Some more coasters

Do you remember the citrus coasters I made http://chickenlickenscreations.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2011-07-01T19%3A04%3A00%2B01%3A00&max-results=7 ? Well Purl Bee have got a pattern for these scrumptious apple coasters now! Nice and autumnal I thought....

Art Journal Week 34

Still keeping up with this! This week was "Dreams; do you have them? Do you dream in colour? Can you remember them? Do have recurring dreams? Include some clouds on your page." I DO dream, quite a lot but I only ever remember the horrible ones! There are 3 main ones I remember; one when I was a teenager I was walking through London and it was deserted. There had been some sort of incident and there were no people about just lots of smoke and black sacks. The second one I have quite often and my teeth crumble whilst I am lying in bed and as I try to spit the bits out they just keep on crumbling; the third one I am walking into my shower and a man steps out and attacks me......I wonder what a dream analyst would make of that little lot?

60's bag No 2!

After practising on my bag I then made one for Jess with several improvements from mine! I found some better magnets; ones you fix in through the fabric (rather than sew on one I used) and I also managed to get the pictures the correct way round on BOTH sides of the handle rather than upside down on the back of mine!

Quilt part two.

So the next part was to lay out my squares in alternate darks and lights in a pleasing manner then stitch the rows together. Here I have done the top two rows already.

As I was cutting up all my squares I found I was chopping up hens and wheelbarrows with gay abandon! Then after the shuffling process and as I began to re-stitch them I discovered that this hen had joined itself up again, despite being on two completely different fabrics! Well, this square just had to be the central one didn't it?

And finally after a second day of stitching, I finished the top, complete with sashing. I had to concentrate hard to cut the border fabrics the correct way so the pattern all went round the right way!

And I was rather impressed with my beautifully lined up corners on my sashing, if I do say so myself! Not bad for a beginner!

Now I have to back and bind it. I bought some binding fabric but I don't like the colour so a re-think is needed...

Our Patchwork Day.

Ok so now I shall tell you all about our fab day with Janet from Sleeping Bear. http://www.sleepingbearcrafts.com/ We were doing a stack and shuffle quilt from a layer cake which involved cutting it up and then moving all the bits about. We had to concentrate.....

...Burn whizzing up some squares. Concentrating was hard with all the lovely fabric around us! It was a bit like working in a sweetie shop!

Proof that I actually do have a face (and I sew!)
These are Burn's squares, with two more strips to go,

and this is me sewing on the third strip.

By the end of the day I had a pile of squares ready to lay out "in a pleasing manner" (Burn's fave phrase!) which I shall be doing today.

Please join me tomorrow for the next thrilling instalment!

Patchwork Class

Today I am going for a Patchwork class here. http://www.sleepingbearcrafts.com/... It is making a quilt using a layer cake; Here's mine...

I'll show you how I get on tomorrow!

1960's style bag

Ta-dah! Here it is! In this months issue of "Making" magazine there was a pattern for this 60's inspired bag. I loved it and on Tuesday I went to a fabric shop and saw the fabric so I HAD to have it! I was too tired to start it that evening but yesterday off I went and just about managed to finish it by bedtime! Not only that but I even used it today too. Here is a close up of the yummy buttons, from my nicely colour sorted jars; see I told you I would use them more once I had sorted them all out!

I reckon this one might even be from the 60's. Now I have to make one for Jess.

More pegs!

You may not have realised, but I have been trying very hard to blog every day in August, as I am off work. I have done well so far but yesterday I just didn't get round to it. The reason is that I bought some rather divine fabric to make a bag with and last night I had a good old stretch without interruptions so I just got on with it! And it got too late by the time I finished it. So I have decided to cheat a bit and I will blog twice today. Another quick peg bag for my first post.

Roses.

In case you hadn't noticed I am trying to blog every day in August whilst I am off work! Been a bit tired last night and out all day today so I haven't created anything. So instead I thought I would show you some roses from my garden and some of them have grown through my fence from next door! They are sitting on my dining room table and it looks like I cut them just in time because it has poured with rain here all day today.

Quilt Number Three.

So this is the second stage in of a quilt for my bed. After I realised how straightforward Jelly Rolls are to use I bought a Moda one called Freebird. Some while ago I assembled all the strips and cut them into squares but I had only managed to sew two rows back together again and it has been languishing in a bag to be "got on with". Yesterday I cleared my decks, got rid of most of the children, and got sewing!

This was the two strips I had already re-assembled. It is a sort of picket rail design with alternating light and dark strips, the orange and the brown; not sure if I am completely happy with my choice of orange but hey, too late now!

And finally, after a break for lunch (and then a couple of hours socialising with the neighbours on the green,) I got to this stage, all the strips done and the first border sewn on. Now I need to buy more brown for the outer border and backing etc.. It seems a whole lot less orange now that it's complete!

Another Peg Bag.

When Mum saw my peg bag she decided that after 50 years without one she deserved one too! So after a rummage through my fat quarters I found some colours she would like and here we are. The yellow button is from a huge tin of vintage buttons given to my daughter. They are so quick and easy to make I feel lots more coming on!

Anyone for a biscuit?

Today I thought I would show you what two of my children have been up to over the summer holidays. I picked up a copy of the "Mollie Makes" magazine that has been out for several months now and in it was a pattern for these rather scrumptious felt biscuits! Jess decided to make the Jammie Dodger whilst Eliza (who is only 12) made the iced gems from the patterns provided. Then one of Jess's friends asked for a custard cream and a Party Ring so Jess made them using the pictures in the magazine to help. If you would like to se other things this designer has made then have a look just here. Jess is now working on a Bourbon....!

Art Journal Weel 33

This week's Journal Prompt was "Spirit; are you spiritual? Include a quote and stamp a symbol that has a meaning for you". Clearly I don't consider myself to be spiritual so this week was done with my tongue firmly in cheek! In fact I was chatting about this very fact with my friend Burnice (who, I found out yesterday after knowing her for about 5 years, was born in Australia!) and she sort of "dared me" to go with it! So emerged this multi layered affair.

Under the first flap is this G&T printed on acetate as an overlay to my first quote.

The final layer is another acetate overlay, this time of a brandy glass and another quote from that well known poem! Again, as I have no symbols that are inportant to me I used a circley stamp for the BG. So the conclusion to all this is that I have no spirituality at all then! Well none that is strong enough to write about!

A Girl's Day Out

Managed to get rid of the boys today; Hubby in bed after night shift and Jasper gone to Grandads so I took the girls to Brighton. There is a bead shop there called The Big Bead Boutique and I know they do classes for adults so I rang to see if they could do something for me and my girls together. The lovely lady who runs it, her name is Jo, said yes so off we went.

It took us absolutely ages to decide what beads to use, and then just what to do with them! Then we had tuition to show us what to do. Here I am stringing my choice.

And Eliza with her choice, well under way.

Jess getting to grips with all sorts of fiddleyness. More news about Jess in a moment...

And finally Katy, who seems to think she is not creative, tackling some tricky wire-bending.

So here is my finished necklace! Not a very good pic but it is really sparkly.

So if you want a great craft experience in Brighton I would thoroughly recommend going there as Jo is lovely, and we even had a cup of tea in vintage cups and saucers!

Now my news about Jess; today is A-Level results day and I am very proud to announce that Jess

got B for English Lit, B for Textiles and C for Drama, meaning that she will be studying Costume with Performance Design at Bournemouth Arts University.

Ok for some reason I can't add a hyperlink to The Big Bead Boutique so please use the link on my sidebar to visit.

All white?

Helly, this entry is JUST for you!

Here is my latest project underway. I spent 3 hours cutting this little lot out! I saw this on the Purl Bee blog ages ago and have wanted to make one for about the same time. Next time I go to Gillys we are decorating some MDF wreath shapes that we bought a while ago. So I decided to use mine as the base for this wreath.

How fab are these middles!

And some more middles too! I have ordered some neon threads too.

...and a bit more.

When Jasper and Eliza were in Year Six, after SATS, they worked on a project to build an electric kit car. The finale of all this is a Grand Prix in which they compete against other schools. I can't remember now where they finished, no doubt they will tell me, but they did get a trophy of some sort!

Tricky one to scrapbook this because of all the colours in the pics. The school production was "Joseph". Eliza was a narrator and had a lot of solo singing and Jasper was Potiphar. Jess made the Dreamcoat and I made Jaspers outfit!

As part of our A-Z year (which we didn't finish, we only got to O I think) we went in K week to fly a kite. Previously we had been to a kite show in Seaford and bought a cheap kite, shaped like a seagull so we were trying to get this flying. All attempts were pretty unsuccessful. However, Ken dug an old PeterPowell Stunt Kite out of the garage (yes you DO remember those from the 70's!) and that flew really well! In the end, we just got some lovely photos!