Photographs

The camera battery is now fully charged and I can take, and share photographs with you.

Firstly, I was very fortunate to win a Ravelry challenge with my 'Forget-me-not', home dyed yarn, and this is the beautiful sheland roving that Megan sent me. Doesn't she do lovely colours.

And a UFO - now, this is far from perfect, my binding is too narrow, but it is a sample I've made for our monthly Stitchers Group. It's based on Patchwork Pottery's, butterfly potholders/oven mitts.

This is my first attempt at free motion quilting -

it's a little hang bag simply made from a square of lining fabric, batting, fabric and voile, and if you want to hide your inner face of quilting, line the bag with another decorative fabric before adding the binding. It was so easy to make and can basically be done to any size you fancy - mini hanging bags in christmas fabrics would be lovely with chocolates inside would look good on a tree. I'm thinking that this could be used to hold roving fibres on or by your wheel whist spinning.

Today I finished off my Threave challenge project, it didn't take long, then - well we will see how I feel. Then I russeled up this handbag organiser - hopefully it will keep some of the loose odds and ends together instead of rolling around the bottom of my bag - it's also a sample piece for Stitchers group.

And then of course I'm also spinning some roving - this is the fourth of the lengths of roving that I dyed - I'm again trying to get some lace grade yarn (about 800 yards), but I'll be happy if I get over 500 yards.

I purchased some lovely lace yarn back in April - called Black Cherry - and after seeing some lovely Kid Silk scarfs at a local craft fair on Sunday, I started this scarf - I hope it turns out OK.

Until next time!

Disappointments

All set and ready to sew, well almost - nipped out this morning after doing the housework, to gather supplies, ready for a day of crafting - first on the list was to complete the 2nd half of my black and white challenge top. Just one border sashing to add, then sandwich - I knew I needed more of the same material I'd used for batting, so that was on the list together with some more thread and machine needles. Managed to get everything except the batting, there won't be any in until Friday. So I've replanned today and have 98% finished 1 UFO and 1 new project (to be a present). When they are complete I'll post photos, I just need to get some ribbon.

But what will I make / work on tomorrow?

Long weekend

As we didn't get away again on holiday, due to a number of reasons, I've got some holidays to use up from work before the end of the year - so this weekend is a lovely long weekend. I'm off until Thursday. Over these few days and after completing some of those craft distracting issues (housework), I'm hoping to get a few hours each day up in my craft room - it will be chilly up there but hopefully some frantic sewing will keep me warm

The UFO's on my 'hit' list will be:-

1. The Threave challenge project
2. The B&W quilt challenge top
3. My butterfly pot holder

I've a couple of other projects lurking around which I'd like to make inroads on but these will do for starters. One of which is a BIG BIG challenge - Leah was kind enought to email me some suggestions regarding quilting the Round Robin top, and I must say that confidence is slowly building, along with the urge to get going with it - so maybe 2010 is the year that this actually gets finished.

Other than the Threave project I'll hopefully be able to share photos with you within a day or two.

Of course those times when I'm not in my craft room sewing I'll probably be sitting in the Living Room (beside the wood burning stove), doing some spinning or knitting or crocheting, though I am thinking of preparing some hand sewing project (or other) which I can be doing here as well.

Slow week

It's been a week of ripping back and re-doing in the knitting department, but at last I've finished the 'Sandalwood Textured Shawl'. Just need to weave in the yarn ends and then block it.

I've also finished soaking and drying the hank of 'Stormy Skys' yarn. I'd been trying to spin this as part of the Limegreenjelly - 800 yard spinning challenge. I'm quite pleased that, for about my 5th time spinning on a wheel, I've been able to manage a full 400 yards. Compared to my other attempts which were around 300 to 330 yards, it's still pretty decent.

Yesterday was out 'Gathering Day' at Spinners, Weavers and Dyers. Unfortunately I can't take photos of what I bought, the pretty things are intended for presents, and it wouldn't be fair to show them here and spoil the suprise's. But, it was a good day, busy and plenty of lovely goodies to browse and buy.

Accepting Leah's Challenge

I don't know if any of you have stumbled upon, and are following Leah's blog. There is such inspiration there, and oh so many wonderful ideas on free motion filler quilt patterns. Well just this week she has been showing us how she works out possible quilting patterns for a quilt. Check out her site to see what I mean.

Well as a result I've taken her suggestions to heart and, though it's a dodgy photo, overmarked the Round Robin quilt with the 'start' of a possible quilting pattern.

What do you think:-

I'm unsure about the cross quilting in the 9 patch blocks and the rail fence blocks and as yet completely unsure what to do on the flying geese border strip and the square on point border to the central panel. I'll mull things over at present but it may be something I look at in detail once I'd have the other sections done - the top would be held in place by the edge ditch stitching to each of the fine framing strips between each 'ring'. I'll also possibly reconsider the 9 patch/rail fence blocks quilting.

As they say time will tell - it's amazing though that I've even thought about it at all becasue I've been putting it off for so long as I didn't want to just 'frame' blocks in the standard quilt in the ditch fashion.

Stormy Skys

I'm planning to take part in a fun challenge on Ravelry - on the Limegreenjelly thread we are having a little challenge to see if we can spin a lace grade yarn and get 800 yards of plyed yarn from 100g of roving.

I'm trying with this roving that I dyed back in September.

Here's my attempts so far:-

That's a single thread over a new 5p piece.

Challenge!

After I'd spun up the blue roving - 'forget-me-not', because the colour it reminds me of those delightful tiny flowers, my pal Charlotte issued me with a challenge to knit a shawl with the yarn. Well it's been a long time since I'd knit something other than a scarf and as I've never had any success with keeping a lace pattern going, yet, I decided to do a textured shawl.
Beleive it or not but I managed to knit this up in about 4 days. My blocking needs to be sorted out but I am happy with the final result. Here's a close up, don't you love the way the colours blended into zones.And a reminder of the journey from dyed roving (26 Sept 09) to knitted shawl (18th Oct 09)

Here is a collage on the progress, so far, of the 'sandalwood' roving to yarn - now what do I make with this?
Today will be a play day for me - DH is away to the football (Ibrox), and I've to decide whether I'm doing some patchwork/quilting or yarn crafting when I've got some housework done. So hopefully there will be more to share with you all soon.

Blogger Quilt Festival

This is my contribution to this massive 'Blogger Quilt Festival' - an online event

Jack Skellington - he now proudly hangs up in my brother Robin's home -

Robin is a big fan of 'Nighmare Before Christmas', and as a crafter I wanted to make something he'd be happy to receive and display in his home. It's my own design based on one of the many images you find on the internet. This was also the first time I used the free form curved seams, quilted the top to wadding before adding the back (a technique of Ricky Tims), and I have to say I loved the whole process, quick and liberating.

I'll be posting photos of some current UFO's that I plan to have finished this year so please drop back again for a visit.

Progress

Mum's birthday scarf arrived in time and she loved it.

I've had a busy and varied week this week - I took 3 days holiday from work at the end of the week, and had been hoping to split the time between some home DIY and crafting - well it's been mainly DIY and a little crafting in those 3 days and the DIY continues today, but I did get a little crafting done on Friday.

Back to last weekend though first -

One length of the merino blue dyed roving spun up

and, presently -

Currenly spinning one of the merino/silk dyed roving lengths

Finished quilting one half of the B&W challenge project

and a close up - with plenty of fluff, I'll need a good lint brush to clean up this once the top is complete
Prepared and cut the pieces for the Threave Quilters challenge project (unfortunately this will be the only photo of this project until after the December meeting)

Yesterday was a very enjoyable, relaxing day at the Spinners, Weavers and Dyers yesterday, and I came away from there yesterday with LOADS of fibre for spinning - 500g of lovely soft merino roving (just ready for dyeing) and I was urged to take two lovely soft, but smelly, shetland fleeces. It will be a huge learning curve working from the fleece from scratch and going though the whole process to a large finished wearable article of clothing. No doubt there will be plenty of photos of my progress with these over the coming months.

I found my limited stash of complete SBS blocks, earlier today, whilst clearing out my craft storage box (where I hide many of my hand sewn WIP projects), and whilst following Karen's blog on her Dear Jane quilt, I've been thinking, as the winter nights roll in, of restarting this project, with that in mind I'll ponder the idea for a few weeks as to whether or not do something similar to Karen and share weekly progress reports on the blocks that I make. What do you think?

Another finish

It started out as this as a length of dyed roving (Limegreenjelly 'Precious') and I spun it on the drop spindle whilst on holiday in July, then plyed it and after rinsing, skeined it up ready for use -

Finally I decided that as we took Mum (and Dad) on holiday with us, (a special birthday present for Mum), I decided to crochet the resulting yarn up as a gift for Mum on her actual birthday this coming week - here's the finished article -

a ripple scarf with a picot edge that drapes well and actually looks like a really textural piece of seaweed.

I hope she likes it.

Dyed roving

They are dry now and looking great - can't wait to start spinning, but do I go ahead as I've done to date or do I get some proper guidance?

Play day again

This afternoon I got the opportunity to try dyeing the merino and merino/silk roving that I received with the Kiwi wheel. I used Dylon cold water dyes.
The first batch (300g of merino) - I used 4 dye colours on this in varying combinations along the each length of roving. Though I kept the dye as a pretty concentrated solution you can see that they came out quite subdued - but I'm happy with the result. I might blend these up with the dyed fleece I did a few weeks ago, once its carded.

This next batch of roving is 4 lengths each at approximately 100g of a merino/silk blend. Here I got a little more adventerous. I used 6 Dylon cold water dyes and even combined some of these dyes to make another 2 mixes. Here I tryed to vary the colour combinations in each of the roving lengths and am really really happy with the variations and colours that have come out.

Now I've got to play the waiting game and allow each of the lengths to dry out fully before teasing them out a little before plaiting them up. Once they are dry and plaited I'll do another photo, in better light. There's a tingle going up my back at present, as I think that once I do this the true potential of the fibres will be shown, here's hoping I'm right.

Another Challenge

We are well and truly wizzing through the year and Finn again, has set her challenge - 'how many UFO's can / do you want to finish up by midnight on Hogmany (New Years Eve).

Pop along to here blog and join in. I've currently signed up for 3, I'm thinking it will be these projects:-

• the B&W challenge top
• Lewis's quilt (a Chistmas present)
• Treave Quilters challenge - one that's in design stage and has to be finished by early December

There are a few additional wee projects lurking around in the background that may join this list in due course though.

Other than that it looks like I've potentially got another play day tomorrow when DH is off to Ibrox for the home game, so once the shopping is done and housework completed (this can be done in double quick time when DH is not around), I'll get some crafting done, even work on some of those UFO's.

Finished!

I started this scarf on Saturday night, to show a friend a quick easy scarf/neckwarmer that she could do as a gift. This is made from the first fibre I've spun on my Kiwi wheel - its BFL fleece which I bought at Woolfest from Limegreenjelly check out her Etsy shop - there are of course many other UK suppliers of both roving and yarns on the Etsy site, as well as many many countries over the world.

When I spun this the singles yarns were quite thin so I plyed it once and halfed that yarn and plyed the two two ply yarns together. Now do I keep the scarf for myself or pass it on as a gift! I just don't know - it's my first completed project with one of my first own spun yarns. Decisions, decisions.

And as promised a chance to see the willow basket that I made Saturday week ago.

Progress

Designing as you go - if you can call it that, can be quite forgiving. After sewing together the 'coin strip' for the backing section for this half of the lap quilt I decided to add sashing strips to the border. It was only after I'd taken this photo that I realised I need to add some more strips to the coin section. At least I've got some strips left (not many) to do this. Next stop however will be to sort out some batting material, I think a trip to Dunelm is in order on the way home form work tomorrow night.

And, mentioning design as you go - I'm considering a vertical 'coin' strip down the back on the second half of the backing - so as they say 'what this space'. More soon I hope.

B&W Challenge 2009

One evening earlier this week I took the plunge and started my contrabution to the Black and White Challenge. After a lot of inspirition hunting and indicision I eventually decided on a wonky block format. Here is a selection of half the blocks made ready for sashing in black and squaring up.And here are the first six blocks - sashed and pieced together. I hope tomorrow to sort out a 'coin' strip in scraps of the front fabrics along with the black for the backing. Then I'm going to try and 'quilt as you go' these six blocks.

Now I've got to apologise - I forgot to post that last Saturday at spinners, weavers and dyers I was one of a small group of members and friends who took part in a basket weaving class. It was an intense day and I only managed to get one photo. Neil with Charlotte looking on - as he prepared the willow reeds before forming the base 'fold' and bringing up the sides. A worthwhile class, very enlightening and makes you appreciate the skill used in making even the most basic format of willow basket. Not only that but sore on the finger tips and even the sides of some finger when you fold the reeds over or around other reeds. Next time I post I'll show you my wee basket.

New things

I quite often check out the new blogs who join up with Quilting Gallery - Quilting Bloggers - today I found this blog http://www.freemotionquilting.blogspot.com/.

Oh boy what inspiration there is here for machine quilting - and what a challenge Leah has set herself - to do 1 design per day - imagine 365 machine quilting patterns.

It makes you want to test yourself just a little. Not just now though I've been working on a few quilting projects (old and new) this week. I've almost got the butterfly pot holder complete (will post a photo or two when its 100% finished). I've also started using the fabrics for my Black and White Quilt challenge - 7 blocks complete in just over an hour - I'm hoping to get at least 12 blocks with my minimal stash of black and white fabrics for this challenge, and to at least get a lap quilt/living room throw. I also propose to use this quilt as a tester for 'quilt as you go', and if this works out I'll do Lewis's batik blocks this way for his Christmas quilt.

Progress - unlisted UFO's

Having got back to my patchwork, in some small fashion recently - that is by making birthday blocks for my TOR sisters, I've hunted out a few UFO projects, one old, one a month old and one which is a sell of panel from a friend. None of which are listed on the 'In Progess' side bar.

The Old is this 'quilt as you go' Cathedral Window quilt. Now I have to admit that I've just been 'winging' it to a large extent. I spotted a tutorial on a blog and just jumped in using whatever was available at the time. A cream sheet for backing, a selection of 5 Eastern Promise fat quaters and a bargin fleece panel. The template was one of my dinner plates.

From the 5 FQ's I've managed to cut out 4 circles from each of the fabrics, and other than the diversion of new projects and having not had a dedicated craft area, there is no reason why this top shouldn't have been finished ages ago.

Having worked on it a bit last night I realise that to make it more of a bed size I'll probably have to add a selection of blocks around the boarder, that should a lap quilt of 40.5"x47.25" (1025x1200mm) in size. So I'll have to sort out 2 plain fabrics which compliment the patterned fabrics for the border, I may even change the background fabric for these border blocks as well - time will tell.

The not so old is the scrap strip fabric bucket that I started at the last Stitchers meeting. I know it's probably not put together properly but I find out where I went wrong and maybe try again. I might put a strap on this or add it to a sewing mat and use it as a tread/scrap catcher when I'm machine sewing.

And lastly, here is a panel I bought off Anne - she made this as a demo panel to show how various haloween fabrics could be used. It's just to be sandwiched together, quilted and bound.

Now I'm really please to have completed 2 things and be working on a third that should be quite straight forward to complete.

Best laid plans

Eventually finished. I promised you photos of my first yarn spun on the Kiwi wheel last weekend, but as I said the best laid plans went to the wall. Unfortunately last weekend I didn't feel too great and therefore didn't get all that I wanted to done.

Last night however, I eventually got it finished. There was a bit of tooing and frooing as I'm just working with 3 bobbins. You spin 1/2 the fibre onto one bobbin, the other 1/2 onto the second bobbin and save the third bobbin for plying these yarns together. Well I went one stage further and actually 'double plyed' the yarn - when it was plyed once I subdivided it again into 2 bobbins and plyed these together.

It's not perfect but not too bad for a first attempt. Hopefully better next time.

Blog I just stumbled upon

Can I recommend you check out this blog

1. It's got a giveaway until early Sept


2. There is some fantastic patchwork, applique and quilting projects on display

Here is the link to the giveaway - join in - but remember to get inspirition by checking out the blog as well

http://www.dontlooknow.typepad.com/