Better late than never

It has been a really busy few weeks since I last posted here on the block. I have completed two pairs of socks - this orange and browny-purple pair and another pair in shades of grey and white. There are two projects on my needles at present. The first is a knitting kit picked up in a charity shop.

Although it looks blue in this photo, the yarn is actually a rather silky off white with brown flecks. The kit only cost me £1 which is amazing. It is the Winter Jumper kit from Aldi which was available from the stores earlier this year. I must admit that this project has been stalled over the past few days since I found the most delicious silk and merino yarn from the Sheep on Mars  stand at the Knitting and Stitching Show in Harrogate. I bought three yarns and just had to start knitting with the first of these once I had completed my grey pair.

I have knitted this same pattern which was free with the XXL sock yarn I bought some years ago. It is a very simple design which is perfect to showcase these patterned yarns. This time I have used a ridged heel instead of using the stocking stitch heel from the pattern.

These are the other two yarns I bought. I really just couldn't walk away and leave one of them......

Also purchased at the show - some gorgeous lining fabrics. I fancy making a new jacket at some stage over the next few months.

My haul of needles and general bits and pieces from the show.

This was my collection from the Cone Exchange which had a stand. The fabric is furnishing weight and will be used for some cushion covers I need to make.

After the Show I went round some charity shops with my sisters. Silk fabric and silk tops along with more buttons and some books to read. The book at the back is about Heath Robinson. I just love his illustrations.

Whilst in Harrogate we were lucky enough to find a Vintage Fair in a rather beautiful Methodist Chapel. This was my haul. The magazine dates from 1952. I couldn't resist the vintage patterns and the cotton fabric inside the vintage paper bag was quite a find too. I think I will frame the bag rather than discard it. The cotton fabric is a rather useful cotton lawn. I don't think it was ever taken out of the bag. Just £4 for the lot. I picked up some leaflets about future events.

These two fabrics - the peony and crane design and the stripe are both jerseys. The floral design seems to be a ponte roma with a lovely sheen whilst the stripe definitely feels like cotton. I found these on a charity stall at one of the textile groups I attend. There is enough to make tops with both these fabrics.

The green jumper I mentioned last time is complete and now sits waiting in my wardrobe.

At the start of this post I mentioned that I have been busy. One of the groups I attend regularly is the Moulton Sewing Group. In December the group will have a stand at the Craft Fair in the village. I have been busy making items for the stand.

There have been mug rugs - shown above; pot holders; heat packs (microwaveable fabric bags holding pearl barley) and also a couple of cushion covers. The cushion covers and mug rugs are now complete and the last of the heat packs need some hand stitching to finish them off. I just have another six of the pot holders to complete and then three table runners that were added to my list last week......... I'd better get going since I only have until the 7th December to complete this lot. I do have other things which I should be sewing for other challenges, Secret Santa and so on. Why does everything need to be completed at around the same time?
Ah well, I am off to grab a cup of tea and then get an hour or two of sewing before the dogs demand their tea and an evening walk.

Knitting, sewing, and some more pages.

Things have been rather busy here, hence the lack of posts recently. This knitting yarn was one I fell for when I went to the Northern Quilt Show in Harrogate in September. So I bought it. It is beautifully cosy and I am knitting a pair of long cuffed gloves with it. My first pair of gloves.



The pattern is a lovely one by Julia Mueller (Laris) which you can find on Ravelry. It is called "Knotty". I have nearly finished the right glove, but need to complete the thumb.

Apart from starting these gloves, I have been taking part in Mystery Socks 2010. This is run every year by Kirsten Kapur of Through the Loops. It is good fun too. I started the gloves whilst waiting for clue number 4. Sorry, I can't show you the work in progress photos, but this is the yarn I am using.



I just love the colour. Its a gorgeous rich purple called "Grape".



Well, I went off to Quilt group on the 7th October, fully intending to get on with adding to this quilt top. I'd been busily making additional squares like the one in the centre, planning to add these to the corners with other simpler sections between. Well, disaster struck. I had completely forgotten to take the fabric I needed to make more of the squares. I had enough for some, but not enough for everything I wanted to do. (The completed block is six inches across, so isn't very big.)
So, rooting through the fabric I had brought with me, I found some I liked and started making some log cabin blocks.



This is one of the blocks I finished. Yes, that is a ruler measuring in inches - not, I hasten to add in centimetres.

These are the ones I have completed to date. It has been fun, but I really ought to be getting on with a quilt for my mum.

I have finally decided how to go about it. I shall make her a quilt made from very simple squares in differing sizes. This is to be quilted onto fleece. Then I shall make her a wall quilt using the ideas I have been collecting for some time. I had wanted to make her a really interesting quilt, but since this is to be used to cover a chair, it wouldn't really be practical. Not with the designs I had had in mind............

While mulling over how to make mum's quilt, I have been busy making two more Traveling Pages. I sent one off today, but can only show you a teaser...........

The theme is "All creatures great and small". This was my page for October. The photograph shows some FME onto some fabric which, in turn is hidden under some water-soluble fabric. This is why you can see a muddle of stitching and pen lines waiting to be stitched.

The photo above is also a bit of a teaser. I posted this a couple of weeks ago, but it hasn't arrived yet. The theme here was "Shabby Chic Vintage". This page was late and should have been sent in September.

Posted a week earlier, this page has arrived. You can see more about it here. This page was extremely late and should have been sent in August!

The theme was "Doors", so I started off by painting some fabric and having a lot of fun with dictionaries and a thesaurus to find different words meaning the same as "door". I chose my favourites and wrote them all over the painted fabric using a fabric dye pen.

This was lots of fun.

I then made a door in the front of the page and added this little lock I found in a bead shop.

This is the reverse of that little door.

My cat likes to shout in bathrooms.

A phrase I couldn't resist, but true. Felix loves to go into the bathroom and, when the fancy takes him, he will "talk" to himself. He enjoys the sound of his own voice. I don't enjoy it quite so much when he announces he is ready to come to bed at some unearthly hour in the morning, shouting from the foot of the stairs..........

Well, enough of cats, infuriating and loveable as they are. This last week has seen a lot of sewing. I completed a remake on a shopping bag which had seen much better days.

This picture shows my poor bag before I started, with the jute going into rather a lot of holes. In fact, the bag was being held together by the lining which I had completed three years ago.

This is what it looks like now.

The handles and lining have been reused, as have some pieces of the original fabric.

The following photos show all four sides of the bag as I was getting ready to assemble it. All ribbon and fabric came from my stash. I bought the buttons and iron-on embroideries to make the whole thing more fun.

I remade a previous bag in a similar some time ago. You can see it here and also here. I now have one more bag to renew in the same way. However, it will not look the same as the previous completed bags....

Well, I also got started with a skirt which I had cut out ready to sew some months ago.

It is now sewn together and awaiting a zip. I have decided to add a full lining since the fabric is a wool mix and will not hang well unless lined. The original pattern does not have a lining and has edges finished off with an overlocking stitch (serged stitch). Not a look I like, but the design is such a good shape. I shall give it a more "finished" finish, if you see what I mean. The lining is now cut out and ready to sew. I just need to get some gardening done before the weather breaks again.

Oh, we have been making a new raised flower bed out of some paving flagstones we were given some months ago. This will hold our fruit and vegetable garden once it is completed. The strawberry plants are ready to go in and I have asked if we can get a rhubarb crown.... I do like rhubarb, especially cooked with a little ginger.

And I have been feverishly knitting a pair of Vinnland socks , started some weeks ago and now destined to be my husband's. He is rather interested in the idea of handknitted socks, and hasn't had anything from me in years - not very fair, but then he only wears the jumpers I have knitted for him for "best". In the 33 years we have been married, he has only managed to wear out three jumpers. It must be said I was asked to make a replacement for his favourite of these. A simple polo-necked jumper in a mid blue double knit mohair with wool, having a triple cable down the front. The original had been made in a beautiful Pinguoin mohair mix a couple of years before we married.

Playtime - dyes, printing and more.

The past two weeks have been really busy here. I have been doing a lot of sewing!
But first, I had a lesson. My first sewing lesson to help me understand how to use commercial patterns properly and to alter them so that they fit.
It was a really interesting experience. Two hours one-to-one. I don't class myself as a beginner and there were no other local lessons available to me, so I thought it money well spent. I have another lesson in around three weeks time. I have far too much to do at the moment to fit another lesson in before then. Especially since I have some homework to do...........



The first pattern I am working on is this one. It is Sandra Betzina's Vogue 7903. The fabric was a lucky find on a market stall. It is a cotton-like fabric which will be just right for the long-sleeved version of this blouse. My homework? To trace off the pattern and get it all cut and sewn ready for a first fitting.




This is the second one. A semi-fitted blouse. Its an old New Look pattern 6134. Here the fabric is a heavy silk I bought some years ago in Hong Kong. I have loved this fabric, but never felt brave enough to use it............. My homework? To get the pattern traced for a tissue fitting.

My homework has to wait for a special quilt I am working on. Since this is a gift, the details are secret. But here is a photo I took of some of the quilting.



This weekend has been busy with a few experiments being completed. My younger daughter was at home and was able to join in and help.

Firstly, we did some screenprinting. This was fun and we worked outside until it decided to spot with rain. It is a two-person operation since one person needs to hold the screen steady whilst the other person uses the squeegee to pull the ink across the screen.

This is the first piece we did. The patterns were achieved by using cardboard pieces to cover part of the screen. Basically we were just playing to see what would happen. Next time, I shall cut the fabric pieces to be the shape of my printing board.

The next piece was printed inside the kitchen since it was threatening to rain. Thankfully it didn't, since the first piece was hanging to dry on my washing line!

On this second piece, we played with mixing the red and yellow screenprinting inks together. We only got one print out of the properly mixed medium, so for the next three played with putting the inks on the screen without mixing them.

I just loved the effect this gave. Magic. I must buy some more inks.........

While the fabric was drying, we washed the screens outside.

I must remember to wear wellington boots next time! My poor slippers got soaked.

The next experiment was to do some pole dyeing. I had read abnout this in a number of posts on the Contemporary Quilt Yahoo Group. I am new member of this section of the Quilter's Guild.

This was huge fun. A piece of fabric is scrunched onto a pole and fabric dyes and inks are painted on. Note for future reference - red silk dye does not come off concrete paving slabs however hard you scrub before it gets to dry!

This is the finished piece drying on the line. I think that next time I shall use a much smaller piece of fabric. That way I should be able to saturate the material thoroughly with dye. I shall work on this piece further. Sadly, it will have to wait for another day.

With all the activity, my poor workroom looked like............ well, it was a mess. Can you see the DVDs on the radiator? Its summer here, so they are perfectly safe there. It is part of my collection of Jane Austen films - BBC serials, as well as the box office type of film. These have kept me company while I have been busy quilting and working on the quilt mentioned above.

Well, I did get the room tidy again, ready for work on an improvised swift. I needed to get some lovely yarn ready for being knitted into a pair of Vinnland socks.

It is this lovely yarn. So soft. It will be delightful to wear this as socks in the Autumn.

Well, I had better get back to the quilting so I can get this quilt finished in time.

Getting reacquainted.

Sounds daft, I know. It is a very long time since I really knew my old machine, it's foibles , weaknesses, strengths. I got the strong feeling this last week that, if I was ever to get any sewing done whilst my younger daughter has my own machine, then I would really have to get to know this machine really well once more. I need to trust it. It needs to trust me............

I may be going too far here, but I do talk to my machines and, in return they purr along to me as they work. If I forget to talk to them, they stop working well.......... It has happened far too often for it to be anything other than the truth................... Or perhaps I am going completely around the bend towards insanity.

No, if it works, don't stop doing it.....................

I started by cleaning my untidy workroom. No views of the "before". Believe me, you would not have been able to see much more than glimpses of the floor, and very little of any of the surfaces. There was also an enormous pile of stuff to the left hand side of the sewing machine. This is now tidily put away in the wardrobe. (Away to the right of this photo.)

My dear husband had mentioned the dreadful phrase "throw out...........".

As a true lover of fabric, fibre, yarn and thread, my various stashes have now been caressed, folded, tidied and put away neatly. Only two lengths of a truly dreadful polyester cotton sheeting that had pilled, and which I could never see myself even using as a "muslin" have been sacrificed.

I should explain that the white desk really should belong in my younger daughter's bedroom. There is no room for it in there, so it does service as the table for my overlocker (serger). The books upon it are hers.

I now feel better, more confident and have started using my old machine once more. It was also cleaned during the general tidy-up and is ready to go...........

The latest edition of "Sew Hip", found on a recent trip into W.H.Smiths was truly well-timed. It has this delightful blouse on the front cover. I shall make this, though I shall probably have to alter it quite a lot to fit my more ample bustline.

Inside was this lovely little hanging.

Fun to make, and so useful, it now hangs on my wall. I used scraps of upholstery fabric left over from making a bag. The lining came from the remnants of a skirt I had made from an overly wide-legged pair of trousers.

The extra pocket on the bottom was made from two extra pocket pieces and their lining.

I also added a small pocket inside to hold my sewing machine screwdrivers - so helpful to have those immediately to hand when needing to retrieve the broken point of a needle.......................... Or does it only happen to me?

I have not done very much knitting lately, but the tunic I have struggled with now looks a little more possible.

The cabled jacket abandoned a little while ago looks as if it may get restarted. Well, three WIPs (Works in Progress) is much better than one WIP and two hibernating projects. Isn't it?

Of course, the socks are still under way, albeit at a rather slow (for me) pace.

Perhaps this is an irrelevant thought, but I can even see the telephone on my window sill. True happiness is made of this.