Pouchette

Many times I run out of inspiration for something different to do. Before the stitching blog explosion I would search through my magazines for something different that I hadn't tried before. Nowadays I just log on and browse through my favourite stitching blogs, like this one. I'd seen these little pouches several times and wanted one. Yesterday I had finished all my swap stitching and decided to make something for myself and here is the result. It's a great little pouch for adding to swaps and as gifts for stitchy friends, I think the idea I saw on one blog of using it to send fat quarters or samples of fabric in was a lovely idea, so that's what mine will be for. I'm using calico and some of my fat quarters, this is a great way for me to cut into some of my stash.

I love the colour of this one, the green print is very pretty and the pin-tucks and lace are enough decoration I think.

Puzzle Punch

Last year my friend gave me a puzzle punch. I used it to punch out the corners of cards but hadn't really spent any time getting to use it properly. This past weekend I decided to spend time getting to know how this punch worked and these two cards are the ones I made that have some stitching on them. I like the colour of the cream and green one but I'm not so keen on the pink card I used on the second one, I do like the embroidery on it though, it's adapted from a free pattern from here.

Crazy Quilting

I'm putting together the packages ready to send to my cq swap partners and decided I must get a picture of the bunches of grapes I'd put on one of the blocks. I've never done cq before and found it quite a struggle deciding what embroidery I should do on the blocks. I've tried to cover each seam with stitching and was left with this short seam so decided to try using beads. The grapes turned out quite realistic I think! So, I will be doing them again on something for myself.

Latest Cards

A few months ago I went to a craft fair at Newark Showground. I was hoping to get some sewing and stitching stuff but the majority of stalls were selling card making items - so - of course I had to treat myself! One stall was selling a punching system and doing a very interesting demonstration of how to use punches in a way that I hadn't seen before. These three cards show how to use one of these punches to make quite a novel design of card.
The punch you use is a normal corner punch with the removable guide.

I've also incorporated some dry embossing and some paper pricking. These three cards are what I've made as example cards for my craft group. I've kept them simple so that they are fairly quick to make once the punching and embossing/pricking is done. Peel-off stickers are great for a bit of quick embellishment, here I've used glitter to colour them.

More Scissor Fobs

I received my scissor fob exchange this morning. It's a strawberry shaped fob that I'm very pleased with, I'd wanted a scissor fob this shape but hadn't got round to making myself one so this is just perfect for me. I also received a lovely note card and two lengths of ribbon that will come in very useful for my cq. Thanks Amanda, I enjoyed receiving your package.

This is the scissor fob I sent to my exchange partner at the Tiny Treasures Exchange blog.

Blackwork

I've been stitching scissor fobs lately, for an exchange I'm in here. I belong to a couple of Yahoo groups, one of which I do swaps with regularly but this is the first thing I've done for a blog exchange. This isn't the fob I'm using for the exchange, I don't want anyone to see that until it is received by the person I was assigned. The three that I have made are done on linen evenweave fabric, two are blackwork stitching and one is canvas work. The blackwork ones turned out nice but the canvas work one didn't look so good because the linen was a bit slubby and the strands of thread tended to look a bit uneven in places. The method of sewing the back and front together was the same as in this tutorial, a very neat way of finishing this type of work.

This is the canvas-work fob, it is adapted from a free pattern - I had to leave off the border for two reasons, one, it made it too big to use as a scissor fob and the second reason was that I have trouble with counted work and kept going wrong!!! The butterfly is a fancy paper fastener, you can get some lovely ones for using in card making but I think they are also useful on stitching.

Tea Parties

It was my birthday in December and my DS and DIL took me out to tea here. We had a lovely time and the sandwiches and cakes were delicious. I'd had a tea party at my house for a few friends a couple of months before this and realised that tea parties were fun and a good change from inviting friends to dinner. I find putting on a dinner party very exhausting these days so tea parties will be taking their place at my house. With this in mind my DIL gave me a couple of lovely gifts this Christmas, the cake stand in the picture and a book entitled Afternoon Tea Parties with ideas for themed teas. I wasn't really sure how much food should be offered on these occasions so this book was a big help. Then yesterday morning I got an unexpected phone call from friends saying they would be dropping in to see us that afternoon and immediately saw this as an opportunity to put on an Afternoon Tea!!! Luckily I had some ready prepared finger food that I had bought in 'just in case' I needed it over Christmas and New Year and all I needed to buy was some fresh bread. It was the quickest meal I had ever prepared, I didn't get stressed and worn out rushing around trying to get too much done in a short time. What a pleasure it was to be able to welcome my guests in this way.