Acorn Garland

Last night I felt it was time for a garland change and made this one using an acorn garland tutorial which I saw on A Beautiful Mess blog.

The tutorial uses sticky back vinyl for the wood effect but I thought I'd try using these old sample books instead. I was a bit doubtful of the glue I use working because the samples are plastic but they seem to have held fine and nobody has been hit on the head by a falling acorn so far.

Disclaimer Added

I don't know if anyone has noticed that this blog has never had a disclaimer before but I have had to pop one on. The reason I hadn't put one on before is because everybody knows that I don't sell anything that I make so I never minded if people wanted to use any of my free designs to make things for craft fairs, etc. In light of recent events regarding one of my designs I have been advised to include a disclaimer on this blog. I'm sorry that I have had to do this.

WIP's

My morning has been spent crawling around the floor attaching a binding to this quilt then pinning the batting and backing on. I'm finding this kind of thing far more easier now that Little L is in school as if she sees anything blankety or cover like spread on the floor, she seems to have an uncontrollable urge to crawl underneath it or roll herself up in it. Not ideal especially when I need to work with pins. All that needs doing now is to hand quilt it then sew the binding on to the back. Having never hand quilted before though, I don't know how long it will take me.

Another thing I'm working on is a knitted golly wog from the above pattern. This is for my Mum who loves golly wogs but has never had one. At the moment the pieces I have knit are looking out of proportion, the head looks too small compared to the body and the feet are tiny. Having never made a golly wog before I don't know if this is how they are meant to be or if it is because I am using an old pattern. I'll just have to see how it turns out.

These are two projects which have been hanging around for months and I have not got round to finishing yet. I'm finding the transfer on the embroidery too faint for me to see at night with our appalling lights and I can't seem to get the legs right on the creature.

I am also waiting for a delivery of some wool to start on making some Christmas presents

Creature Keyrings

As soon as I saw these Aimee Ray mythical creature patterns I knew that Little L would love them as key rings. All the children who have started school this year put key rings on their book bags so they can recognise their own bag more easily. At the moment Little L's is a felt bird which I made and her new best friend has taken a shine to it and wants to do a swap so after buying the pattern I set about making one for each of them.

 Little L chose the jackalope and I made the dragon for her friend.

Now that Little L has seen the finished dragon she has decided that she wants one in a different colour so I might be making key rings for a while yet.

Finished Quilt

This week has been a bit of an odd one for me as Little L started school full time. She absolutely loves it . The only problem she seems to have is that she every time she goes to the toilet, she gets locked in and has had to be rescued by an older pupil or the teacher. I'm pleased Little L has settled in so easily. For me, going home to an empty, very quiet house is strange. Also shopping alone is something I haven't done for quite a few years. I've managed to get the housework done faster which has given me time to finish off my first quilt this week.

I finished it off this afternoon and it has already left the house for it's new home at my Mum's.

Trying Something New

Over the summer holidays I have been trying out something new craft wise. Beside making this dolls quilt for Little L I've not done any patchwork so I thought I'd give it another go mainly to reduce my stash of fabric.

The first thing I made was another dolls quilt but with a hexagon pattern. Most of this was done sitting in the garden on the (very few) nice days we have had here.

The next was this not very colourful quilt top. I always seem to accumulate more fabric in brown shades and most of this has been given to me or started off as clothing. When I was sewing the pieces together I found that some of the cotton blends were a bit stretchy so my joins on this aren't perfect and I also found that I wasn't that bothered about it. I must be getting less picky in my old age because not long ago I would have cut down the troublesome squares to fit perfectly or removed them. I'll have to see if the pickiness returns on my next one.

I also bought this book on quilting ( because I know nothing ) off Ebay for 99p. I think you can pick up some bargain crafty book from there as long as you don't mind them being a bit dated.

These are some blocks which I have started. I'm finding these ones a bit more fiddly and may be some time finishing this one.

Somebody Elses Rubbish

My gran has been having a bit of a sort out and some of her rubbish has ended up here. She thinks it quite funny that I was willing to take her old bedding of her hands. We were talking about embroidery the last time I saw her and mentioned that I use plain pillowcases and she said that she had some king size white cotton sheets at home that hadn't been used for about 25 years if I wanted them.

Of course I said I'd have them so she sent them to me along with more bedding, a tablecloth, a large piece of calico, some sacking with tools for making a rag rug and a wooden tapestry frame ( with some work still attached ).

These music sheets and books of my Grandad's also ended up with me.

While I'm not ready to set to my Grandad's old books with a pair of scissors just yet, I made new garland yesterday using music sheets bought from a charity shop. The garland is in the usual garland spot above the front door.