Christmas Countdown - October

Once again I'm joining in with Allie's Christmas Through The Year.  Hold on to your hats as I've actually made some progress this month!

1, 2, 3 - travel tissue holders, blogged here.

4, 5 - linen bunnies, blogged here.

6, 7, 8, 9, 10 - Christmas tree decorations, blogged here.

11 - Needlepoint bookmark, blogged here.

12? - Possibly a Christmas present, though I'm not sure who for - bluebird, blogged here.

Bring on November!

Homes for gnomes

Disclaimer: this post does not contain any images of, information about or reference to gnomes.  The gnomes bit of the title was a bare-faced lie.

The Christmas decorations that have been sitting half-finished on my cutting table for weeks are finally finished. 

Last month's issue of Cross Stitcher came with a free cover gift of a little kit to make 3 of these houses.  In theory.  In reality, after cutting the Aida to the correct size and using the template in the magazine to cut the roofs, the felt they'd provided to back them was far too small.  Luckily I have stash.  I also added some of my own Aida in off white, sparkly white and green and stitched up 6 in total.

Yes, I can count.  Unfortunately I apparently can't measure properly as I cut the green one (which had a snowflake design on it that had taken me ages to stitch due to the DMC Light Effects floss I'd used) into a square and it was too small.  It remains on my cutting table waiting to be made into something.

I got a little piece of the Bliss on the above right door in my kit, so added some Bliss of my own and some buttons and ribbon.  The cross stitch designs came from the magazine, except the robin which came from one of my books.  I don't think I can count that as a Craft Book Challenge though, can I?

I didn't sew the twine in properly on the ones which have twine as hangers and they've come undone, I'll have to hand stitch them in place.  These little houses will be part of Christmas presents for a few people, though I'm not sure who as they didn't turn out as well as I was hoping.

It looks like my newspaper debut has been cancelled.  The paper wasn't impressed with the arrival of my new wheelie bin and have decided not to run the story.  I will be ringing them again should it disappear in the future! 

New job starts on Monday.  I'm quite excited and a little nervous, what if I mess it up?  I am looking forward to speaking a lot more French each day though, I do love a good foreign language.  Wonder if I should learn Arabic?

My winter to-do list

I've been meaning to write my Christmas to-do list for ages, then I saw that Sarah at Fairy Face Designs was doing a Winter version of her Summer Stitching event, so thought it would be the perfect time to get myself organised. 

Or make myself panic as it turned out.  We have to make a list of all the items we want to sew (though I've included other crafts in here too as this is a list for me) by the end of March next year.  Check this out for a massive list...

Birthdays before Christmas

1. Crochet hook case for mum - I think I have a pattern in one of my books

2. A thread catcher for mum

3. 2 x car kits, 1 for my dad and 1 for my FIL (I suppose technically that should be two items, but if I do that, it gets even more scary)

4. 2 x mug rugs for the same 2 men

Other pre-Christmas stuff

5. An item or two for a private swap

6. 4 PIF gifts

Christmas presents

7. Finish the CRM cushion for mum

8. Glasses cases x 4 for mum, dad, FIL and an aunty

9. Slippers for mum - yes, I'm going to attempt slippers again!

10. Mani pedi kit (can't find the link) x 7 - mum, MIL, 3 friends, SIL and niece

11. Amigurumi pig for mum

12. Flash drive keyrings x 2 for dad and brother

13. Keyboard duster for dad - yes, I'm struggling with him!

14. Frilly apron for the MIL and non-frilly apron for FIL

15. Spa kits of my own devising x 6 for MIL, SIL, niece and 3 friends

16. Finish the Petit Ecole table runner for my SIL and BIL

17. Matching tea towel for the above

18. Handbag for another niece, not sure what design yet

19. Yoda ami for my brother, whilst looking for that link on my bookmarks I also found this crochet R2D2 so had better add that to the list!!  I'm struggling with my brother this year, though he'll be getting about 10 cookies in jar mixes as he loves them

20. A great big question mark.  Spot 20 is reserved for my brother.

21. Embroidered cushion from Handmade magazine for Nana-in-law

22. Iris cross stitch bookmark for Nana-in-law

23. Tea cup candles all round

24. A frog x-stitch pouch from Cross Stitcher for my best bud

25. I'd like to finish the alphabet chart for my goddaughter.  I'm on N so I find it hard to believe that will get done!

26. Something for my friend's baby.  He'll be 9 months, and I don't know what to make him.  Any suggestions will be gratefully received - he's got loads of stuffed toys

27. Patchwork pouch for an aunty

So, that doesn't seem so much, does it? ...  I haven't finished yet!

My nephew's birth in February

28. Quilt

29. Crochet receiving blanket

30. Sewn booties

31. Appliquéd baby grows

32. A cushion for his nursery, I've seen a few cute ones I want to try

33. Trousers

Stuff for myself (for a change)

34. The dining room chair cushions

35. Matching table topper

36. And placemats

37. A needle book or 3

38. Crochet hook case

39. A coffee mat as my coffee pot drips

40. A lunch bag

41. Shopping bags for the supermarket

42. A handbag

Oh no, I just remembered it's my brother's birthday in March and this Winter sewing is until the end of March...

Brother's birthday

43. Coasters with cross stitch - quotes from Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

44. Matching coffee mat

45. A cross stitched towel (just a band, not the whole thing!!) again with the quotes.  If you've read the books, you'll understand why

Oh, I'd better put my WIPs on here too...

WIPs

46. Giant granhy blanket

47. Granny square cushion

48. Sampler blanket

Well.  That's quite a long list, isn't it?  I think I might well have bitten off far more than I can chew!  I'll review it again at the end of November.  I suspect some other items may creep onto it... and hopefully some will creep off!

I really shouldn't have counted each individual item... 90.  Oh dear, I feel a big fat failure coming on!

finishing up

I'm really not sure what came over me during the super-productive weekend, but I got loads done.  I managed to finish some WIPs.  First up was the Hardanger heart which I blogged about here.  That was the 15th September I see, so this hasn't been a WIP as long as I thought it had.

I backed the apertures with some satiny blue material which came from the cushion covers a relative made for me to match my curtains (back in my pre-sewing days of course!), and made the back in the same material.  For some bizarre reason, I thought the back piece needed to be double sided, so I cut out 3 pieces from the blue and sewed them together (by machine) before turning and stuffing with lavendar.  It was a right bugger getting the lavendar in because of the multiple layers which obviously weren't sewn up at the gap.  Stupid Wendy.

I wish I'd left it as a square shape now.  It will be a birthday present for my mum.

Do you remember this needlepoint bookmark, blogged about here?  That was the 6th August so this one has been a WIP for a long time, especially considering it just needed a back!

Whilst on my hand-stitching bender I folded the edges back and backed it with yellow acrylic felt.  Not bad.  I have since pulled of the little dangling wispy-type bits.

The hand stitching is far from invisible, but it does blend in enough I think.  This will be a Christmas present.  Watch out Allie, I'm coming to get you this month!

I actually finished something I started!

I started a little bluebird from felt on FSNI and, guess what?  I finished it the very next day!  That has to be some kind of record for me.  Tradition dictates that it should have sat forgotten and neglected in a corner for at least 3 months. 

Yes, his left wing is a little odd looking. Please try not to stare, and don't mention it to him, he's very self conscious about it.

I really enjoyed hand sewing him, I'd forgotten I enjoy hand sewing.  In fact, I enjoyed it so much, it's set me off on a little hand-sewing spate!  Fruits of that labour to come in future posts.

I really hope he doesn't poo on my car.  Oh, and yes, if you were wondering, the Pterydactyl poo IS still on my car.  Yes, I'm very lazy.

In case you missed the first post about him, the pattern was from British magazine Craftseller and he's made with wool felt, very nice, I do like wool felt but I still feel acrylic felt has its place.  He might be a Christmas gift, though I have no idea who for.

knitting needle roll tutorial

Last week was a barren crafting-desert.  This week will be different.  I got so much done this weekend I surprised myself.  Not only did I finish 8 WIPs, I also completed 2 projects from scratch and am working on more as we speak.  Well, clearly not as I'm typing, but I'll be going back to them soon.  I'm not going to show you all as once as I might not make anything else all week and we'll be back to me posting about bin wars and stuff. 

I'm a member of the Crafty Christmas Club blog and one of the members over there was looking for a knitting needle roll pattern.  As I was planning on making one for my mum for her birthday anyway, I offered to put together a tutorial for her as I was doing it.  I thought I'd post it over here too just in case anyone is vaguely interested!

You all know by now that I'm no sewing expert - or expert in anything actually (Oh, maybe plastics.  And the USSR and Poland during communist times.  And maybe English grammar, none of which help me sew a straight line), however I do know how to make a knitting needle roll as it was one of the first things I made and I've since thought about how I can improve that design.  I made a couple of mistakes and they will help you to make a perfect roll!

I'm using the leftover Amy Butler home-dec weight fabric I used to make knitting/crochet baskets for both me and my mum eons ago. 

You will need:

Outer fabric 23 x 21 inches

Inner fabric 23 x 21 inches

Fusible fleece 22.5 x 20.5 inches

Pocket fabric 9.5 x 23.5 inches

Pocket lining fabric (I chose a plain white as it wont be seen) 9.5 x 23.5 inches

Approx 30 inches of ribbon

Matching sewing thread

Contrasting sewing thread

As I was using offcuts from a different project, the inner fabric wasn't quite big enough.  Instead, I cut what I had (to 23 x 19 inches), then added a strip 23 x 3 inches to the bottom, ironing the seams open.  You could of course make the whole roll, or just the outer piece, from patchwork.

Fuse your fusible fleece to the back of your inner fabric panel.  I cut it 1/2 inch smaller all round so the seams wont be so bulky and so that you can line it up easier than if it were the same size as the fabric panel.  Make sure you fuse well - it does take a bit of time, but trust me, it's annoying when it doesn't stick properly and unpeels later.

Now to create the pocket.  Pin the pocket and pocket lining fabric right sides together and sew using a 1/4 inch seam allowance.  Leave a big gap for turning along the bottom as it'll get sewn shut later.  You do not need to slip stitch it shut.

Turn the right way out, poke out your corners (I use my trusty paintbrush that's never seen paint in its life) and press.  I then top stitches 2 parallel lines in my contrast thread along the top edge, roughly 1/8 inch from the top and then 1/8 inch from that line.

You can either wing the next part, use a seam guide, or draw on your lines.  I didn't think about using the seam guide (which would have been a good idea) until I'd finished so I drew on lines using my fade-away pen.  The first was 2 inches from the edge, the next 1 3/4 inches etc down to 7/8 inch.  I then alternated between 1 inch gaps and 7/8 inch gaps - remember that knitting needles come in different widths.  Now pin the pocket panel to the bottom of the inner piece - I should probably mention at this point that the 23 inches is the width.  You may also notice my pocket panel is too small, that's because I cut it too short, I adjusted the measurements for you!

Sew down these lines with your contrast thread.  I made a mistake on the first few I did.  I started at the bottom and so the fabric puckered at the top.  Make sure you sew top down each line, then any puckers at the bottom will be hidden in the seam later.

Sorry about that poor photo.  Even though I took this in the sunniest room in the house during the day and turned the light on my sewing machine off, you have to remember that I live in England and it is October!  The following photo shows you what it looks like after you've sewn your lines, you can see on the ones to the left the puckers caused by sewing bottom up.  Snip off your threads from the front of the piece, don't worry about the back.

Cut your ribbon in half, place the two pieces together and pin about half way down on the right edge.  Make sure you place your pin at least 1 inch away from the edge of the fabric or your sewing machine needle may have a nasty accident.

It's a good idea to also pin the other end of the ribbon to the centre of the pockets to make sure you don't accidentally sew it into a seam later.

Place the outer and inner panels together, right sides in and pin all around, leaving a gap for turning.  I would strongly advise you do this on the left side (away from the ribbon) and above the pocket.  I stupidly left my gap on the pocket and had a right palaver hand sewing it up later.

Sew all the way round, turn, poke out those corners and press.  Now slip stitch or ladder stitch your opening closed.  I originally left the gap on the pocket as I was planning to top stitch all the way round, but after turning I realised it would be messy as there is a lot of bulk in the bottom edge and the bottom half of the side edges.

Fill with knitting needles - these are mine, I have ordered mum a set to go in this, but they haven't arrived yet.  Probably because I only ordered them after I'd made it!

To roll it up, fold down the flap onto the needles and roll from the left, then wrap the ribbon around the roll and tie in a bow.

Ta da!  One knitting needle roll and one very washed out photo.

That's a better photo.  See that red organza in the picture behind?  I bought that to make myself a scarf.  Bet it's over a year before you see me blogging about that!

FNSI results October

Good morning!

Before I tell you what I got up to in last night's Friday Night Sew In, I have to tell you about the war with the council.  I won!  After the interview with the newspaper and having my picture taken I got an email from my local councillor who was looking into it.  Then, before the paper even published my story, the Waste Department got back to me and told me they'd deliver a new bin on Monday AND they're revising their policy.  Oh yes, I won...  think I should run for Prime Minister in the next election?



Now on to the good stuff.  After work last night I went to see my parents, then got home and fed the bunnies.  That is always the extent of my housework on a Friday night.  Tidying up and washing can wait until Saturday (actually, they're still waiting!), so I was sitting down at 8 ready to get started.  Considering I went to bed at 11:45 and only had a short break for some carrots and houmous, I didn't get nearly as much done as I thought I would.  The plan was to get this done, then do that, then move on to some of them.  I got half way through this.

The pattern for this little bluebird came from a recent issue of Craftseller - a new UK magazine.  As soon as I saw the pattern, I knew I'd make one, but I didn't have any wool felt and I didn't want to use acrylic felt on this.  I got on line and found a wonderful wool felt shop Felt Girl on Folksy.  The pattern said I needed a 4cm x 4cm (10inches by 11inches) piece.  Well clearly there was something wrong with the measurements there and so I assumed it meant 4 x 4 inches.  Clearly I didn't do anything as intelligent as measure the pattern piece!  I duly ordered some 8 x 8 inch pieces of felt, they arrived and were too small. So back to Felt Girl for some 12 x 12 inch pieces.  It's a great shop, she has a wonderful selection at a good price and delivery is quick.

I sat down to make this from some baby blue felt, cut out the first piece and realised I wouldn't have enough felt! I had to select this turquoise piece and with a bit of folding and measuring, I was able to cut the right amount of pieces.  If you have this pattern and intend to make it - you need a 12 x 12 inch piece of felt!  Oh, it's an extract from the book Little Birds incase any of you recognises it.

For some reason I'd got it into my head that this was a hand sewing project, in actual fact it would have been a lot quicker to sew the body together by machine and do the rest by hand, but I was settled on the sofa in front of Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares (followed by Celebrity Masterchef and Waking the Dead incase anyone is interested in my TV viewing) and so hand sewing it was.  Wow, am I slow.

Lots of plans for this weekend.  All involving sewing, crafting, making and blogging.  And dealing with bunny poo of course.  I'll leave you with a couple of pictures to show you my progress on the Mackintosh cross stitch.

Where I was at:

Where I am now:

Universal Craft Blog Directory

Hello, thought I'd pop in and tell you about the craft directory that Crafty Rie has set up, and I might as well tell you about the war I've waged with my local council. 



Craft directory first.  Rie wants to make a list of ALL the craft blogs on line.  Over time she'll create categories so you'll be able to easily find the kind of blog you like to read and then she'll create it's own blog for it to live in.  In the meantime, you ladies ALL need to go over there, link up your blog and spread the word.  I think this is a great idea - imagine going to one place and perusing all the crochet or quilting or sewing blogs that your heart desires?

So, onto the war with the council - yes ladies, it's a rant!  A quick explanation for non-UK readers - Each City has its own council, so does each county.  It's an elected body that makes local rules and by-laws.  They're responsible for rubbish collection, recycling, libraries, housing, all that kind of stuff. 

Every house has a wheelie bin or two or three - one for general waste, another for recycling, another for garden waste etc.  They look like this:



(they always say you should have a photo on every post - I don't think this was what they had in mind!)

They're designed so that the dustbin lorry can pick them up and tip the contents inside.  The council collects our green, general waste bin, every fortnight and the recycling bin the alternative week.

I put the green bin out last Friday morning as usual and when I came home from work, someone had stolen it.  Yes, wheelie bin theft is prevalent where I live.  They're either taken by large households so they can put two bins out, or they're taken and set fire to.  Ours has our address on it but a hunt down our road and the next didn't reveal the missing bin.  I wrote to the council and got a reply saying I had to pay £10 for a replacement!  Well, I'm not having that, why should I pay?  I might add that if I were on state benefits, I would get the bin for free but as I go to work and pay the taxes that pay for the rubbish collections, I have to pay if someone commits a crime against me.  Being the outspoken loud-mouth that I am, I wrote to my MP, the leader of the council and the local paper.  A reporter called me this afternoon and is coming round to take my picture tomorrow night!!  Fame!  She's also getting in touch with the council.  They picked the wrong person to pick on...

I'd posted about it on Facebook and one of the men's club at work just cornered me in the kitchen and went on about how I should have to pay for a replacement, why should the council pay!  I was a bit stunned, but then he is a director so probably wipes his bum with £50 notes!!

So that a picture of a bin isn't the only photo on this post, here are a couple of pics of my babies. 

I thought the picture of Tiff with the wheelie bin was quite relevant!

Not much of a post

Morning, morning.

Not much of a post today.  I have absolutely bugger all to show you.  It might be like this all week.  I had a very busy weekend, a day out with my family including my brother, his girlfriend and her daughter to the Nottingham Beer Festival (which my amazing dad organises and runs), then a day out with the in-laws on Sunday.  Both days involved a meal in a restaurant and wow... there's nothing I can eat in restaurants!!  On the Saturday we went to Franky and Benny's and they cooked me something from scratch to my specification, not bad for a chain restaurant.  It's not the sort of place we'd usually go, but as we had 3 kids with us, we didn't want a posh restaurant.  Sunday was harder and I just had to have plain food.  Then I watch my ever-loving husband demolish an enormous ice cream sundae, thanks for that Mr CA, it will be remembered!

I'd like to apologise if you've emailed me or left a comment and I've not replied.  Apart from being busy, I'm having trouble with my email.  It refreshes every couple of minutes and if I'm halfway through writing a message, I lose it, very annoying.  And today, it loaded up but now has gone and wont come back.  Damn you technology.    Give me a few weeks and hopefully normal emailing, posting and crafting will be resumed.

In the meantime, have you signed up for Friday's Friday Night Sew In?


Sign ups are Here.  No idea what I'm going to be working on yet, though the end is getting near with the Mackintosh cross stitch.

I've joined The Crafty Christmas Club blog.  It's a group of people who are making Christmas presents and may not want to display them on their blog.  That's not a problem with me as no-one outside my bloggy friends knows I even write a blog (apart from the Director of Operations who just walked behind my desk and so probably has a fair idea!), but I wanted to join in for the motivation.  I'm intending to write a to-do list at some point. 

 

Well that's about it.  I've been feeling a bit rubbish the past few days after accidentally ingesting some yeast (I'm still learning what I can eat - practically nothing, and what I can't eat - most things so there's bound to be some slip ups) so I may not post much this week or next, unless I get a big heap of crafty motivation and some energy from somewhere (and it wont be from sugar).  I'm going to remove all pressure from myself and maybe read the massive stack of craft magazines I have yet to look through.  Please try not to pine for me too badly, hold those tears back, I will return.  (Yes, I am joking.  I'm not that egotistical).

Oh no, just realised it's only 4 weeks to my mum's birthday, then it's only 6 weeks til Christmas - now I'm panicking!  It's about time they banned calendars. 

Ooops!

I'm entering this project into the Celebrate Color competition over on Rachael's blog - Stitched in Color









Recently I promised you a failure, so a failure is what you're getting today!  It's not actually the same failure I promised you so you've got another one to look forward to.

A friend had a birthday yesterday, so at the weekend I got started on her present.  I wanted to make her a couple of pouches with some patchwork and some embroidery.  On Saturday I got the patchwork bits done and took the embroidery to my cousin's to work on whilst we babysat (when the kids were in bed obviously, embroidery and boisterous small children don't mix).  She came home earlier than expected so I didn't get them finished until Sunday afternoon, watching the Eastender's omnibus from the week before, I'm very behind with Eastenders. 

This little gnome is from Amy Ray's Doodle Stitching, the Motif Collection. He took me ages as I just couldn't get him right.  He's still not quite right but it's too late now.

I'm much happier with this tree from the same book.  I only traced the trunk, the flowers, stars and circles I added in free style.  All the colours were chosen to coordinate with the patchwork.

After I'd finished the embroidery, I wanted to get them sewn up as I don't get much of a chance to sew on the machine after work as I get home quite late, but my Aunty came round so it didn't happen.  Monday is shopping night so Tuesday after work I headed up to the sewing room.  Bad idea.

I was tired and I've had a stomach ache since I came off the yeast.  But I knew it had to be done.  The tree was first.  I'd already done the patchwork strip for the top.

I couldn't take process photos as it was very dark.  The fabrics are from a charm pack of Hideaway.  I didn't have any larger pieces of fabric that matches, so I decided to do a patchwork lining.  I added a green zip and the whole thing was sewn up really quickly.

It looks a little odd in the photo as it has a boxed bottom, but I had to take it outside to photograph it, the bench was wet from all the rain, so I put down a tea towel and couldn't get the pouch to stand up.  I assure you it is a normal shape!

I'm really pleased with the lining, I think a patchwork lining works really well.  They were just simple large squares, about 9 in total I think.  Then it was on to gnomey and this is where it all went wrong.

OH NO!!! I've deleted the bloody photo!!  I've been relishing that photo, waiting to blog it for you and now I've deleted it, not only from the computer, but from the camera too... hold on, let me check the recycle bin...  Phew, it was in there!  

See what I've done?  Oh yes, I've sewn the whole thing up with the zip on inside out!  I nearly cried.  I took it downstairs (ready for its photo shoot the next morning - oh come on, as if I'd miss an opportunity to show you a monumental mess up like that!) and sat watching TV and crocheting my giant granny for the rest of the evening.  I mean, you can't mess up a giant granny can you!  Oh dear, what's that... yep, did the entire round on the wrong side.  It's staying like that!  So, Wednesday night, back to the sewing room, quite a lot of unpicking, repairing of patchwork edges that had come undone, sewing with a slightly larger seam allowance...

And here they are together.  Sitting there looking all innocent like they'd done nothing wrong, though in fairness Mr Treey pouch hasn't done anything wrong, it's all that damn gnome's fault.

And the backs look like this:

In other news, I came out of work today after having the shittiest week ever and found a pterydactyl had pooed on my car.  Oh yes, definitely a pterydactyl, no normal bird could excrete that amount of poo.  Here's to a better week to come.