Showing posts with label dogs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dogs. Show all posts

Monday, July 03, 2017

Making progress - but slowly


Found this beautifully marked feather in the garden this week. I just had to rescue it. It looks to have come from the partial albino Blackbird which visits the garden from time to time.

Free machine embroidery under way.
Front view
 The free machine quilting has continued this week with the third of my four pieces now under way. This one is bigger than the previous two being 16" wide by 19" long (40.5cm by 48cm). A useful size, I haven't quite decided what to use it for.

At the moment it looks rather distorted since I haven't added all the stitching yet, as you can see in this photo of the reverse side.
Current back view


The knitting is continuing. I have almost finished the body and am now on the ribbing at the bottom edge.



 The colours make more sense when you see Ella's colouring. I chose her as the inspiration for the colours I used.
Crazy patchwork challenge
My crazy patchwork piece now just needs the edges tidying up and a border added. The cat buttons have been in my collection for rather a long time so it was nice to be able them here.


Sketchbook challenge - MEG
 I have also been adding bits and pieces to my Ideas Book. This was started as a challenge for the MEG group. I really need to get back into feltmaking again, so I added a series of sheep cartoons. I have samples of wool from each of these breeds ready to felt. Since I hadn't got much idea what these breeds looked like, I decided to find out and develop cartoons to help me recognise them. There are many more breeds of sheep than are shown here. This is a project where I still have rather a lot to do, even before I get started with the felting.

Monday, January 30, 2017

Getting ready to start more projects

Pinfold challenge
Yes, another challenge. The challenge is to make something out of these collections of five inch squares. There are twenty squares in each pack. I still haven't got round to washing and ironing the fabric, but I must think of something soon.

Colour challenge jacket
The completed jacket which I promised I would show you. It is really cosy to wear, just what I need. It caused a bit of a stir when I showed it last Thursday at the NWCQ meeting. It was wonderful to see the variety of pieces made by the other members of the group.

Back of the jacket

Label from inside the jacket
I've also been making a bed for Sasha. Very simple - two metres of polyester wadding folded inside one metre of fleece. I had already made one for Ella some months ago - she really loves her bed, so I thought it a good idea to make one for Sasha too.

Sasha's new bed

Ella's bed, made back in November

The Solar Dyeing experiment, back in July
You may remember my post about trying Solar Dyeing in July. Well, I finally got around to emptying out the jars and washing out the fabric.

The same jars this morning
As you can see, rather a lot has happened to the fabrics in the intervening months. I have not opened the jars, but left them to their own devices. The results are interesting. The Dyers Chamomile, the yellow flowers in the top photo have produced the fabrics below. All yellowy greens. Really interesting colours.

Dyers Chamomile
The second jar was the Medieval Solar collection. This has given a really fascinating collection of colours - from a light yellowy brown to a beautiful reddish brown.

Medieval Solar
At present the fabrics and fibres are still wet. I'm interested to see what they look like once they are dry.

New knitting project
I have another knitting project waiting for me to finish the tension square. It is a new hat. This will match a rather nice cowl which my elder daughter made me for Christmas. This is the same yarn which she used. The cowl already keeps my ears cosy, so having a hat to keep it in position will really help on those walks out with the dogs. The pattern, "Cogges", is designed by Jeni Hewlett and can be found in The Scrumptious Collection Volume one. The pattern is now available as a leaflet since the books is now out of print.


I just have the buttons to add to my waistcoat now. I am still trying to decide whether to go with the turquoise buttons, or whether to go with navy. I could use orange, but I really don't think that would look as nice.