January FNSI - Featuring actual sewing!

 I do enjoy taking part in the monthly Friday Night Sew Ins hosted by Wendy, they encourage me to make the most of my Friday crafting time.

This month I started at 4pm and got a good mix of things done. 

I sewed two more blocks for my scrappy round the world quilt (following guidance from Quiltville Quips and Snips) and figured out the best use of pressing and seeing time in order to increase the number of blocks I can make in an evening.

Whilst I had the sewing machine up and running I zig zagged the edges of a piece of fabric for a future cross stitch (white on white so not that easy to see).

I added a couple more lengths of thread to my blackwork project; this big block isn't feeling as intimidating as it was before I started the purple stitching as the pattern grows quickly.

And I got to the halfway point on my Musselburgh Hat and added the second colour, they always seem to go faster from this point.

If you want to see what others got up to on this Friday night pop over to Wendy's blog or look for the FNSI group on Facebook.

September FNSI - All About the Patchwork

I joined with Wendy of Sugarlane Designs and friends around the world for this month's FNSI on, unsurprisingly, Friday night.

Having just driven 2 and a half hours home from work I thought I might be too tired for much of an FNSI but it turns out I have reserves of energy for crafting.

I started off working on a couple more blocks for my neutral scrappy Trip Around the World quilt...

and had a quick check that my planned layout would work...

This is for a king size bed and a rough calculation is that I will need 48 blocks to fit the bed - so this is going to be a long term project.

From sewing I moved onto cross stitch and my Mini Christmas Patchwork Sampler.

I'm making steady progress on this and there's a realistic chance of this being finished by Xmas (I even have a frame which might fit it).

And for the last bit of the evening I worked on the sixth square of my Cozy Memories blanket.

This is quite additictive and it's tempting to just make more squares but I'm trying to only use scraps from projects I have finished this year (and following years as this requires several more squares to become a blanket - currently its table mat size!).

If you want to see what everyone else got up to visit Wendy's blog or look up the FNSI Facebook group.

Long Weekend FNSI

 This month's FNSI took advantage of the long Easter weekend (four days in the UK) which meant that I had plenty of opportunity to join in with the fun over the weekend, when I thought I would miss April's FNSI.

A random selection of crafts were undertaken...

Serious progress has been made on the temperature cross stitch, byt the end of the weekend I was only a day or two off November which means I have less than 70 motifs to go (still sounds like a lot but definitely decreasing). I'd like to get this finished soon so I can start on one of my other cross stitch projects - for a non-cross stitcher there is quite a queue of projects appearing!

I put some time in on my Tree Tram Tro slipover. I'm using this to practice cabling without a cable needle which is working well until I need to undo a mistake and then things get very fiddly (and usually require a cable needle.

And I even managed to fit in some block sewing prep.

These are destined to become a mini Sparkle Pow quilt (designed by Elizabeth Hartmann), hopefully they acieve their destiny faster than the fabric I cut out for my first Sparkle Pow quilt!

FNSI - February 22

 It has just taken me too many attempts to write this blog title - I really need to buy myself a calendar!

Wendy of Sugarlane Designs has once again kindly hosted the Friday Night Sew In, a virtual gathering of sewists around the world via blog and Facebook group.

For rthis FNSI I went old school and worked on some quilt blocks. I have been sewing the block for my Meadowland Quilt together individually , and while this has been satisfying I did wonder how long it would take. Yesterday I decided to give batch piecing the remaining 9 a try. 

 I feel its working, though after 3 hours I don't have any finished blocks to show (and the making process isn't particularly photogenic) but I am at the final press and sew stage on all of them. Only one moment of slight panic when I was pressing and decided to put the Flying Geese bits with their respective centres and spent a few minutes thinking I'd sew the wrong bits together, but I'd just paired them up incorrectly so simply solved.

I'd taken the day off work yesterday as I had to spend the morning driving back from a Dinner I'd attended on Thursday night so I had plenty of time around sewing the blocks together to work on a few more (colourful) projects.

I'm playing catch up with last year's temperature cross-stitch but I am determined that this will be the second cross-stitch ever that I fully finish (my sister will probably be glad to hear that as she inherited the last project I lost interest in and it's fundamental counting error!).

I when it was too late to trust myself to sew correctly I moved onto some knitting for a while.

Bit hard to tell but this is destined to become the first half of a pair of fingerless mittens.

If you want to see what everyone else got up to visit the FNSI post on Wendy's Blog.

FNSI - August

 Being off work meant I was able to spend a little more time on my FNSI projects, and I worked on a few.

Firstly I cast off my Bubbles and Brioche shawl designed by Stephen West.

I knitted the coloured stripes of this using leftover sock yarn from other projects and some cheap balls of black and white sock yarn. I wanted to try out brioche knitting (the vertical black and white striped sections). I really enjoyed it and have already planned to knit another West Knits brioche project, once I've completed some gift knitting. I'm also toying with making a bubble cardigan, but that is still very much in the just thinking about it stage.

I moved on to piecing some QSTs into strips, these are slowly becoming a cushion cover. Unusually for me I didn't overthink the 'random' placement of the blocks and I'm pleased with the look and how quick it was to pretty much just lay them out.

The main aim of the evening was to get the quilting done on my current baby quilt. Underestimating the time required and my machine having a fall out with the thread I used meant that I didn't achieve as much as I hoped (I've done a little more today) but I think it's looking good. 

If you want to see what everyone else hot up to during FNSI pop over to Wendy's blog - Sugarlane Designs

July FNSI - All the colours!

 I am actually in the process of making a quilt for the first time in ages (possibly a year), so as the intended recipient has been born I thought it would be an ideal thing to continue with this FNSI (my new baby quilts are always a little late!).

I started off with a pile of blocks

Which required the odd correction as I added to them

Which eventually became pinwheel the majority of which I sewed into rows and I even managed to sew somd of the row together. 

I was fairly close to finishing this part of the quilt, which will have borders added, but as the night wore on the concept of nesting the seams became more and more tricky for me to achieve, so I decided to come back to it another day. The pattern is the Pinwheel Pindot Quilt which is a free pattern from the Fat Quarter Shop's website. 

I semm to have a few very colourful projects on the go at the moment and to fill the time before bed I picked up my newest and currently most addictive one. 

This is the Bubbles and Brioche Shawl by Stephen West which I am mostly using leftovers from other projects to knit. 

If you want to find out what everyone else got up to during this month's FNSI visit Wendy's blog Sugarlane Designs to find links to everyone else's blogs. 

April FNSI - Project hopping

 I seem to be on a roll both with FNSIs and with writing blog posts this month!

FNSI came around at a perfect time for me this month, plenty of crafty things planned and underway.

First task of the evening was to cut out out the fabric for my dress, which was achieved.

After a fairly late dinner, I had a a choice to make whether to start sewing the dress together or to practice my free motion quilting before my class on Saturday afternoon.

The free motion quilting won and I watched the instructional videos and started working on my feathers.

Not too bad and nothing a bit more practice won't improve. I've enjoyed this course (although could definitely have practiced more) it's all been online over 4 weeks and we've covered petals, leaves, spirals, flowers (which you can see to the left of the feathers) and feathers. If it had been a face to face course it would have all been squeezed into one 6 hour day and I probably wouldn't have been able to attend as it would have taken place somewhere more than two hours away from my home. For anyone who is interested the course was run by The Crafty Nomad

As it was now getting quite late and I find myself not able to concentrate on sewing if I'm tired I swapped onto knitting. I've decided that it would be a good idea to knit at least 4 Xmas presents this year, luckily if also decided to start on them early in the year.

I can't show too much in case the recipients are reading  but the yarn is Coop Knits Socks Yeah DK and the pattern is by Andrea Mowry. I'm finding this an enjoyable (and fairly quick) knit thanks to all being in knit stitch and no more than 2 colours per row. It's looking likely that I'll achieve at least one knitted Xmas present this year!

If you want to see what everyone else got up to this Friday pop over to the sign up page over at Wendy's blog  Sugarlane Designs.

March FNSI - A study in grey

 This month's FNSI was pretty productive for me, although there was definitely an unintentional colour theme to what I worked on.

Whilst waiting for my partner to finish work (and free up the table I use for sewing) I added some more stitches to my Jumping Dots wrap/scarf in Scheepjes Whirl and coordinating dark grey whirlette.

The main plan for my FNSI was to continue with my toile for my Sew Over It Marguerite dress. I decided that I needed to insert the nexf size up waistband so I cut a new waistband, interfaced pressed and started to sew it to the bodice when I discovered I'd made a mistake whilst tracing which meant that one side was an inch too short! I was very tempted to put it in the naughty corner but remembered I had the smaller waistband all cut out so I cut a bit off and added the misding inch to my waistband. Not a particularly pretty solution but it kept me sewing.

By the time I was too tired to continue sewing I had the bodice and skirt attached and am all prepared to start inserting the zip. So far so good, looking forward to getting the zip in and finally checking the fit.

I finished my knit with some simple knitting on the thumb of a mitten.

And to avoid inventing second mitten syndrome I managed to cast on the second mitten.

Pop over to Wendy's Blog to see what everyone else got up to. 

February FNSI - Bits and Bobs

 Looking back on what I worked on during last night's FNSI I've realised that I worked on nearly all my WIPs and I did a bit of every craft I do.

Between finishing work and dinner I continued catching up on my temperature cross stitch.

This is based on the Jardin Privé 2020 temperature cross stitch design with the houses indicating the high daily temperature and the roofs the low temperatures. I hadn't realised how low UK winter temperatures were so I need to purchase another colour skein of thread for the missing roofs. I started this towards the end of January, nce ive caught up im hoping to sew a house a day.

After dinner I managed a few rows on my latest sock which is being re-knit due to poor size choices. Luckily the yarn is stunning (dyed by Mothy and the Squid) and I've now memorised the pattern. 

On a Friday evening my partner XBoxes so whilst he did that I started sewing a toilet together for a new dress.

So far so not very exciting but it seems to fit okay. Next step is to carefully follow (puzzle out) the instructions for the sleeve cuffs. The pattern is Marguerite by Sew Over It.

By the time the bodice was sewn together it had gone 10.30pm so I moved on to some simpler crochet while watching a bit of catch up.

I seem to have adopted this technique of butterflying between projects at the moment, keeps my interest although things are progressing slowly - hopefully there will be a rush of finishes all together.

If you want o know what everyone else got up to during their FNSI pop over to Wendy's Blog

January FNSI

 Wendy has decided to continue hosting the monthly Friday Night Sew-In, so I will continue joining in as often as I can.

I've made a good start by joining in last night with other crafter round the world and I had a very enjoyable evening. 

I started off before dinner with a row or two of my Jumping Dots wrap. 

I'm not a particularly fast crocheted so this is my big yarny project for the moment. It uses tapestry crochet to combine the two colors and will be purple and grey on one side, and grey and purple on the other. If you've ever used a Scheepjes whirl the next bit will make sense - I'm waiting impatiently for my first fuzzbuzz - the point in the purple yarn where a new coloured strand in incorporated. I'm also hoping that a better contrast between the colours will mean easier crocheting in evening lamplight. Jumping Dots is designed by Jellina Verhoeff (jellina-creations.nl)

I then bit the bullet and made some good progress on the Alice EPP cushion.

Top and bottom borders added (by machine) and the whole piece basted and ready for hand quilting. Figuring out how the borders should be attached had left this languishing for too long. It wasn't as bad as I'd feared in the end, although I'm very thankful that I've got the hang on consistent seam allowances! (I have a patchwork I made when I was around 12 and the original 4 inch patches end up anywhere as small as 2.5 inches in places! I know that was a long time ago but until very recently I'd still been massively reliant on my 1/4 inch foot for accuracy). I didn't start the quilting but I know what I want to do. The evening ended with a little more crochet.

Whilst crafting I also watched and listened to crafty things. 

I've recently come across the Fruity Knitting podcast (fruityknitting.com) so I dipped into a couple of episodes of that and one of the episodes led me to the Wool Work audio podcast from knitbritish.net. I only listened to the first episode (from 2014) so plenty to go but seems interesting so far. Does anyone have any recommendations for crafty podcasts? I've only recently come across them and would love to watch and listen to more.

So that's all from me, if you want to see what everyone else got up to pop along to Wendy's blog Sugarlane Designs

December FNSI

 In preparing to write this blog I've realised that before photos would've been useful - but I was keen to maximise my crafting time.

First project was a bit if reworking on my Billie sweatshirt. As you may expect it's a Jersey top and as it was the first time I'd ever worked with jersey there were a couple of points where I'd created unintentional pleats. After a bit of unpicking and restitching I had a much smoother waistband.

The rest of the evening was then devoted to working on a pair of socks that will become a Xmas present for my partner's mum. 

A focused effort means that I only have a few inches left to knit. 

A very productive and enjoyable FNSI. 

If you want to see what everyone else got up to head over Wendy's blog:FNSI

August FNSI - Multi Crafting

 Not having a definite plan as to what to work on this FNSI I was pleasantly surprised how productive I ended up being.

In the continuing plan of working through WIPs I decided to continue with the toile for a pair of Tilly and the Buttons Jessa shorts (these have been a WIP for a year so far and if I was a betting person I'd say the finished article won't be ready for this summer!) I thought I'd just get the zip fly in. 

But I was wrong... 

... and actually got the toile to a stage where I could try it on for size. It fit. I have decided to stop making the toile at this point, without as waistband and cuffs, as the fabric is horrible to work with (cheap, thin, with a tendency to shrink if ironed), some of my pieces seem poorly cut (or could've been affected by the iron), and I need to re-use the zip from the toile for the actual shorts. Also if I stop here there's a better chance of the actual shorts being finished in 2020!

I then went on to a bit of baking prep. 

 Pasties are the plan for lunch this weekend and the recipe suggested that the pastry was best if left to rest overnight. 

And after all that excitement I even had timeto squeeze in a bit of sock knitting before bed. 

Hope everyone else had a successful and enjoyable FNSI. 

July FNSI

My second FNSI in a row, although due to the current circumstances I do tend to spend most Friday nights sewing.

As I guess might be the case for a lot of crafters I had a long list of things to do but that was never going to be doable in the time.

I started the evening with a few post-dinner rows of sweater knitting and then I moved on to some sewing. 

On an impulse I started a Charmed Cushion last Friday, which I continued with. 

I didn't take many photos but I sewed together a pile of HSTs to make QST blocks. Then I spent much longer than I expected squaring up the blocks. Luckily the layout was pretty easy to do, I just didn't think about it too much!

Pleasingly by the end of my FNSI I had both the back and front panels sewn together in rows. Hopefully I'll have a finished cushion to show soon. 

June FNSI

I've finally managed to join in with FNSI again after quite an absence and to celebrate I had a multi-crafting evening. 

First up was a quick scone baking session. 

During lockdown, when flour and egg availability have permitted (these have been hard to find items in my local supermarkets for the past 3 months but that seems to be ending) I have been trying out recipes from the National Trust scone book. 

I've generally only made half batches as there's only two of us. So far every recipe has been a success, I've mostly been baking the savoury scones as we watch out sugar intake, although the odd sweet one slips in and I'd really like to try some chocolate ones. And as we don't eat them all at once they've been stored in the freezer with no ill effects.

Tonight's batch were red pepper, onion and cheese and the little taster scone I made with the scraps was lovely. 

After the baking I moved onto knitting, whilst advising my boyfriend who was playing a Zelda computer game.

I am starting to make better progress on a colourwork sweater which has been suffering due to my not paying it full attention. As I'm currently working with 350 stitches I only achieved about a row but any progress is good progress.

When my boyfriend moved onto online gaming with his mates I moved onto my sewing machine in another room. I did have high hope of getting quite a bit done but my machine had other ideas. I did get the quilt binding I'd planned to do sewn on one side of my quilt, but thanks to jammed and broken needles caused, I think, by my walking foot loosening the needle's screw this took me the best part of 2 hours.

But it was all attached and trimmed by bedtime so I'm calling that a success FNSI. 

What did everyone else get up to? Head over to Wendy's Blog to find out. 

First FNSI of the Decade - Results

I only had a couple of hours to dedicate to sewing this Friday but I think I made the most of it. 

I decided to work on my Mini Pumpkins Quilt from Cluck Cluck Sew; she was also the designer of the Slam Dunk Quilt. There's a lot of 1 inch and 1.5 inch pieces so I was nervous that it would be very fiddly.

Not the case at all. 

The pieces flew together and even lent themselves to chain piecing. 

This was the results after two hours of sewing (and snooker watching) - 8 leaves, 8 big pumpkin bodies and 4 stripey blocks destined to become pumpkin bodies. 

I'm really enjoying this pattern, which is lucky as I'm already hoarding orange scraps for a second!

I also managed some rows on my Floozy cardigan after dinner. 

Hope everyone else had an enjoyable FNSI. 

November FNSI

A short report on my FNSI progress for this month due to a 50% success rate. 

I planned to start my FNSI early by quilting my second Xmas quilt on my Cotton Orchard frame. 

Unfortunately I instead found out what happens when you thread you machine slightly incorrectly and ignore the odd noise it's making instead. Lots of loopy thread on the back meant that my quilting afternoon changed into an unpicking afternoon. 

A break for dinner and then onto my second planned project (ignoring the remaining unpicked stitches in my Xmas quilt for a while). 

Second project was a quilt for my brother in law for Xmas. This has been causing me a few snags due to some inaccuracy early on. Luckily, except for having to reinforce some very skimpy seam allowances, this one behaved beautifully.

The blocks went from... 

to... 

I also got white borders on two other blocks and the green borders on the remaining 4 blocks. 
Pleasing for three hours work and no sign of a quick unpick! 

Thanks to Wendy for hosting, if you want to see what everyone else got up to visit her blog HERE