Favourite places – Chirpy, Leeds

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There’s a lovely little shop in Chapel Allerton that has the most amazing collection of prints, jewellery and other gifts – Chirpy. Their tag line is ‘design to make you feel fine’ and it’s the perfect description of what they stock. It’s one of my favourite shops for present buying and inspiration. Recently they have started stocking my work too, so exciting! If you need an excuse to go & visit there are lots of other great shops in Chapel A, including a proper greengrocer, fish shop and butcher, so you can do your food shopping while you’re there. Bonus.

If you fancy learning a new skill, maybe with a friend, Chirpy also has a workshop space upstairs where local makers (including me!) run creative sessions that you can book onto. Their autumn programme of workshops has just been released and will be on their website very soon, so if you fancy learning a new skill as the nights draw in, pop on over to their site and click on Workshops to have a look.

baskets in Chirpy

Work in progress – appliqué leaf mini quilt

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I subscribed to the magazine “Love Patchwork and Quilting” recently and the latest issue popped through my letterbox the other day. It’s lovely to look at for us fabric addicts as they show a lot of new ranges, and there are some really fabulous looking projects in it too. Problem is, they’re often quite large or fiddly which is usually a bit ambitious for me and my short attention span. Anyhow, in the last issue (33) there was a lovely appliqué leaf mini quilt project, and I decided to give it a try. It’s going well so far, I’ve got all the leaves made and pinned into position, I just need to stitch them all on now. Then add the batting and the backing and quilt it and bind it, but that sounds like a lot of work, so I’m not thinking about those bits until it’s time!

You can see the quilt I’m trying here. For the leaves I’m using Cotton + Steel Basics in greens, teals, ochres and navy, with some gorgeous metallic gold detailing, then the background fabric is white.

Here are my leaves, all ready to go. If they didn’t take up space I’d leave them like this, they’re very satisfying. The instructions in the magazine have been good up to this point, very clear and easy to follow.

I’ve tried a few different layouts but I think I’ve got all the leaves where I want them now, there are a few evenings of stitching ahead for me.

Hand stitching is the perfect accompaniment to a good tv programme I find – we’re currently watching Trapped (Icelandic drama, recorded from BBC4) and Line of Duty on BBC2. I also want to start Blue Eyes which I’ve been recording from More4 but just need to persuade Mr O. Any more drama recommendations anyone?

Easter Holiday Fun – North Berwick

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We’re just back from a lovely week in North Berwick, on the east coast of Scotland. It’s a super cute little town! Very family friendly. Our holiday home was about 20 steps from the beaches and rock pools and Scottish Seabird Centre, and the town itself is 35 minutes from Edinburgh by train, so there was plenty for us to see and do.

North Berwick Law, is a tall steep hill which you can see from pretty much everywhere in the area. It’s relatively easy to climb, a bit steep in places, but the view from the top is definitely worth it. We conquered it on our first day, so we could say we had done it whenever we saw it the rest of the week.

There are also lots of little islands out to sea and I think you can take boat trips out to some of them but we didn’t do that as the water was a bit choppy for my liking. Take some binoculars though and you’ll be able to see all sorts of seabirds – my favourites were the little turnstones that came pecking at the seaweed left by the tide, looking for food.

We spent quite a while each day poking around in rock pools looking for crabs and other things. You can use the beach as a kind of short cut to the shops or station – that’s brilliant in my book. There are lots of nice little shops in North Berwick selling pretty things, as well as some fragrant delis, a butcher with fabulous pies, and a couple of convenience stores.

There were a couple of rainy days though, but our holiday home was so lovely with such spectacular views that it was ok to stay indoors at times. I would highly recommend the company we hired our home from, Gone To The Beach, you have to have a look to see their beautifully decorated cosy homes here!

The National Museum of Scotland is one of the places we took the boys in Edinburgh. It can be summed up in one word: fantastic! We must have spent four or five hours there and there was still more to see. My youngest boy loved the dinosaur and animal exhibits, while my oldest loved the science bits. There were also comprehensive exhibits on Scottish history and world culture, plus the most amazing views of the city from the roof terrace on the 7th floor! There was more as well but some galleries were being refurbished I think.

It was a wonderful family week as my mum and dad were with us, and my brother for part of the time too. I’m sure we’ll be visiting again, but it’s really good to be back home now.

PS look at these lovely doors, this boat park(?) used to be an outdoor pool!

Successful Sunday

5 / 17 / 15

in amongst my usual Sunday chores – washing, cleaning, getting ready for the week ahead – I managed to find time to add a cute little pocket to my new mint green vest top (from New Look).

I used a scallop print on a white background, with a little neon top stitching (you’ve got to love a bit of zing!). It will be perfect for layering, and summer of course!

I kind of winged it, but there’s a good tutorial HERE.

Also, Mr O replaced a broken tap, doing real plumbing and everything! Considering he’s a self professed non-DIYer, I think his Sunday was even more successful than mine!

Scraptastic pegging out pinny

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I have been meaning to make one of these for ages, ever since my friend at work said she had one. I always end up wearing a hole in the lawn when I’m pegging the washing out – even though my peg basket hangs on the line it is always just in the wrong place. This way I have all the pegs near at hand all the time. Little things!

I used up some scraps of furnishing fabric to make mine (including my Ikea fave Fredrika!) but any woven fabric would do I should think. If you choose a very lightweight fabric you could reinforce it with some interfacing.

You will need:

Fabric for front of pinny: 18” x 12”
Fabric for back of pinny: 18” x 12”
Fabric for the pocket: 18” x 8”
At least 54” of wide ribbon or tape for the ties, enough to fit around your waist and tie securely
Thread in a contrasting or matching colour

Method:

Cut out your fabric out as above.
On your pocket piece, decide which of the long sides will be the top, then fold over ½” then ½” again, press and pin.

Sew the folded edge down.
Lay your pocket piece over the front piece, right sides facing up on both pieces. Align the bottom of the pocket piece with the bottom of the front piece, then pin around the 3 edges where the fabrics meet.
Find the centre of the pocket piece and mark a line from top to bottom with a pencil or disappearing marker.

Carefully sew along the line you have marked, backstitching a little at the start and end.
Place the back fabric on top of the front & pocket pieces, right sides together.
Pin the fabrics together, removing the pins that hold the pocket to the front piece as you go.
Sew all the fabrics together starting at the top of one short side, across the bottom, and back up to the top of the other short side. Backstitch at start and finish. You will now have a kind of pouch.

10.Clip the corners, turn the pouch right sides out, and press.

11.This step is optional, but it adds a nice bit of extra detail and will also help your pinny keep its shape: Pin along the sides you sewed in step 9, then topstitch them.

Fold the raw edges at the top of your fabric in on themselves by about ½”, press and pin.

Lay your ribbon or tape across the top where you have just pinned and pressed. Make sure the centre of the ribbon or tape is in the centre of your fabric. I folded mine & made a crease, but you could mark it on with a fade-out pen or washable marker.

Pin your tie to your fabric, making sure the turned down top does not come untucked! Then, sew the tie to the fabric, as near to the edge of the ribbon or tape as you dare, turning just before you get to the end of the fabric. You will end up with a long narrow rectangle of stitches holding your tie to your fabric, and hopefully a nice neatly finished top to your fabric as well.

Trim the ends of the ribbon or tape with pinking shears or fold it over twice and sew. This will stop the ends fraying too much.

Don your finished pinny and peg out your washing! Or bring it in again, depending on which end of the day it is…

Here’s to many more drying days to come!

On my work table

7 / 3 / 14

On my table this evening, I have two little birds waiting to be embroidered and 3 tulips all finished. Also a pile of baskets ready to be sewn (but they don’t look quite as pretty… yet!)

Hope you’re having fun too!

De-tangling

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This is how I keep my threads.

I know, so organised!

I’m doing a bit of a spring (summer?!) clean in my little sewing room at the mo, and thought I might buy a fancy spool holder to pop all my cotton reels on & have them all neat & tidy.

Long story short, I didn’t buy one, I made one instead. Easy peasy! I just used a long piece of wood and some long nails.

I used a reel of thread to make sure I spaced the nails out enough. My little helper was itching to do the hammering for me!

Ok, it’s not a thing of great beauty, but I can see all the colours I have at a glance and… tangled threads? What tangled threads? Here it is in situ. In the dark, sorry!

Bring on the summer!

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Look! I used the sorbetto top pattern to make myself a cute little smocked top!

I love that pattern and how adaptable it is. You only have to google it and you can see all the different variations that people have made themselves. Thanks Colette patterns for providing it as a free download! I am sure you have inspired many many people to start sewing their own clothes.

When I’ve found some gorgeous jersey fabric (the never-ending quest – I could just buy some online but I really really like to feel the fabrics myself – I might have to compromise, this is adding a lot of time to the creative process people!) I would love to try Colette Patterns’ new Moneta dress or Tilly’s super cute Coco dress.

So, back to my lovely little top. I wanted to make a kind of t-shirt top with a bit of something else to it, kind of like a short sleeved Mathilde. I cut out the back piece as normal, then I cut out the bottom 3/4 or so of the front as per the pattern, but then cut out the top 1/4 of the front without the pleats to make a yoke, adding a cm to each for the seam allowance. Then I played around with pleats in the bottom part of the front piece, and basted and pressed them when I found a look that I liked. Then I pinned the pleated bottom part to the top part, ready to sew. I added in some cute peach lace that I had lying around, just to see if I could, then I sewed the 2 parts of the front together. Then I carried on sewing as per the instructions, adding the sleeves like I did before. I hope that makes sense, do let me know if you would like any steps clarifying!

pleating + lace detail

And here’s a rare picture of me modelling it:

The fabric has a tiny stripe in it that does funny things to your eyes if you look at it too long! Anyhow, I like how it turned out on the whole. Next time I would make it a tiny bit longer perhaps, and a bit less flarey at the hips.

Off to dig out my brolly, it’s sure to rain now I have a lovely new summer top. Bye for now! x

Beautiful blue birds

3 / 23 / 14

Look at these beautiful blue birds! Well they’re turquoise really I would say, but that would have spoiled my alliterative title…

Anyway, the fabric is by Fabric Freedom and I really love it. So much that I made a top out of it.

Check out the real sleeves…

…and the contrasting yellow binding hidden inside.

I wanted to try another Sorbetto but this time with sleeves as sometimes a vest top can be a little too, well, little, especially for spring. I am not clever enough at sewing to add my own sleeves but fortunately after a little browse I found this pattern piece on a blog called Sew Incidentally so I decided to try it. It is for a bigger size than my pattern for the Sorbetto, but I just cut it out as it was then when it was time to add the sleeves I just pinned from the middle outwards and cut off the excess once I’d sewed it… Probably not the actual proper way but it worked a treat! It took me about a week to make overall, but I didn’t have much spare time this week so it was not too bad in fact.

Thanks for your help, fellow sewists of the internet x

Finished!

3 / 14 / 143 / 15 / 14

I finally finished my cute cloud project – it’s a little wall hanging memo board!

Here’s what I did, if you ever want to make one. Just to remind you, I got my wooden shapes from this shop here.

First I laid my shapes out how I wanted them, then I drilled holes in both the cloud and the raindrops with the tiniest drill bit I could find. Well it wasn’t actually the smallest one in the box, I couldn’t get that one out… I used an electric screwdriver instead of a big drill, I was worried about breaking the wood – it’s only about 6mm thick. Anyhow, it worked really well.

Then I painted blackboard paint onto the cloud, being extra careful around the edges. I did 3 coats in all.

For the raindrops I chose the fabrics I wanted then cut out a piece slightly larger than each drop. I coated the front of the wooden shape with mod-podge (PVA would do it as well I would think, maybe slightly watered down) and also the back of the fabric, then laid the fabric onto the shape, sticky sides together. I smoothed them down then put a layer of mod-lodge on top too. Once they were dry I trimmed the overhanging edges down carefully with scissors and poked the hole through with a pin.

When the cloud was dry I painted the edges of the cloud with pink paint just for a little zing of extra colour.

To assemble the hanging I put gold thread through the holes in the cloud and through each droplet, then tied them when I’d chosen the length I wanted.

I made 2 more drill holes in the top of the cloud and put some twine through to hang it by – I put the twine through from back to front and made a knot in the end. That way the knots became a feature.

Hey presto, a cute cloud memo board! Think I might need some new chalk though…

CherryPeg

bright modern handmade