More yummy fabric and stitching

I've had another fun week making bits and pieces for the summer fair (to raise money for repairs to the local church roof). These butterfly brooches were a bit of an experiment but I was pleased with the result. I cut the butterfly shapes from patterned fabric then used iron-on fusible webbing to stick them to black felt which was about 1 cm larger.

Next I randomly machine embroidered black veins on the wings. As you can see I used ordinary scissors and pinking shears to trim the excess felt from the coloured butterfly.The black body is a rolled piece of felt, two small beads make the eyes and thin copper wire is used for the antennae. Finally I stitched a brooch pin to the back of the body.

The butterflies were made from left-overs scraps of fabric belonging to these bags. The variety of rich colours is absolutely scrumptious and mixing and matching the rainbow shades took almost as long as the bag making!

I used a Jelly Roll of 'Tropicana Batiks' by Moda and I'm happy to say there are plenty of strips remaining for future projects.

If you aren't fond of vibrant shades then you'd probably enjoy working with the mixture of Tanya Whelan fabrics below.

These bags, like the previous ones, were made from narrow strips of fabric. To line the bags I used a white cotton curtain lining which had been fused to felt interlining. This is easy to cut out, doesn't fray and makes the bags more robust. The lining is the same size as the bag and with narrow turnings on the tops of bag and lining I stitched the two together incorporating the handles as I stitched.

Another Moda Jelly Roll in my collection is the yummily named "Butterscotch and Rose". Unfortunately the visitors to the summer fair won't be finding anything made from these fabrics as it exactly matches my sitting room curtains and so it is destined to become cushions. I can't wait to start on them as I adore this combination of colours.

After my enjoyable extended sewing session with so much yummy fabric I'm hoping I'll be able to pick up my knitting needles again anytime soon but it might be difficult!

Yummy colours

I'm still busily making items to sell at the village fair (in aid of the church roof fund). I haven't done any freestyle machine embroidery for quite a while so last week I had great fun creating these flowers and hearts to make into brooches. I want to decorate them with buttons so have scattered a mixture of sizes and colours over them to make the button choice easier . . . hmm! I think this could take quite a while.

As you can see, my sewing machine has been working overtime recently. After making the flowers and hearts I machine embroidered some little dollies onto white linen. Each little girl then became a panel in the centre of a tote bag.  

Over the past few days my machine stitching has been interrupted by the Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations. The UK is currently awash with red, white and blue and I couldn't resist making these patriotic little mice. They are only 15cm (6in) tall and just fit inside this tiny basket. The arms and legs contain pipe cleaners (chenille stems) so positioning the little rascals is quite easy, and fun! The pattern for the mice can be found here. I altered the clothes slightly when making them and gave the girl a fabric dress rather than a knitted one.

The Diamond Jubilee celebrations are over but the many flags will remain in readiness for the Olympics in July. I'm happy to escape to the sewing room where red, white and blue is cast aside in favour of vibrant shades of every hue. As always there's no shortage of helpers!

I love working with yummy colours don't you?

Around the garden

I love having pots of flowers on the patio throughout the summer. So with the risk of frost now over (hopefully) I visited the local garden centre yesterday and purchased a variety of colourful young plants with plans to fill the pots over the weekend. The evening weather forecast however brought unwelcome news. The coming weekend could see unseasonal falls of snow in the north. My heart sank. These little beauties will have to live indoors for the next few days until the worst is over.

Today is warm and sunny with no hint of the cold blast to come so I took a stroll around the garden with my camera.

My son and his wife gave me these gorgeous daisies as a Mother's Day gift. I transplanted them into a large pot and they have bloomed their hearts out ever since. They start small and grow 'fat and fluffy' as they mature.

If you have visited my blog during May in previous years you will have seen my pics of our rhododendrons and azaleas. Here in the English Lake District they grow like weeds and the garden is currently ablaze with colour.

This pale pink beauty hangs over the wall beside the kitchen.

Vibrant magenta lights up the driveway.

Scarlet blooms spill onto the lawn

The edges of our garden are left to grow wild and mingle with the woodland that surrounds our property and the whole place echoes with bird-song.

Fresh new buds open and reach for the sky whilst wild flowers like these delicate white wood anemones bask in the warm sunshine.

I always keep a watchful eye on this young horse chestnut tree (below). It started life as a shiny brown conker as of course all horse chestnut trees do. The conker is the special ingredient as it is one that I picked up from the garden of my all time favourite gardening guru, Rosemary Verey. I planted the conker in her memory hoping that it would become a mature tree one day and so far it is obliging.

For many years I had wanted to visit Rosemary's famous garden in the English Cotswolds but she passed away in 2001 before I'd made the trip. Then in 2002 I discovered that her garden was welcoming visitors for just a few days before closing for the last time.

On a sunny day in early October 2002, hubby and I travelled to the much loved garden that we had admired from a distance for many years. Since her death it had been maintained by loyal gardeners and was full of late summer blooms and berries and of course, conkers.

If I could choose the perfect house in which to live it would have to be Rosemary Verey's 300 year old rectory (above) which is built from honey-coloured Cotswold limestone.

Her laburnum walk became world famous so you might be familiar with this picture.

The old rectory has now become a country house hotel and the owners open the garden to the public at specified times. Rosemary's spirit lives on but for me some of the magic has gone and I'm pleased I saw the garden just as she had left it.

But back to reality . . . when not working in my own rambling patch I've been spending time making small items to sell at a local village fair. It will be held in June in aid of the village church that has a leaking roof in need of urgent repair. Here in England our ancient churches require constant money raising events to fund repairs to roofs, windows, bells and organs etc.

Kate and Lucy have been assisting me and looking after these pencil dolls that I knitted last week. They are quick to make, only take small amounts of yarn and hopefully will appeal to young customers who don't like to return home empty handed. They should raise a few extra pence for the church roof repairs.

I used the pattern that I featured on my blog last year. If you'd like to create a fun pencil doll or two then you will find the pattern here -  FREE Pencil Doll Pattern

Have a great weekend everyone

Pirates

The playroom door has remained firmly shut for the past couple of weeks as there has been much talk of pirates here at Flutterby Patch.
My daughter has always been a fan of ocean going adventures such as 'Hornblower' and loves the movie 'Pirates of the Caribbean', and so I wasn't surprised when she showed me these colourful pirate flags that she'd designed for her Etsy shop.

She'd also been working on a pirate to accompany the flags but wasn't sure how he should look. Should he look mean or friendly? Over Easter we put our thinking caps on and discussed various options. We both knew which book would be first out of the bookcase. This was one of my daughter's favourites when she was younger and needless to say is very well thumbed.

We searched on the internet for pirate images and were overwhelmed by the variety. In the end we concluded that her pirate should look more comical than cruel.

Once started, the pirate took shape quite quickly. He had an eye patch (of course), striped jumper, scarf, belt and long boots with turn-over top. By giving him a large nose, straight mouth and upturned eyebrow he looked like the sort of pirate you definitely wouldn't want to meet on a dark night! But very quickly we decided he looked rather lonely and needed a shipmate.

It was quite amusing to watch this little fellow taking shape. He is worked from the same basic pattern as the one above but his facial expression give him a completely different character. This pirate we decided had been in one battle too many. He has a stump and and a hook. But now surely there should be a third member of the group.

And here he is with his bead-trimmed dreadlocks.

What a terrifying trio they make!!

Daughter and I both dream of finding treasure one day so for obvious reasons this is our favourite part of the book.

As luck would have it daughter has a replica wooden chest which made the perfect prop for this scene. Some old necklaces became the treasure, although judging by the reaction of the pirates I'm not sure it was quite what they had hoped to find when they opened the lid.

Over the years my daughter has collected quite a number of nautical bits and pieces and this page in the book reminded her of another essential item in her collection.

And here it is, a replica cannon. I can't remember when or where she bought it but I know when she saw it she just had to have it. And so, several years later it is being put to good use! With beads being used as cannon balls and a bit of gun powder (or soap powder) this motley crew will be a force to be reckoned with . . . . . . . . So now you can see why the playroom door has remained firmly shut.

If you  know any young pirates who would welcome shipmates like these then you can knit your own motley crew. The pattern for the 3 pirates and the bunting flags can be found in my daughter's Toyshelf Etsy shop.

A cute gift

Greetings friends. I hope you've all had an enjoyable Easter. My daughter stayed with us over the weekend and I'm happy to say the box of chocolate nest cakes that the dolls were looking after remained unopened until she arrived. She'd mentioned a couple of weeks ago that she was knitting something 'round' as an Easter gift for me so I naturally presumed it would be egg-shaped. When she passed me this little tissue covered surprise I let the dolls take the first peek inside.

Lucy Lavender couldn't wait to untie the pretty lemon ribbon.

And just look at the little cutie that popped out! She certainly wasn't the egg shape I was expecting.

Of course everyone in the playroom was delighted to find a new playmate.

But this little girl is not destined for the playroom as she will sit next to my sewing machine and hold my pins.

My daughter had mentioned a few weeks ago that she was working on a new pattern to list in her Etsy shop. This little girl is one of three dolls (small, medium and large) that she designed for children to play with. When she'd stuffed them she decided they would make great pincushions.

As she had brought the two larger dolls to show me we couldn't resist covering their skirts with all kinds of treasure. The vintage brooches belonged to my mother and the tiny rings were stashed in my daughter's childhood jewelry box. I think they'd look great sitting on a dressing table holding bits and bobs.

Lucy Lavender seemed very surprised that anyone would want to carry pins in their skirt. I just hope she doesn't try any experimental pin-sticking amongst her dolly friends in the playroom!

My daughter has named these little characters 'Twirling Doughnut Dolls' as their skirts are doughnut-shaped with twirling zig-zag stripes. The pattern made by the stripes is very easy to knit and as each doll only requires small amounts of yarn they'll be a great way to use up odds and ends. They are soft and cuddly so make safe toys for very young children. I also love the idea of using them to hold pins and other sparkly treasures. The knitting pattern contains instructions for all three sizes of doll (10cm, 12cm and 15cm).


Whilst the smallest doll now guards the pins in my sewing room the two larger dolls have gone back to my daughter's house to join the other characters on her toyshelf. If you'd like to knit your own twirling doughnut dollies you'll find the pattern in my daughter's Toyshelf Etsy shop.