WOYWW

The camera never lies!

Yes I built a snowman but he is only 6 inches tall and sitting happily on my wheelie bin!
I know - I am totally mad but I thought it would be fun to send a photo of him to Sam and Lexi so they could enjoy him as they didn't have quite as much snow at Nanny Annie's.

Today my desk is scattered with fabric left over from the projects beside the mess.

I decided to make some little collages with random fabric backgrounds and a free machined collage. Then I added a few hand stitches and some buttons and lace etc. I also made a couple of cards whilst the idea was fresh in my mind.

I have certainly been a bit more creative this week although today I am full of a snuffly cold - hope it goes away soon. I have just made some homemade chicken soup so I am sure that will help!

I hope all our WOYWW friends are managing to keep flood free. We are on a hill top so hopefully reasonably safe. However, there is a lot of water in surrounding fields and the flood defences are up in Shrewsbury.

Check out some of our WOYWW desks by linking up over at Julia's Stamping Ground.

Have a good week and keep safe.

x Jo

WOYWW - another rainbow?

Welcome to my table lit by the late evening sunshine!

I can't show you much of what I have been up to this week - secret little items for a certain wedding that is happening soon. Some are actually hiding under the heap in the middle of the table. I will reveal all next week.

So what is out for you to snoop today...

• Tiny collages trying my free machining skills on faces - cute little dolly pics which I might put onto little book fronts or cards (I found the idea on a fab blog - Flutterby Patch)
• Heaped in the centre are the hand embroidered vintage napkins I found at the car boot sale. I think I will make some lavender bags with them or maybe some vintage bunting.
• The woolly stuff is gorgeous ginger hair coloured tapestry wool from the same car boot sale. My brand new little teacher niece to be asked me to make her a Katie Morag dolly ready for her class in September - how could an old infants teacher like me refuse!
• Next to the wool is my latest little poppy dumfling. Shaz in Oz is hoping hers will arrive soon - along with a very tired little owl no doubt!
• Lots of crafty clutter around from other card making and sewing activities.

AND ......

What do you think of this?
A lovely lady at the car boot sale sold me a big bag of chiffon scarves - I really only wanted a couple but the offer was too good to miss and I use lots of chiffon when I am dumfing pictures and brooches.
I popped them all in the washer and the couldn't resist pegging them up on my line like a rainbow.
Now, the question is.......

How many scarves were in the bag?
They are all there on the line.

I will send my little poppy dumfling to the one who guesses the right number or nearest to it.
(Annie - Wipso - You can't enter cos you know already - but that means you can make sure I don't cheat!!)
Have a great sunny week everyone - enjoy everything Olympic over the weekend.
I am late posting today so I had better nip over to Julia quickly and join in the fun!

WOYWW - Decisions!!

Lots of lovely threads to play with on my table today!!

I have been busy working on my big garden picture which I felted a few weeks ago.
It has been sitting in my sewing room just waiting for me to feel in the mood to attack it with some free maching and hand stitching.

Here it is before I made a start with the machine...

This is what the back looked like after a few hours of machining........

And - this is what it looks like now........

My next job is to add a few more hand stitches .

I did have a thought that it might look better as two pictures - so it might get cut down the middle - argh!!!! Decisions, decisions - and I am a Libran too.

Oh well - once I have finished it - all will be clear, I am sure.

What do you think?

To chop or not to chop???

I always love to hear what you think, so please leave a comment.

Thanks to all who popped over to see what Tilly Tea Dance had been up to on her first WOYWW last week. She loved hearing from you all. I know she has been busy dumfing over the weekend so hopefully she will find time to post too.

Join in our blog hop over at Julia's Stamping Ground - and see what we have all been up to this week.

Have fun

x Jo

Dumfing workshop.

Saturday was dumfing day!!
When M came home to see her Dad for Father's Day we had time for an hour or two in the sewing room.
She loves to craft with me and uses it as a good stress buster.
Having seen my poppy picture (last pic on this post), she decided she wanted to make some.

She had already made the tiny dumflings in the picture but fancied a different style.
So with a little direction from the one who knows......
She made the 3 gorgeous little poppy dumflings in the front of the pic above.
They are made with wool rovings and yarn, dumfed with the needle felting machine into felt.
Then the detail is added with free machining and beads.
Here she is at the sewing machine..
 


















And here are my little poppies that I made earlier.

It was just lovely to spend time together and share a crafty session.
She went home happy, with a box of baking that we made for a fund raiser for the charity she works for and her 3 little dumflings.
I just cleared up the mess and then carried on where I left off......... pop back tomorrow to see a few more dumflings.

Thanks for calling by.
x Jo

WOYWW - crafting overdrive!

Good morning all!

Nice tidy desk today - just three of my latest pieces of work.

Two more of my Montgomery series of pics and a special Golden Wedding picture for two special friends.

The lovely Tina from Indigo Moon came over for coffee this morning, so I cleared my work table and put all the things that I had made over the last month on my dining table. They filled the table and it was great to share my work with a "real artist". So - thanks for your kind comments Tina! It's what keeps us moving onward and upward isn't it.

The other "make" of the week is this little dress. Sew Scrumptious has been collecting dresses made from a pillow case for girls in Africa - its the Dressing a girl around the world scheme.

So I decided it was about time I joined in. This is my effort. I used one pale blue pillow case and then trimmed it with the contrasting fabric from my remnant box. I think Sew Scrumptious has collected well over 100 of these little dresses and has already posted 50 out to Malawi.

OK folks - time to nip over to Julia's Stamping Ground and join the rest of the blog hoppers.

Have a great week!

WOYWW - PiFs and stuff.

Good morning all!
So nice of you to drop in to take a look at all the bits and bobs on and around my desk today!

Lots of interesting items for you to snoop - I like that on a WOYWW desk don't you? Or is it just nosey old me that likes to see what everyone is busy making and using.

On the window sill is M's latest little lighthouse pic all framed up. We are looking for a source for square mounts if anyone knows a good one. A few of her "new home"  doors are mounted on card ready to sell too.

Scattered across the table are some of my little owls that I have machine embroidered and then tweaked with water colour pencils. I think I will make them into little cards (more owls on posts below).
There are a few little crochet and beaded motifs that I sorted out when M came acrafting on Sunday. Not sure what to make with them but they are so pretty. We found some lovely bits at the car boot sale.
(Check out the post below if you like bold retro poppy fabric!)

Last but certainly NOT least.......PiF time!!!!!

This is the beautifully handmade brooch that arrived yesterday all the way from Patsy in the Phillipines.
It is lovely Patsy - thanks so much. I love the little fabric roses - must have a go at making those.
Can you spot the WOYWW motif hiding on it?

And -
In case you haven't seen it on Kirsty's blog - here is the PiF I made for her.....

It's a WOYWW shop of course - complete with tiny dumfed "Wipso" style pictures in the window.
I really enjoy making these little collages and have already made five using the shops in Montgomery as my inspiration.
I think I might take commissions, so if you want something similar all I would need is a good photo of the house/shed/VW camper/ shop/ garden etc and I will do my best to create a collage for you. Costs would depend on size and detail required. Leave me a message if you are interested.

Now lets get over to Julia's Stamping Ground and join in all the fun of the blog hop!!
Happy Wednesday everyone.

Latest collages and a creature from the deep!!

Just so that you know I haven't been sitting with my feet up all weekend!!

On Friday I spent the day making a free-machine embroidered picture for my friend Suz. Her hubby has a neat little VW camper van and she asked if I could make a picture for him.
"Of course I can" said I ....... and after about 5 hours work, this was the end result.

She loves it - I just hope P. does too! (Click on pic to enlarge)

Sunday, that horrible, cold, wet day arrived and daughter M came to craft with me.
She was busy with amazing little Baboushka doll pics.
(I will devote a post to her later in the week.)

I decided to make a collage from a photo of the "Postcard from Wales" - a garden at the Chelsea Flower Show. My friend Roz sent me the photo of it and it was just the most perfect litttle garden, crying out for it to be converted into a little collage.....

(Click on pic to enlarge)
Not sure what to do with this picture but I think I might produce some copies as they would make lovely greetings cards.  I will probably put it in our blog shop "SistersCrafty Creations" so keep a look out if you are interested.

So my next project may be a collage of this little creature.....found beneath my veg rack.

Don't panic - it won't bite!

It'sjust a shrivelled carrot but it gave me quite fright!

And below is the best scarecrow we can find.

We have been woken every morning for over a week by marauding crows attacking our windows.

So, we fixed my little garden owl model to the fence.

We haven't been woken for the last two mornings - RESULT!!

WOYWW - June 8th

My room is a mess - the floor is covered with threads and fabric scraps - my table has been cleared but only because I have piled it high on a shelf out of sight!!

Happy WOYWW everyone!!!

So -  on my lovely tidy table, you can see the cards I planned with daughter M.
She thought they were fab and then floored me by suggesting I do some with flamingoes on!!
(I will give it a go as I don't like to be beaten!)
I have to credit Fi (Marmaladerose) for, yet again, inspiring me with her gorgeous cards that she made for Milkchurn Cottage.

I am loving my free machine work and today I made another "shop" picture. If you know Montgomery then you will know this shop!!

Below are just a few of the colours in my garden at present. Mostly blues and purply pinks.

It was great to visit as many folk as I did last week. I don't think I made it to everyone but I had a really good try!! Thanks for all your lovely comments too. I am looking forward to seeing all those PiFs on display.

Mine has a long way to come but I don't mind waiting!!

Have a fab week. Join in this mad blog hop by following me over to Julia's Stamping Ground and checking out the blogs on Mr Linky.

Little dress update

Well what else do you do on a wet afternoon.!

I had cleaned my car, done the ironing and made a homemade chicken soup lunch so I reckoned the rest of the day was mine!!!

So here is the little dress all finished. I made it slightly larger than planned so that it will probably fit little L.

I have enough fabic left to make her big sister P. one too!!

Here is a close up of the applique.
I like the idea of applying them with Bondaweb and then free machining round them. Its quick and easy and each one will always be different.

I know, these days, children's clothes are so cheap that it's hardly worth all the effort but I enjoy the challenge and I suppose the pattern only used about 50p worth of fabric and a couple of pretty buttons.
Well worth the effort, I think.

WOYWW

Good morning all!!

Today, as you see, my ironing board started off as my workdesk. ( Please excuse all the blotches of glue and fabric paint!)

I  am busy with the little pinafore dress from last week's WOYWW post.

I decided it needed a little applique before I make a start on sewing it together.

Birds and flowers seem popular on tinies' clothes at the mo, so that's what I decided to do.

I cut the little shapes from scraps of baby dress fabric ironed onto Bondaweb.

All I did then was, peel off the backing paper and iron the shapes on  to the dress front.

Then I whizzed round with the free-machining.  Done!!

Below is the finished applique. Now I just need to get sewing to make it up. Its so tiny - 0-3 months so it should be done in an hour. I may add an update but I have a few jobs to do today as well!!

The car needs washing and I have a pile of ironing....... Mmm .. maybe I will sew first..lol!!!

Enjoy your day and I will pop over and see what you are up to thanks to the wonderful Julia who organises us all!!!

To thrill a Hummingbird

Well I am not sure if it was thrilled but it certainly looked a lot better!!!!

Apart from needing its beak straightening, I felt that it lacked a little something.

Having been inspired by MarmaladeRose on her blog, where she has used free machining to great effect on her felted pictures and raw applique, I decided this was the answer.

I like the result. And.... following MarmaladeRose's clever idea, I am showing you the wrong side of the pic so that you can see exactly where the stitching went.

I am hoping that, tomorrow, Wipso will help me with my dumfy bird tutorial as mentioned in my previous post. We will have a fun day Monday come what may!!!!!

Thanks for popping in - and thanks for the encouraging comments - they really help!

My next project and WOYWW.

I quite like the photo of my table today. By accident, it is colour co-ordinated with the projects of the week.

You can see the little photo frame I made on Friday. It has silk flowers and leaves free machined over felt, wool and yarns. I think Wipso has already popped it in the blog shop.

If you look to the right you can see a little paper rose that I made following Paula's brilliant tutorial. I think I need lots more practice, but now I know how to do it I shall try again. Wipso and I certainly had a giggle on fun day Monday as we sat making our first ones.

In the cenrte of the photo, you can see my next project. I chopped up my table cloth and I am going to combine that gorgeous wool/ribbon yarn and the flowers with free machining to make another photo frame. Its all a bit experimental but then so is everything I do. I never make the same thing twice. - Unless of course its knitting......

This week I have been mostly knitting for my great niece and her sister to be. I finished a gorgeous little cardy in Crofter wool - pinks and lilacs and then I have made 2 little shrugs. This is the tiny one for the baby due next month. P. is16 months now and loves her little shrugs, so I just keep making the pattern a bit bigger each time.

Well thats my table for today.

I am popping over to Julia's blog to see what everyone else is up to but first I have to clean my windows! I have a friendly window cleaner who cleans the outside but the inside is down to me and not my favourite job. The exercise will do me good!!

Following the trend...

Lots of folk are free machining these days!

I saw the idea for this in a crafting mag and thought I would give it a go. Lots of people are doing clever stuff with free machine embroidery at the moment. Marmaladerose has blogged a great tutorial if you fancy having a go.

I copied the idea from the magazine using scraps of fabric and worked the free machine stitching in dark grey thread. I think the idea was meant for a Mothers' Day card.

Then I thought I should do my own thing.

Still room for improvement but I had fun trying. I think it has sort of childlike look to it - well either that or childish look!!

I need to practise a bit more. I have done lots of free machining over the years but you soon get out of practice.

I made this picture of a teazle a year or so ago after a kindly elderly neighbour gave me a guided tour of her garden. She was pleased to give me some of her teazles and I brought them home to photograph and use for my picture.

I printed the photo on silk and then free machined the detail.

I also found some little pendants on Hens Teeth blog. So clever to be able to make such tiny little pictures with the machine.

So- that's what I have been up to.

Now to the award Wipso kindly gave me yesterday.

To accept it you need to take part in a little information sharing
Instructions:

1. Give a top 10 list of the things that makes you happy.

2. Give a top 5 list of trivia about yourself.

3. Share the award with only 5 persons and ask them to do the same thing. :)

4. Link the blogs you choose and link the blog of the person who awarded you.

Well I think I told you my top ten things that make me happy in an earlier award ceremony!

Not wishing to bore you I will move on to 5 trivia items!
1. I used to live next door to a Scunthorpe United footballer.
2. My favourite soft centre is Turkish Delight.
3. I have moles in my garden - yes even in the Winter they tunnel beneath my flower beds!!
4. I have spoken at a London Conference.

5. I make superb brownies.

Now I know I should pass this award on, but we seem to be "award happy" at the mo, so I will save it for a while and spring it on a few kind souls, whose blog looks on the bright side, over the next few weeks.

20 minutes can stretch to hours!

20 Minuters

The idea was meant to challenge us to find time for 20 minutes creative activity each day. Well, I have managed to fit at least 20 minutes activity into my daily schedule but for some reason this week I have not felt very creative.

Anyway, I decided I would put a few photos on my blog, just to show that I have been busy.

This was a little "dumfling" heart brooch that I made before Christmas so I just popped it onto one of my new cards.

Valentine card/gift maybe?










The card on the right was a machine felted and machine embroidered card topper. The colours are much fresher than this photo.











This card reminded me of the English cottage garden pictures on hand embroidered cloths. I used a scrap of printed fabric and then embellished it with machine embroidery and free machine stitching.




So there we are - certainly a good 20 minutes each day and more but I think the snow has frozen my mojo!!

I am sure Wipso has had a much more creative week and I look forward to seeing it all tomorrow.