Sewing Things

 Like most creative people, i love the tools of my trade, sometimes it's paints, brushes, thick creamy watercolour paper, fine nib rotring pens, tiny bottles of ink.....but at the moment mostly the tools of my trade are sewing things ....besides the computer of course ;-)......and i love all the little things i use each day.........

 ....the scissors, threads, needles and pins....and of course the pin cushions......and i had an idea to make some new ones as gifts shaped like...gifts!..... this idea was one i used for my crafts beautiful magazine xmas project which was a cushion that looked like an xmas gift tied up with ribbon with a stitched tag.....

 .....i made three little pincushions from some of my favourite fabrics....and tied a bow round them, gift-style....

 .....and then i made some little tags using rubber stamps and bits of cardstock, patterned papers and fabric scraps......i love to do these for fun, and then the ideas are useful for magazine commissions later.....

 ......the china blue card stock is a lovely shade, i think....reminds me a bit of my cornish blue blanket edging...

 .......a little tag makes it look more present-like and it's always nice to write a special message to the recipient....

 ........so after lots of playing with these....well only a short while really as i have been working very hard on the top secret project most of the time and these were very quick to make......i had a play with the button factory set my daughter gave me.....now i've made covered buttons before, often with cross stitch on them, and had one featured as part of a corsage in Sew magazine last year.......but i have never had a whole set of button moulds to play around with at once.....so this was fun to do......and i made lots very quickly (some better than others as some were a bit wonky)....

 ....but i am very pleased with my new collection of covered buttons and will be adding them to my quilts and cushions....and anything else i can think of too......

 ....i have had to order a large amount of fabric lately for the secret project, and have turned into a bit more of a fabric aholic than i already was.....i've found some more ranges that i fell in love with which haven't yet arrived in my sewing room but will be here soon and i can't wait......

.......but this sweet jellyroll  from tanya whelan has appeared already, and before i open it and work with it i decided to have a nice photo or two to put on my blog and enjoy it all rolled up like this.....sew pretty....
Thank you for dropping in today, it's lovely to see you........... I hope you are having a cheery week and if you live in the uk or anywhere else where the temperatures have dropped..............keep cosy!......wishing you a happy new month ...............back soon xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Buttons and Patches

 There has been rather a lot of rattling of the big button jar here this week, as some of the projects i'm working on include an array of buttons....and so did these little projects .....two nine patch pincushions.....

 .... my elder daughter needed a pincushion so i stitched her one, embroidering on her initials and a few little flowers in her favourite colours too to make it special to her.....

 ....and then i made one for me too....with some tiny pieces of the gorgeous ruby fabric that i haven't decided what to use for yet, and some grey spotted fabric left over from one of my earlier book projects....i love the combination of grey with spots and florals.....

 ........lovely colourful buttons....so many to choose from.....the perfect one is lurking there somewhere....

 .......ck buttons still on the card but not for long as i have a special project in mind for these......and a little covered button with an initial cross stitched on.... i have just been given a button making kit by my younger daughter when we visited her last weekend so i will be making more of these very soon.......i will also be making a pincushion for my younger daughter too of course :-)

.....here is the back of my pincushion with an extra stitched heart, tag and button, next to the big button jar.....

 .....thank you  for all the crochet love in my last post, i was so delighted to hear from so many of you and as a novice crocheter it was very heartwarming that you liked the projects.....the spotty red and white crochet hook that many of you asked about was made for me by my lovely blog friend Robin at my nest of yarn and buttons here...just pop over and visit her and choose a spotty hook too.....

...thank you for visiting me on this cool but bright morning.....it's lovely to see you......wishing you a happy week, with sweet spring flowers (or summer ones if you live on the other side of the world) to brighten your days...and plenty of sunshine too.......back soon xxxxx

Crochet Colour

Today it is grey and rainy here so i decided it was the perfect day to show some colourful crochet projects....the bliss of crochet for me is the way you can use LoTs of colour in one project, often the more the better in fact....i showed you the project below a while ago when i'd just begun....i was learning to crochet the granny squares together instead of sewing them together, which i now much prefer......i loved the cornish blue wool and thought it worked well with the squares which had a red or pink flower in the centre and a row of white surrounding it....

 ....i finished it, apart from an edging,  a while ago and then had to work out how to do a picot edge as that's what i really wanted it to have so that held it up for a bit longer, and then i made some cushions as presents which held it up even longer....but finally it was all finished and here it is......

 .......if my first blanket was a BiG one then my second is a small one, but still very cosy and nice to snuggle under.....and i do like this edge too and will use it again on another one i think......

 .....and then the next plan was to make a granny stripe after all those granny squares.....i had seen so many beautiful ones made by so many of you that i was really looking forward to beginning this.....except i didn't actually know how to begin.....but i found an excellent tutorial by Lucy at Attic 24 and soon i could crochet a granny stripe too :-).......

                                                     ......the colours make me think of spring......

                                                      .......lots of fresh floral shades........

 ....i used some of the yarn i already had and ordered a few more shades that took my fancy.......the colours remind me of spring bulbs and pots of primroses, a real colour fix on a grey day like today.......

 ....i shall be doing a bit of my granny stripe this evening and maybe making a block for my quilt too....

......but now it's back to working on sewing top secret projects....with a nice cup of tea i think too....
Thank you for popping in here, it's always lovely to see you ......wishing you a wonderful, happy, colourful and cosy weekend....back soon xxxxxxx

Sew Sunny

 The last few days have been amazingly sunny and bright, and we have had beautiful blue skies and white frost...

 ....besides getting out and about for lovely walks beside the sea and to our favourite gardens, i have been reading and sewing....one inspired by the other......the two books above arrived here last week....one of those reading trails where one thing leads to another....i had read The Diary of a Farmer's Wife years ago and loved it but didn't have my own copy till now and am so enjoying re reading it......

 ....below is a detail from a quilt i made when i was in my folk art craze...it shows the farmer's wife feeding her hens, beneath a very sunny blue sky......

 ....the second book is also wonderful ....The Farmer's Wife Sampler Quilt book contains letters from 1920's farm wives and the 111 blocks they inspired....it is just the book i  have been wanting as it has a delightful range of quite small blocks, with templates, that you can paper piece or machine sew.....and i do love paper piecing and small projects that add up to a bigger one...slowly and enjoyably.....

                                                    text from diary of a farmer's wife 1796-1797  


 .....so far i have made three blocks.... called Homeward Bound, Practical Orchard and Bow Tie...I love the names of the blocks and the homely associations and choosing which one to do next.......

.....they are fun to do and very varied.....they have captured many people's imaginations and i know there are lots of lovely quilt alongs going on across the pond  where people make a set number of blocks per week or month....

 .......a lovely project to be involved in and i know i will enjoy quietly working on a block for this quilt whenever i get a moment away from all the top secret projects i'm busily producing at the moment in my studio and sewing room......i will leave you with a picture of the incredibly blue sky taken yesterday when we had our seaside walk....i added this picture to the lovely Annie's delightful new Sky 365 project on flickr...pop over to knitsofacto to find out all about it and how to join in.....

...thank you for dropping in to see me and for the lovely comments and emails which i sooo enjoy, it's so good to hear from you.....wishing you a happy week with lots of sunny crafty times...back soon xxxxxxx

Big Bunny

As usual there has been some sewing going on here.....and today i would like to show you a new BiG bunny....meet ruby! Lots of lovely readers have been in touch since my last book was published in 2010 to say how they have enjoyed making things from it, and many of you have made the bunny...i have seen lots of sweet and colourful versions.... everyone makes their own slightly differently which is fun to see.......

 .....i recently had another look at the book and the bunny and decided to enlarge the pattern page by 150% on a photocopier......i adhered the pattern to thin card using spray mount, and then cut out the rather large shapes......and then i began sewing ruby........i love making toys and am collecting old books filled with patterns and information for crafting them which are proving very useful.......

 ....just to show how much bigger ruby is, here she is with her little brother from the book below.....

.... besides sewing and other crafting, i have been painting something white.....it doesn't feel right for me if too much time goes by without me painting something white.....and this time it was an old ikea cupboard  which was rejuvenated with a pot of farrow and ball (shade: pointing) and is now in my studio, being filled up with bright crafty bits and bobs.......

 ....the studio hyacinths have finally opened  their pretty blooms and are filling the air with a wonderful fragrance......

....i hope you have a happy week filled with the things you enjoy....thank you for popping in to see me here, i do enjoy your visits and your sweet comments make my day.......sending you sunny wishes...back soon xxxx

Warm for Winter

 Today's theme is a woolly one....a few years ago when i fell in love with knitting  all over again, i stitched a little cross stitch sampler to celebrate my re discovered  knitting joy, inspired by the pleasure of both making something with lovely wool and having a warm and cosy garment to wear at the end of the process.....

 ....the little sampler found its way to Cross Stitch Collection, where it was made into a knitting needle roll by the clever creative design team there, and it was then featured as a project in the magazine.......

.....the Knit and Stitch design has recently become available again to download at the making spot here.....

 .....and i am still happily knitting, this time a fair isle scarf inspired by a pattern  by Martin Storey, using some of my most favourite wool in soft warm colours.....as i'm only doing the fair isle pattern at the ends of the scarf there is a big relaxing stretch of simple stripy knitting in the middle.....

 ....i began this project a few weeks ago and i am taking my time over this scarf as i have so many other things going on too, but there is a little bit of calm each time i pick it up and knit a few rows......

             ........i really think there is nothing so cosy as something hand knitted for winter.......

....these are my weekend flowers , they looked so fresh and pretty i just had to put this picture in too....
I hope you are having a lovely weekend...thanks for popping in here it's lovely to see you....wishing you cosy, cheerful and crafty times  this week.... i'll be back soon xxxxx

Fresh and New

 A fresh new year, and a fresh new start....i love the sense of new beginnings that this time brings.... and the tidying away of the xmas decorations and arranging of new things that i received from my dearies is always a new year pleasure......the blossom in the sweet new greengate jug above is from a tree in our front garden that blooms almost all year round...

                          ....some new sewing pretties came my way and will be put to good use ......

 

 .....and some delightful new pip china ......there is a jolly little robin in the garden today too, just like this one...i love the vivid colours and the textures of this design, and the stripes and the clever mix of new and vintage style...

 ........soon there will be more baking.... once the recent feasting has been recovered from.... and this sweet book will be inspiring me.......

 ..........i've been working hard since yesterday when Mr P went back to work and so did i.....my studio has been de-christmassed and some new bulbs have been brought in (yet to open, but almost there).....

 ....the light changes all the time, from a bright sunny spell first thing to grey and silvery and then to deep dark cloud......

 ....i have lots of illustrations to do, and my new book projects to make and write about, and my new stripy crochet blanket is growing amazingly fast, as many of you predicted, i love doing the stripes too :-))....will take a picture of it very soon.....

......wishing you all a happy first week of January...thanks so much for dropping in to see me and for everyone who follows and comments a big ThAnK YoU.....keep cosy and have a wonderful week....i'll be back soon xxxxxxxx