Lets spread the love people

I made a valentine card for The HusWife. And then I made another one. And another. Which is a bit wierd given I really only needed the one. And before I knew it I had a whole bunch of these lovely little badgers being cute and floppy and needing a home. I mean I love him dearly, clearly, but not even he has need for 30 cards. So the only thing to do is give them away. Thus, if you'd like one to give to your honey, DM me your address and I'll get one in the post while they last.



And I have to come up with something else for The HusWife, because he has seen these and now wants something "exclusive".

Sunburst thank you cards

Or at least, I think that's what they are. I'm currently trying to finish up a log cabin quilt I started last summer and I have lots of tiny weeny little bits of the fabric hanging around. I've found that I just can't throw any fabric away, no matter how small and so I have bulging bag after bag of the tiniest little bits of stuff. Slightly OCD if not completely bonkers. However, I do see it as quite an interesting way of tracking what fabrics and colours I've been into over the year and at some point I might actually use them for something. I'm thinking of sticking them all onto a canvas for the lounge. Or something.

Anyhoo, looking at the growing pile of snippets from the quilt I thought I should try making some thank you cards and this is what I came up with. I like to think of them as positive little rays of fabric sunlight. They go a bit droopy depending on the weight of the fabric but I quite like that. Now, to get them in the post!

The tiny bits of fabric:


And the finished cards:

So how did 2010 work out then?

So here we are. A year ago I was given my lovely green Bernina by The HusWife and The Magnificent Mum and it has been red hot pretty much all year. What started out as bits of fabric manipulation with old table cloths turned into a bag making obsession, which meandered into an ipad cover frenzy, which then morphed into a (lets face it) pretty bloody marvelous quilting obsession, with the odd tangent down purse and scarf making ally. I have had a bloody lovely year learning how to do all this new stuff and I thought it would be a good idea to review what I've made over the last year and have some thoughts about what my sewing goals will be for 2011. First up, this years creative endeavours:

Taken from my flickr set, this is a mixture of actual things and experiments. I was going to separate the images out but I love how these are displayed together. A quick count shows that this year I made:

3 notebook holders
1 peg bag
9 handbags
7 tote bags
15 ipad covers
1 allotment bag
1 baby dress
1 pencil case
2 zipped granny purses
9 scarves
7 purses
1 denim quilt

Crickey.

And for 2011? What shall I be doing? Well I have 2 other quilts on the go that will need finishing early in the year. I'd like to make a wall hanging of some description for our lounge. Other than that I feel pretty open to anything. I think it would be good to go back to some fabric manipulation and see what comes of it. And use each of the machine feet The Magnificent Mum gave me. Yes, even the darning one. Oh, and maybe sneak in a business plan. I'm so looking forward to year 2 of my sewing experiment. Bring. It. On.

What I made in December can finally see the light of day!

What a brilliant and fab Christmas we have had! So lucky to see family (although sad not to see everyone due to snow) and much merriment drinking Slippery Nipples, playing Cockney Scrabble (East Enders inspired) and going midnight Bag-Sledging (TM). Feeling about 2 stones heavier but luckily, not as skint as usual as I made a lot of presents this year. The good news is that they seemed to go down well; everyone said they were thrilled. It's so good to know that they liked them receiving them, I liked making them = everyone is happy! So, here they are:





I love the jewel like quality of these purses. It was such fun to use my nice fabrics and make them all luxurious and gorgeous. I put little gifts in each one, ranging from Links of London mirror compacts to nipple tassles and er, some other somewhat risqué items that shall remain nameless!

Next up are the boy scarves:



I used wools and cashmere from The Cloth House and then Liberty print for the binding, all hand sewn. A labour of love but definitely worth it!

The denim quilt is finished!

Finally, finally, finished my first quilt. I was so blown away when I discovered the Gee's Bend quilts - it seemed to make perfect sense to use up all our old jeans that have been hanging around. The HusWife goes through jeans like nobodys business (it's his balls of steel, apparently) so there was plenty to work with. I used 2 colours of fleece as the backing and some nice corduroy (or needlecord, not sure) for the binding. It so super cosy, very strokey and I love it. It feels great to have made something so massive and useful and interesting. I can't wait to get cracking on more.



 The binding and backing and top all moosh together in one big coochy mess of loveliness :-)

It was a labour of love unpicking all the pockets from the back and then unpicking all the stitching on the pockets themselves, but I love the marks that came around because of that.

A beautiful bag for a beautiful sister

Today is my little sister Emma's 30th birthday and so a special bag was called for. Here it is, modeled beautifully by Frank our resident skeleton.

It is a small version of The Sidewalk Satchel by Anna Maria made in a beaut embroidered silk and a dupion lining. It is very strokey and very lovely and I rather wish it was mine, which means it is perfect for a special birthday.

Feeling slightly less grumpy now

But am absolutely full to the brim with cold. But all things considered much more chirpy. So chirpy in fact, that I'm wondering what I can do with this photo I took last year up in Yarkshire. Quilt-wise most likely. Bed spread-wise or some such. That's when I've finished the 3 quilts currently underway. And the Christmas presents. And written the business plan for the business that I will have launched by the time I'm 40 that I've been spouting my mouth off about.

But isn't it lovely? The colours, the textures - it's got linen and silk velvet written ALL OVER IT.