New Year means tidy the craft room!

Posted on 19 January, 2017 by patchworkfairy

Well it’s New Year and that means it’s time to tidy the craft room! I can no longer make anything in there as there is no room! I can’t post a picture because it’s too awful for public viewing! I may, once it has been restored to normality, post some before and after pics!

But for now, here here is a brief roundup of some of my recents makes and adventures!

This ribbon was on my presents from my son – far too good to throw out!

This crochet flag was finally finished!

My crochet flag of Guyana for the Sixty Million Trebles Project

This was a post Christmas walk!

View over the boating lake at West Kirby

This is my latest stash increase as I am addicted to crochet planned pooling!

My new red heart yarn for planned pooling

This was a refreshing walk in the North Wales wind!

Twilight on Llandudno Pier

And finally, it’s back to Patchwork class and a new project!

My latest fabric selection for a new patchwork wall hanging!

Well that’s all for now! I’ll be back with some updates on the planned pooling projects once my craft room is tidy! 😏

Back Home from Holiday!

Posted on 7 August, 2016 by patchworkfairy

Back home from holiday!

Boo 🙁

My new camping blanket made from fabric called “Windy Days” came in handy and was appropriately titled!

new camping blanket

windy days are good for surfing!

gransdon catching a wave

not so good for watching so thank goodness for the beach tent – cosy behind the gauze flap!

Inside the beach tent – Cosy!

we are a messy group of 16 covering 3 generations on the beach and there’s always something to look for, someone to chase after, or someone taking their sunhat off (again) !

Messy beach day!

It was a lovely week though tiring. At the end of the day it was nice to have my sweet little caravan to come home to for a cuppa!

inside of small caravan showing red seats

newly covered seats and cushions!

bench seats

I enjoy making things for my caravan and the awning, especially when I use things from my stash. However, I’m off to the Festival of Quilts next week so I might just acquire a teensy-weensy bit more fabric ….. 🙂 …….. It’s good to be back home from holiday!

Auditioning the Fabrics

Posted on 22 November, 2015 by patchworkfairy

Hello! I haven’t been around on here for quite a while so today I decided to write about ‘auditioning’ the fabrics for my grandaughter’s new quilt!

I’ve been getting over the knee replacement (much harder than anticipated) and also the return of the dreaded Sciatica!! Having two bad legs has been pretty difficult pain wise and then to find there is an 18 week waiting list to see the Pain Consultant has been very demoralising. Especially since the initial appointment only leads to another waiting list for the actual injection treatment, which is the only thing which made me better last time.

Anyway DH did some research and suggested buying a home ultrasound kit and it actually seems to have made a difference. I’ll never know if this time the sciatica was going to be milder or whether the daily ultrasound treatments have stopped it in its tracks so to say. So I’m cautiously optimistic that I am improving and ohave started going about for a bit longer without any terrible repercussions.

I’ve only managed a limited amount of sewing in the last few weeks and it been more a case of sitting down with crochet hooks and a bag of cosy yarn! But never mind that today! Today I must tell you of a new term I learnt in my weekly patchwork class, it’s called ‘Auditioning’ the fabric for a project. So, if like me, you thought you were just messing about with your stash when you were wondering what to make and/or what to use, you weren’t, you were auditioning your fabric for a place in the final item, in my case it is a quilt.

Auditioning Patchwork squares for the quilt top!

DD is obsessed with pink girly everything after having two boys but I think it’s nicely balanced with some non pink in it.

That’s it for this week, hopefully I will be able to make it to the Knitting and Stitching show in Harrogate on Saturday and I’ll have lots to write about next Handmade Monday!

ATC August 2015

Posted on 23 August, 2015 by patchworkfairy

This week I thought I’d share my ATC which I made as part of the ATC August 2015 swap over at Very Berry Handmade! I haven’t got a lot else to show as whilst recovering from surgery my days are mainly taken up with exercises, resting with ice packs and sleeping!

So what is an ATC swap? It stands for Artist Trading Card and is a small, handmade card which is crafted to a theme. It can comprise all different crafts as long as there is some stitching involved. The them this time was a bit more flexible than previous swaps as it was ‘My Favourite………’ I chose to add the word ‘crafts’ on the end and so made a card with a mini quilt, some crochet, a mini Quillie, a little greetings card and some freehand embroidery.

i had a lot of fun making the card, it distracted me from the immediate aftermath of surgery and focussed my mind on something other than the pain! It’s not my best work as I just wasn’t in the best state to craft it but I decided it was ok enough to send to my swap partner in France! I had collected all the things needed to make my card into a little box before surgery and so everything I wanted was within my grasp once I was back home. It will be a while before I am back in my craft room, but part of that. Is my fault as it’s so messy in there it’s dangerous when you are walking with two sticks!!

Little card with mini patchwork quilt, some crochet and a little greetings card.

ATC My Favourite Crafts

Linking up with Lucy Blossom Crafts!

Using a Seam Ripper – aka Frogging!

Posted on 10 May, 2015 by patchworkfairy

I’ve really enjoyed making the ’round the world’ pram quilt and am finally at the binding stage. I had to look at a you tube video again to remind myself about making mitred corners – can’t seem to retain any information on how to do things like that any more! I also made a lot of use of my seam ripper – aka frogging! Rip it Rip it Rip it! Here is the quilt just before binding.

Round the World Pram Quilt

I decided not to over quilt it and just do some heart shaped lines in the middle with straight lines round the outside. The centre heart is made using variegated quilting thread and an embroidery stitch, whilst the overlapping hearts are in delicate Aurifil thread.

Despite using the seam ripper rather a lot I still have some points not matching! The worst thing though was sewing a whole strip of pink spotty border on wrong way up! And of course it was the last one and so just when I was about to stop for the night grrrrr. This is why it’s often better to stop when you’re tired rather than keep going to try and finnish things! Whilst I was frogging away I remembered the blog post I read somewhere about using seam rippers correctly and how amazed the writer was that they had used it incorrectly for years. It was quite funny because I had inadvertently realised there was a better way to use them only a few months before I read the blog post but I thought it was just me being silly – never thought other people might be using it the wrong way too!

So, how do you use yours? If you pick at the seam, breaking the thread every few stitches, and pulling out sections bit by bit, as I used to do, you will be amazed to find there is a much faster way to frog! I have tried to take a picture of how it should be used but it was quite hard to get it to clearly show the action. Basically you hold the seam vertically in your two hands and then run the ripper downwards between the two pieces of fabric, – parting the seam easily and quickly. It can be tricky to hold the fabric and use the ripper, but once you get in position it’s fab!

Pushing the ripper vertically down the seam

If you’ve never tried it like this you’ll be so excited you’ll be hoping you make a mistake just to hear the satisfying riiiippppppyyyyy noise!😃

I’m linking up with Handmade Monday again at Lucy a Blossom Crafts now!

April 2015 ATC Swap – “Home”

Posted on 3 May, 2015 by patchworkfairy

April has been a mixed month! I’ve been trying to complete things for my new granddaughter’s arrival whilst also taking part in the Very Berry Handmade April 2015 ATC swap – “Home”. It’s too late to join in this one but if you fancy the idea just keep a look out on the blog for the next one, probably in about 2-3 months. April is my birthday month and we went to South Wales for a few days which rather slowed me up completing my ATC, especially as after a fabulous few days I went and tripped full length on the car park during a rest stop on the way home! My arms took most of the fall and luckily I don’t seem to have set my sciatica off again but – honestly – I am a danger to myself!!

Firstly let me show you my ATC – the theme was “Home” and so quite open to interpretation. After a ~~short~~ ridiculously long ‘think’ I decided that I am very happy at home when sitting in front of the window in my craft room, sewing, with a large mug of tea at my side! I hope my swap partner likes it!

my ideal day at home!

As I said, it was also my birthday at the end of this month and so I enjoyed myself whilst watching Create and Craft one day by spending some birthday money (thanks Mum!) on this lovely book by Janet Clare. All the quilts and embroidery pieces are inspired by nature and it’s a very interesting read as well as really making me want to start one of the projects RIGHT NOW!!

Birthday Book

The book has all the information for making your own mixed media art pieces as well as quilts. There are plenty of instructions, such as for ageing fabric and for applique work and also lots of templates to use as you wish. Two of the quilts which I really want to attempt first are the “Joys of Spring” and “Nature’s Beauties

Joys of Spring Quilt

I thought I would make my own version of the nature quilt and this spring season is a good time to start taking some photos for my ideas. The garden has bluebells growing just now so I think they would make a lovely pretty applique!

Well now I am linking up with Handmade Monday at Lucy Blossom Crafts and I’ve just remembered that I need to finish my HM ATC and send it to Lucy, I wonder how many she has received yet?!!

Patchwork Quilts and working in the Garden!

Posted on 8 April, 2015 by patchworkfairy

Now finally I have finished the sewing and quilting part of the grandsons’ superhero quilts I have to force myself to do the ‘finishing off’ – getting rid of all the pesky thread ends and tidying things up – boo – the worst bit for me. Here is part of one of the quilts with Sonic – but can you make out what I have free-motioned in the blue space between Max and Sonic?

Patchwork quilt in blue and red with super heroes on it

The mine craft stay cool square!

The other thing I’ve been doing this week is wading through the workload of the e-course I mentioned last week, It’s very intense but it does focus your mind on your hobby/business very well. And the best bit about being unable to go out much? It means my ‘office’ and my admin work is wherever I choose to make it!

My workspace!

There’s a lovely feeling about drinking a cup o’ tea in the garden and working in the shade! Don’t think it’s going to last though as cold and rain will return

Recovering and Inspiration from Flowers!

Posted on 20 March, 2015 by patchworkfairy

Well I can not quite believe it but I can actually stand up straight and walk upright again! Yes I went into hospital a week ago – (HAPPY FRIDAY!) – for the injections under sedation and so far they seem to have made a good improvement to my pain levels! Gone is the excruciating electric shock pain in my leg which is so debilitating, and in its place is a low backache and hip-ache, which, is normal at this point, and should improve as time goes on, although it’s not guaranteed.

I am so happy to be better I haven’t been able to keep from trying out a little time in the sewing room although I am trying to be sensible and not do too much too quick.

This is what I have started to make, two small lap quilts for my grandsons which I will back with fleece.

Max’s quilt!

Some of max’s favourite characters!

As you can see, at nearly 8, the elder grandson is into Sonic the Hedgehog and Mario (as well as Minecraft but I don’t know how I’d do that!). I won’t be selling anything like this as the images are copyrighted, I am just cutting them out and sewing into the family gifts!

It’s not as neat as it could be as I probably should have waited till I was a little for comfortable before beginning! I did feel though that I couldn’t start the crib quilt for my new expected granddaughter without giving the boys something first!

Here’s what I will be working on next:

pink and cream fat quarters

Lovely pinks – fat quarters from Create and Craft – I do enjoy the sewing and patchwork shows but you do have to be strong and resist buying everything!

As well as sewing quilt for the children I was very inspired by the colours of some flowers I received for Mothers’ Day and have managed to select some cotton yarn which I hope I can make into a delicate blanket for the new baby as she is due in July so cotton will be quite appropriate.

Vintage rose from boquet

Here are the cottons I have selected:

cotton yarn in vintage rose colours

The cotton in the picture is a little lighter than in reality but not too much so is quite a good match. This will keep me going as soon as I have finished the Simply Crochet Poncho – I will not let myself start anything before that is complete or it will be too hot to wear it!!

I will now be popping over to Planet Penny Happy Friday and Handmade Monday to see what else has been going on while I was away!

Sewing Machine Appliqué

Posted on 22 February, 2015 by patchworkfairy

Not done a lot this week so thought I’d show you how I used the digital download of a sewing machine which I bought from Wendy’s Handmade Harbour a few months ago! I made two sewing machine appliqué for two machines.

Embellishing Machine

I had great fun copying the images onto felt then sewing on the little details using some of the array of stitches which normally I never use! The little patchwork quilts are made from Liberty Tana Lawn scraps!

Sewing machine cover

so that’s it for now – over to Handmade Monday to see what’s going on in the crafting world!

Penrose Tiling!

Posted on 25 January, 2015 by patchworkfairy

Penrose tiling – what on earth has that got to do with crafting you may ask?! Well DH recently bought me a quilting book called Geometrical Quilts by Pat Store which is full of quilts all based on – you guessed it! – geometrical patterns! They are all beautiful but some are more complicated to make than others. So while I am going to my weekly patchwork class but not able to carry heavy things like a cutting board and templates etc, I thought I would try one of the quilts which is based on English Paper Piecing (EPP) method.

My choice was the Penrose Tiling quilt – the book describes this as “two differently shaped diamonds (36 and 72 degrees) to make tesselating shapes based on a regular pentagon or decadon which do not otherwise tessellate” [Storey In practice this has meant drawing lots of paper diamonds and covering them with fabric in the traditional EPP technique

cutting out paper diamonds and covering them with fabric

covering the paper shapes

Of course before I started I had to choose my fabrics and plan out which colours would go where in the design. I chose a fat quarter pack of various shades of purple as well as the lovely green batik fabric from my stash! I chose these as there is a photograph in the book of a quilt which I really liked and so I have based my design on this.

arranging the shapes to build up the layers

trying to get the pattern right!

It’s quite hard working out how all the diamonds fit together and deciding which fabric to use for each round of shapes. At each round I have to keep trying out the pattern!

arranging all the layers

So although this Penrose tiling is quite complicated and tiring it is a good project for when you can’t walk/carry/machine sew any much at all. (Boo sciatica – how I loathe thee!) This as far as I have got at the moment but I really hope to show you the progress to a mini quilt over the next couple of weeks!

Now I am going to link up with Handmade Monday as usual but over on it’s new home at Lucy Blossom Crafts Thank you to Vicky for taking over the hosting!