Testing and stitching

I wasn't going to let the stitchery piece I did languish in a drawer so I made another purse, I'll keep this one, I love it and it turned out to be a fun excercise in doing something different.

I've been jumping around from one project to another for over a year and I hit the wall with flitting from one thing to another for long enough. The test blocks, ufo's, wisp have stonewalled me into some zombie like state of indecisiveness.

What to do next? What I need to do so that I feel like progress is being made is to concentrate and set a few goals.

What to play with? Pick one or two, any will do, what do I feel like? This is the mind working here, the cogs turning over.

So I decided to ignore the nagging from all those other projects for now and chose to make some progress with the Stars and Sprigs quilt.

If you read my blog, you'd know that my prefered method of applique is needleturn. I'm not an applique snob, I'm open to trying new methods or new products.

I decided to explore another way to prep my applique using these Wash-away Applique sheets from C&T Publishing. I thought itf I reversed my pattern pieces and used glue stick to adhere the seam on the back, it might speed the stitching up. I could then place all my pieces with glue and not have as much trouble with placement, not have to use an overlay and it would all go so much faster. Each block gets a wash in warm water afterwards to remove any glue.

Here's the other product I tried with the same method. Floriani Stitch N Wash water soluble tearaway.

You'd think if the product claimed to wash away, that's what would happen. Wrong. The Wash-Away remained on the stiff side and when I cut out the back of a piece, it had adhered to the fabric and nothing seems to have washed away at all. I ditched that idea.  I may do another test with this.

Second product, the Floriani Stitch N Tear is softer after washing and a slit on the back of the pieces allows me to tear away the product since the fusible had dissolved. Apparently, it gets softer with each washing. I think this was the better product to use and I may continiue with this one. It tears away from the back easier using a glue stick to place all the pieces rather than using basting glue. I have heard that this washes away a bit more with every wash, more testing is in order.

Is anyone else wondering how they can claim these products are wash away or water soluble?

I may continue to use the second product for these blocks since it did speed things up considerably, Each of the blocks only took one evening each to complete in front of the telly.

I've also been playing with the gingham Mr Q got for me, lots of limbs and other body parts here. I hope I can show you what they're supposed to be soon.

Stitching bliss

My immunity for catching bugs of the quilty kind is a bit low at the moment. I've been stricken with the big stitch bug. First I caught it off Jan and so did Amy. I can't help it, I love big stitch, I love how the threads sit on the surface of the fabric and create another dimension. I love how the texture of the piece comes alive and the stitches seem to dance across the surface.

I've been on the computer, browsing around to satisfy my curiosity on  Japanese Boromono which translates to rag thing. I've seen similar with Indian Kantha stitching which is running stitch arranged very basically or done elaborately. This is all been so interesting, to me, I'm drawn towards the folk art, utalitarian nature of it all.

After Jan shared the link to those bags, and then making a pact with Amy to try some stitch love, I decided that I would play with a design that was similar.

I wasn't loving it and it was hard work going through the strips. The fabrics are some random solids I had lying in a bin but not good quality. When I went to wipe a mark off, the colour of the blue crocked badly so I decided to call it quilts and do some other smaller thing.

I had a piece of Japanese cotton that seemed perfect.

This was quick and I decided to deliberately go for a random, not perfect type of stitch. The best part was freeing myself from being uniform, I like it a lot and I'll make this into one of the small purses. I'm satisfied but It's not the end, I'll be revisiting this type of stitching.

Since it's Saturday, I get to show my Klosjes for the week. Twenty is not too shabby. I've started adding some peachy colours.

I've had a spurt on some book buying too,  all very inspirational, who knows what I'll get up to after reading these.

Since Easter is coming, I had another small project in mind if I get in the mood to do it. Mr Q went and got these for me at the LQS, he got a lot of funny looks but he did well.

After a week or two of play, my sewing room is the worst I think I've ever seen it. I even feel embarrased for myself . A clean up is in order before I can to the machine, that's if I can find it.

Little purse tutorial

I've tried to be thorough in my instructions at the same time  trying not to make this too photo heavy.

These purses finish at around 8" wide by 4 1/2" tall. I made two at the same time so the pictures may show either one.

First make a template out of cardboard by drawing two 8" diameter circles that overlap in the middle. Radius is 4" of course. Draw a line on each side to connect them and cut out.

You can make the one with the squares by cutting 24 x 2 1/2" squares and sewing them together in rows of four.

Cut a lining fabric and batting the same size, sandwich and quilt however you desire.

Place the template on top , draw around and cut out. For the one with squares, I centered the template using the seams as a guide.

Place pins at the half way mark on the sides.

Cut two strips of fabric on the bias, 2" wide and long enough to go around from one halfway point to the other. Press in half and sew to the top of the bag, backstitching at the begining and end.

Hand sew the binding to the back just a thread width beyond the stitching.

Place a pin at the middle and 3" either side on both sides of the bag. I use an oversized zip at least 20" ( 51cm) long.

Pin one side of the zip to the bag from one pin to the other as in the photo. Hand sew the binding edge to the zip and repeat for the other side. You can click on these photos for close ups to see which way to orient the zip.

That doesn't look too hard for zipper phobics now does it?

For the side that has the tail end of the zip,  fold  the sides  in to the middle, first holding the zip back out of the way, make sure  the binding edges meet snuggly together all the way to where the zip is sewn on. Rule a line 1 1/2" fom the point.

Pin the the zip back in place and sew on the line, backstitching at the begining and end.

For the other side with the head end of the zip, first close the zip and then make sure the binding edges meet inside, pin, mark and sew as before.

Trim 1/4" beyond the stitching on both sides.

Cut two pieces of lining fabric, 3 3/4" x 2" for tabs to cover the raw seams. Fold in half on the long sides and sew to the cut ends, zipper side underneath and on the same line as the previous stitching.

Turn the bag right side out and stich the binding edges together up to where the zip has been stitched previously to the binding. Do the same on both sides.

The tabs are now ready to be folded over the raw edges inside, pinned and hand stitched down.

Add some bling or other hardware to the zip end to make opening and closing easier and you're done.

Please feel free to use this pattern for personal use and share this pattern with friends but it is not to be sold.

I recieved a lovely gracious email from Rannveig about my little purse tutorial being the same as hers. Click here to see hers. It's purely coincidental as can happen and I applaud bloggers who keep an eye on these things.

Her one has the same shape and size and the zip is machine sewn in whereas mine is hand sewn. Her pattern is from a purse she had bought I think and mine came from a Japanese book but with changes made. I'll add a little note about this on the tutorial as soon as I have time. It's a very common purse and there are a lot of patterns out there the same or similar as we now realise.

A day late

I know now that the klosjes are stitched during the week and shown on a Saturday. Oops, I'm a day late but I think it must still be Saturday somewhere in the world.

Here's the week's worth, all 18 of them.  I do believe my hand stitching is getting a little faster.

I'm waving out to Annemieke she is one of the latest to join in.

I didn't show you the last two applique blocks for Stars and Sprigs. I'd love to move a bit faster on these but I've been distracted, in the nicest possible way of course.

I had some lovely comments on the bread I made and have been asked for the recipe. I don't want to do a whole post as I think there are already some great bread sites and videos on U Tube.

I am using sourdough but I'm making it hybrid using commercial yeast and it's just a basic recipe I made up. We don't like sour, sour bread so this gives a nice flavour and keeps for more than one day.

Here are my amounts in case you're interested.

1/2 cup sourdough starter

1 cup warm water

1 1/2 tsp dried yeast

2 1/2 cups flour ( I use 1/2 cup wholemeal and 2 cups white flour)

1 1/2 tsp honey

1 tsp butter

1tsp salt

If you don't know about this book, where have you been hiding! It's awesome for people with little time and produces a loaf that resmbles that holey, crispy chewy artisan bread. You can find it in most libraries or the basic  technique is on video here. Click here to go to the website.

Simple pleasures

I've been racing around this week and the only sewing I was in the mood for was some playful small projects. I get the urge to make small stuff from time to time, beacuse I need to have the satisfaction of having something finished, you know how it is when all your projects are ufo's.

I've had this book by Chuck Nahora for years and found the directions, which are all done in drawing form, hard to follow. I've wanted to make some pouches so used the photos as my starting point, ignored the directions which just confused me and worked out some easier templates and measurements.

Sneek peek revealed.  I played around with different sizes and come up with one that's the perfect size for me.

Then I decided to play with a different shape and a bigger size.

Lots of space inside this one

I just love the bottom. I was thinking of trying this one in a smaller size. I am thinking a tutorial would be a good idea. Which pouch do you fancy? The zippers are hand sewn in and not difficult to do, so you zipperphobics could even manage this.

My other pet project has been the sourdough, Bubbles. I've worked out a hybrid recipe using sourdough and fresh yeast that suits our tastes, it's delicious. I've been making bread for thirty years and used to teach it in a community high school, I'm still not tired of it. One of life's simple pleasures, you can't beat the smell of homemade bread. This one's about to go in the oven.

I need to get on with cleaning house and then I get to play with my Klosjes. Have a wonderful weekend.