The Treehouse

Stitching catch up...

Just as we were about to leave for our holiday I grabbed my bag of crochet stuff...just in case I ran out of sewing and reading to do - there was of course no chance of that as I'd prepared quite a lot of stitchy stuff to do on holiday, lol! As I mentioned in my previous post, I got a little carried away with the crocheting and in fact - never touched the stitching at all :o I made a multitude of little granny squares for a baby blanket and finished off this bag...

I photographed it outside this morning as it's lovely sunny here today so the colours are a bit washed out - it's a lovely blue/green/cream yarn. I thoroughly enjoyed making this and it was really fairly quick once I got over the problem with how to start off.

Before we went away, I finished of the second of the Tail Feathers blocks - I love these quilt blocks fulll of little birds.

More outdoors photography this morning! See the little pods in the bottom block - all blanket stitch...yum yum! I think I mentioned that I'm a little behind on this project - still finishing off block 3 and block 4 has arrived :o That's this week's task to complete and I'm getting there. 

I also have some Quilt Aid blocks in progress - one a stitchery similar to the Tail Feathers and also by Natalie Lymer, another one is all raw edge applique finished with more yummy blanket stitch and the third one, by Sue Daley, has some English paper piecing on it. I was really excited to do that one as I've not tried EPP before. Unfortunately though, when the kit arrived there was a piece of fabric missing and the background fabric piece was too small. I contacted the shop to let them know and when we returned from our hols the replacements were waiting for me - I'm hoping to get playing with those again either tonight or this weekend. I did start doing the EPP but had to stop because of the missing fabric...I'm eager to get going again and even more excited that the finishing kit that I bought, also designed by Sue Daley, has more English paper piecing in it.

Last week I went to the Great Northern Quilt Show...dutifully chaffeured by the dh bless him. I have photos to share of some of the quilts that were on display there tomorrow.

Busy sewing week...

I've cracked on with a few projects this week thanks to the poor weather. We were supposed to go to Alton Towers on Wednesday however, a forecast of heavy rain didn't make that an inviting prospect so we postponed until a later, more sunny day! Catherine and I did some baking while Matthew hared around outside until it started to rain and then came indoors to play with diablo and football game with about 1/2 the neighbourhood's children in tow :o We girls were safe in the kitchen...with the cookies and cake!

 My aim this week was to get up to date with my Tail Feathers quilt and I'm pleased to say that I have done :D I now just have a bit of stitching left on block two and I'll be ready for the August delivery.

Block One complete except for it's little 1" squares border, I forgot about that!

 

Block 2 with the 1" square border! just needing it's stitcheries completing now. Catherine and I bought some Hercule Poirot dvds in Asda yesterday - we're both thoroughly addicted to Hercule and I see some Hercule and stitching forecast for this afternoon - it's raining again!

I even cracked on and made some of the log cabin blocks - one of them needs its last strip but I didn't have a material left in a big enough size that wasn't already in that block so it'll have to wait for the August package to arrive.

Pretty material isn't it?

Poor Matthew's quilt was abandoned...the reason? I knew there was a mistake in it and the thought of so much unpicking was too depressing, likewise - the thought of finishing it off with a glaring error in it was too depressing as well so - stalemate! Last night I got to work on fixing it and this is what it looks like at the moment...

This week's aim is to get the top finished without the mistakes! I must say I'm glad that I'm redoing it, it looks so much better. I'll be getting a little sewing time tomorrow evening while the chicks have friends round for a sleepover. I'm hoping that the weather will be kind on Tuesday so we can have an outing - not much use going to the park in the pouring rain! (and I can stitch at the park :D)

So last night, after a marathon of correcting for Matthew's quilt I decided on a quick, fun, satisfying make. I had seen a really cute little bag on Moda Bakeshop blog - that is such a smashing blog by the way, check it out if you're a sewer - lots of lovely projects and they're not all big ones. Anyway...the cute bag, I really fancied making it so I did!

Been getting on with a little crocheting too - the nice lady in the sewing shop is getting some lovely Clover crochet hooks in with a soft handle, I intend to have one or two of those. She's also getting some circular sock knitting needles in - I intend to use up my ball of sock yarn, it's too pretty to sit in the cupboard so these will be mine as well, lol!