more catching up

Another week gone - another catch-up post. First, I added a bigger pocket to my swimming bag to hold my watch and fitbit when I'm in the pool. I'd left the smaller pocket on that I'd added last week so there was plenty room for both devices this week.

I bought some new towels for the kitchen so I cut up some of the old towels to make cloths. It's funny how they were past their best as towels but are perfect for cloths!

Then it was back to star-making.

Then I played with my new embroidery machine again.

It was our wedding anniversary last Thursday - 37 years!! As I go to Singers on a Thursday evening and so couldn't go out for a meal that night, we decided to go out for morning snack instead. My cheesey scone was most delicious! Who needs fancy food to celebrate 37 years? Not us! :oD

I treated myself to a blouse out of Asda's this week. I tried it on and was delighted that it fit me so decided I would change the buttons. 12 buttons later, I was ironing the blouse to put it in the wardrobe when I noticed this hole in the sleeve just above the cuff. Aaaargh!

There was no way I could take the blouse back - apart from having to change all 12 buttons back to the original ones, I'd taken off the tags. As I said "Aaaaaargh!".

I pondered a few solutions - darning the hole, patching the hole, making the sleeves shorter, covering the hole with something. But what? Another button? How about an embroidery? Like this?

That was supposed to be a test piece but I decided it would actually be better - and probably easier - just to attach that wee piece over the hole. So that's what I did. I also ironed on a piece of cloth interfacing on the back. I'm actually quite chuffed with it. Nobody else who buys that blouse will have one like mine!

But, you can bet I'll be checking any further purchases very carefully!

more embroideries and stars

Still no dressmaking going on around these parts but I'm keeping myself busy with other things. A few appliqués and embroideries:

Since the trees above looked so good on the black starry fabric, I did something similar with these next two but, to me, the fabric is actually too busy and distracts from the embroideries.

I added a pocket to my swimming bag to hold my watch whilst I'm in the pool. I used it this morning and the pocket is actually a bit small so I'll just add another bigger one on to the other side of the bag this week.

I've been keeping on with my patchwork stars. I decided I prefer the white stars with the coloured outsides so I've made all these that way around.

I've got another seven cut out and sewn up in various stages:

There are still more fabrics sitting waiting to be cut so plenty for me to get on with.

pouches and stars

My dressmaking mojo still hasn't shown up. I'm still hoping it's going to come back soon - it's been ages since I did any dressmaking! Anyway, I have done some sewing. Phew! I made a couple of pouches. Just made the sizes up as I went along and I'm really pleased with both of them.

The first one is quite big but will be perfect for holding my toothbrush etc if we ever *when* we get away for a break.

Nice stripey lining.

This other one was just a "let's see what happens if I do this" kind of pouch. I was delighted that it turned out at all and to have it be something useful was really pleasing.

Just a plain blue lining inside this one.

I had a notion to make some star blocks so I got out my squared paper - once a Maths teacher, always a Maths teacher! - and worked out some sizes. I sewed things together and this is what I ended up with. Not an original design be any means but I was especially chuffed that my wizardry with Pythagoras' theorem is still in my head! :oD

I made another one.

And then another one.

What? Wait. What happened there?

Out came the seam ripper and I sewed it all back together the right way this time!

Then I wondered what would happen if I reversed the colours.

Oh my goodness. I love them!

I have quite a few bits cut out to make more stars - both with coloured stars and white stars - so I'm going to keep going with them until Miss Mojo returns.

This is my only embroidery this week. Again, my fingers are there for scale.

Yes, no matter what people say, Christmas is coming! :oD

lost my mojo!

I seem to have lost my sewing mojo. I wonder where it went? Is it on its summer holidays? It's certainly not here with me. I keep looking for it but can't find it anywhere. I hope it comes back soon - I'm beginning to feel a wee bit antsy without it!

The only thing my sewing machine has done recently was to hem a pair of curtains. I hadn't intended getting green ones but they were on sale in Ikea and who am I to turn down a bargain?

I keep looking at them and thinking "they go with the grass"! Ridiculous to think your curtains go with the grass? Let me tell you, that's about the sanest thought I've had for a while! LOL

Whilst my sewing machine is waiting for the mojo to return, I've been doing a wee bit more playing on my embroidery machine. There's no project in mind for any of these - and you don't know how hard that is for me. I can actually hear voices in my head (told you I was losing it, didn't I?) asking me "what are you going to do with these? what's the point in making them if you don't know what you're going to do with them?". I've told those voices to shut up and mind their own business a time or two!

Anyway, here are the no-project-in-mind-at-the-moment appliqués. My fingers are in the photos to give the scale.

Here's where the no-project-in-mind-at-the-moment appliqués hang for now. I quite like seeing them there. At least the embroidery mojo hasn't gone on its summer holidays! What would I do if it did? Housework??? Aaaaaargh!

The only other thing I've made recently was a batch of Meg's biscuits. Sadly they're all finished now so I suppose I could bake something else but - and who would ever think I'd say something like this? - it's too hot here to bake!!! Incredible, don't you think? Scotland? Too hot to bake? I never thought I'd say such a thing! *gasp*

The recipe for these is here.

If anyone sees my mojo, please send it home. I miss it so much!

baby quilt done and musical bags

I finished the strips baby quilt this week. I LOVE it!

I decided I wanted to make myself a new bag to take to Singers when we restart in September so went ahead and embroidered this design on what I hoped would be one side of the bag. The denim in this photo is really washed out - the true colour can be seen on the bag at the bottom of this post.

This is actually a slightly botched version of it because, when I first embroidered it, I used a blue colour for the word "listening" and it really got lost on the denim background. I decided to unpick the word and do it again in pink. It took me 2 hours to unpick it! (I was watching telly at the time so it wasn't as if I'd wasted good sewing time doing it.)

Next day, when I went to re-do the word, I didn't get the alignment quite right and "listening" is just slightly squint. To be honest, I wasn't too sure from the start if I wanted this design on the bag and all the messing around didn't help so I went for another option altogether. I did a test run first - learned my lesson!

When I made the bag - this time in calico - I changed the colours of the treble clef and the surrounding circle.

I put a wee pocket inside the bag for my pencils.

I didn't want to waste the denim I'd already cut out and, since I had enough denim to cut another bag piece, I went ahead and did a test piece of an appliqué of music notes.

Then I did the same design on the bag and this is how it looks. Fab! (This photo shows the true colour of the denim.)

I lined it with the same spotty pink I'd used for the appliqué and again put a wee pocket on the inside.

I'm really happy with both of these bags. I might just have to make some others. I mean, you can never have too many bags - can you?