Hangie

Not much crafting going on here again. I have made three zipped project bags and another sewing roll but no pictures of those yet. The picture here shows the hangie I finished today, it is from an idea I saw here that I fancied having a go at. The stitching is a freebie from here . I'm not really very happy with the finished result but it's ok. I used a butterfly brad in the centre of the stitching.

Hanging over my banister is an almost finished patchwork quilt. It's been there for at least a year! I've just got to quilt it and put a border on it. When I have one of these UFOs I have to wait for the 'I will finish this!' feeling to come over me. Until I get that feeling I think 'Oh it's too difficult, I can't do it' then suddenly I start to feel that of course I can do it!

Fabric

The past month is one I do not wish to repeat. My DH should have been in hospital for four or five days and he ended up there for three weeks. His operation was completely successful, it was the illnesses he developed while he was in there that caused the problem! But he's home now and progressing well. So, apart from the extra duties caring for an invalid entails I am now able to get back to a bit of crafting. The fabric in the picture is 'Rachael by Sentimental Studios for Moda'. I love this fabric and have had it for two or three years, it's taken me until this year to actually use it! So far I've only made the two sewing rolls you see here. Now that I've come to terms with the fact that I'll never be an ace quilt maker I'm enjoying making these small items (as you probably guess from my other pictures!).

Swaps and Things

Shown here are some swaps I received for a sewing container swap and the square box and two jars are what I made. This sewing container swap was great fun and my fellow swappers sent me some lovely things. I've got them displayed in my bedroom and enjoy just looking at them each day. Oh, and the floss ring tag at the front left was from another exchange I was in but it goes nicely with the other things shown here. I won't be doing any more swaps for a while, my DH is still in hospital recovering from surgery and being a bad patient as I predicted. I hope he will be home by the middle of this week and I expect most of my time will be taken up for a while. I'm still doing some crafting but it will be stuff that doesn't take a lot of concentration. Here's another hanging bag I made, this one is from flannel fabric.

Sewing Rolls

I was looking at someone's blog the other day, unfortunately I forget which one, I look at so many, and I saw a variation on the sewing roll I usually make. I decided to see if I could come up with a pattern that would look something like the one I saw. This one is so easy, I might even do a tutorial but that will have to wait until I'm a bit less stressed. Anyway, this sewing roll probably takes about half an hour to do and is just two pieces of fabric 6 inches by 12 inches, two pieces of fabric 6 inches by 8 inches for the pockets (they are folded double so you end up with two pieces 6 inches by 4 inches), I'll be better showing how to do the rest with some pictures but I'm sure anyone could work it out for themselves from just these measurements.

As for the stress, I don't handle stress well and at the moment I'm having to catch two buses to visit my husband in hospital, then two buses home again. I don't know if I'm just using the buses as an excuse instead of worrying about my husband or if I've just got out of the habit of using public transport. Also, if I do use the bus you can just about guarantee that I'll catch a cold, there always seems to be someone sitting behind me coughing all over me, disgusting!!!

A Short Break

I don't appear to have done anything lately do I!!! But I have been busy making lots of the little sewing sets so nothing different to show a picture of. I wanted to get a few of these sets made plus cover the lids of jars for use as storage because I'm sharing a stall at a school fair on Saturday and wanted the stall to look pretty. Will I make any profit, will I even make enough to cover the expense of the stall? I doubt it!!! But who cares - it's fun making things and fun having a couple of hours at the fair. The items I've made will come in very useful as gifts or for swaps. I've put away my sewing machine for a while and I've cleared my crafting table. This is all in readiness for doing a bit of 'mini-ing' . I've started making an outside WC and shed. It will be a bit of a challenge because apart from the miniature lavatory, that I had already got in my mini stash, I'm trying to come up with a building and interior from 'trash'. So far I've got a cardboard box that is just the right size and I've put a layer of polyfiller on the roof. That's as far as I've got and I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out!

Another Tin

Here is yet another covered tin - and I managed to cover it with fabric other than the one with little roses. Instead of felt to pad the lid I used some quilt wadding, it has given it a more domed look than the felt does. Also I ironed vilene to the back of the fabric for the sides, as I was using glue to stick this on I thought it needed a bit of thickness to stop the glue seeping through. Unfortunately you can still see the writing that is on the tin through the vilene backed fabric, it doesn't really matter, it's for me anyway!

Pochette à ouvrage

Just lately I've been getting a lot of inspiration from French blogs - I love their style. We used to get a French cross-stitch magazine here in the UK but I haven't seen it for a couple of years. I find that the cross-stitch magazines we get here aren't very sophisticated in the designs they contain. Anyway, knowing how I love this French look my dear husband has ordered a cross-stitch book for me, it's called Made in France (of course!). Hope it arrives soon.

I'm up to date now with all my swap commitments and I'm wondering what to make next. I bought a bargain length of fabric a couple of months ago, it was only £3.75 for 3 yards, and I want to make something, anything really, with it. I can see me making another set like the one above. I saw a little pouch containing soap (pochette de savon) told you I was going all French! So perhaps I could make some of these pouches to put soap in and give them as gifts.