The Treehouse

Henrietta Whiskers finished...

Poor Henrietta Whiskers has been languishing in my sewing basket for quite a lot of months now. I was inspired to get her finished by Sinta's BOM rehab and so once Catherine's new school bag was completed I dug her out and set about putting the finishing touches on her. 

This is how she looked back in March

which is the last time I did any work on her. All of the blocks were stitched together with block no. 9 needing to have the applique stitched down on it. At the time, I was debating whether or not to leave out the birds in the border and instead of making a decision I procrastinated for 6 months! I had all of the borders cut out and ready to stitch on and had even traced the applique for the border but...just couldn't decide whether to put it on or not.

On Thursday I made my decision - I wanted to put the applique on the borders. I set too and stitched the borders on and cut out the applique shapes and soon had them glued down. Since then, I've spent my evenings happily whip stitching the wool pieces and blind stitching the birds wings and I am delighted to have finished the top. I've decided to send this to be long arm quilted as I'd like a good job to be done of the quilting after all the hours spent handstitching and I'm just not capable of doing it justice. I emailed last week and Henrietta is booked in to be quilted by Chris at the end of October - I can't wait to see her once she's all quilted up.

Next I intend to work on finishing off my version of Anni Downs' 'My Favourite Things' from the book Some Kind of Wonderful - especially as I bought her new book over the summer holidays and would like to make the quilt in that too! 

 

Linking with BOMs Away Mondays 

March Cottage, In Full Bloom and Henrietta

I was a little late starting this month's cottage as I was busy finishing off the first two blocks for Lynette Anderson's In Full Bloom BOM. I got underway with March on Friday last week - I LOVE the greens in this cottage. I've loved all the colours so far actually and each month becomes my new favourite!

Here's the progress so far...

The little shamrock above the house is in the wrong place and will have to come out - I miscounted, oops!

The next pics are of the In Full Bloom block of the month - there are two blocks to stitch each month and these are the one for the month one. Thoroughly enjoyed stitching these although that garden bench seemed to be neverending!

My kit for this BOM came from Bev at Fobbles and she has chosen a gorgeous linen type fabric for the stitcheries, it's a pleasure to stitch on...so glad I bought an extra metre of it for my cushion making.

I decided to stitch the quilt top together while I was in the mood so that all I will need to do each month is to stitch the designs and then applique them to the background. The original pattern uses Broken Dishes blocks but I wasn't too keen on those and have swapped them for pinwheels. I have the two borders to stitch on and then the quilt top is all done but for each month's stitcheries. My husband loves this quilt already and can't wait to see it hanging on the wall!

In the continued spirit of finishing things off, I dug out poor neglected Henrietta Whiskers yesterday. I decided to get the final block made and to attach the borders so that I can take this away with me at the weekend and enjoy stitching the applique down. I'm hoping to get the top finished before the end of the month. Just a few borders to stitch on and the applique to prepare now - Sophie the blackbird makes several appearances in the border along with some more stars I think.

We're having the first of our crafting weekends away this coming weekend and I'm really looking forward to it. I've probably got enough stitching for 6 months ready to go with me! 

I've got quite an exciting little project planned once the postman delivers. I was enjoying a wander through the Fat Quarter Shop coming soon pages one day when I happened upon the upcoming Grinch fabric. Catherine was looking over my shoulder at the time and fell in love it and asked if I would make her a Grinch quilt. As it doesn't come out until May I explained that she would have to wait. Later on, I found that they still had a supply of the previous Grinch fabric so I have secretly ordered it up in the hopes of completing a quilt for it in time for her birthday in May. Whether or not I'll manage I don't know as procrastination is one of my middle names!!!

Sunday Sewing

The rest of the family have been out splashing about in boats today so I've had plenty of lovely sewing time. Yesterday while they were splashing about in Coniston I made a couple of GFG flowers and did a little bit of stitching on the sunflower wall hanging. I made another GFG flower this afternoon when it was too hot to be in my sewing room and did a little more stitching of the poem on the sunflower.

I've not stitched any of these for quite a while and it was lovely to get back into the swing of things with them. I'm going to try again with the one-a-day and see if I can get them finished off...then it'll be onto the next ring and then the diamonds. No pic of the sunflower just yet, I'll wait until I've finished stitching the poem.

I made another 3 Summer Bow Ties this morning and stitched them together with the one that I made on Friday - I really like the look. I saw this layout on Jodi's Pleasant Home blog and it convinced me that I needed to make some bow ties!

I did quite a bit of cutting out for the bow ties as well so that I can sneak in the making of one now and again during the week :)

Finally, I made this month's Henrietta Whiskers block and it's another very sweet one - I'm getting spoilt for choice for a favourite block now!

The applique is only stuck down at the moment so I've the treat of stitching that to come as well as the little bit of embroidery that's on the block.

On Friday I picked up my two cross stitches that I'd taken for framing and I'm very pleased with both of them.

 

The teacups are my favourite stitch so far this year, it's a shame I can't get a better picture of them.

I'm itching to get the next block for the Designer BOM sewn, it looks lovely - hopefully I'll fit it in over the course of the week. I had thought I might get it made today but a Henrietta Whiskers block takes quite a well to prepare. I'm away to enjoy some of the evening sunshine with a glass of wine now and then perhaps some stitching on the Library later on.