WIPW

Quite a lot of work in progress at the moment. 

The scrap of Swedish Darning has now become a book-cover, with the wrong year embroidered on the front.  I'm only 20 years out!

That has to be restitched.  But, it has made a nice book-cover.

I put pellum and a lining inside, so it is nice to hold as well and I stitched it all by hand and there was only a little pain.  That is encouraging.

I have trimmed up all the strip blocks and cut the fabric to sew on each corner.

Now I have to think about sashing and borders.

I have finished quilting the borders of my 'lock-down' quilt and have the tedious job of tieing off and burying threads.

Just the binding of the edge to go.

Progress made at Toowoomba

I have come back from a weekend at Toowoomba with my quilting friends.  I always enjoy these weekends, they are special.  I love the school where we do out stitching, the old houses, the parks, just everything.

I have finished all the strip quilting for the blocks. 

Everything has to be cleaned up and the corners added, so good progress.    I have no idea just what I will do with this quilt.  I think it will be a gift for my niece.

I also received another quilt that needs to be finished.  I had a good look at it and I think the problem is that the stitcher didn't get the designs orientated correctly, threw up her hands in horror, and then donated all the fabric and pieces to the quilt group.

I will finish the applique and embroidery that is needed to finish the main blocks and then take it back up there again in August and we will discuss what should be done next.  This quilt will be for a major raffle.  I'm sure it can be rescued.

Then I get an email alerting me to Constantine Quilts in S.A.  who have just finished quilting this exact same quilt.  Now I know now how it could look.  A bit different from the original pattern so we will see what can be done.  (There is one block missing completely from my bundle.)

I also brought back some new books,

and some old embroidery that I want to do something with,

plus a pile of other odds and ends.  So, I have added to my list of things to do.

It was a great weekend.

 

 

Knitting

Nice to know my daughter can use my knitting.

I'm off to a hand specialist, when I can get an appointment, so this may be the last knitting for a while.  I'm thinking of the worst so that anything less then that will be a bonus.

Back to childhood

I didn't get to go very often, but I loved the Saturday afternoon matinee at the movies.  Jaffa lollies that made a racket when you dropped them and they rolled down the wooden floor, cowboys and cartoons.  Some cartoons you could sing along with. Burl Ives was always a favourite.

 

 

I have a little tea pot short and stout.

I love my little tea pot.  It is a 2 cup type and a few years ago my friend Pam gave me a kit to knit a tea cosi for it.

I thought it might be fun to make tea-cosi's for my friends for Xmas this year and went onto the net to see if I couldn't find some cheap 2 cup tea pots.  Prices started at about $50 plus postage!  (This group of friends has set a $10 limit on Xmas gifts.)  So, the next port of call was the Op shops.  There were non in Vinnies, which was a surprise and then I found 2 priced at $5 each in another Op shop.

At the third Op shop prices were around $40 each, so I left quickly.

On the weekend we had our monthly Op shop on the island so I went along and found 2 pots, a sugar bowl and milk jug for $12.00.  Considering that they were Royal Albert in brand new condition, I was very pleased.

So I still need another 2 pots so that I will have 1 for each person in the group.   The next job is to design a different tea cosi for each one which I will either knit or crochet.  I haven't got a clue how to do this so quite a bit of research will be needed.

 

 

WIPW

Because my wrist has been so sore I have not been doing any knitting or crochet and only the minimum amount of embroidery.  But, I have been quilting using my sewing machine.  I am quilting the borders of my 'Lockdown Quilt' and driving myself crazy trying to fit the pattern to the borders.  But, it is coming along and who cares it it isn't finished in a hurry.

 

I have now finished one end of the table runner and am now starting the other end.

I am also thinking about just what I will make next.  I think it will have to be a quilt, piecing it using my machine.  I have found a free pattern and tutorial at the Jordan Fabrics site.

The pattern is called "Scrappy Lattice."

It is paper pieced so I am beginning by preparing my papers.  This version calls for 24, a4 pieces of paper but I think I will make mine a bit bigger.  I have a weekend at Toowoomba coming up so this will be my project.  BUT I have just found a problem with the pattern.  The printer paper used in America measure 8.5" x 11".  Our paper is metric and measure 8.25" x 11.5".  I'm sure I can make it work I will just have to fiddle a bit.

It is Lemon Butter time again.

This has been a great year for lemons and everyone's trees have been heavy with fruit, so it's time to make "Lemon Butter" again. ( I wrote a post about this back in 2014.)

 

I am still using Mary's recipe, with a couple of changes.  This is because I have a new microwave which has a higher voltage  (I reduce the 3X 30 second wizzes at the end to 25 secs.)

I also remembered my grandmother's pastry tartlets and have been making lots of pastry cases.

I used the old recipe for the pastry.

Shortcrust Pastry

1 cup Plain flour

1 cup Self Raising flour

250g (real) butter

2 tablespoons of icing sugar.

1/3rd cup cold water

Method

 Sift flours and icing sugar

cut the butter into the flour

Rub in until it looks like breadcrumbs

Mix in water with a knife until the mixture hold together.

(you may need a little extra water here.)

Turn onto a floured surface and knead lightly.

Cover with Glad Wrap and place in the fridge for about 30 mins.

Roll out on a floured surface to size required.

Cut with a metal cutter.  (an egg ring is just the right size.)

Bake in a moderate oven for about 15 mins.

 

I found that I liked a very thin pastry.  This just melted in the mouth.

Every time I make these I think of my Grandmother.  I loved both of my Grandmothers so much.

 

A bit of recycling

I picked up some old embroidery from an Op shop, Oh, maybe 2 or 3 years ago.  This piece was so badly damaged that the only thing I could save was this bit of 'white-work'. I thought that I would cut away all the fabric right up to the stitching and hope it wouldn't fall apart, it all held.  (I had been putting that off for some time thinking I might wreck it.)

 

It has been sitting on my desk along with a bundle of scraps since then.  I knew I wanted to use if for something, but nothing came to mind.  And then, out of the blue I had a brainwave.  Well actually I need a needle case for my longer and thicker needles and this looked as though it would fit the bill.  Firstly, I hand stitched the piece onto the background with a fine white cotton, leaving the open bars unattached so it still looked like white work.

The backing fabric came from a quilt I made some time ago.  This piece was from the edge where it had been trimmed back so the wadding was still attached.

I used a piece of silk shibori fabric for the linning, stitched around the edge and turned it through.  I decided not to top stitch the edges as that might distract from the embroidery, the batting was just a bit thick.   Then I added some wool batting leaves in which to put the needles.  It is just great for those larger needles and the white leaves stand out from the Shibori fabric making the needles easy to see.

I did a double row of stitching, sewing either side of the mid way fold to attach the leaves.  This makes a good fold.

I then got out my button box and lost a good hour deciding which button to use.  (Button boxes are a trap!)  I stitched the loop in a perle 8 thread.

So now when I go to patchwork meeting I have a proper needle book and I will not be pricking my finger as I dive into my sewing pouch looking for my needles and I have saved that piece of embroidery.  I love looking at the stitching used to make the bird's feathers.  Someone put a lot of love into that bird.

 

Where I live

We have lost a number of really big trees here on the island over the last 6 months.  Some looked so big and healthy but with the dry weather followed by big storms they just came crashing down.  This one was on the edge of the road the runs from one side of the island to the other, everyone knew it.  I now see a resident has repurposed it.  I hope that the fairies move in.