What's on the sewing table?

Hello one and all!
After my hiatus I am back and ready for a season of cosy, fireside activities. I'm not going to lie, I had a freaking amazing holiday. It was beyond lovely to spend some quality time with my folks in a place that wasn't one of our respective homes. We were all forced to chill out and relax and, as it turned out for Mum anyway, buy a whole lot of shoes (don't ask).

After a fab time in Hawaii I jetted over to LA (I love how that sounds) to see my best pal of all time and soul sister par excellence. I can't begin to describe how good for my soul it was being with someone who just gets me. After a few days together I felt like my old self again, that would be the best version of myself - great friends just bring that out in you don't they?

Anyway enough gushing. I'm now back in bonnie Scotland and there's been a definite Autumnal shift in the weather and the days are drawing in. This means two things. The first is that I need to get the garden 'put away' as my gardening guru Aunt would say. I am hoping to tackle the bulk of that work on Sunday. This also means factoring my interloping chook who not only has stayed on but who I am now trying to integrate with my two existing chookies. More to the point, Francois as I had named him, may in fact now be Francine. All the suspiciously cockerel-shaped tail feathers have disappeared and he is looking more and more like a she. Who knows but I feel responsible for the blighter now so we're all one big happy family from now on.

The second thing is the return big style of some crafts that are perfect for the fire side. I'm talking about crochet. In the spirit of the season I picked up Niki Trench's book Cute and Easy Crochet. I really like this book, it is full of projects I'm reasonably confident I can not only start, but finish (not always the case with craft books). I decided to tackle the chunky shell scarf but instead of using chunky wool I went for a teal 100% Shetland style wool and I'm pretty pleased with how it's coming along. It'll look better finished and pressed so I'll keep you posted. I'd forgotten how many odd looks crocheting in public can attract but it's a nice diversion on boring public transport journeys.

I've also been stitching a super sweet 1976 Simplicity wrap skirt pattern, with one or two hacks to make it more my style. I'll post a couple of pics of the finished article shortly. My skirt is the one with the ultra stylish pointed yoke (which required a moderate number of swear words to finish) and ties around the front. To say I found the greatest sewing-themed fabric ever to use on this project would be an understatement and pics will follow.

I also found myself lurking around eBay the other night when I happened on a couple of auctions for fab patterns finishing imminently. I bid and won both for the bargain price of £0.99 each! Result! Both are Simplicity patterns from 1967 and are from the Jiffy range, meaning they have only a few pieces and should be pretty speedy to whip up. I can't wait to get started!

So, I hope you have fulfilling projects to keep you distracted over the coming months. Apparently this winter coming is supposed to be a doozy and not in the good way so plenty of projects will be needed to see us all through.

Crochet necklace

I've enjoyed playing around with some quick projects this week and one of the results is this crochet bow necklace. Each bow takes no more than half an hour to complete and would be a good project for a beginner because the stitches are super simple.

 

 

Fireside paraphernalia

When I moved to the sticks a little over a year ago one of the things I loved about the house was the fire in the living room. This beauty not only heats all the water and runs the central heating, it also does a good line in atmospheric and romantic light of an evening.

Anyway I'm ashamed to say that for all this time I've continued to use the ratty old gardening glove the previous owners left behind to open the doors when they heat up. You'll see from the picture below that this was not an item befitting a crafty bissum's home.

I decided it was about high time that I replaced the ratty glove with something a little sweeter. I hope you agree that the owl inspired crochet/applique creation is much more appropriate.

Crocheting with t-shirts

After what can only be described as a horrible but thankfully temporary loss of crafty mojo it's come back full swing with a little help from my good friends. Apologies for the hiatus.

When you meet a true crafting genius you begin to feel that everything is possible and there's no limit to what new skills you can learn. For me, my crafty soul mate is Marion, my fellow Bissum. Fueled by cakes and bucket loads of tea, I came away from a weekend with Marion having tried my hand at needle felting for the first time, rug making with wool and hooks and crocheting with strips of unwanted fabric.

Marion presented me on my arrival at her lovely home with the worlds fattest crochet hook. This beast promised to allow creation of bigger stitches and larger items in record time. It did not disappoint and not that I want to play favourites with my hooks, but this could be the best one of all.

We set to work cutting old t-shirts into a long continuous strip of fabric, stretching as we went and rolling it into a ball of yarn. I decided a new bath mat was in order so off I went using a simple treble crochet to whip up this mat in no time. It's 50cm across in diameter giving an overall circumference of around 160cm. Not bad for two old t-shirts eh?