OH! WHAT A LOVELY DAY.





I have had such a lovely time today, this morning I popped down to Leasingham village hall for the st. Barnabas hospice grand sale, fill a bag with fabric for a quid! wow   -had to be there.
There was stufff ,  lovely stuff   everywhere I felt like I had died and gone to heaven.....



I found a bag of sparkly, glittery brocade offcuts, I feel a bag coming on........



assorted embroidered lace doilies, God I do so love old stuff, it has a history, a life, character and wear  and tear, I get such a buzz just from handling old textiles.



I found a gorgeous hand knitted jumper body but the arms were missing, its a lovely shade of cornflower blue, if I sew up the edges it will make a lovely pram blanket for our youngest pipsqueak-- who actually rides about the village in a pram!
And does this round doillie say yellow to you? yes, definitely yellow....



and look at these lovely square shell sequin like things, a whole bag.yayy!



how about this marvelous olden days baby bib, the stitching is so tiny and it was spotlessly clean, clearly made in the days before spaghetti hoops..

Look how tiny this rolled edge is...cant actually see the tiny stitches in the linen.
And I found some lovely crewelwork fabric[ book cover, or bag?]And some old linen and two tablecloths and two boxes of buttons, one of which I managed to drop all over the floor and everyone helped me pick up[ and well done leasing ham, that was a very clean floor].
.

I missed out on a big Euphoria in a pot, shame, as mine died this winter, and then I had tea and cake, with tablecloth and  small vase of flowers, and then Frankie walked in, so I went back to the fabric stalls and we found some offcuts of wool men's suiting's, which is perfect as Frankie has gone all Sue Spargot and we are going to do something from her book soon.

Then we had more tea and cake, and Frankie, who has just returned from Malvern, brought me  a lovely unbirthday present of some gorgeous threads from the African lady, such a kind friend, then I bought some homemade cake for Mr, shed man, who has finished the decking and is now mending my car, he is a good lad, and sadly for him. he isn't married to a woman who bakes[it would cut into my sewing time and create unrealistic expectations]



After dashing home to drop off my purchases and pick up the sprogs we shot over to spalding to the unique farm studios for their wool day,



look at the baby Alpaca, isn't he lovely, ooooooh  I  want one



 Angela was dyeing wool  in a microwave, sadly she couldn't boil up her daffodil heads for dyeing as it was way too windy to light the gas burners, hand painting wool really is great fun..



there was GIANT knitting..



Nigel was doing big french knitting .there was weaving and spinning and felt making and fleece dyeing and some  really gorgeous handmade  honey soap- also made by Angela 



and of course, sheep shearing, some very agile Australians were divesting the Jacobs of their warm winter coats.




not very dignified, but effective.




Before
and after...



the alpacas were napping as we left tired but happy.
I had a really nice day, it felt like a weeks holiday rolled into one day, lovely

And if you want to see what happens to the lace doillie--go here.







SCOUTING, CAKEING, THINKING,NOT MUCH SEWING....

THINKING------I was in primark last week, and I saw these four great little brooches on a card, for £1.50
bargain!
And I thought, wouldn't they be great, pinned onto the front of a personal book cover, as a gift for someone.[ notice how I am completely fixated on book covers at the moment?]
Bish Bash Bosh!spent all week making a book cover for my daughters friend, and I have really enjoyed it!



Last year we made Amelia a fabric birthday card, and its been on her wall all year, so I knew it would be appreciated, sometimes, you make something as a gift and its not really wanted, so I am care full who I give gifts to.



I really really enjoyed making this but, it has created a number of requests from other people for similar items.
Number seven asked me to make a book cover from her favourite [torn ]trousers and you know how I love re purposing fabrics,so,
here we go again.....

CAKING---------Seem to have eaten about , a ton of cake recently two family birthdays plus Trudi, plus, this week,- Frankie, happy birthday Frankie!  

here are some pics of the famous ice cream cake, loved by all of my family, contains no cake whatsoever, only ice cream, and layers of sweets, very easy to make,  yum yum......

SCOUTING----That's why I haven't been about much, packing, tenting, camping, unpacking, washing, practise tenting in garden,
not much sewing.......

I have a deckchair......



I have a new deckchair, its lovely! now all I need is time to sit in it . The house is still  full of kids having sleepovers  [boy, is that ever a stupid name.]  and Mr shed man has decided to build a new deck....





 the maniac dogs have been helping.

so, not a lot of sewing, some here, and a bit of work on the Janet Bolton piece, she has layers of edges, and they often are a little wobbly on purpose to keep the folk theme going,but, at the moment, the centre is empty, 
  to me,    its a big fenland landscape but it really should have something in it, I am going to spend some time on this ,because  I want to get it right.



Working on the frames first.




do you see the little edge peeping out?
Tomorrow I am off to the lazy daize studio for a get together with Trudi [quilting prolifically] and Angela[fenland textile studio, ] I am bringing cake and looking forward to a quiet sewing day.....



CALM AND SPACEY......

Its been a hard week, slaving over sweaty children, who keep asking for meals and constantly expecting to wear clean, ironed clothes,   grrrr  grrr.Luckily, my life has been saved by this woman,  who restored my will to live. About 30 years ago, I took my eldest son to the library and we took out a book with lovely patchwork pictures in it.   It was the first patchwork I ever saw and I fell in love with it .
I never expected to be doing a workshop with the author 30 years later.........

Janet Bolton, and her wonderful box of delights  came to enchant us this weekend, and we were inspired!
she gave us a talk and a workshop and showed us all her marvellous little folk art pictures.Her pictures are very spacey and calm very simple and elegant, very nostalgic.....

 we all tried very hard to make ours as good as hers........



Trudi based hers on her allotment garden- theres a pumpkin coming.



some were based on the seaside.

there was even a flying fish.



some got more done than others





mine isn't here, it needs work, I have to remove the kitchen sink!



BUSY, BUSY BEES.



The young quilters in the house  have been busy, busy bees this week, finishing their quilts for the competition at the quilters guild AGM.






Though I haven't done them for them, I have supervised, which is quite nerve wracking really,I am really proud of them and I hope they keep it up, because I do wonder how many people will be quilting in 30 years from now
,   Its hard to promote  any handicrafts   when ,increasingly, our kids live, learn and play in a virtual world , I think, rather than teaching them the slow, exact and accurate methods of sewing ,its better to attract them with quick, easy items to make and plan to teach them proper techniques later on, when they are hooked......

   Now they are done, I can finish my book cover here and think about  making my next book cover,there are three options that I want to explore,a small ravioli parcel book wrap, already started,or something recycled, either using an already re purposed Indian newspaper carrier bag which could be exciting but I am not sure how to do it
Or, re-use an old Indian cushion cover that itself is made from old re-used Indian embroidered sari fabrics.Its marvellous to think this started life far far away, its lived a whole life already, then a second life here being a cushion, lurked for a bit in a charity shop, and now its hanging about in my house, I absolutely love second hand textiles, I dont know why but they have a feeling to them that I dont get from shiny new fabrics,



Got to be the cushion cover, really, too gorgeous not to.........

But ,now that I have taken the old cover apart, I am a bit shocked at how delicate the sari fabrics are and  I realise I need to back each piece with something, perhaps a soft iron on vilene to suport them before I do anything with them...sugestions please....?

TIRED BUT HAPPY....

What a lovely mothers day weekend it has been,yesterday I enjoyed a delicious three course lunch with other mothers as our scouts cooked us a lovely meal, and today we went to the good old British seaside. Hunstanton to be exact.
we played on the beach and built mermaid shell palaces.

 we watched the tide come in......

gave the baby his first glimpse of the seaside...



we ate ice creams




had a ride on the fairground..



And finished the day with a fish and chip supper,going home, we sat in a traffic jam and gazed at the rain
An absolutely perfect day
, thank you family....I have done some sewing go here  to see it.