Not the quilt

That's right, this post is not about the baby quilt.  But... I have finished it!  The reason I'm not showing it to you is that I finished it on Sunday night and I have been at work during all hours of daylight since and this quilt deserves proper photos (if I do say so myself!).  My nephew still hasn't arrived, he's now 5 days late and according to the midwife, he's almost ready to make his entrance.  Fingers crossed people, I can't wait much longer.  I've been in a state of mild panic for over a week (not helped by being given a false deadline at work... someone may just die today...) and need to get rid of these butterflies in my stomach!  I dread to think how my brother and his lovely lady are holding up.

Anyway, I didn't just drop by to witter on at you, I do have something to show you.  In my last post I showed you the appliqued babygrow that I'd made for my nephew and also the failure that was the booties I made.  The lovely Sandra suggested that I throw them away and forget about it!  What??  Sandra, you must have realised that I'm as stubborn as a mule, give up?  Never.  And guess what?  I conquered the bloody things!

Ta da!  Yes, they're slightly wrinkled and not exactly perfect, but they are cute (in the British sense of the word)!  I'm pleased I stuck it out and got them finished, and I'm pleased I managed to get a giraffe on one and an elephant on the other like I meant to do it (I kind of did, but didn't know if it would work, I have low expectations of myself).  The pattern is from Craftseller magazine, not an entirely successful pattern, I felt the directions were a bit hit and miss, but at least the magazine isn't rife with spelling mistakes and bad grammar like other UK craft magazines I could mention.

I clearly forgot about directional print when cutting out the soles...  we'll just ignore that, shall we?  Here they are with the babygrow:

I think that makes a nice little set.  Now, I finished these the same night I finished the to-be-revealed quilt, but I wanted to make something else for him.  I found a pattern for a bib in One-Yard-Wonders and thought that would do nicely.  This was a well written pattern, but it turned out rather on the large side, you'd have thought I'd have noticed from the size of the paper pattern really.

This pattern was excellent, I'm looking forward to making more stuff from this book, and the Fabric-by-Fabric sequel which I also own.  I would have loved to have made this bib to match the baby grow and booties, but I'd wasted some on the failure booties, so I used this other Alphabet Soup fabric I'd bought with my nephew in mind.  It's backed with flannel and the bottom edge isn't as jerky as it looks in the photo. 

I got it cut and sewn in minutes, then disaster struck.

Bloody, sodding snaps.  I hate them.  I'd bought some white plastic snaps like these:

from Ebay ages ago.  I assumed they worked with my snap setter, which looks like this:

They don't.  What they did do was leave a little hole in the fabric.  I then had to use a standard metal snap which has an open ring, showing off the hole!  I got one side in, but couldn't get the other side to set.  I took it down for Mr CA to have a go and he couldn't get it to work - it turned out I'd put it in back-to-front and damaged the prongs.  Although I have countless snaps left, I don't have any of the prongy bits as I've damaged them all.

Can anyone help?  How do I set the white snaps?  Is there a better tool for setting snaps in general?

That's it for the moment.  I'll be back with pictures of the quilt after I see daylight, so Saturday at the earliest, though it does depend on when my nephew appears.  If he gets here this week, I'll be going down to see him on Saturday (my brother lives 3 hours away), so may not get time to blog... oh, hang on, Mr CA takes about 3 hours in the bathroom every morning so I probably will have time to blog!

In the meantime, I've got some other crafty bits and bobs to show you.  I'm still working on stuff for the baby, and probably will carry on until he's about 18...  I am, however, looking forward to getting some non-baby items made, perhaps from One Yard Wonders (though after digging through my fabric pile recently to make something I'll show you later this week, I discovered that I mainly buy half yards of fabric...  I might have to leave the baby for an hour at the weekend to go to Fabricland in Bristol...).  I'm going to baby-craft like mad until I meet the little fella, then I'll start some other stuff.

A small success and a fail!

How is everyone doing?  I am having a lovely, restful Saturday.  I've been working really hard this week and so decided to chill out this weekend - an unusual event for me!  I'm trying not to feel guilty about it either.  I didn't get out of bed until noon, I just lay there drinking coffee and reading my book.  Then I got up to watch so programmes I'd taped on Sky+ and continue the hand quilting of the baby quilt - nearly there!

I'm having a break to do a little bit of blog surfing and I realised I was due a post.  I've got a few things lined up to tell you about.  Isn't it odd how it happens, a few weeks ago I had time to blog, but nothing to blog about, now I've got loads to show you and no time to do it! 

Ready for one of my customary failures?  Well first you get to see the success.

Yes, this is for my nephew!  Due yesterday, but still no sign of him.  All I did was cut out a block of animals, turn under the edges and sew it on with a zig-zag.  Nice and simple, but I think it's quite cute.

I bought this gorgeous Michael Miller Alphabet Soup print at Prints to Polkadots.  I then attempted to make some baby shoes with the same fabric.  If you've been reading my posts for a while, you may remember that I have very little luck with foot wear!  This is no exception...

See what I did there?  No idea how it happened, the pieces were the same size, and I thought my seam allowance was the same for both, but apparently not!!  In addition to that, I also made this mistake:

Yep, sewed the inside onto the outside.  Oh dear.  Another pair has been cut and stitched and is just awaiting the final bit of hand stitching to finish them off.  I got the pattern from the magazine Craft Seller, though I altered it a bit as the instructions weren't great and I didn't like the way they finished them.

Well that's it for now, I'll show you these shoes when I've finally finished the handsewing.  I've also got to show you the finished mini embroidery in its frame and hopefully, very soon, the finished baby quilt!  I've also done a little house-prettying which I will show you too.  Phew, too much to talk about!

Baby blanket done, baby quilt getting there

Evening ladies.  I planned to write this post yesterday, then earlier today but work has been crazy busy, I've been staying so late I'm days behind on blog reading and emails so please forgive me, I'm not ignoring anyone.

I think I've mentioned once or twice (or hundreds of times) that my only brother is about to have his first child, so I've been frantically working away.  I managed to get the baby blanket finished on Tuesday and posted off yesterday.  Want to see?

I used a V-stitch for the main part of the blanket, just judging the width and length, then I finished it off with the same shell border I used for this blanket.

I couldn't get brown satin ribbon like on the previous blanket, but as I knew that my nephew will be a nephew, I went for blue.  It took ages to get it all in place!

Since I finished that, I've been hard at work on his quilt.  Hand quilting has commenced and I LOVE it.  I thought it would be laborious and tedious, but it's not, I love it!

I'm quilting it in perle cotton in 4 different shades and enjoying every stitch.  When he arrives, I wont be able to go down to see him until the weekend as my brother lives about 3 hours away.  He's due tomorrow so if he's on time, I'm going to be in trouble as I've still got 30 squares to go, then the binding to make and sew on.  If he's born next week, I might be in luck!

Baby quilt progess

I thought that I was about due for an update on the baby quilt I'm making for my nephew.  I wrote about the top here, and the back here.  This is my first ever quilt and I'm running out of time as my nephew is due on Friday!  I finished his baby blanket last night, but didn't take photos as I was late getting to bed and it was very dark, I'll post about it soon.  The blanket is to be posted down to his parents tomorrow, but I want to take the quilt with me on my first visit which will be shortly after he's born.  Part of me wants him to arrive NOW, the quilting part of me wants him to wait another week or so!

So, where am I with it?  On Saturday I did loads of straight-line quilting on my machine using grey thread.

Actually, it wasn't that straight.  I was following the edges of the sashing with the inner edge of my walking foot, but the sashing is fairly wobbly!  I got there in the end, after about 2 hours I think.  Here it is so far:

As you can see, the back and wadding were loads bigger than the top, I do learn from my mistakes occasionally!  I used Hobbs Heirloom wadding and bought the fusible stuff, thinking it would be easier.  Spot the safety pin basting?  Yep, it wasn't easier.  First of all I didn't realise it was fusible on both sides (duh, why wouldn't it be?!) and fused it to my ironing board, secondly, it's not that fusible.  It fuses, but it peels off.

Here's the quilting on the back, I quite like it, wonkiness and all! 

So, all that remains to do now is to hand quilt the squares.  I've got some perle cotton in various shades hoping that some will match.  I went back and forth over whether to cotton should match the square I'm quilting, or contrast.  I'm going with matching, about 1/2 inch from the edge, I think!  Oh, and I'm going to have to deal with the little issues shown in the photo below.  There are two of them... and no, I'm not unpicking the quilting, I'll snip them out somehow!!

After that, I'd better get the binding on pretty quick! I'm at work all week and have things to do most evenings, so if my nephew will just stay put for another week, that gives me the weekend to get it done. Oh, I told Mr CA I'm painting the bathroom this weekend... perhaps not!

Word Verification - PLEASE turn it off

I've always hated word verification when leaving comments on posts, especially the kind where you type your message, then the page reloads and you have to type in a word, I suspect I've missed the word-typing hundreds of times and thought I'd left messages but hadn't.  Now word-verification has got even worse.



Now Blogger has changed it and it looks like this above.  People, I can't read it!  Yesterday I tried 3 times to leave someone a comment but couldn't get the word verification right so I gave up.  I'll be giving up a lot more too I think as it's a massive waste of time and utterly frustrating. 

I've just read an excellent post at The Run Around Ranch Report on this very subject and I ask you all to go and read it, please!!

I'm afraid I agree with her and will have to stop leaving messages on word-verified blogs as it's just too hard.  I don't have word verification, but I do have comment moderation.  The reason I have it is that I love to go to my dashboard and see "3 comments", but I'm sad like that.  I have no problem with spam.  I allow anonymous comments so I do get spam, but Blogger puts it all, without fail, into my Spam folder where I can easily delete it without seeing the light of my Blogpage.  If you don't want to do that, don't allow anonymous comments.  Seriously, that's enough to stop spam. 

Ladies, I beg you, turn it off!

A Dotty Kind of Swap

Evening!  Well, have I got some exciting things to show you today?  On Friday night my mum came round with a parcel for me (I have to get everything delivered there as not being in during the week provokes the post office into losing my stuff...).  It was from the lovely Dotty, a bloggy friend of mine.  We'd decided to have a private shop after I admired her glass work pendents on her blog.

Well, did I win in this swap!  The parcel was incredible and even Mr CA was interested which is not usual for him and craft-related stuff!

First up was this cute little pouch...

Inside?  Two beautiful fused glass pendants made by Dotty's fair hand.  I'm wearing the blue one now!

Then came this little bunny rabbit.  How cute!  He's sitting on the shelf above me.

And last, but definitely not least...  this octopus! 

How cool is he?  I did consider divorcing Mr CA and marrying him, but Mr CA wants to divorce me and marry him himself!!

Dotty, you're a star!  Oh, and she has a shop, all sold out at the minute, but keep your eye out and you too could be the proud owner of a funky octopus.

So want to see what I sent her?  It looks crap in comparison.

A patchwork lavender-filled heart.

Made with the scraps from this puffy pouch, tutorial by Ayumi at Pink Penguin.

Hmmm, not quite as good as Ayumi's, but it looks loads better when it's full.  Promise.  Not that I thought to take a photo to prove it!

That's the back, see how I've pulled the inner bits out so you can see them?  Doesn't make it look great though!

And lined with stripes.  I also sent her a RAW bracelet.  This isn't the one I made on the jewellery course, I got my seed beads out as soon as I got home to make one for Dotty.

Here's a close up:

I also sent her one of the owls and some crocheted bunting.  And this card.  It's supposed to be a quilt on a washing line.  Not too successful, I'm afraid.  Sorry Dotty!

I really must stop doing swaps as I always seem to get the better end of the deal, and whilst that's great for me, I feel sorry for the poor partners I rope in!!

FSNI and TAST 7

Morning ladies.  The Mr woke me up early so I'm up and blogging whilst I drink gallons of coffee to ready myself for the day.  Last night was FSNI and I had plans to baste and machine quilt my nephew's quilt.  It was not to be.  It's about time I learnt not to make plans!  Instead my parents came round and I didn't settle down to sew until 9.  That sounds like I didn't want them to come round - not true!  I love to see my parents and I knew they were coming, I just mean it changed my sewing plans.


Instead, I decided to work on TAST week 7 - detatched chain stitch.  Now, this is also called the lasy daisy stitch and Sharon was saying we don't have to use it for flowers, but you know what, I got an idea into my head and flowers it was!

First up is my little sampler.  I used 4 strands of some cheapo floss I got free with a magazine and tried out my ideas.

I know the butterfly in the picture only has one wing, but the floss came to an end and it was only a trial.  His wings are made from giant detatched chains couched down in several places.  Then I got a piece of thin blue linen and took out my perle 8s and began to sew.  This is the first time I've used the Perle 8s for embroidery and I'm deeply in love. 

I'm not sure the side on daisies worked as well as I wanted them to - I feel my shape is better in the orange version.  I also added the butterfly, but didn't make his wings from detatched chain as I didn't want to risk them going wonky - they went wonky anyway!  Despite its imperfections (many) I LOVE this piece.  I'm going to frame it up in a little embroidery hoop and hang it.  I'll show you when I do.

The picture above has a pen it in just to show you the size - I worked this as small as I could!  So, I feel TAST 7 was a success.

Last night was the last ever episode of Big Love, I'm heartbroken.  I fell in love with this programme and with the family.  I had to sit up and watch it on Sky+ after Mr CA had gone to bed so I worked on the crochet baby blanket for my nephew.  It's so close to being finished now and I'm putting on the last border round.  It takes forever but I'm getting it done this weekend. 

Watch out for some finished items next week, oh and a post about the most incredible swap package I got!

Valentines love for some, fabric love for others.

Morning ladies!  It was Fat Club last night and I only lost a pound.  I'm not sure what I did wrong as I was very good, but I blame my body, it is a little strange!  I'm sure you all know it was Valentine's Day yesterday.  It's not as big a deal over here as it is in America, we only give cards/presents to our other halves, or those we wish were our other halves.  Me and the hubby did exchange cards and small presents (well I didn't as my order still hasn't turned up!) but that was it.

A friend at work asked me to make something for her to give to her husband on Valentine's.  Apparently he's got the rather bizarre habit of reaching his hand inside his t-shirt and stroking the label....  she asked me about a mini-version of a tag blanket and I said I'd make a heart-shaped one.

As he's going to carry this in his pocket it didn't want to be too bulky but I added a layer of wadding inside.  It's small, about 2.5 inches excluding the ribbon tags.

I used a couple of charm squares that I had hanging around.  I made the card for Mr CA.  Not terribly impressive but I'm going to show you anyway!  I'm so out of the routine of card making that I tend to struggle with my designs, they used to flow.

In the background is my rather gross ironing board cover which I intend to recover, joining in the sew-along at i have to say, if I can find time!

I thought I'd show you the bargain Amy Butler prints I got at Prints to Polka Dots in their recent sale, I mean that I "won", they might be destined for my ironing board cover...

Just a quick side note before I leave you, I've just been pinning and I discovered that if you highlight text on the page before you click "pin it", that texts automatically goes into the text box when you pin!  What a great time saver... did other people know about this?  Am I the last one to cotton on?

Jewellery Making course

On Saturday I went on a basic jewellery making course at The Bead Shop Nottingham with my mum.  They run a massive range of jewellery courses, most of which I hope to attend at some point over the year!  I have made jewellery before but my mum hasn't so I said I'd go with her as I still have a lot to learn.  I'm really glad I went. 

First of all we learnt the correct way to form loops.  I've been doing it the hard way all this time!  OK, so Blogger has rearranged my photos.  Fine.  The LAST thing we made was a memory wire bracelet.  The most difficult part about this is choosing the beads but I managed to find some lovely blue and white beads that reminded me of porcelain, so I used them.

Apart from bead choice, this was incredibly easy to make.  Making the loops was quite hard as the wire is very tough but it wasn't a difficult technique.

The FIRST thing we made was a pair of earrings using our new-found loop-making skills.  I had a bit of trouble with this as earrings make me feel sick.  Yep, weird I know.  I used to be pierced, loads in my ears, two in my nose and one in my belly button, but for the past 10 years or so they've made me feel ill so I don't wear them.  Even seeing other people wearing earrings can make me nauseous.  I got past it in the end by very much not focusing on what they were!

I went for a simple three-drop design with these lovely blue beads and some clear crystals.  My mum said they looked like the kind of earrings she used to wear in the 60s.  Not sure if that's a compliment or not...

Yesterday I attempted some artistic photography.  Hm. 

After we'd done the necklaces (which blogger says you can't see until last), we had a go at beadweaving, attempting the Right Angled Weave (RAW).  I love this technique!

I chose to do a stripy pattern, rather than have one colour in the centre and a different at the sides like the samples in the class.  Somehow I managed to break my end-cap type thing which the tutor said never usually happens so I'm not quite sure what happened there!  As I'd already cut the thread, I had to rip back a few rows and make the bracelet smaller.  It's a good job I've got the smallest wrists known to man (the only slim bit about me).  Oh that reminds me, I didn't tell you about week 2 at fat club, did I?  I got Slimmer of the Week, go me!  It made up for almost dying in the aerobics class.  I'm so unfit it's not funny.

This was incredibly hard to photograph as it's so small.

I don't think I've captured the colours very well, they're all really dark.  I did manage to iron my photo background cloth though, the new iron is great, it gets wrinkles out and everything, I'd kind of forgotten that irons do that!

So, we made earrings first, then the necklace below this, then this necklace.  This uses crimp beads which I like a lot now I've figured out how to close them properly!  The beads I used are actually clay, not wooden though they do look it.

I went for a rainbow arrangement and I love this one, I'm keeping it for myself along with the RAW bracelet, the other items (especially the (urgh) earrings) are going in the shop.

I took a close up of the ends as I love the little triangle beads and wouldn't have thought of this kind of detail without the tutor suggesting it.

On to the first necklace!  They'd provided us with big jars of mixed beads, so trawling through them to find beads to use was a long process.  I'd found two perfect beads and it turned out they didn't have a hole all the way through!

This necklace was made with a kind of cord and knots.  Tricky to get the knots in the right place.  This was a technique I'd never tried before.

I quite like that funky bead, but it's too long for me and so I'm going to try to sell it.

I'm looking forward to more jewellery classes in the near future, we're planning on attending one a month if we can, but not next month as I've already booked onto a stained glass course, I can't wait! 

If any of these pieces take your fancy, or you want to see some other jewellery I've made, take a look in my Folksy Shop.