Stag do!

I have had a Reverse Applique project on the go for ages, it has been taken apart and re-done at least three times.

First of all the patchwork back for the applique didn't fit the applique outline, so needed to be reworked to fit the frame. Then, I really struggled to turn under some of the allowances on certain parts of the design. All in all it has been a complete pain in the proverbial, but I am delighted to say that I have finally completed the Reverse Applique!

You will not be surprised to know that the antlers were where I really struggled to turn under the allowance. I discovered when I compared this to the magazine photo that the antlers on my version are a lot narrower than in the pattern version. I do remember taking the pattern to be enlarged at a local printers (don't you just hate patterns that need to be enlarged!) and have a vague memory of having to compromise on the final size, so that presumably accounts for the difference.

Having seen these magnificent beasts on a recent visit to a Deer Park, I think the antlers in the version above are pretty accurate though, don't you?

I did not help myself by picking a linen blend fabric for the top fabric, as it was fraying where the applique points are narrow before I had even got to stitching it down!

So, I went for a belt and braces approach by hand stitching the turned applique and then machine topstitching. Next up an application of Fraycheck to be sure, to be sure :)

The piece will become a cushion eventually when I have sourced some Deer Horn buttons for the back!

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Ready for the sunshine

Since we have moved to the coast one of the joys in life is sitting outside with a cup of tea (or glass of wine!) watching the passing parade, weather permitting of course, it is Scotland after all!

For a while now I have been wanting to update the tablecloth for our garden table, as it was cotton and purchased before the table, so didn't have a space in the centre for the parasol pole. I did cut a space out a while ago, but as we tend to leave the parasol in the table it meant that the tablecloth had to stay put too. That parasol is too heavy to be lifting in and out on a regular basis :)

I did start to make a new tablecloth a while ago, using some plasticised cotton that I had lurking in my stash. Sadly, I completely messed up the measurements so had to ditch that particular project. However, on a visit to cuddle the gorgeous grandson a while ago, I came across Flo-Jo boutique, which had a great selection of oilcloth. So, after lots of calculating and re-calculating between the staff, my daughter-in-law and myself we worked out how much fabric I needed (lots!) and the purchase was made.

Then the bag sat in my sewing room for several weeks as summer sewing for the boy took precedence, but with a visit from the gorgeous grandson and his parents on the horizon I thought that I had better get cracking with that tablecloth as baby mealtimes are not the most tidy of occasions :)

I measured the radius of the table, cut a piece of string to that length then attached a tack to one end and a Frixion pen to the other and with the oilcloth fabric folded in half lengthwise I drew out a half-circle for the tablecloth. I added an overlap at the middle edge so that I could add hook and loop tape to one of the radii to make the tablecloth easily removable. The weather changes so quickly here that it will be good to be able to whip that cloth off at the first sign of rain!

The measuring and cutting proved to be the easy bit of this process.

As oilcloth doesn't fray I could have just left the cut edges raw and, indeed, that is what I did with the centre cut out for the parasol pole, but I wanted to finish the tablecloth off with a bound edge. Just call me a glutton for punishment :)

My rather rusty maths proved my undoing as I discovered that my order of green bias binding was about 0.5 metres too short. Fortunately, rifling through my ribbon bag uncovered sufficient of this deep pink bias binding to bind the tablecloth and still have some left over.

So, with the Teflon foot attached I set to work.

Boy, was it tough going. The oilcloth wasn't very easy to manoeuvre around and the weight of it kept knocking the needle off centre when I stopped to straighten the fabric under the needle. By the time I had finished stitching the binding to the front my poor arms had had a thorough workout, and I still had to go around again to stitch on the back.

Fortunately, the hook and loop tape that I had purchased along with the oilcloth was the adhesive type not the sew-in, as I really wasn't looking forward to trying to sew that on. I have had enough trouble in the past stitching it to fabric, I can only guess how much more difficult it would be trying to keep to the small margins at the sides whilst wrestling with the oilcloth and using a Teflon foot!

Eventually my tablecloth was complete, but I couldn't rush out to try it out as this was the view out of my sewing room window.

Our forecast for today was sunshine and showers and we have definitely had the showers but the sunshine hasn't been very much in evidence. As I write I have been waiting for hours for the rain to stop and the sun to come out so that I can finally get a photo of the finished tablecloth. If the photo below is of the cloth on the kitchen table you will know that my wait was in vain!

 Five minutes after I finally took this photo the rain came back!

I could do with ironing the tablecloth particularly where the seam is but I am a bit wary of doing it, so if you have any tips I will be all ears :)



So that's my finish for this week's TGIFF, now it is your turn to link up and celebrate your finishes this week. As ever don't make this a solitary celebration click on your fellow linkers and leave a congratulatory comment on their fabulous finishes. Grab the blog button and add it to your post so that your readers can join in the fun too.

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Summer Stitching

The gorgeous grandson is growing at a rate of knots and is also about to go on his first summer holiday, so if these aren't an opportunity for some summer stitching I don't know what is :)

Cathy at Blueberry Patch has a grandson a couple of months older than our bundle of joy, so she is a great source of pattern inspiration. Recently she posted photos of shorts made from a pattern from Vagabond Stitch. Needless to say the pattern was very smartly downloaded after I had read Cathy's post!

And here's my first attempt at a pair of Baby Bloomers! I am rather proud of them :)

I made the 12-18mth size and as the gorgeous grandson is not yet 1 year old I was worried that they might be too big, but his mum informs me that getting him dressed is a bit of a struggle at the moment so bigger is better!

Of course I couldn't stop at just one pair now could I?

So, once I knew that the size was alright I rustled up a spotty pair for the holiday wardrobe.

and a plain blue pair just because!

The pattern was very straightforward so they came together in no time. Stitching in elastic is really not my favourite thing to do, but apart from that they are a cinch to stitch up. Well, they are if you don't put one of the cuffs in the wrong way round, but we will not go there.

Next up, some new t-shirts to go with these shorts :)

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts

Good to Go

Remember this hat?

Well, I couldn't just send a hat off to my friend's new grandson, so I dug through my stash of knit fabric from previous projects for the gorgeous grandson and found enough fabric to make this.

My go-to t-shirt pattern from Brindille and Twig. I am definitely getting good use out of that pattern!

This one seemed tiny even although it is only a few sizes smaller than I am now using for the gorgeous grandson.

With the addition of a matching pair of leggings, pattern you will have guessed from Brindille and Twig, I had a much more respectable gift to send off in the post.

Next up some summer sewing for the gorgeous grandson's first holiday :)

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts

Whiskers and Chips

As you probably know by now I have developed a bit of an obsession with Ann's Orchard mini beadwork kits. The gorgeous grandson already has Hilda the Duck, Basil the Cockerel, Hetty the Bantam, Lettice the Rabbit,, Daisy the Cow and Cheddar the Mouse on his bedroom wall. When I saw two more of these cute little kits on Emma's stall at the Knitting and Stitching show, well I couldn't resist.

So, along with Chips the Seagull,

I now have Whiskers the Fox to add to his collection!

All framed and ready to go in the post

I think that is probably enough wall art for the gorgeous grandson's bedroom for now, don't you think?

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts
    

Beach Party

We have been having a welcome burst of sunshine recently so that might explain the beach theme of today's post!

When I visited the Festival of Quilts show in 2015 I naturally indulged in some retail therapy and one of my purchases was a canvaswork kit for a scissor keeper from the Sue Hawkins Needlework stand. Well, it has taken a bit longer than I anticipated but I finally have a finished Beach Hut scissor keeper.

The stitching of the canvaswork was pretty straightforward but the website wasn't wrong when it described making up the box shape as fiddly! I had it turned inside out a couple of times to make sure that I was stitching it up properly.

When it came to the instructions for the cord, I was completely stumped. There were no photos to accompany the text and the text just didn't make any sense to me at all. Fortunately I bought a braid making kit at the Knitting and Stitching Show in Olympia a couple of weeks ago, so this was the ideal opportunity to give it a whirl.

It was a pleasure to sit in the sunshine and manipulate the threads around the card to make this braid, even although it undoubtedly took a lot longer than the original instructions intended :)

Sitting in the sunny SW of France it is easy to agree with this sentiment, might be a bit more difficult to hold on to when I am back on the West Coast of Scotland! Still at least now I will have no excuse for losing scissors down the side of the sofa anymore!

That's my finish for this week's TGIFF, now it is your turn to link up and celebrate your finishes this week. As ever don't make this a solitary celebration click on your fellow linkers and leave a celebratory comment on their fabulous finishes. Grab the blog button and add it to your post so that your readers can join in the fun too.

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Getting the green, white and gold on!

Happy St Patrick's Day!

Shamrock Hearts Cushion

I have been working on some last minute makes for the EG exhibition and sale tomorrow, and with a St Patrick's Day celebration in view naturally green, white and gold were the top of my colour picks!

You may remember these display pegs?

They were made from a Bustle and Sew pattern a couple of years ago and they sit on the edge of my pen holder keeping a tight grip on all sorts of useful notes and things :)

I thought that they would be ideal for a quick and quirky make for the craft sale so dug out the pattern and searched through my stash for appropriate scraps.

Green, white and gold naturally!

And here they are, another flock of birds ready to fly off to new homes. These are such fun to do, so I hope they sell well and give me an excuse to make another flock next year :)

That's my finish for this week's TGIFF link party, now it is your turn to link up your finishes and add to the St Patrick's Day festivities with a celebration of your own. Check out the other linkers and congratulate them on achieving that Friday finish feeling too :)

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A Boutis-liscious finish for TGIFF

Welcome to this week's TGIFF link party.



 ( I know my days and dates are all out of whack this week so apologies for posting this too early!)

I have finished my first ever Boutis project, it is definitely small but I am nonetheless thrilled with how it turned out! The project is part of a larger undertaking by my EG branch, where we were all invited to take a small piece of board and sign up to make a piece for the the board using a particular stitch technique. I chose to try my hand at Boutis, as I had been wanting to give it a go for a while and this seemed like the perfect opportunity.

I traced a Celtic Knot pattern on my Batiste fabric and basted the traced fabric to a square of white cotton then placed them in the hoop.

Using DMC Coton a Broder 20 I backstitched over the traced lines.

The work is then turned over in the hoop so that the back of the stitching is uppermost. My book tells me then to stuff between the stitched lines with cotton yarn, and recommends threading the stuffing needle with cotton thread and using it to "lasso" the cotton yarn to pull it through between the stitching and layers of fabric. Well, I just couldn't get that to work for me at all, so I just threaded the stuffing needle with the cotton yarn and pulled it through on its own, and it worked just fine. You can see the ends of the yarn in the photo above. Thank goodness for my Karen Kay Buckley Scissors, they made short work of snipping off those ends :)

When the stuffing and snipping was complete this is what I ended up with.

The fabric didn't completely hide the board backing so I backed it with a small piece of white wadding and then pinned it to the board, before lacing the back.

I blanket stitched a piece of white felt to cover the back and it is now ready to join the other stitched pieces. The plan is ( I think) to join them together in some manner to make a wall hanging for the upcoming exhibition, but for now I am just relieved to have successfully completed my first ever piece of Boutis work :)

Now it is your turn to show off your finishes. Check out some of the other linkers too and share the joy of that heady finished feeling :)

Don't forget to add the blog button to your post or sidebar so that your readers can join in the fun too!

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A seven day week

We were sending a parcel of goodies to the gorgeous grandson, so I decided to make some more dribble bids for the little chap.

Armed with the information from Plush Addict's guide to the Best fabrics for Dribble bibs and some fabric bought especially for this purpose, I set to work.

First up this stag quilting cotton bib

with an appropriately checked flannel backing.

Then an alphabet quilting cotton front

with a Plush fabric backing. By now I was on a mission to explore lots of different fabric combinations! So next up was

a quilting cotton front

with a knit fabric backing.

Then a flannel front

with a waffle cotton backing.

A couple of duplicate combinations later and I had six bibs to send off.

When I showed them to my husband he wondered why there weren't seven bibs, one for each day of the week. So, of course I went back to the sewing machine to produce

More quilting cotton

with a waffle cotton back. The waffle cotton in this case came from a discarded dressing gown, so this was a thrifty version too!

So, these are all currently winging their way south, to help mop up the dribble from a certain chatty little chap! I shall let you know if any combination is better than the others at that job.

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts,