Spot the Difference

The Fairy Tale Quilt is filling up. I've added the straw and stick houses for the three pigs, a rickrack beanstalk with, at the moment, unattached leaves, a huge firebird off to steal the golden apple, and a lamp awaiting a genie. There's an awkward space under the brick house that I need to fill, and I still don't have a frog prince - a character I'm quite fond of, although with legs difficult to sew. All my characters are still eyeless, and the troll has lost his head. I'm looking forward to adding tiny details, once all the main bits are on, which should be soon now.

Still on the fairytale theme, I've completed another page for my tatty book - a grimly determined firebird this time!  I'm really pleased with the colours on this one. Adding fine white stitches to the yellow apple seems to make it glow. 

The four double pages are now complete and sewn together. I just have to work out how best to put a cover round them. Probably a bit of planning before I embarked would have been useful, but sometimes worrying about future issues means that nothing ever gets started. 

Even the best plans can go wrong though. I started with what looked like the easiest of the clothes for the rabbit, and successfully completed the summer dress, but I wasn't happy with the material I used, and I'm not a fan of floaty dresses anyway. On to the gilet, which I made from some scraps of tweed that must have been donated to me, as I've never sewn with it before. All was going well until I tried to fit the shoulder seams - the back and front pieces didn't match. What had I done wrong? I managed not to panic, and turned to google instead. It turns out the pattern pieces are printed incorrectly in the book; an errata message tells you how to fix the pattern. But I had already sewn on the pockets and didn't feel inclined to start again. To make it work, I abandoned the inside facing and cut lining using the outer pattern pieces. This worked fine, until I had to squeeze the entire front of the gilet through the too-narrow shoulder seams. A bit of unpicking did the trick, followed by some rather unlovely resewing. I was quite proud of myself at the finished result, and the rabbit is at least bare no longer. I feel it may not ever get anything to match this rather fine article. In the spirit of only using what I have, the next creation will be made from an old pillowcase. Look out for pink spotted dungarees! 

The silver lining in the cloud was that, when I googled the pattern, I came across the you-tube channel of Claire England, who demonstrates how to sew the patterns in great detail and with really useful tips. Just what a wobbly stitcher like me needs. Here's the link https://www.youtube.com/@ClaireEngland1

 

Bare Rabbit

 Time for a new challenge! 

This autumn, I'm having a go at improving  my sewing skills. Mostly, the machine only gets used to zigzag round applique, and, in fact, is working overtime on the Fairy Tale Quilt at the moment. But I found this book on the second hand market, and decided it would be a good project to make the rabbit and all her clothes. Some of the outfits are quite advanced (for me), featuring sleeves, buttonholes, pintucks and gathering, all on a small scale. The advantages are that I won't waste a lot of precious time and fabric if it goes wrong.

 

The book seems perfect for me - very clear instructions with lots of diagrams, full size pattern pieces and some handy sewing tips. 

The first job was to make the rabbit. She is mostly felt, with scraps of fabric for the ears and feet. I aim not to buy anything new for this project, so she is a patchwork of grey scraps. The eyes are tiny black pompoms and the nose is pink knitting wool, which was thick enough to give a good coverage. Her arms are held on by buttons, sewn right through the body so that they move. In fact, most of the sewing was by hand, with the felt seams whip stitched together. With ears up, she is about 48 cm tall, a bit larger than I expected, and which might lead to some strange coloured clothes as I attempt to use only fabrics I have. 

Hopefully the rabbit won't be bare for too long!

Part of the challenge of making the clothes will be following instructions and being precise. My natural inclination is to cut scraps freehand and sew haphazardly together. So I've got a lazy evening project on the go, making a tiny book. As usual, I've gone for a fairy tale theme. This cottage in the woods is one of the double page spreads, measuring about 13cm by 6cm. All the scraps are raw edged, and held on by seed stitching. I find old, worn clothing is lovely to stitch through, and the frayed edges fit the theme. This page features scraps from a shirt, a skirt, offcuts from someone's wedding dress and an ill-advised garment from a trip to Disneyland, which I never wore, but has provided a wealth of cloth to use. I've used a single strand of embroidery thread and metallic machine thread for the stitching. 

Once Upon A Time

I have always wanted to make a fairy tale quilt, and this year I got stuck in, after finding the perfect background material in Hobbycraft. So far, most of the big pieces are appliqued on, mostly by machine, but a few fiddly bits by hand. I made the decision to only do animal characters (not counting the troll, who has had his arms trimmed since this photo was taken). There are a few more buildings and trees to add, and then the details which will hopefully make it come to life. I will be much happier when the characters all have their eyes!