall piece.

Some details of the texture.  There will be some more stitching in the hexy, I just have to decide what it will be.  The little leaves are just tracing the fabric design.

The doiley section will be stitched down later.  As you can see, there is quite a bit more to do, but I think I am at the stage where I can pin on more fabric, as I have freed up quite a few of my appliqué pins.

By the way, Mick’s rug got its christening on the weekend while watching the footy.  The weather was absolutely freezing, so he was happy to have it.

Meanwhile, no start has been made on the Sew Together Bag for this month’s Chookshed Challenge.  I met a bit of a road block, but that has now been navigated, so a start should be made soon.

Finding a Squirrel Down a Rabbit Hole - A New Start

Once you finish a project you can start a new one.  That’s how it works, isn’t it?  That should be the Sew Together Bag shouldn’t it?

No, that is not how it works.

I seem to have been seeing lots of slow stitching coming up when scrolling and felt the urge to start something,  I even have a little tub with offcuts from doileys from previous projects that I want to play with.

The Sew Together Bag needs some light wadding, so I pulled out the tub.  There just happened to be a piece that was sort of the size to make a pouch, so I squared it up.  Next to get out my doiley offcuts and a box labelled “Small Scraps” as well as my usual scrap tubs and have a play.

Oh, what a glorious mess I made.  The plan was to have a faded look, but my scraps ended up making it somewhat pretty.  More so than I had originally thought , but it will still be nice……I hope.  I’m not a fan of raw edges, as in a lot of slow stitching, so lots of turning under.  It’s not Kawandi, or Boro, or Kantha, rather making it up as I go along.  My tiny appliqué pins, that I have had for years and never used, came into their own.  It has ended up bigger than I thought I would make, but I just worked with the size of the batting piece.  It will be about the size of an iPad pouch, so quite a large panel to work on.

Once I ran out of pins it was time to find some threads to stitch it all down.  Time to get out the box labelled “Crochet and Pearl Thread”.  Yep, there seems to be boxes of just about everything lurking in the deep dark depths around here……and…..shock horror……most have recently been labelled.  You never know when you may need something.  Thank goodness they don’t go off.

Time to start stitching.  There isn’t a lot of thread on these spools, so we will try to use them up first……more to add to the jar.

A little progress was made on Sunday, while chatting to Lou about her exciting fabric haul.  Just as well slow stitching isn’t required to be perfect, as mine is a bit how’s your uncle.  Having said that, I quite like the texture.  After the first couple of rows of stitching I used the Hera marker to keep my stitching lines somewhat straight.  It will be fun to decide how to stitch the different areas and then to do some embellishing,  There is also still quite a bit of batting to cover with fabric.  This won’t be a quick process, just something to pick up now and again.  Then, it is called “Slow Stitching”.

Chookshed Challenge #8 Is Complete

Can you believe it.  I actually completed a Chookshed Challenge project within the month!

I did not expect to get this project completed in May, but we did not expect to be back home after only about a week away.  Let’s recap.  You can read my initial post here. 

So, this was the kit I was working with.

As I explained at the time, I replaced the embroidered centre hexagons with vintage doiley pieces.  Despite saying I would include a yellow fabric, it was too strong.  In the end I made the three EPP motifs the same.

The kit used two different background fabrics for the blocks.  They were from fabric that was cut at ten inches square.  I felt that an extra half inch would give the motifs just a smidge more room to breathe, so would use something else.  I have a box of fabric labeled “Pretty”, so I was hoping to find something suitable in there, and I did.

This super soft green on cream was ideal.

I also wasn’t too fussed on the border fabric.  It was a bit too lolly pink I felt.  Therefore I auditioned a few options, all with the striped binding fabric that came in the kit.  

This is what came with the kit.  When I look at it now, it would have been fine.

This fabric was one of the fabrics that came with the kit and was to be the background for one of the blocks.  I liked it, but then realised that it was directional and that wouldn’t work.

I found this one in the Pretty box.  Mmm, that’s OK.  Still a bit too pink.

Let’s try something else from the Pretty box.  Maybe a bit to green.

Now, what if you refold the fabric, which has large florals?  That’s better.  

Next to look for some batting.  I knew I didn’t have sufficient iron on batting, but maybe I could make some frankenbatting that would work, and also use up of some of those small bits.  

It worked….just.  Mum would be proud of my frugality.  She was always careful with fabric usage.  If ever she used a commercial pattern, she would lay it out at home before purchasing fabric and inevitably found that you didn’t need as much as the pattern recommended.

I found a backing fabric in the Pretty box that would work but I’m not that fussed on.  You won’t see it, so a great way to use it up.

So, here it is.  All finished on the 29th of May.  

And the back.

I am so very pleased to tick this one off the list.  It is very “pretty”.  In the end, the only fabrics I used from the kit are the pink and blue in the EPP and the binding, but I am happy with the fabric choices I ended up making.  The other fabrics from the kit have now been added to the “Pretty” box for use in the future.

I am linking up with Deana.  Pop over to see what the other girls achieved.

Now, we just need to have a nice afternoon tea with pretty cups and saucers.

Stitching Wishes for May

I’m starting to sound like a cracked record, as once again, I won’t have a great deal of stitching time. This time it is because we will be away for much of the month.  Let’s see what I hope to achieve.

First up is the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  This month’s colour is green.  The split nine patches shouldn’t take too long.

Now, for the Chookshed Challenge…..

The number drawn is Number 8.  The goal for that number is to make a quilt from the split nine patches that I have been making for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, but I had already decided early in the year that I need another year’s worth of RSC blocks to get to a decent size.  Hence, it has to be late in the year that I work on this one.

Therefore, for the fourth time this year I need to swap things around.  Hand stitching will be the go.

The project I have settled on is the Tilly’s Tea Party table runner.  This was initially the project for February, but was swapped out then.  The delay was the stitchery on the centre hexies.  This is a kit from a stitching day that never ended up happening due to Covid.  When I opened it up earlier this year, the printed stitchery design has actually faded to a level that you can’t follow it and I can’t be bothered to retrace it.  It was suggested to me that I could possibly use vintage doiley embroideries for the centres.  Now, I liked that idea.

This afternoon I had a little hunt and found a piece that would work.  The motifs fit nicely and are a suitable colour.  It has quite a few small holes in it, so I have no hesitation in cutting it up.  None of the holes are anywhere that will affect the areas I plan to use.  It is currently soaking in some Oxyclean to get it all nice and fresh and hopefully remove a couple of marks.

One of the fabrics in the kit looked a bit wishy washy next to the embroidery, so I switched it out for the yellow.  Other than that, I think this will work.  It is something I can prep and then take away with me.  All I intend to get done is the EPP motifs.  The rest will have to wait till we return home, so I am not aiming to get it finished in May.  If that happens, it will be a super bonus.

The hexies that I basted last month are currently all packed up in a pile.  I think I will lay them out again, in a similar fashion to the above photo and stitch them into that shaped panel.  Then I plan to join it into a ring and make it into a panel around the base of a tote bag.  I’ll just need to add two more hexies.  I think I can manage that……all subject to change, of course.

Other than that, I just want to work on my crochet blanket. That will keep me out of trouble for quite a while……if I can find more of the yarn on our travels.

I really don’t anticipate that I will manage to complete all of these wishes, but I at least want to have them prepped and packed into my sewing basket that lives under the seat in the caravan.  There would be nothing worse than running out of projects…..as if.

I’m going to link up over at Deana’s.  Pop over and see what other Chookshed Challenge projects are going to be worked on this month. 

Chookshed Challenge End of April

As expected, I have no finished project to share this month.

Today is the last day of the month, so this morning I finally at least made a start.  There is nothing like a deadline to kick me into gear.

I now have my 68 one inch hexies glue basted.  Sorry about the lighting.  It is all showing a bit more yellow than in real lift.

I now know about how big a panel I can make.  The next thing is to actually decide what to use them on.  It will be a good portable project, whatever I decide. Watch this space.  

I’m going to link up over at Deana’s blog, so pop over and see what the other girls achieved this month.

Chookshed Challenge - Not Much Progress Report

Remember at the start of the month I switched projects for the Chookshed Challenge to make things easier for me in a busy month? Oh, and because I couldn’t find the pattern to go with the fabric.  (Lou has now provided me with another copy of that pattern, so at least I now have the makings.  Thanks so much Lou.)

This is what I settled on and I even took it along to Scrub Stitchin’ with the hope to make a start.  Obviously, that didn’t happen.  Well, looking at the pattern photo, I realised that the fabrics would not be ideal, as quite a few had prints that weren’t a consistent colour over the whole charm square, and the pattern effect would be somewhat lost.

Time to have a rethink and come up with an alternate pattern idea for a table runner using the fabrics.  This is what I found.  I figured I could just do a couple of rows of this quilt pattern and it would work.

Then I had a better look at some of the charm “squares”…..and found that they weren’t, by quite a bit.  Blast!  That takes care of either of those patterns.  

Time to rethink once again. I want to use up those charm squares. They were in our project pack at Girls Day in the Country back in 2013, and our project didn’t require them to be cut into squares, so it wasn’t an issue back then.

Therefore, I figured I need to also do something that doesn’t require squares…. Ta da!  You can make four one inch hexies from a charm square.  There are 68 roughly cut hexies there, ready to glue baste and then do something with.  Probably not a table runner, but who knows. Also, the variations in the fabrics works really well now that they will be hexies.  

All I know is that whatever I make, it won’t be finished in April, but I at least want to have them basted.  My new plan is to have them made into something by the end of the year.  I really would like to have all the Challenge projects done by then.

Wish me luck and I will check in at the end of the month.

Scrub Stitchin’ - Part 4 - What I Worked On

“Stitchin” is a key part of our time at Baradine, however, the amount completed varies considerably between participants.  This year I spent quite a bit of time before the event preparing projects with the intention of being a bit productive.  Of course, I did not expect to get everything done, but to have a variety of projects to work on.

The first thing I brought out on Wednesday was my Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks.  A nice quick and easy way to ease into the retreat.

Next, I started work on the appliqué on the bright fish blocks.  Rather than complete each block, I chose a thread colour and used that on whatever blocks required it.  I did manage to complete one before being ready for a change of project.  After working consistently on an appliqué project last year, I knew that this year I would give myself lots of breaks in this project.  The plan went well, and I just did bits and pieces randomly throughout the retreat.

The next project I started was the Secret Garden Quilt.  I had this cut out and ready to stitch the centre strip into the blocks.  That didn’t take too long.  

I had to wait a while for the design wall, before I could play with the layout, so went back to my fish.

Once a part of the design wall was free, I started yet another project, the One Yard Wonder Quilt.  I worked out the placement of the patches for the panel.

It didn’t take too long to stitch them together and then add the remaining pieces to format the quilt top.  The alphabet fabric, found at a neighbour’s recent destash garage sale, really sets it off.  This was to be a donation quilt, but one of the girls asked if she could buy it, as she has a baby quilt that she needs to make soon.  Yes, she could have it, but no she couldn't buy it.  In the end, she gifted me a charm pack she had that she wouldn’t use.  I think that was more than fair, as she still needs to get the backing and batting, quilt it and bind it, so she will still have made a lot of input into the gift.

The design wall became free, so it was time to play with my Secret Garden blocks.  I was determined not to overthink it and they came together rather quickly.

Once again, it didn’t take too long to get the top together.  This will be another donation quilt.  The turquoise sashing fabric was a “free to a good home” item at last year’s Scrub Stitchin’, so it was great to use it this time.  There isn’t enough of the fabric to do an outer border, so this is as big as it will be.  I still have to decide on a backing and binding fabric.  Hopefully, it will be finished before too long.

Time to play with some more fish….

Then it was time to bring out another project.  This time the “Five and Dime” quilt from the fabric I was recently gifted.  I had just brought strips of the fabrics that I had cut, so stitched them into their sets and cross cut them into their blocks.  Once again, time to play with the layout and not overthink it.  As there were only eight different fabrics there would have to be duplicates in the rows.  I can live with the layout.

This was on Saturday afternoon and I knew that there would not be time to get them all stitched into a quilt top, so packed them up in their rows to complete at home.  Once joined, there will be a narrow and wider border added.  Once again, hopefully soon.

Then it was back to my fish.  I had hoped to get them all done, but the two skeletal ones still have to have their bones stitched down and the eyes have to be done on all of them.  However, overall, I am really pleased to have made such good progress.

In addition to all these, I did start to use my leader and ender pieces I had cut towards my “Bonnie Lass” quilt.  I ended up getting forty pairs joined, which was a good start.  This will be a long term project.

So, all the prep I did before the retreat really paid off, as I did manage to get quite a bit of stitching completed and best of all, there was very little thinking or matching of fiddly seams involved.  The challenge will now be to get them all completed.

I also took along my Chookshed Challenge project, but didn’t make a start on it.  Fingers crossed I still get it done this month.  

Stitching Wishes for April

It is always fun to look ahead to a new month and think about what I would like to achieve.  Let’s have a look at April.

CHOOKSHED CHALLEGE

Deana has posted the project number for April and it is NUMBER 4.  

I’m not sure if this is really funny or sad, but to date I have swapped around every project number that has been selected.  Let’s see what Number 4 is:

Yep, you guessed it.  I’m swapping this one around as well.  At the start of the year I couldn’t find the fabric I had bought at Baradine last year to make this project and couldn’t find my pattern either.  

The fabric has been found, but the pattern is still playing hide and seek.  That is particularly annoying, as I have made this project twice before and have some hand written notes with the pattern to help me along the way.  I know it is here somewhere, as I did have a look at it after I bought the fabric.  Grrrr!

Anyway, in the mean time I am swapping it with my Number 5 which is the Granny Square Table Runner.  I do have the fabrics for this one and the photo I am using for inspiration. It even travelled to Scrub Stitchin’ with me last year, but wasn’t worked on.  The charm squares are left over from a Girls Day in the Country project from 2013, so I do think it is time to get this table runner made.  My goal said that it will be good to practise ruler work on Monique, so it may not be completed in April, but will at least be well on the way and should be finished by the end of the year.  As you can guess, this is now yet another project to pack to take to Baradine.

The funny thing is that when I chose my projects for the year I thought they would all be nice and easy to complete within a month.  This is mostly true, as long as you don’t get busy with other things.  Let’s hope I find more time later in the year, now that I have kept postponing those that need a little more thought.

RAINBOW SCRAP CHALLENGE

The colour this month is?  I haven't been able to ascertain the colour as yet.  Once again, I will keep it simple with my split nine patch blocks.  Hopefully, that is something I can prepare in the next couple of days.

EDITED: The colour for April is RED.  Now to pull some fabrics.

Other than that, I hope to have lots to show for my time at Scrub Stithin’.  I can’t wait.

What I do need to do is get some hand stitching prepped, as other than my Sashiko panel, which is half done, I don’t have anything on the go at the moment.  Oh, the possibilities…. and the decisions to be made.  Watch this space.