Progress.

It seems listing my WIP's is working as I am now tackling them as opposed to hiding them!

This week has seen me cross the secret project off the list as it was turned into:

A cute little cushion using the Little Apples range by Aneela. 

So to remind me here's where I stand with the list.

1. Little Apples Project 

2. Lap Quilt for 'Little Miss H' - Progress (binding nearly sewn on)

3. Baby Boy Quilt

4. Cross Stitch

5. Crochet Blanket - Progress (another square completed)

6. Knitted Tank Top

7. Knitted Shrug

8. Lily's QAL

9. Fairytale Lap Quilt

10. Love Quilt - Progress (another square made)

If I'm been totally honest I would have liked to have completed more blocks on the 'Love' quilt but hey ho!

Other sewing has included this bunting:

This has been made for a twitter friend using the fairly new line by Denyse Schmidt that was a US & Australian release only. There will be a lap quilt to match very soon!! I'm very excited about these goodies as they are technically my first 'paid' for work - more about that another time.

This week has been a good mail week too! By that I mean 'ahem' fabric week

From left to right we have some cute apples from Seamstar, fab Monaluna foxes from Fabricworm, Sherbet Pips again from Fabricworm and a lovely cross hatch again from Fabricworm.

I also treated myself to a lovely new cushion cover which I got from the talented Leila. Her Etsy store is full of fab handmade goodies for the home, all in her great scrappy style. Love it!

Finally for now I also splurged and got some of this stunning line:

Yes it's some of the great Habitat by Jay McCarroll I really love the quilts that I have seen using this line and can't wait to make one for myself.

I'm working the next couple of days so it'll be quiet around here but hopefully I'll be back to some sewing on Tuesday! 

WIP......

So in an attempt to make myself crack on and get my WIP's actually completed, I've decided to join in the WIP fun over on Meg's blog! Basically you blog your WIP list and then give weekly updates as you check the items off your list. In theory.

So here goes, my dreaded list that I WILL complete over the summer!!


1. Secret Project - this little fun project using Aneela's new line needs to be finished first.

 2. Lap Quilt - this is for 'Little Miss H' and is just waiting on the binding been hand sewn on and a few little appliques to the front to cover the disastorous burn mark :(

3. Baby Boy Quilt - This quilt top is 3/4 pieced and needs finishing as soon as possible so it can be given to it's new owner.

4. Cross stitch - cute little super-hero project for 'Master M'

 
5. Crochet blanket - Ongoing project from the lovely Dottie Angel blog that needs finishing before I start another crochet blanket!!

6. Knitted tank top - for moi!

7. Knitted shrug - For 'Little Miss H'

 8. Lily's Quilts QAL - this will be a picnic rug when finished and is made using the Hideaway collection, so cute!

9. Fairytale Lap Quilt - this is going to be for my neice

10. Love Quilt - this is made using the blocks from my month in Fresh Modern Bee 2. Modified Bento blocks using Amy Butler's Love range, a king size for our bed. Massive!

Wish me luck!!!

 

Playing with Dolls.....

So you all know I have four girls right? And by girls I mean Blythe dollies yes?!

I'm relatively new to collecting dollies but very quickly I gathered four beauties just before last Christmas. And there it stopped. I'd spent way over my intended budget and holy moly the clothes are just so expensive!

Until today my poor girls have simply sat on a shelf spooking the hell out of my hubby! That is until I called at my friend Katy's for a quick coffee after the school run this morning.

You know how it is, I mentioned my girls were neglected, Katy said she's decided to sell some of her collection for the same reason (seriously it was huge anyway!) and so I said if she's ever selling clothes or accessories to let me look before listing it anywhere else. The rest you can guess!

So a couple of hours later and I'm back home with a stash of new clothes and accessories for my girls! Let me tell you even at mates rates it's cost me a pretty penny. Oh well, you can't take it with you as my Nan says. Good blinkin job 'Mr. G' would say!

So here are my girls Boo, Betty, Lexi & Queenie wearing what I think is an eclectic collection of clothing to see them through the summer festival period! Check out those Hunter wellies and that baseball cap! I've definitely fallen back in love with them and have even put Betty on the waiting list for a customisation by the very talented Milky Robot. Out of the four dollies she's the one that isn't clicking just now, she needs some serious funking up!!!

I'll leave you with a little sneak of a nearly finished project.

It should be finished by the weekend and I guarantee it will be cute!!

 

A dress made from couches?

I always seem to be playing catch up! Do you? 

I've not really blogged for the last week and now I've got so much to say I don't know where to start. Unusual for me I know!

I think the best place to start would be by showwing you guys all the things that have kept me from blogging! First up is a fantastic ball that 'Little Miss H' and I attended last weekend. Here she is with her friend Nina:

 

The ball was organised by the local suport group for families of childern with Down Syndrome and it was a proper black tie do with a meal and a band and a disco. It was brilliant!

Everyone had so much fun and it was great to see all the young people with DS partying away. My pictures only really show the younger end of the kids there as 'Little Miss H' was the youngest attendee but let me tell you there were gorgeous looking teenagers too. And snogging!!

It was way too loud for 'Little Miss H' most of the time but she got used to it. Have you noticed her dress? Fab isn't it? Its a one off number made by my lovely friend Amanda. She blogged it here where you can get the low down!


I've also attended a local craft fair recently and scored these beauties:

We just love badges and brooches at our house and managed to pick up a great selection, along with a pot holder for our camping trip and a cute screen printed hoop to add to our collection!

On the sewing front I am so determined to finish off my WIP's it's untrue. I've nearly completed the Wonky Star lap quilt:

It's quilted and the binding is machine stitched on one side, I just need to hand sew the rest of it down and fix that blinking burnt patch with some applique! Hopefully it will be a Ta Dah! moment soon.

I've made some progress on my Modified Bento Love Quilt blocks:

I thought I was nearly complete with this but when I laid the 1st row of sewn blocks across the bed I realised it wasn't wide enough and needed 2 more blocks per row to give a good overhang! Argghh!

I've been losing motivation with it as I find cutting the fabric and sewing the blocks for this one a wee tedious so I've decided to just make 1 block per day and take my time with it. I'll still have the quilt top finished within 2 weeks so that's OK by me!

Check out this lovely yarn my postie delivered yesterday:

Its a Peruvian wool called Cascade 220 and I bought it here (which was by far the cheapest place online I found it!) It's been bought to make a start on the lovely crochet blanket in Issue 2 of Mollie Makes so watch this space!

Finally I'll leave you with this:

Oh yeah! We were that close. And I'm going again tonight!

It was going so well.....

Remember the lovely wonky star quilt top I finished a while ago for 'Little Miss H'?

Yeah? Well last night I basted it and began quilting it, it was looking good even if I do say so myself!! I quit at around midnight, dreamt about the quilt all night (sad I know) and so was up early to do some more quilting this morning, you know before the little peeps woke up!!!

So there I am happily quilting away when 'Mr. G' rings me, I stopped, leaving said quilt under machine and had a 5-10min chat with the hubby. When I returned to the quilt I could smell burning? I switched the machine off and checked round the house to make sure we weren't on fire and couldn't find anything??? Curious I thought, switched the machine back on, rotated the quilt and saw it.........

It appears the light bulb has burnt the quilt top whilst it was scrunched up under the machine. Its entirely my fault as I was sewing without the cover on that bit of the machine, which I'd taken off to make it easier to attach the walking foot.....then being lazy I didn't re-attach. Pap.

So what to do? I'm thinking hand applique some circles of fabric onto the top, one of which will cover the burn mark??? Any ideas greatly appreciated!!

Here is a close up of my favourite star on the quilt, quilted of course:

This is my favourite quilt I've made so far, just need to sort that burn out. Damn.

Fresh Sewing Day #3

Hello! I'm back!

Seen as it's the 1st of the month I'm linking up with Lynne of Lily's Quilts and her monthly feature 'Fresh Sewing'. Basically it's a chance to show off what you've been sewing up and also lets you see what everyone else has been doing too! I love a good blog hop don't you?

So without further ado here's what's been keeping me busy the last few days.

I've made some adjustments to this cute top I made 'Little Miss H' a while ago. I've taken the length off the sleeves and added elastic to what remains as well as adding a pocket. I'm much happier with the top now and so is the little lady!

I've resewn and trimmed my Modified Bento Blocks, I just need to make 6 more blocks and sew them all up!

I've got until the weekend to do this as I'm entering the finished quilt top into the naked bed challenge, organised by fabric designer and quilter extrodinaire Sarah Fielke. Wish me luck!!!

Finally I've pieced this baby boy strip quilt for my friend:

Now it's all pieced I've realised I need to add some strips about another 15" to make a 42" square baby quilt.

So what have you been sewing???