comfortstitching

Belle the cloudbuster!

 
Introducing my newest baby, no night feeds or nappy changing for this creation:)  Belle was thought up whilst listerning to 'get off my cloud' by the rolling stones of all things when antiquebrowsingshelfhunting 2 sundays ago.  First she got turned into a new-coming-soon-I'm-so-excited-fabric-design, then I got bored waiting for that to arrive (oh spoonflower - why do you take so long!!!) and she got re-born in embroidery.  Asha keeps checking that she is going to live with us as little red riding hood is off course being sent away to live in her new home soon.

 
She has now been reborn again (nine lives style) in pdf format, in case any of you are as stitch crazy as me and long to re-create her in real live stitch.  Perfect for any little girl to dream along to!!!  Belle is exactly where I want to be, floating in the clouds with the helpful aides of colourful balloons wearing stripy leggings and a bobble hat!!

On the subject of new spoonflower designs, I have created a few new ones that should be arriving in a couple of weeks.  I was wondering..................would you like to see and pre-order designs sooner or would you rather wait until the actual fabric arrives and see them then??????   I am quite excited about them, there are a couple of boy ones too as requested by angela and jo.  Jo wanted me to do something along the lines of 'slugs and snails and puppy dogs tails' which I did without making it at all as gory as I first thought it would.

 
As it's nearly halloween, we've got our decs and witchy tales ready today.  'The Worst Witch' is one of my all time fave books and this is my original aroundabouts 30 year old copy, scribbled on by my little sis as a baby (she's 30 now!)

We will be enjoying the spookiness with a little candy corn love from the delightfullykindandnotspooky jenny (Thank you!!).

!!!!!!!!!!!Happy Halloween!!!!!!!!!!!!!

cheery cherry on the volcano of duty

 
I honestly am not purposely intending to be around as little as I am.  The fleeting prescence is due simply to the otherwise quite possible eruption of the volcano of other more pressing duties - it could get quite messy if things aren't attended to.  You can guess to the nature of these duties, many involve the prefixes of tidy or sort.  I wont bore you with the gory details, you might fall asleep!! 

I have managed a little of something enjoyable in the form of the cheery cherry of the title, my little red embroidery is all but finished and was extremely pleasurable to complete right to the very last minute!!  So pleased with the result was I that I decided to delve in to the murky depths of the world known as PDF-ing (see last thursdays post).  This came with several nightmares which thankfully due to the magic wand known as asking for help in blogland are now all well and truly sorted out!!  Thank you to EVERYONE who contributed to that help - I have learned simply LOADS!!!!

 
So if you fancy creating your very own little cherry to cheer up your own volcano of duty, I have my personally instructionalized version with 2 sizes of miss red and a rundown of stitches I used in my version all ready to e-mail.  Available of course in my shoppy!!  And as it's neatly pdf-ed to you - no shipping!!!!

I have done a few crumbs of other bits........

 

hexing along nicely!!

 

more stitchy legs!

I asked last week if anyone had begun making anything from either of my christmas fabric designs and Jo was quick to show me her wonky stars for her christmas quilt, I LOVE it!!!!  Would love to see any more beginnings or ends out there!

aliens in the christmas tree and a nightmare of pdf

There are some things I am quite confidently good at.  You know when you are happily content in your blissful cocoon of ease at being able to do something you quite enjoy.  In this little box of smugness I would quite happily place sewing and blogging.  I am completely self taught in both these little large hobbies of mine and just find my way around quite easily now that I sort of know what I'm doing.  There are other things I would wish to be able to do better or maybe even be able to do at all.  In this pile, sitting quite shamefully on the top like a blemished cherry, I would probably place creating a pdf file (or rather Please Don't Frustrate yourself file).  This is what I have been trying to do all day thus far, in my usual style of 'try it and you will find a way eventually' as I don't have a clue but have a go anyway............I have got as far as being able to create one only it has to have just words or just pictures (just not both together!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!).  

Is there anybody out there (???!) who can help me?????????????????????

any PDF tech-ie wizards???  completely computer-abled persons, I need you!!!

Oh well thank goodness I can sew! else I'd have nothing to show you!!!

 

I've turned my aliens in the christmas tree patchwork into another..............

 

as if you couldn't have guessed(!).......cushion!!!

 

And it will probably take me now until then to work out the PDF nightmare (and that is a very optomistic dream if ever there was one!!!).

Calling all purchasers of my spoonflower christmas fabrics!!!!!!!! - I would love to see anything you have made or started with my designs and add a few links on my blog so others can see what you are upto too!!!!!  Not that we are nosy you understand..........
 
 
 

 
 
 

are you sitting comfortably?

Here we are, a little later thanks to parent's evening but the blog must go on! 

I am enjoying chopping into my christmas fabric to address the lack of comforting holiday cushions, which I always remember to make each year, precisely when I have no time left to make any.  So this year obviously I am very well prepared having my own fabric on hand too!!!

 

This is the first one I've finished, nicely improv-ed style with added aliens and lobsters!!!!  as you do!!  and of course a sprinkling of my spoonflower fabrics.  Now I just have to make a few cushion-y friends!! 

 

The back is just a simple double flap.  The way I work out the width measurement for each half is, divide the width of the cushion by half then add six inches.  The edge of the flap is turned over by half an inch, ironed, then turned by one inch, ironed again and finally sewn in place.  Do this for both halves of the back.  Then lay your cushion front right side up on the table, top with your two overlapping back pieces both wrong side up as above.  Stitch in place, with a half inch seam allowance all around.   Oh so easy, go on have a go!!!!

Remember, many sale items still available, so stock up!!!!!!!!!  now.

  Thank you to julie for my fab blog award!!!

 

 

 

more cushion-y goodness soon!!!!
 

 

the broken home

 

Stitch...

stitch......

stitch.  The soundtrack rarely changes around here and today was  is  no exception.  These little nibbles are just to whet your appetite for next week, when the whole of the above should be cooked and ready to serve. 

In the meantime we could talk about....................shelves.

 Oh you know me................I like to be random...........Do you like shelves?  Is your husband a mr fix it??  On second thoughts maybe I shouldn't ask, as there is very possibly a high risk of more ceaseless unhappiness for me in the case of the broken home!!!  My home is pretty broken you see, as a matter of fact, I can't ever remember any such thing as a fully functioning version of this particular abode.  Let me show you just one case load.

Exhibit one : The (broken) bookshelf.

This bookshelf was once whole and bookshelf-y perfection.  It was bought to act as living room library and dispense my weighty tomes to me in seconds.  Alas the case of the ' husband must have the christmas tree in the corner' soon put an end to the happy relationship me and the bookshelf shared.  Husband = must move shelf.  Husband = can't be bothered to move any of the books off first.  Fully laden bookshelf is dragged across the room to accomodate the tree.  Several weeks after the merry season, it is noticed that there is a landslide where once perfectly straight and flat shelves once served.  See that third shelf.........frightful.  Husband of course blames this on the weight of wife's books and magazines because of course no one else buys weighty craft and cookery books and that is why a bookshop is rarely found on a high street and why amazon makes precisely no pence whatsoever, ever.  Wife put's up with misery of broken bookshelf for three years waiting for husband to own up to mistake even quietly and re-furbish this highly important centre-piece of the home.  In the meantime wife lays many books on their side to prop up the shelves and stop possible book shelf avalanche.  Wife still waiting.  Wife hatching many plans including quietly pointing out all the nice bookshelves people have in their homes on tv programs.

If only I could stitch my bookshelf better, things would have got better years ago.  Please tell me I am not alone.......................

and again, randomly moving on, for those of you who love fabric and especially fabric that is free and being given away!!!!!!  Please visit my friend Jenny's almost one week old blog! - Cut sew iron repeat.

more randomness (!) soon.....

 

october continues while autumn falls

It is that awful third week of the month time or as it is known in our house - many minutes of mummy moaning maudily.  Well it actually isn't but it should be and you can probably guess those rather feminine reasons why..............  So me, myself at this time of ache-y -o-rama drama, like to self prescribe myself a dose or two of hexagon-ing.  Should be stocked on the chemist shelves in my opinion as it is a proven remedy for a stroppy head-ache or six. 

Are you ready for another quilt????  Well settle down with a cup of something and a biscuit-y bite whilst I saunter my latest gift-to-be quilt, an autumn-ish quilt in a seventies disco style ( strictly the view of myself and not necessarily anybody else).

each block is individually improvised for maximum spontaniety assurance!!

lot's of colour, lot's of loudness and even more pattern!!!!!

The white is needed solely to calm the whole riot down!


 All blocks are created from scraps and slightly mis-behaved.

Can you tell I have developed a taste for mosaic maker?  I thought it might be a good idea to remind myself that the season we are in  is the one before the holiday one and while the leaves and the tempreture both tumble, plummet fall or cascade, I reasoned maybe so should the prices in my shop............there's nothing like a bit of unison in a season.  So take a look, visualize how these more attractively priced something's may look in a holiday stocking or two.............or else buy them for yourself, as something to get you through...........the seasons, the weather, the moaning, the shopping, the tantrum-ing and more.

little red love

Today a little homage to all things girly, hooded and red-dish.  The stitchy colour by numbers above is my little effort of painting by stitch for a hand stitched swap on the stitchy side of flickr.  Forget Joseph and his technicolour dreamcoat, this is the only kind of coat I hankered after as a wee-er version of myself. 

 

Needless to say, Asha and Ciara have grown up in a sucession of red velvet-y coats and funnily enough, Ciara announced on the way home from school the other day, that for the forthcoming 'dress as your favourite book character day' at school, she wished to go as little red riding hood...............can you blame her???   Though the red-velvety-coat upbringing may have had some to do with, I like to think that red-hood fever is passed through the genes like some cherished family heirloom.  Ciara just isn't a cinderella type but she makes the most perfect little miss H.

One metre each of red fabric and velvet ribbon later.....

I like to say it has an enlarged hood as that is the main characteristic of this story piece of fiction fashion but you know really I made it so it can fit me too, should the need ever arise of course......

Talking of swaps on flickr, I got my quilty swap package from kim, a super duper heather ross mini quilt with the most fabulous loopy stitching I have EVER seen, a purse - to save my pennies for more fabric and my post office bill - and even more HR scraps!!!!!!!   

Thank you Kim!  It's mine!  all mine!!

'til the girls clap eyes on it of course!

spoonflower 'skip-ity' fun!!

Forgive me!!!!!  I think I am addicted to spoonflower!!!  Well in my defence I had to try a design that wasn't about christmas and see if I could go through with it, without the urge to stick in some sprigs of holly or red breast-y robins.  As you can decipher I haven't strayed far in terms of colour but one step at a time!

 
So I am going to call this wee number 'skip-ity' because you can't call any of my fabrics 'the red and aqua one'.  I don't know why I decided on the skipping theme but then why not???!  Who doesn't want to return to the heady days when your only worry may be how many you could do in a row without doing a trippy!!  This one should be arriving in a week or so but I thought I would get ahead of myself and get a little organised.  This first order only has three fat quarters for grabs and I've just listed those in my shop.  I can order more should the need arise but I never know if anyone is going to like my designs or not???!  Maybe I'm just a one trick christmas designing pony?  We shall see.......

What do you think? could you give these girls a home? or should I stick with the holidays???!

quilt festival!!!!!

 
Here is my contribution to 'park city girl's online quilt festival'.  It is a mini at around 19 x 22" but I love it and plan to make something similar in a more use-ably human size soon.  The pattern was all planned by me and it uses mainly heather ross prints's fussily cut and co-ordinated with other fun-ish prints. Each of the little blocks is only 4" square so that was alotofcuttingandpiecing!!!!!!!! I love that there is lots going on but it is calm and serene to look at at the same time.  The quilting was done in a grid formation using the little guide that fits on my machine foot (again!!).  See this weeks posts on tues and wed to see a picture of the tool in action (!).  It was made about 3 months ago as part of a mini quilt swap on flickr.  Well that was the plan anyway................my eldest daughter decided otherwise, that this quilt was perfect for her and that I never make anything for her (????noT tRue!)  So in the end I relented and gave it to her - what else can you do, sometimes daughters know best!!

Who would want to give up this unicorn????

Of course I did make another mini for my swap partner, you can see it here. 

Be sure to check out the other Blogger's Quilt festival quilt's by clicking on the button in my sidebar!!

wanted - a home for a .....................

 

*********************************Update : Sorry sold!**************************************

As you know I have been productively counting my way down my gift's to give list, in the hope of avoiding the commonplace but boring-ly commercial seasonal shopping trips this year.  I would much rather be at home with a pot of tea and a plateful of fruit shortcakes, stitching merrily along whilst multi-tasking by watching miss marple/doc martin/anything steve mcqueen.  Sanity is this season's must have.  I have not however just been thinking of myself............, oh no!  For the season of goodwill, I have thought of you too, think of me as some kind of seasonal elf if you must but I know many of you may work and not have the stitchy time it takes to knock up a 'I made it myself' item.  So..................if you fancy gifting craftily this Christmas, I am stocking onto my shelves the grand total of one of my home-made and hot off the sewing machine mini quilts for a very competitive price.  I am not planning on making any more as there is the to-do list you know:)

 

robots....speedy cars and frog spawn-a-like prints!!!
 

vans with guitars next to them!!!!
 

Sail boats and snails!!!  cowboys and aliens!!!!  multi boyish-ness!

Take a look at the spec.

fit for purpose

perfect for a boy

small but large at the same time (25 x 28")

looks great on any cot, bed, stroller, floor, den, attic in years to come..........

Just- pretend-you-made-it-yourself-ability!!! (I won't tell if you don't:))