WOYWW....

Hello all.  Hope you've had a good week.  We are here to link up with Julia over at the Stamping Ground and show what's on our desks this week.  If you'd like to know more then just click on the link and why not join in the fun?

You saw the little bear I was working on last week?  

Well, here he is finished.  The fluffy fleecy fabric made a really lovely little bear.  Isn't he just gorgeous?  My customer loved him so much that, as there was still plenty of the fabric left in the item of clothing she brought me, she has now ordered two more bears to be made from it for other family members......which I will enjoy making once my order of the woven, iron on interfacing arrives.

The rest of the week I have filled my time in between my customer's sewing with little items using the Laura Ashley samples that Margaret sent for Jo and I to use.....I love a challenge as you know.  So here goes...

Two little hearts to hang up.

5 little lined, zipped purses.

A fabric brooch.

Plus 4 little owl pin cushions.

I hope you like what I've made so far.  I still have fabric to use but I'm struggling to think what to make next.....any ideas?

I hope you have enjoyed your visit today.  Please leave me a little message to let me know you've called in and I will do my best to pop along to see what you've been up to this week.

Hugs,

Annie x

WOYWW...

Well folks it's as if I've never been away....except I have had my batteries recharged and I feel the break really did me good.  I'm sure life is the same for others in that we all have highs and lows but just sometimes I need to shut the door and chill out to cope with the lows and make the very best of the highs when they arrive.

You will see from my last post that the family excitement is growing well  :-)  I am blessed with just the best family in the world and can say that each one of them goes out in the world and makes the world a better place for them being in it so can't wait for the extra little family members to arrive.

Funday Monday was another brilliant day of laughter, chat, cuppas and, as always, a chocolate or two [thanks T].  Twiglet brought down her Cuttlebug with the new Tim's Tattered flower and leaf dies and she provided each of us with a wonderful ceramic button [thanks Jo].  We each chose fabrics to suit the colours of our buttons and cut flowers out using the new toy.  A bit of heating with the embellishing heater and a few stitches here and there and ta da here is the brooch I made.

I have spread out the knitted squares I have made so far for you to see so you know I did manage to do a few while away last week but I'm sorry to say Jo that I didn't manage to knit while in the car very successfully....I dropped my needles once or twice then had to put it away  cos it made me travel sick :-(

Nearly 15 now so that's 7 more since last week  :-)

I've been busy doing a few sewing jobs this morning but have still managed a batch of yummy wholemeal rolls for lunch.....feel free to cut one in half and fill it with what ever you choose.....they smell wonderful.

I usually like to share a little of my garden with you all and this week it's lavender.  We have lots of bushes around the garden and it's really looking and smelling wonderful at the mo.....even the little bee seems to be enjoying it  :-)

And how's about this for honeysuckle?  It's really beautiful and smells divine especially with a drop of rain on it.  :-)

Hope you all have a really fab week and can enjoy a few sunny days.  Please pop over to Julia's blog and join in the WOYWW fun.

Good news, bad news....

First the good news.....

 These are my, now finished, latest batch of brooches.  They are all made from voile and all have a matching / contrasting button or two in the middle.I really love these and just know they would be really perfect on a summer outfit.  If you see one you like or would like one in different colours I would be happy to make / design a special one for you.  I shall be uploading them into the shop soon but til then feel free to leave me a comment here if you are interested in buying one.  They are £4.50 each plus postage.

Now the bad / sad news......

The triffid is under attack.....If you enlarge these two pics you will see lots of very hungry caterpillars.  They are the caterpillars of the white cabbage butterfly and obviously find my triffid very tasty.  I did try to pick them off when tiny but over night they seem to have munched their way through most of the leaves on this, over 6 foot, plant!  Alas I think we have no option but to dispose of the whole plant before the hungry little critters take over the whole garden.

Finally I would just like to say thanks to Jo and Suz for dropping in for coffee this morning.  It was really lovely to see you both.

WOYWW.....

What a wonderful week of celebrations last week was.  I could picture parcels going from house to house and also from country to country.  What wonderful business we were for the postal service  :-)

 This was the gift I sent to Kate.  I made her a desk tidy with one of my poppy pictures printed onto the fabric in the base and the WOYWW acronym accross the bottom so it blended into the leaves.

Kate very kindly sent me this pretty card to say thank you.  What a lovely way to link up new friends Julia.

This was the lovely gift I received from Kezzy.  It is now hanging very proudly in my sewing room.

[And I would have sent her a thank you card if only she had remembered to put her name and address on the parcel!  :-)  ].

Thank you so much Kezzy.

On my desk today are the brooches that I am in the process of making to restock the blog shop.  All our brooches that we had in the shop have now gone to Tina's shop up at Montgomery so Twiglet and I are now designing the new brooches to go in our shop.  Hope you like how these are going.....I prepared the petals / leaves on our Funday Monday and have now sorted out buttons for the centres and when I have time I will sew them together.

The only other thing I have on my desk today are curtains to shorten!......yuck yuck yuck.
It's not that I don't like these curtains...they are actually very nicely made curtains and I rather like the fabric.
It's just that they are heavy and there is a lot of fabric to heave around while I shorten them.......STOP moaning Annie and just get on with it!!!

Well girls thats it from me for today.  I really hope you have something more exciting than curtains needing shortening to show and tell on your desk today.  I will be around to visit all I can, when I can find a minute spare.  Pop over to Julia's blog and join in the WOYWW fun and I will hope to see you again soon.

WOYWW....

Good morning to all my fellow WOYWWers.  Brrrrrrr it's a bit chilly here this morning.

It's been another busy week for me....do I have any other?  :-)

Everything from ......

• Tea out and a theatre visit to see 'The Essence of Ireland' in Shrewsbury....A fab night was had [just wish I could manage all those high kicks] :-)  thanks Jo.
• A 2nd birthday tea out for my gorgeous little Granddaughter P...A wonderful night was had by all....how quickly time flies.
• Visiting our dear friend B in her care home....still very confused but a little more settled and not so agitated this week
• A fun day Monday without Twiglet ....Had another friend here to 'play' but of course big sis was missed by all.

.......to more painting and decorating [stairs and landing walls this time] and getting ready for new carpets this next weekend [hopefully!  cos at the mo the 3 rolls of carpets are full length of our sitting room!].

So? What's on my desk today I hear you ask  :-)

I have mounted my brooches on cards ready for the craft fair and made a couple of new ones [on the left in the pic] during our fun day Monday afternoon.

On my table today is.....

• the, now finished, lap blanket....I just love the colours.
• another knitted dolly on the go and
• my wooden chopping board that I do my melting and burning on.

...Oh and my Nutrogena....my hands are like coarse grade sandpaper at the mo  :-(

I am also making Christmas card toppers with some pretty Christmas fabric.  I'm wadding each little panel and using machine embroidery to decorate them.

And?  What am I doing today?  

I'm having another play time with my little Granddaughters while my daughter goes for a pre-op check for a minor op she needs next week.  Fingers crossed all goes well.

Thanks for dropping in on my blog and for all the lovely comments you leave me.  Please pop over to Julia's blog next to join in the fun and check out all the other crafty desks.

Brooches and a doll in a day....

 

I have now finished the brooches I made using man made fabrics that melt and thought you might like to see a few snaps .....

 

I will be mounting them onto cards and will probable take them to the up and coming craft fair but if anyone would like to buy one they will be just £4.50 each so please feel free to email me. [I can't get the photos to go where I want them sorry...think blogger has a mind of it's own today!]

 

As many of you will know it was our little Granddaughter P's 2nd birthday yesterday and I wanted something to give to her 7 month old little sister so she didn't feel left out while her big sister was opening her presents so at about 10 o clock yesterday morning I started knitting [it's what you do when you're a Grandma  :-) ].  This was the result and little L thought it was lovely so I thought I would show you just what's possible if you put your mind to it  :-)  I finished her in about 5 hours.  She is about 7" high and really huggable  :-)

WOYWW....

First I have a confession....Last week's WOYWW was launched automatically for while I was away and although we did get back home Wednesday evening since then my feet have rarely touched the ground so I haven't manage to do any return visits on my blogging friends.  Sorry.  I will aim to do better this week....promise.

Last Thursday morning I had to have my routine mammogram in Shrewsbury so Twiglet and I decided to use the opportunity to have a quick shop and lunch in Shrewsbury....bliss

Friday morning Twiglet and I paid a visit to Tina, from Indigo Moon in Montgomery, to discuss helping stock her tables for a Craft Fair. It's on Saturday 27th November in the town hall. So, if you fancy splashing out on a few fab hand crafted Christmas gifts then come along and see what we have been up to!!  Of course we chatted over a coffee [thank you Tina] and it was really special to wow another crafter with our crafty bits and bobs.

As you may well have seen on my previous post Saturday was another wow filled day for me.  It was spent oohing and awing over the most gorgeous dresses and making plans for our eldest daughter's special day.

Monday was a 'back to work' day for me and oh how I've been missed  :-)  As you can see my rail very quickly filled but of course Monday is Funday here and Twiglet came down as usual for the day.  We counted, wrote down the codes etc and filled boxes with lots of goodies ready for the up and coming craft fair and then set to to have creative fun. 

Tina had asked us to have a go at making some brooches using fabrics that melt around the edges and then layering them up and beading the middles.  As you will all know we are happy to have a go at anything and have even surprised ourselves how successful they are so far.  I still have finishing touches to put to mine but of course Twiglet has already finished hers and will probably have put them on her blog today  :-)

As you can imagine Tuesday had to be a catch up day and although I did nip out first thing for a quick hair cut I spent the rest of the day head down at the sewing machine  :-)  [ that is apart from a quick coffee break mid morning with Twiglet and another mid afternoon with my Tuesday coffee friend].....well, a girl just has to have some fun  :-)

I have lots and lots on my 'to do' list as well as clearing my 'to do' rail...

• Make Christmas cards using my fab fabrics
• Finish off my brooches started Monday
• Finish off my lap blanket you will have seen on prev posts
• Make a Mr Tumble for my Granddaughter's birthday [this weekend!]
• Make some flower balls that I saw on Suz's blog
• ........the list goes on and on  :-)

As I'm still catching up on clearing my rail today, and of course as I clear some yet more arrives, I will be doing my best to blog hop in between jobs.  Thank for dropping in and leaving your lovely comments.  Please pop over to Julia's blog to catch up on other crafting spaces.

Now just a quick snap to make you smile.  You will have seen that beautiful daughter of mine on the previous post trying on those gorgeous dresses for her up and coming Wedding.  Last night  was a gathering of the clan here so that she could see her little niece P to give her some early birthday presents.  Little P sat down with Aunty M and excitedly opened her presents and was thrilled with them all but especially when Aunty M tried out one of them for size.....

It's a Peppa pig fancy dress outfit with a hat and maybe, just maybe this could be the style of the head dress for her Wedding?  Little P thought she looked wonderful  :-)

WOYWW...

Hi fellow WOYWWers.  If you want to join in the WOYWW madness fun then pop over to Julia's blog for details, link yourself on Mr Linky with a photo of your crafting space  to share with the rest of the world.  

This week has been another eventful week for me.... 

My weekend was spent visiting care homes for my elderly neighbour and what vast extremes there are when it comes to what is available.  One I could have booked myself a bed in and another I wouldn't have booked my dog in and yet both have been assessed as excellent.

Fun Day Monday was just that......fun fun fun.  Twiglet came down as usual and then at around 10.30 our fun started....my 2 gorgeous little Granddaughters arrived for a few hours while their Mummy was helping her hubby in their new business unit for their banner printing business.  We had 4 1/2 very special quality hours amusing the girls.  They were as good as gold and I feel so very blessed to have them in my life.

Tuesday was spent catching up on ironing and all the other little jobs that were put aside for better things on Monday. Oh and the odd customer or ten needing sewing and two or three friends calling in for coffee and a chat.  All in a normal day for me  :-)

Today being Wednesday I am exposing my space to fellow bloggers.  My space has plans for changes. 

We are planning to put a doorway in here where this fitted cupboard is so we can get through direct from my sewing room into our living room.  It will mean losing this storage and the one end of my work surface in front of my window will have to move.  I have to think carefully so that all changes are the right ones therefore more planning than doing is needed at this stage but last night we fetched a new door frame in readiness :-)  It's very exciting and I hope to keep my blog updated with the changes as they happen.

This is a quick snap of my table full of my crocheted brooches, now all packaged and labelled.  They have all been uploaded in the shop on the gifts shelf for anyone interested in buying one. 

That's all I have to show today so now pop over to Julia's blog to see what's going on in other crafting spaces all over the world.  Thanks for dropping in and taking the time to leave a comment.  I really do hope you all have a great week.  See you next Wednesday.

What a brilliant Fun Day Monday it was this week...

This is just a very quick blog because I have lots of sewing to catch up with today. I just wanted to say what a brilliant day we had yesterday. Twiglet came down as usual in the morning and we did the cutting of curtains and the quick jobs that had to be done urgently.

We then cleared the decks here and filled our working table [and most of the rest of the room] with wedding inspired fabrics, threads and beads etc. We looked at what we had already made and planned the items we were going to make. We have been asked for a good luck wedding horseshoe so this came top of the list. Our planning and designing took up the rest of the morning so that after lunch we could make a start on the fun bit.

The first thing we did after lunch was to invite our lovely friend Paula to join in our fun :-) We have both set up web cams in our craft rooms so she can join in our fun. Our other friend T joined us around 2 o clock and the 4 of us had a brilliant afternoon of fun and crafting. Isn't modern technology a wonderful thing? Paula sat dumfing a little bear [well, that's what she said it was hehehe only joking Paula :-) ]. Our friend T beaded up a beautiful red brooch she had dumfed earlier and Twiglet and I set to to dumf embellishments for horseshoes.

Here's to many more fun days in the future :-)

Dumfing....

I know a lot of you already know what Dumfing is but we have had lots of enquiries lately so I thought I would do a proper blog to attach to the link on the side bar.

Dumfing is our word for embellishing.


Back last October Twiglet and I bought ourselves a Huskystar ER10 Embellisher each and we both agree that this has been our best 'toy' ever purchased.







Up til then we had used single embellishing needles or hand held embellishers with several needles in as shown here with the Brush to work on [I always keep a piece of felt on the top while working on it].





Embellishing needles are barbed needles that push fibres from one material into the other so locking them together. The barbs only face one way so that the fibres are pushed down but the needle then pulls back out clean, leaving the fibres behind. Hand held ones work perfectly for small hand held items like the bears I make but it takes time and lots of patience [and, in my case, fingers that end up like pincushions!]. For larger items the embellisher takes over beautifully. We have made covers for books, brooches and larger pictures to name but a few of the items and you can find some of these over in our blog shop.

We are able to combine threads, wool rovings, fabrics and all sorts of embellishments and produce really yummy things.

Now, I can hear you saying why dumfing? Our machine makes a noise when it works. It goes....dumf dumf dumf :-) From this has come a whole new vocabulary......
To dumf...to embellish
Dumfable....a yummy fabric that will easily embellish [not all fabrics will embellish]
Dumflings....little works of art made using embellishing
Dumfers....The crafty sisters of course :-) ....the list goes on :-)

If you google dumfing you will find our blogs come up top of the list and my son has even tried to get it put in a dictionary :-) I would advise anyone to get themselves an embellisher but beware it will take over your life...in just the best of ways. Here are just some of the ways it has taken over mine and some of the gorgeous things Twiglet and I have made with it.




My box full to overflowing with dumfable wool rovings. What gorgeous colours you can get. I try to keep them sorted into colours and, yes, they really do all squash down so the lid shuts :-)






Yummy dumfable fabrics. Natural fabrics such as wool, silk and linens work best but we have found lots of man made ones work well too so well worth trying anything.






A hand dumfed bear. I have spent many a relaxing night dumfing whilst watching the telly.








Dumfed Poppy picture. I have made, and now sold, very many pictures and really love the 3D effect you can get with fabrics to make beautiful flowers.











A brooch made from dumfling loveliness. Twiglet has made some really gorgeous brooches of all colours and happily takes orders it colours have to be specific.











A beautifully dumfed picture frame. Twiglet has made several frames and each one is so touchy feelie. It's just a shame we don't have touchy Internet :-)




There are so many other really fab cards, books etc over in the shop it's well worth making a coffee, pulling up a chair and having a browse.

Welcome to the Moo-ed gallery

Muddyboots loved my little felted cow [as seen here on the left] and asked if there was anything else in the Mootiful range so of course Twiglet and I put our heads together and would now like to take you through the Moo-ed gallery.

£10.00 each plus postage







We proudly present Cassy cow the hand puppet made entirely to my own design and one of a wide range of puppets [watch this space for more tomorrow].





£30.00 plus postage.










A fleece finger puppet with hand felted cow's face.



£3.00 each plus postage









A cute fleece child's hat and scarf . Suitable for approx 1-3 yr old. Have given the first one made to my little one year old Granddaughter tonight and it fits her perfectly. :-)





£6.00 per set plus postage










A gorgeous little lined dolly bag with elasticated top. Approx 5" across the base and 7" high.



£6.00 each plus plus postage








Hand felted brooch,

peg clip and



fridge magnet.

£2.50 each plus postage.