Jan May

A vision in Teal - front view Towards the end of February I saw a competition advertised on Twitter by Hillarys Blinds .  I can't remember the exact wording, but it was along the lines of "would you like to receive some material and enter our competition?" Of course I would! After sending an e-mail, I was delighted to hear I'd been chosen to take part.  I was able to pick from 3 fabrics.  I opted for the peacock print as I adore teal.  About a week later I received a packet from Hillarys containing a metre of my chosen material.  I wish I could get the colours to come out properly.  I don't think any of the photos I've taken do the fabric justice.  The background is a light cream, with the branches and blossom in subtle shades of brown and pale yellows.  Sitting on the branches across the fabric are a selection of beautiful peacocks.  In shades of teal, they are quite wonderful. A Vision in Teal - back view My ...

Spring may not have sprung in quite the way we would expect - but I do seem to have shrugged myself out of my sewing hibernation.  Goodness me - since coming back from holiday I have been in a stupor.  Haven't been able to apply myself at all.  However, my neighbour telling me her foster-child has a birthday soon has got my creative cap on.  With a blue and red bedroom to match in with, I've rummaged through my fabric stash and run up this little pillow. With the exception of the 14" Ikea pillow inside, the outer is up-cycled.  The red fabrics were cut from pretty dresses I have found at car boot sales for next to nothing (I set my buying limit at £2 - but will only spend this if the dress contains a lot of fabric - more usually 50p or £1), and the denim and check background were once my husband's shirts. You can find such great detailing on girl's dresses.  I loved the beautiful embroidered hem to this dress.  It's been perfect to make the b...

I've got there in the end!  One puffy pillow already for the bed.   The puffs were easy to do - and a good trial run for my next project of a bed runner to match.  I actually think the pillow would look better if it was all puffs, but hey - ho - you make and learn. Here's what I did...... Fabrics collected together.  The finished pillow is 14 inches square.  Allowing 1/4 inch seams - I cut the centre embroidery at 7.5 inches. Then 12 different squares of 5 inches each (top) 12 squares of 4 inches (back) cut from old white shirt.    There's no need to tack.  Though pins are a must. Begin by folding each top square in half (wrong sides together) and run over with an iron at the edges.     Match up the corners with a backing square.    Pinch fold in centre, and fold down flat against the backing square.  Pin in place, and continue around, bending each fold the same way.     All squares pinned, placed, and ready to se...

My blog posts have been lacking the last few weeks.  This is due to moving home and trying to sort out the chaos.  One of the things required was that hubby thin down his clothing, or there would be no room for any of mine in the fitted wardrobes.  At the last count he had well over a hundred shirts.  Ridiculous.  Under strict instructions to free up half the wardrobe space for me, he set to with bin bags, to turf some out for the charity shops. With a large selection of shirts ousted, I started looking at the fabrics and wondered if I could make use of them myself.  There's a surprising amount of fabric in a mans shirt, particularly an XL one. After cherry picking the ones that were all cotton and nice fabrics, I sat down and scratched my head for inspiration. My first of two makes is this pillow.  When I began I had no real vision of what it was going to look like.  I just knew that I wanted to use some of the front pockets, and make a...

 I've called this my French Boudoir Pillow, as it does have a bit of a French theme going on, and I reckon the only place it can go is on my bed.   (Boudoir it ain't - but it sounds good). I think this is the most fun I've had with my sewing machine for ages, and considering the "gay abandon" with which I attacked this project, I don't think its turned out too badly. From Moda - Curio range  You see I had fallen in love with this piece of fabric, and wanted to do something with it.  Due to the overall stripe pattern, I didn't want to cut it up.  However, just a plain pillow seemed very boring.  How to jazz it up? In the end I went a little bit mad.  Grabbed a bag of vintage lace and started attaching.  Then I printed off a few French themed vintage images onto printable fabric sheets.  Three vintage doilies for good measure, a handful of ancient buttons and a few bits of broken jewellery later - I had a cushi...

If you have a pretty charm pack in your fabric stash that you're wondering what to do with...... Why not quickly make up a charming little Love pillow?  Extremely quick and simple to put together, you can run one up in next to no time.  The finished width is the perfect size to place on the bed in front of your pillow. To complete this project I used 28 squares from a charm pack.  (Curio by Moda).  Simply sew 10 together to form each side.  I then drew the letters onto bondaweb and ironed on to 4 of the squares.  These in turn were ironed onto 4 plain squares.  I then cut around leaving about a 1/4 inch border without going into the fiddly shapes of the letters. If I'd had enough bondaweb left I would have attached the letters to the pillow that way, and hand-stitched them in place.  I didn't, so instead I used spray adhesive to hold them in place whilst I stitched around the edges by machine.  I then did a quic...

Finished...... at last!   Phew - as a commercial venture this is surely one big flop, simply due to the time it's taken to do all the hand-stitching.  I must have spent at least 10 hours working on this one little pillow, so I can't see myself putting it in my Folksy shop anytime soon.  I'm rather pleased with it though, even if I don't know what I'm going to do with it now! I've done another little piece of reverse applique on the back, behind a small oval panel of wool.  This time a heart to go with the theme, and I've finished off the bottom of the envelope flap with a little row of cross stitch kisses.  After so much time hand-sewing, it was a matter of moments to whizz around the outside with the sewing machine to finish it. The only place I can think suitable for it would be on the bed, and it certainly doesn't go with any of my bedding.  Oh no.....  does this mean I now have to make a quilt to match?  Sobs quietly.