Monday 11 July 2016

Beautiful French script and delicious fabrics .... add some delicate hand embroidery & a design forms.







Those who sleep under a quilt
sleep under a blanket of love....





Whilst stitching away in my sewing room and not actually looking out in the garden at the birds, bees and butterflies, which is my normal thing to do whilst stitching.  I take a little stitch and then look out whilst pulling my thread through....  I was actually looking at some fabrics I had laid out.  I had put several together ( different ones all either paisleys or old eiderdown fabrics) and I kept looking.
Then I added some beautiful and extremely old letters and envelopes in French script ... and kept stitching.  Suddenly it was like a light bulb moment.   

Let me explain, thanks to a lovely reader, Dawn who put me on to a great product that I can print onto and it is like a linen, from our ink jet printer, My designs are morphing to new levels at the moment.(Dawn I ordered two packs and they have arrived! happy days!)

So if I see something that is paper based but beautiful I can now in fact copy the image on to fabric and use it in my stitching.  If I am using the original paper product in a picture that is OK because it
is behind glass and you do not need to wash it .. unlike a quilt top say!

So I could see a very pretty design going on.... So of course me being me I had to drop what I was doing and get my note book out to jot down some ideas and also gather what I had laying out for me to look at and pop it straight into a design basket with notes attached....

This will be a personal stitching project and I think it might be a wall hanging quilt piece.  I love having fabric items hanging behind our iron beds.   I feel you can have a few and change them periodically.  It is nice so that they can be cleaned and checked for sunlight and any unwelcome
nibbles from unwanted moths ..... I wage a war on those little fluttering munchers!!  Cedar wood, lavender my electric bat that I bought to swat them.   They never used to bother me until I saw first
hand the damage that they can do to beloved fabrics and blankets ....

With very little time for lots of personal stitching right now it is nice to quilt a wall hanging as it is not the same time frame as making a quilt for beds ... these are a lot smaller and manageable as well and can be hand quilted, which I love doing if there is not too much of it .. it is a therapeutic thing for me to do and to be honest at the moment in the evenings on dull days I get cold so to have one on your lap whilst you work on it .. is very cosy indeed.


I am thinking as it is going to be a wall hanging I can of course add embroidery and make it a slightly
picture one with a bit of applique as well..... So I have in my spare time ( what spare time?) have been designing each square.  Individual ones I like and then I will scan them in and cut them out of paper and piece them in the order that I feel looks best.  Take a photo of it and then begin work.

Thinking of each design is fun and no doubt not all will be used but it is a fun personal project right
now.  My evenings or weekends when at home and my husband is doing things, be it cleaning cars, a little wood work project,
gardening ... I can steal some time to stitch.  What is so funny is that he will say to me ' Why don't you stop working and do something for you or read a book, some down time' .. Trying to explain to him that is exactly what I am doing is another matter... I do not see my work as a chore and therefore it is different again when stitching for us .....

The other thing that I purchased is some patchwork papers for English paper piecing work.  I had the
tiny hexagons as you know but I have bought mini flowers and mini diamonds!  They are fabulous.  I enjoy sitting and cutting around these with fabric and tacking them in place.  I have started to put those into a basket too.... this way I can sort through them and make a flower up or a star shape from the triangles .. even box shapes if you want to.   If I think something like that is needed to be added I can just sort through and pick some out and stitch them together to add to something ..... This is a great little stitch project because you can do these in no time and they soon pile up ....

Well that is it for this Monday morning I must get to work, via the kettle for another coffee.  I hope you have enjoyed your read this morning and as always Happy Stitching! XX



6 comments:

  1. The paper templates look fun, what are you going to do with those?

    Julie xxxxxx

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    Replies
    1. Hi Julie

      Well make lots up and the stitch on to a wall hanging .. I think !!

      Sarah xxxx

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  2. Beautiful fabrics and design ideas Sarah. Glad I may have helped a little. Your home must look very beautiful with all the love and thought that you put into things..a case of 'We reap what we sew' lol!
    I know that I will never make a full quilt, I haven't got the time, so I tend to make small projects or gifts.
    Enjoy your day x

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  3. Hi Dawn

    Thank you .. Well at the moment I am making for our eventual move ..

    I love making and I love Enhlish paper piecing so I will see how some ideas turn out!
    If you do these and keep adding to them you will be surprised how quick they build up.

    Wall hangings is what I am trying to achieve!
    Sarah xxxx

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  4. I did begin to sew a grandmother's garden quilt ie hexagons, paper pieced. I used some old embroidered pieces in it but it's remained the same size now (small)for 7 years!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  5. I did begin to sew a grandmother's garden quilt ie hexagons, paper pieced. I used some old embroidered pieces in it but it's remained the same size now (small)for 7 years!!!!

    ReplyDelete