Neat Feet!

On 1 Sept I posted the postcards that I made for the Footwear swap for the BQLPC group. In the first photo are from top left, clockwise, flip flops from Kandy, fluffy pink shoe from Dawn, Victorian boot from Ruth and sneaker from Wendy. The second photo shows a horseshoe from Janet, more flip flops from Michelle (they're decorated with beads, flower and brad) and trainer detail from Caroline.

All lovely shoes which graced a shelf in my living room through September.

I also took part in a challenge for Arts in the Mail called "Slash and Burn" which I posted a little while back and are linked here and here

The card on the left is from Kate with lovely pastelly colours and on the right from Priscilla and the photo manages to pick out the texture in hers.

Another Bowl

Not being able to resist doing another bowl as the first one was easy, this was even easier. I made a square drafted from a square ruler onto freezer paper marking out the position for the middle square and making darts from the points where the square's corners are. Making the bowl itself from bonding the fabric onto bondawebbed craft Vilene to finish took an hour and a half. Quite please with the result though uploading the photos taken with my phone I think the light was too bright coming from the patio window so it looks a little pale.

Fabric Bowls

Here's 2 pics of a fabric bowl that I've made. It was demonstrated by Jenny at Quarterjack Quilters last night. And yes, it is Christmas Fabric. I thought that I would use this filled with baubles and pine cones as a table centre during the Christmas holidays. One the fabrics were "sandwiched" together with fusible stabiliser in the middle and the template drawn it was quite easy to sew together which I did this afternoon. Nice to see something started and finished in such a short time! The first pic is looking into the bowl, the second is the outside.

Little needlecase

Playing on the embellisher last week, I needlefelted some slightly sparkly rainbow yarn onto black felt and added some black tulle netting over it. After sewing some felt "pages", I added some flower sequins and button with loop fastening. I presented this to my friend Penny who gave this yarn to me, which came from her friend's collection of yarns.

Fancy Footwear

I've been a member of Yahoo Groups BQL for some time and signed up to a Postcard group nearly 3 years ago and have been making postcards since then. Of course I joined another group earlier in the year and find that postcards are a lovely size to work with, not having the opportunity, or time even to make many larger quilts.

The latest swap that I signed up for was the theme "Footwear". Inspired by my own shoes, that I have rarely worn but they do look lovely I made my party shoes cards. Using metallic thread on black felt I used the fancy stitches on my machine and cut out shoes shapes to go on the shoe fabric that I already had in my stash.


I enjoyed making these postcards although I thought I only had 6 to make. Having checked the list again it was a good job that I did - there were 8 on the list so a 7th postcard had to be made!

Going for the burn

Carrying on the "Slash and Burn" theme for the Arts in the Mail challenge I decided to layer up some fabrics and heat them up with a heat tool. Layer of red silk, yellow/orange lame, pieces of gold and multicolour netting with some crinkly organza, topped with organza. The first pic shows the stiching and burning back having added sequins afterwards. The second pic shows the card trimmed back and torn organza zig-zagged on around the edge. I've quite enjoyed distressing the fabrics this way.

Slash and Embellish

I had a go at using some unusual fabrics to make this postcard for a challenge for this month on Arts in the Mail, in the theme of "Slash and Burn" . Haven't done the burn bit yet, but here's photos of the slashing. I layered up some hand dyed cotton, fine muslin, silk, lame and organza. The layers were sewn together with metallic thread. Then slashed. I further distressed this with my embellishing (needlepunch) machine.

I liked the front (above) but also liked the look of the back as well (below)

I joined the back of the work to some craft Vilene and used some ribbon yarn, also distressed by the embellisher and zigzagged onto the postcard.
Think I impressed myself with this one, think I might try another!

Been Busy

I've had several things to finish and send. Having got an embellisher machine, a Janome Xpression, and played around with it, I've joined a Yahoo Group, UK Embellishers. Having been too late to sign up to their challenges I managed to sign up to a flower ATC swap with 4 others in the group. I'm quite pleased with these 4 little cards. I'd made the petals and leaves from a piece of wool rovings trapped in matching coloured organza and cut out the shapes and needled them onto a felt background. Dark coloured chiffon was used for grass and fuzzy yarn used for the centre of the flowers.














Next on the agenda was to get 4 postcards done for Art in the Mail Yahoo group. The theme was pink and purple. Doesn't look much like that in the photo's does it? Started out as crazy patchwork, but decided to do something different with the other 2. I enjoy sewing bits of embellishments. Lot of fun with this swap.

Got a quilt done!

Nearly 4 weeks after my grandson, Leo, was born I've finished his quilt! As it was a lovely afternoon the last binding strips were put on and I spent time in the garden hemming it to the back of the quilt. I've really pleased with how colourful this is and just had to photograph this straight away. Please excuse the garden ephemera and catching the sunlight on the top right corner.

I've now got a few pink and purple postcards to finish and post off and will put those on the blog in the next few days.

New arrival

Following on from my previous posting about waiting for my new grandchild due on 4 July, he arrived yesterday (9 July). Born in Poole Hospital at 11.24 weighing in at 7lbs 13.5 oz, his name is Leo James Wild. His parents Jamie (my youngest son) and girlfriend Carly are over the moon. I went to visit them last night, so here's a pic of me holding my lovely new grandson.

New Quilt

I've started to make a quilt for my second grandchild who was due on 4 July, however we are still waiting! I bought a pack 5" square blocks from Strawberry Fayre in March which had mainly animal prints and added some of my own to make up the 25 blocks needed. I added strips to 2 sides log cabin style then the blue print sashing. In the top right corner are 2 of the green setting triangles that I've used as the quilt is on point. At this point I've still to added borders in the blue print. Seeing as I've only put this together in 2 days (last Saturday when it was tipping down with rain and this afternoon) I have to say its looking quite good. I'll take another photo when I've progessed further.

Picture Frame Postcards

I made four postcards quickly this weekend for a swap that I forgot about. I signed up to an "Arts in the Mail" Picture Frame swap which was due to be posted this week, before the Ribbon Weaving one due in July.

It was when I received a couple of cards from this swap from Kate and Evelyn that it fell into place. I already had the picture blocks attached to background fabric but never used them so I'd orginally made "picture frames" from Bondwebbed fabric. However when I went to the National Patchwork Championships at Sandown one trade there, Glitterati had a "loot bag" with an assortment of trimmings. The braids and ric-rac used made really good picture frames and finished of these picture blocks nicely.

All are now in the post to London (Kate), Germany (Evelyn) and USA (Kaye and Sue)

Holiday in France

Last week David and I have been on holiday in the Loire Valley. Last Tuesday we returned home to Poole from Cherbourg on Brittany Ferries ship the Barfleur. It has to negotiate going through the narrow channel leading into Poole. I could not resist taking some photo's (although it was getting dark) but have managed to get them in the wrong order, so here goes.

This is a view of Brownsea Island with its castle and cottages near the landing bay. The island is famous for the first scout camp run by Lord Baden-Powell a hundred years ago this year.

The pic to the left is of the Purbecks, the area around Swanage in Dorset. It was a lovely site to see when coming home.

Our time in France was spent in the Loire Valley, visiting chateux and other sites. A lovely time, lots to see, lots of walking and we did get some nice weather though a lot of rain too. I might seek out some pics later to post.

Ribbon Weaving

Some postcards that I've recently completed and will go in the post tomorrow. Two of them are off to the U.S. adnd a third to New Zealand. Hope they get to their destinations, while we're off to ours. Good to be ahead of some things as these aren't due to be posted until 7 July.

The them of this swap is ribbon weaving, which I quite enjoyed doing. Various types of ribbon are woven over felt. Black tulle was placed on top and then free machined. Ric rac tidied the edges and finished with sequins. Lots of glitz here. Great fun.

Tissue paper printing

I've not posted for a little while and will be away for a week on holiday in France, hope to post some pics when I get back.

Today, I thought I would have a go at tissue paper printing. I had an assorted pack of coloured tissue paper and dampened calico. I laid the tissue paper on top and dampened a bit more with a spray of water in the first picture. The colours bled out onto the calico and this is the result, in the second picture when dry. Like it, not sure what to do with it.

Latest TAST stitches

Having fallen a little behind with the TAST stitches in recent weeks I took time to practice the Woven and Whipped Wheels, even made a few "roses" from this (but don't look too closely at the leaves of one of them!). I also tried the Basque stitch too, which I found easy to pick up. This was edged with up and down buttonhole stitch to hold the front and back piece together. Made a nice little bookmark.

Trying to get creative

Today I'm on holiday the day after the Bank Holiday. After doing the chores I thought I'd get down to a little expirimental stuff which I'd normally not have the time to do. In Arts In the Mail Yahoo Group the challenge this month is "mixed media". I've made a card which has the background fabric printed from the paper bag, the flower picture from a magazine (my garden looks nothing like that - shame!) covered with self adhesive plastic film, flowers trapped in organza stitched on top of the pic. I then stamped a trio of little flowers and backed the whole thing with pelmet vilene and hand made paper. Phew, I hope that's enough, though will have to stitch around all layers to hold together.

Yesterday the Bank Holiday was spent stitching some "string" pieces into squares, which will form the basis of another quilt, probably for local Project Linus. I started the first 4 blocks in a quilting meeting back last winter, but just last week decided to have a go at more blocks until I got all 16 done. Nove have to think how I'm going to arrange them and look at some border fabric.

Postcards to go

This month I've taken part in "Circles" themed postcard swap organised by BQLPC, an offshot of BQL (British Quilt List), a Yahoo Group. Having been to Jennie Rayment's workshop last month, I'd learnt a quick way to applique circles so went mad on this. As well as some fancy machine stitches I've also used some of the TAST stitches from recent weeks, like the Palestrina stitch, Bonnet stitch, Cretan and Herringbone stitches. They just been sent in the post this month so should be with their recipients early next week. Hope you like the pictures.

New stitches

I've posted a pic of the 2 latest stitches in the TAST challenge, Oyster stitch and a little bit of Palestrina stitch, which I've also posted to the Flickr website. Oyster stitch took quite a while to master, but got enough of a hang of it to sew these lupins, together with a few French Knots. The thread that I used for the lupins is Coats Anchor Multicolour Stranded Cotton, which is made in some lovely colours. The lupin pattern was originally a goldwork pattern from Stitch magazine which I thought would be a good way of showing off this stitch.

If there are any English people out there reading my blog - I'd like to wish you all a happy St George's Day tommorow.

The Blue Pool

Yesterday my husband, David, and I went to the Blue Pool in Wareham, Dorset. Being a lovely warm and sunny afternoon, it just seemed too nice to stay indoors. The pool was once a clay pit producing ball clay which was used for making clay pipes and later Wedgewood pottery. The light refraction gives the water the aquamarine blue appearance. Being armed with my mobile phone I could not resist taking a pic.