Creative Stitches and HobbleCrafts Show

Thought I’d do a bit of a post about the Creative Stitches & Hobblecrafts Hobbycrafts show that visited Brighton Centre this weekend.

I read a really funny post here about how the average age of those attending was about 80, so I thought I’d add my thoughts to the pot. 
Now, please don’t get me wrong: I love little old ladies.  I fully intend on being one quite soon.  

What I can’t cope with is flocks of them, all shuffling very slowly into a bottleneck of indecisive inactivity.  I have the same loss of patience in supermarkets (when I’m not helpfully reaching for stuff on the top shelves) and on busy pavements where I often find myself trapped, at the height of Christmas shopping meltdown, by their stealth-like pincer formations.

But I digress.


About 50% of the stands were devoted to papercraft and scrapbooking, and a lot of it really ghastly.  Sorry.  I like paper more than the next (wo)man, but some of this was super tacky.





But, there were some lovely sights along the way, like these giant knitting needles (they had some glorious shawls and rugs on display) beautiful hand dyed wool (but oh so expensive!) and some creative bundles of Fat Quarters.

There was also this glorious glitter stand - I wanted to scoop up handfuls and throw it into the air, like fairy dust, but they were only selling it in tiny little packets for £1 a pop.  I resisted.  

The high spot was the exhibition area - there were some great examples of embroidery and some quilting here.  

The first section was a “Glimpses From the Sixties” competition

This was absolutely superb!

the petit point stitches were no bigger than a couple of mms!

Liz Taylor in Cleopatra!

There was this lovely piece too:

the detail was simply beautiful!

Beer Today Gone Tomorrow by Maggie Danks

and some really fab dyeing and stitching:

Daisy Chain by Jenny Rolfe

My favourite part was a little mini exhibition of corsetry 
- check out that bunting!  Knickers!?  Genius!

	<---- self portrait with corset made from bras!

So, all in all a fun few hours, but ultimately I don’t think I’d go again unless I needed something like a new ruler … (more of that another day!)

 The problem wasn’t the little old lady brigade at all.  It was the lack of any evidence that ‘modern quilting’ exists in the UK, either on the selling or exhibiting side of things.

The lady at the Quilter’s Guild stand admitted that she had no idea that there was a quilting community on this here interweb.  I was aghast.  She asked me if I wanted to write an article about it for them, but then informed me I’d have to stump up the £37 annual membership first.  No thanks, not just now …

But my ultimate high spot of the day ??



Oh yes!  Impossible to find here in Brighton - and now I’m on an applique melt down … Yay!

I am so so happy to be a part of a wonderful online community - thank you for stopping by and taking the time to leave me comments and support along the way.*  

It means so much more now I know just how difficult it is to find this on my own doorstep!





*Talking of which … make sure you pop over here to Flutter Kat’s and stay in touch with this great week of posts … there’s some great stuff being discussed …

Happy Valentine’s Day - Follow Your Passion - Treat People with Kindness - Keep it Real

Just a little breathtaking bit of passion and artistry from Cirque Phenix to kick start the old day … 

As in love, as in life, as in blogging - good manners and kind human behaviour help the world go round just that bit more sweetly -

So, if you missed it, you should pop on over to Diary of a Flutter.Kat  to read yesterday’s Day One of a week of guest posts on Good Etiquette for the Modern Blogger - First off was Angela from Cut to Pieces - a lovely, perfectly balanced post to kick the week off -

Be sure to Keep an eye on Flutter.Kat’s blog all week - there’s bound to be some interesting discussion in the comments! - I’m guesting later in the week (with a short novel! LOL) - I’ll let you know when …

Sunday in the Park with Hexies - Giveaway on Lily’s Quilts + New Quilt at Moda Bakeshop!

 

Pop on over here to Moda Bakeshop to see my lovely online friend, Lynne from Lily’s Quilts, unveil her Bakeshop debut Hexagon Park.  I’m so pleased that this will bring a shedload  new visitors to Lynne’s blog - she does some really amazing quilting and is so generous with her knowledge and advice!

It’s a really super pattern (Hexies? Tick! Beautiful? Tick! Even I can understand the instructions? Tick!) and it showcases perfectly the gorgeous Sherbet Pips line for Moda from Aneela Hoey @ Comfort Stitching.


Now, the Brucie Bonus here is that Lynne is also doing a giveaway on her blog for a layer cake of Sherbet Pips, so there’s no excuse for one lucky winner not to have a go at her wonderful pattern!
So, make sure you pop over there (remember to come back later though!) you’ve got until morning of Sunday 27th (a day earlier if outside the UK) - don’t forget, this line is not available here until March, so like Lynne’s quilt, it’s a precious thing :)

- sew fresh fabrics - scrap quilting bee -

Talk about keeping busy! 

The lovely people at Sew Fresh Fabrics have been feverishly sending out little packages of scraps to those of us who signed up for round one, to make a 12.5” x 12.5” block that will go toward quilts for Project Linus … Sounds good to me … (and we can keep any leftovers! Yay!)  My block is for a girl's quilt.

So, I thought I’d start by doing the centre with this lovely block from I_like_orange_too … It involves strip/foundation piecing, which is something I’ve never tried before … 

via

How much fun is that?  - and sooooo quick! 

I then went kind of improv on the rest of it … All I added from my stash was the cerise polka dot to give it a bit more of a girly thing ...

I really like it, although I would never have used any of those florals before … hmmm, I’m seeing patterns quite differently these days - much more in terms of how they interact with solids … Interesting how our ‘eye’ changes, isn’t it?

I'm entering this and the BendyBloodyMary block into Quilt Story's Block Party - Have you entered anything?  Hurry on over (click the banner below) deadline is Wednesday 9th - there are three categories - Traditional, Modern and Art ...

Now to focus on my Urban Home Goods & Make Mine Modern Swaps … yay!


What new things do you have your eye on trying this year?

Look what I won!

This lovely little giveaway  of Flea Market Fancy scraps from Nichole @ elevenquilts  that’s what!

I’ve never had any FMF so this is SUCH a treat!  Thank you Nichole!  They’ll be put to good use …

Now I know what all the fuss is about!  They are lovely …

What do you think I should use them for?  One of the upcoming flickr swaps perhaps?

DQS10 - Mini Quilt? Tick!

 Yay!  My first mini quilt is officially ready to go to its new owner (whoever she/he may be … heh heh heh)

I really hope my partner likes it. 

 front

 back

There were lots of firsts in this quilt, other than it being my first mini quilt!  I took my inspiration from Gee’s Bend quilts and worked back from there.

inspiration mosaic

I’ve never tried improv piecing and it was a tad scary being liberated from measuring and any sort of clear plan, but as soon as I sewed that first centre block, I was hooked.





From there it just sort of made itself.  I didn’t have to unpick anything (another first!) and just trusted it would find its way …

When it came to the quilting I couldn’t rely on Mrs Singer being able to cope, and with Damiel having his tune up I decided to go with big stitch sashiko style quilting with embroidery thread. 



There were other considerations too; I wanted the front to hold its own and didn’t feel that the wonky block would work so well with straight line quilting, which is why I turned to the trusty hexagon! I wanted the randomness of the stitching to not detract too much from the block piecing.




Then I had to think of how to do the label.  Luckily one of the echino scraps and a Sharpie did the trick perfectly!




Towards the end of last year I played with some laser printing onto transfer paper (more of that another time) so, I just happened to have some little pingsandneedles waiting to be used!
 




I’ve never put a label on a quilt before - I know it’s something I should have done with my big quilts but they were for friends and family, so I didn’t think it was important.  I know better now.  It finishes it off well, don’t you think? 





My last first (!) was that I made my own binding - I remember posting here that I could never see myself doing this - boy was I wrong!  What an addictive thing this is going to be!





I made a very narrow binding - 1.5” - and used Kerry’s single binding tutorial over at verykerryberry- it’s fantastic!  I had a little trouble with one of the corners, but I think that was much more to do with my not squaring off perfectly!  


So there you have it - my first mini quilt - tick!  

What firsts have you got in mind for this year?

Sunday Stash

In the fourth week doldrums of the dreaded fabric diet, what’s a girl to do?  A little saunter round the local flea market brought these little darlings to my attention … Lovely wooden reels (bar one) and lovely cotton to boot … all for under a fiver! Result!

Shame I’d just bought these lovelies from my LQS! … Never mind, I’m going to need all this cotton yumminess for the quilting jobs ahead … 

Scrumptious!

what’s made its way into your home this week?

Reunited (and it feels so good)

It’s official! Damiel (my lovely 1958 boy-racer Novum) and I are an item again.  Just in time for Valentine’s Day.
 
He’s been in for a bit of a tune-up (new pedal) and now, the nightmare that was New Year’s Eve is a mere Bobby Ewing false memory.
 
Now, I’m not sure he’ll be terribly happy about me having absolute speed control (from throaty crawl to full-on Grand Prix pedal to the metal) but I am delirious.  I’ve never been able to sew slowly with him, so we need some time to get re-acquainted.

Simply Solids Celebrates with a Fab Giveaway!

You’d better click on over to Simply Solids blog and help Mandy celebrate 400 followers !!  (pretty fab, eh?)  She’s giving away a massive 12 FQ bundle of SWOON by Melissa Averinos  

Simply Solids is the only UK stockist of this Andover range, right now … squeak! … I just love the turquoise and blue prints in this range  …

all pics from Simply Solids 

Pretty fab eh?  Giveaway winner to be announced Friday 11th Feb … So, to be in with a chance you know where to go