Still Playing Catch Up - Sewing Shindig

Two weekends ago I went to the Sewing Shindig near Shrewsbury, which was a weekend retreat with a mix of workshops and social sewing.  When I booked to go on this back in March it was just before I finished work and thought it would be a good retirement treat to myself.  Events had overtaken me in the lead up to going to this and I rushed to get things ready for going away.  Together with that, instead of driving myself there and back (route and timings all planned) the car became poorly and David drove me there and came back to collect me at the end of the weekend! I thought this trip is doomed!!

Anyway, I had to make gifts to swap with my room partner, Marie, who made me some lovely gifts in return.  She had requested a roomy storage bag for taking supplies to workshops, a Goody Binding pouch, notebook cover and mug rug.  I didn't manage the mug rug and I had a disaster with one of the bags (more of that later) so had to make another. Here are some pics.

This is the Sewing Date Traveler by Cynthia Frenette which is a free pattern on the Robert Kaufman Fabrics website, which is linked here , which I found a really good make with clear instructions and I used a mix of Alison Glass 'Road Trip' and Beth Studley 'Sundance' fabrics.  A bag like this needed a firm interfacing, but the US sites recommend Pellon interfacing, which we don't have in the UK so the nearest equivalent is Bosal in R Form, a foam interfacing with a single fusible side (it is also available with both sides fusible). Although a lot of seams to go through at the end and the springy-ness of the interfacing making it challenging to machine sew it was a quick make and would happily make another.

Some time ago I made the Goody Goody Binding Kit, which is not a pattern as such, as all the instructions are in a blog post by its designer Vanessa of Lella Boutique.  That was a good make too which I really enjoyed and used a modern print with hexagons by Aneela Hoey which I had after some time broken into and also gave me colour choices for the other elements in the folder as you can see from the pics below.

I'd made a notebook cover from earlier this year which I put in with the gifts as well as some Dorset made Moores biscuits and a pack of Grandma Wild ones too.

From Marie I had this super bag which I didn't imagine when saying I would like a tote bag! She used Alison Glass fabrics too and if you look at my pics above it was the same design range but different colours!

There was another smaller bag as she picked up that I knitted socks and this was just right for my sock knitting.  I used this to put my current knitting in on my journey home!

Another make was this lovely zippy pouch from an Aneela Hoey pattern from her book Stitched Sewing Organizers which Marie made with more of the Alison Glass fabrics and she included some low volume fabric and a set of hexies towards my Kingfisher quilt.

Its in use everyday as I make more progress on this slow stitching project.

It was a lovely weekend of sewing, sewing and more sewing.  I took a workshop on free machine quilting with Trudi Wood and designing how I would quilt my sample quilt, so this gave me the basis on which to start this process and I started on this the next day but haven't progressed since being at home. It was a valuable lesson in quilt design and also learned that I don't have to drop the feed dogs on my sewing machine to free motion.

The afternoon was another workshop from Susan Standen (Canadian Abroad) called Quilt As You Go.  Using small fabric pieces, fussy cutting and selvedges on top of backing and wadding with close stitches to effect.  Also learned about a porthole border to create a cushion top. Here's my sample

I enjoyed this so much I made another piece, below, which will be a large pouch to go in my rucksack  to contain purse and phone.  I used fabrics from my collection of reproduction 1930's style.

There was also a goody bag and a

lucky dip during the weekend and I won some threads and two patterns

 My purchases were really modest

In spite of the problems on the lead up it was a great weekend.  The bookings for the next one is full already so I won't be going next year.  I will be on the lookout for another retreat a bit closer to home as it was a really good to get away.