The Treehouse

Nancy Drew is a Clue

Day 3 of the Nancy Drew blog and it's my turn to show my creations. As Always, thank you to Mdm Samm and Cheerleader Carol for their tireless efforts in organising such a fun event. I've never really bought a lot of novelty fabric but the Nancy Drew fabric was irresistable and it's even more lovely in real life and a great deal of fun to play with. 

Sleuth your way to the end of my post and see if you can work out what my favourite thing to do, other than sewing, is!

Clue 1

I use this small electronic device, or a real life version of the type of thing that it stores, daily. I decided that it really needed a little home of its own to next in during the times that I'm sewing on my sewing machine.

and the inside...

I used 3 of my favourite Nancy Drew fabrics to make this case - the black magnifying glass, the red silhouette and the bookshelf.

Clue 2

I love to hand sew - applique, cross stitch, embroidery, English paper piecing etc. I thought for a long time about how I could accomplish my other favourite thing to do while I am sewing. The solution to the puzzle involves the use of a set of headphones. I like big headphones that stay on my head not those little ear buds which refuse to stay in my ears. I thought that the headphones also needed a nesting place for when they're not in use and came up with this...

and look inside...there's plenty of room - 

I can even fit my other device inside and probably a sewing project or two as well!

Clue 3

I thought that a little celebratory quilt was in order next. So, I whipped out the fusible web and went to town drawing and cutting, snipping and ironing. Coffee and a Cozy was the result...

Did you solve the mystery? It wasn't really very hard was it? I have always loved books and reading. There aren't many books that I won't read or try but I do love to snuggle up with a quilt, a cup of good coffee and a cozy mystery book now and again - it feels like a real treat. I can often go from start to finish without moving from my spot!

When I was young, there was no book shop in our little town so it was a good long trek to nearest one but what a treat that was when we made the journey - usually to spend birthday or Christmas money. I can remember choosing Nancy Drew and the Hardy boys books along with a wide range of other books. Other than that, our library got a lot of visits from me! These days of course, I can buy a book in the space of a few seconds by clicking a few buttons on my Kindle and I can listen to books on my iPod, downloaded from the internet in the space of a few minutes and I can drive into town and buy real life books. 

Here are all my 3 clues together...

Now for a few credits...

the tutorial/pattern for the Kindle case came from Melissa at http://www.100billionstars.blogspot.com

the tutorial for the open wide zipper pouch for my headphones came from Anna at http://www.noodle-head.com/

the pattern for the book and the mug on my quilt came from Anni Downs' book Some Kind of Wonderful.

Now, in order to further hone your sleuthing skills you'll need to follow the clues below so that you can visit the rest of today's bloggers and enjoy their creations. 

That’s Sew Julie 

Scrapbook-ChickADoodle 

Lily Patch Quilts 

Cherry’s Prairie Primitives 

The Thimble Room

The Treehouse <--- you are here

The German Mom 

Stitch, Stitch, Stitch.

Quiltin’ Jenny 

Blackberry Creek Home Arts

Dare to Dresden Blog Hop

Welcome to the first day of the Dare to Dresden blog hop. A big thank you to Christine of Quilt Monster in My Closet and Mdm Samm for all the time,  hard work and encouragement that goes into making these hops work and be such fun.  

My project is from a free pattern that Jenny of Elefantz gave away some time ago. I love sunflowers so this wallhanging was perfect for me. The fabric is Charlevoix by Minick and Simpson - love those cherries and the faded blues and reds of this line.

I didn't have a thread that went nicely with the background red fabric so I quilted using invisible thread and I'm really pleased with the way it's turned out. I stitched all around the sunflower's head to make it pop - you can't tell from the photo but it has popped really well. 

This is the little poem at the top of the quilt stitched in a very pretty multi-coloured lemon thread and below is the close up of one of the bumble bees (I love bees) and the Dresden flower.

Thanks for visiting. Hope you've got a nice warm drink in hand so that you can sit and sip while you enjoy hopping along to the rest of today's participants.

Debby Kratovil Quilts

Apple Avenue Quilts

The TreeHouse <--------- that's me, you are here

Sew Mollie Sue, Quilt Much

Quilts My Way

Buzzing and Bumbling

Marjorie's Busy Corner

Selina Quilts

Quiltscapes

Hill Valley Quilter

Sew Incredibly Crazy

The Raspberry Rabbits

I Like to Quilt Blog

Cherry's Prairie Primitives

Spoilt Dog Quilts

 

New Year - New Start

I realised that if I didn't post on my blog soon then February would have arrived! December went by in a blur of activity and ended in a haze of illness! That seems to have mostly passed now and I'm back to stitching thank goodness. 

I'm not heavily into making New Year's resolutions but I did make myself a little January To-Do list. So far it's going quite well. I've some quilting to finish and some quilts to bind and then I'll be well on the way to completing my list.

My New Year start was the Around the World in 80 Days chart by Little House Neeldeworks. I'm stitching along with Carole on this one. The idea was to start it on New Year's day but as I was busy shaking and shivering and aching and whatnot that didn't happen! Then I wanted to finish off the part of the The Flock that I was working on before I started it. I finally put a few stitches into it last week but by that time I was heavily into finishing off the hexagons for my Hexy MF quilt! I have worked on it since and I love it. The colours are very similar, and in some cases the same, as The Library that I finished last year. I hope that the other charts in the series will appeal to me as much as this one does, it would look lovely with a little family of books hanging on the wall next to The Library. I must stitch The Bookshelf at some point to add to the scene!

Here's progress so far...

I'm hoping to get a bit more done this weekend.

I've been busily working away on my Dresden projects this week for next week's Dare to Dresden blog hop...

A bit of a blurry photo just to give a hint of  what's going on :) The blog hop starts on Thursday which is also my day to post so I'd better get stitching and finishing!

 

Holiday Lane Blog Hop - Grinch Lane!

Thanks for stopping by to visit me on the Holiday Lane blog hop. I have had such a great time with this lovely pattern. Huge thanks to Mdm Samm and Pauline for their time and work organising this fun event for us and another thank you - to Jill Finley  who designed the pattern and allowed it to be used for the hop. It has been an absolute pleasure from start to finish to make this pillow.

I started out by wondering what fabrics to use. I don't have a huge amount of Christmassy fabrics in my stash. However, one day much earlier in the year I was browsing Fat Quarter Shop's new in category (as I am wont to do in a spare moment) when a little voice piped up "ooh, the Grinch - I love him. Please, please can I have a Grinch quilt." Well, what's a Mother today when faced with a request like that! I secretly ordered the fabric and have been working on a Grinch quilt for Catherine for Christmas. A tricky business as my sewing room is downstairs and we spend a lot of time in there so - I've had to be very tidy with my secret sewing and make sure it's tucked away by school home time. Now, there were quite a few leftovers as I bought a fat quarter bundle so I hit upon the idea of using these to make the pillow and including it in Catherine's Grinch parcel for Christmas. More secret sewing during the day and hiding away at night! While I've been working on the pillow though, progress has halted on the quilt - but I will get it finished in time. 

As it's such a big pillow, it's a bit hard to photograph so I took a few close up pics as I was working on it. I wanted to add some sparkle to it and after some thought I dug out my Bejeweller gadget. I've not played with this for a while and had forgotten how much fun it is. I put red 'baubles' on the Christmas trees and a star on top of them. Then, I put some tiny crystals in the snow to make it glitter a bit, added a jewelled wreath to the door and finally, I put some silver stars in my black sky.

Silver Stars in the Sky

Glittering Snow

Wreath on the door

Blinged Christmas Tree

A flat picture before I turned it into a pillow. I quilted all over in matching colours. All of the applique is fusible web and stitched down at the quilting stage except for the felt which I just used a few dabs of glue to stick down and then stitched down by machine.

The finished pillow. Although I loved the flanges I decided to go with a wider pillow and so didn't do those.

The back of the pillow. There was a lovely panel in my fat quarter bundle which was perfect for the back of the pillow.

I'm really pleased with how it turned out and I hope my daughter will be too. I may even make another one once time is more freely available as this one was so much fun to make. 

I've been having a great time hopping around and seeing all the various different versions of Jill's pillow - it really is wonderful and inspiring to see everybody's different versions of the same pattern. 

Hope you've got a nice warm brew in your hands as there are plenty more blogs to hop to on today's schedule.

Living Life One Day at a Time

Polka Dot Classic

Sophie Junction

I'm Keeping Busy

Sunshine Quilting

The Treehouse <----- UR Here

Petit Design Co

Nunu's Quilt World

Ellison Lane Quilts

From This to That

Mary on Lake Pulaski

Loose Threads

Till We Quilt Again

13 Woodhouse Road

A Few Things...

First of all - next week is the start of the Holiday Lane blog hop organised by Mdm Samm  and Pauline

The hop starts on Wednesday 21st November (tomorrow) and clicking the link in my sidebar will take you to all of the details and links. I'm posting on Monday 26th November. I've had and am still having (yes, not finished it yet!) a lot of fun with this pattern...nearly there though.

I'm supposed to be stitching like a mad thing on my cottages at the moment but I did spare some time on Friday night to make a new pincushion - it turned out to be ginormous! I spotted the link on a blog and followed it. I thought it would be a nice quick make for a Friday evening - not taking away too much time from the pillow making and cottage stitching. Things were zipping along quite nicely until we had a surprise visit which although very nice took quite a chunk out of the evening. So the quick project extended itself into Saturday - it took me a long time to stuff this pincushion. I'm glad I persevered because it's turned out so pretty but goodness me there is a lot of stuffing inside it!

Wildflower Pincushion designed by Anna Maria Horner

I love pincushions - I think I'll make it my aim to make more of them in 2013 - I have a few in mind but probably no time to make anymore this year - we'll see though :) 

UR Priceless Blog Hop - My turn!

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog on the UR Priceless blog hop, organised by the wonderful Mdm Samm of Sew We Quilt and chief cheerleader and super helpful Katherine of Sew Me Something Good. This is my first venture into actually taking part in a hop - I am usually quite happy hopping about and leaving comments but I decided to dive in and have a go this time (and next time too for Holiday Lane!). 

The pattern was gifted to hop participants by Mdm Samm who designed it especially for the occasion. If you would like to have a go at making your own then the pattern is available here.

Sew - for my first purse I decided to use some precious Fig Tree fabrics - I love these fabrics. All went well - curve sewing...tick, frame attaching...tick, cute result...tick!

Here's a pic of the inside...some more Fig Tree

Next, I made one for my daughter - she chose her own fabrics in her favourite colours. As none of them were particularly patterned I thought some sort of embellishment for the front panel would be good and decided to machine embroider a monogram for her...

and a pic of the inside using that gorgeous purple...

These were sew much fun to make, I really enjoyed it - and so quick too. I've a few more in mind to make for Christmas gifts. 

Thanks again for stopping by...don't forget to pay a call on the rest of today's purse makers - the links are below and you can find the entire schedule over at Katherine's blog. I'll be enjoying hopping around to all the other blogs with my morning coffee to see all the lovely creativity.

 

The Crafter's Apprentice

Jane's Fabric and Quilts

Rosemary B on That Other Blogg

Why Knot Kwilt

Random Thoughts Do or Di

Mary T on That Other Blogg

SuperMom No Cape

Lilypad Quilting

.Quiltscapes

Stitch Stitch Stitch

Rose Creations

The Treehouse  <------- that's me, UR here!

Gracie Oliver Arts

Quilting Prolifically

Stekje

Grammie Q's