March Quilting Retreat

Yesterday was a rubbish day! A great classroom day but the rubbish bit was, I didn't even remember to think about taking pictures. Looks like nothing changed there!
There was a lot of catch up conversation as most of the ladies hadn't seen each other since the start of Sewing Prevention Season, missing last week because of the weather.

It's only 6 weeks until we go on our next sewing/quilting retreat so I thought I should mention it again. There are a few places remaining. Here are the details:-

Monday 3rd March - Thursday 6th

3 Nights & 4 Days at Hillscourt Hotel in the Lickey Hills

£485.00, to include single occupancy accommodation, unless you prefer to share. All meals, with tea & coffee breaks:- Breakfast is a full buffet of almost anything you can think of. Lunch is a lovely hot and cold food buffet.

Evening meals are 3 courses, with plenty of choice.

Most importantly, you'll have unlimited access to the large, and very well lit, sewing room for the 4 days, and nights should you have the stamina!

£50.00 will secure your place . This has to be a non refundable deposit.

You can email with questions, angiequilts@gmail.com or call me 07807530441. Or, even better, pop in to my shop, you will love it!

Stitching News

 My pictures are a bit out of sequence. As am I!!!

Deb was asked to make this baby play mat after her daughter had gifted one to a friend. It's dangerous allowing people to look at your quilts! Deb rose to the challenge though. Luckily, she was able to purchase one of my pre-cut "Eye Spy Six Packs" so that was a chunk of the work saved. 30 x 6 inch squares, all different designs, winner! The top is soon to be sandwiched.

Sue's top is finished. She had managed to find a little stitchy time during the festive break so was able to finish all the 9 inch border blocks. She's delighted with the look, and rightly so. The backing has been prepared and a sandwich will be made next Friday... a Sandwich Saturday but on a Friday!! If you need to use all the tables to make a sandwich, it's the only way.

I also had a baby gifting quilt to make over the festive break, (it is now finished) I was making a sandwich and remembered to take a piccy. "Eye Spy" play mats are a perfect gift for a baby. A practical gift to be loved, peed on, pooed on, snacked on, picnicked on, possetted and puked on and then absolutely washed to death, they can be tumble dried, as baby get older, they make great dens too.

Stitching News

After my post confessing my Crochet addiction, it seems quite a few have you have been up to crochet shenanigans too. Thank you for the encouraging tips. I am back to my patchwork now though, should I dabble in a new crochet project it will be tackled a bit at a time, in an evening and definitely not a whole entire, non-stop day! 

Back in 2024, that sounds ages ago doesn't it.

Princess Jackie finished her wonderful festive quilt. She had started it originally to be gifted. As the project got larger and more adorable, she decided she might have to keep it. I think lots of us do that. All those hours spent bonding with the gorgeous fabrics. The sorting, choosing, cutting, sewing, trimming, a bit of unpicking too, a wonderful process. But I'm happy to say that Jackie did find the courage and the quilt was gifted.

This is the quilt back, Jackie's chosen style of using lots of smaller pieces of fabric. It makes for a double sided quilt and, I am told, it reduces the left over fabric stash, but that could be just a rumor. Toot toot toot Jackie, the fanfare is a bit late really, your quilt is absolutely fabulous and truly finished.

Gail's gifting quilt. Ever so cute. We tried lots of fabrics for the border but came back to this neutral one. The cunning plan was to add those little corner squares so that there was no need to have a join on any of the sides, a brilliant idea that looks like it was planned all along. That's it, the top is finished. The sandwich was made last week, I am a bit behind, ha!

Our Pam has thoroughly enjoyed making this Log Cabin quilt top. She had seen a photo of someones' finished quilt on social media and had fallen for it. This was back in August. Pam tried, in vane, to find the picture of the quilt again, to show to me as she wanted to make one. She had mostly remembered that it was green and cream Log Cabin blocks. I think Pam hit her very own brief, don't you? There's a green border to add. But Pam has already started three other baby quilts, so goodness knows when this top will be finished. (yes Our Pam, I am talking to you xx)

Here you go. This is one of Pam's 3 baby quilts. She's found it a bit frustrating making a baby quilt using neutral fabrics. She had wanted to make a brightly coloured, cute, applique one you see. Lots of people are asking for neutral tones in their baby quilts these days, seems it's a thing. This is quilt number 2, it is already a sandwich, pinned last week actually. The brief for Quilt number 3 is "as bright and girly as Pam chooses" Ooooh, yes! Pam was excited to get onto that one, and she has.  

Quilty Quarters & Fun

That was a bit of a first week back to normal! I didn't expect to be busy really, what with the weather being so tricky and stopping many folk from getting out safely. It seems some trusty customers were so eager to get back into their sewing routine, that no weather would keep them away from my classroom. It was fun and new projects have been started. More on those later.

I thought I would catch up on my very own stuff. I don't have pictures of all the things I made, some have been gifted and I forgot to snap photos. A couple of 'things' have gone to the shop already, I can take photos of those another day, if I think on.

Mug Bags!

When we go on our Sewing Retreats or to Checkley Sunday Fundays, we need/like to take our very own mugs. Christabelle started making mug bags as gifts for her friends a couple of years ago and I pinched her idea. I purchased my very own pattern online and I found that I love making them and I love gifting them even more. They are so cute. The pattern is easy to follow it's this one . Once you have made one or two it's easy to customize them making them a bit more special for gifting, and I do. I wish I'd have taken pictures of them all now, some are fantastic, even if I do say so myself.

I don't find making 'Things' very easy at all. Quilts, yes, I am very confident with patchwork and quilting. Flat, 2D quilts don't have to fit perfectly on knees, sofas and beds, usually! 3D sewing taxes me rather. But lookie what I made. A very useful boxy thing. I used In R Form so it stands up really well. I sell this pattern in my shop and I will definitely be making more.

I am learning crochet. It's very portable and I can snuggle up on my sofa (or this rather special, recently acquired, John Lewis Snuggle Chair) whilst hooking, or knitting. I have to keep watching little YouTube tutorials though. My memory doesn't seem to save anything not quilted! I was very pleased with my very own self at this point, it was going up at the sides, so clever...

A few hours later, good progress but with my fingers aching and my bottom going numb and the big light on as it was going dark outside! I just couldn't leave it alone. It's like a Jigsaw heroin to me, instant addiction!

It's a good job it was holiday season as this is all I did in one whole day. 

Feeling very pleased with myself, but rather stiff I staged this picture for you. On my John Lewis Snuggle Chair. The Left Hookery pattern was quite easy to follow. There is a video showing how to get started too. The next day, I could hardly move my fingers, suffering for art!!! I did enjoy it though.

Faux Piped Binding

Have you ever tried this kind of binding? It's very effective. You need 1 1/2" wide strips of the main colour, grey on mine, and 1 3/4" strips of the fabric you want to use for the piping, obviously the pink fabric on mine.

After making both strips long enough to go the whole distance around the quilt (and the joins do need to be sewn diagonally, like you do with normal binding) you sew the two strips together, lengthwise.

Then press the seam allowance towards the accent colour.
Next, and this is a very important bit, carefully fold the binding over ensuring you fold the seam allowance in half, that's what gives the plumpity appearance to the the binding (I wrote plumpity, maybe it should be plump-ity-ness ?) 
I've looked online and found that there are loads of video tutorials to make Faux Piped Binding. None of them do this tacking bit and you will see (if you do go to watch any) that lots look more like binding with a flat flange.

I like to tack the whole way along the binding to stop it, the faux bit, from going flat, the seam allowance will want to stay flat so you have to show it who is the boss!

 You can see I used a bright turquoise thread to tack mine, which also helps when it comes to unpicking those large stitches after it's all stitched down.

You will need to sew the binding to the back of the quilt rather that to the front, as we usually do. Check first that you won't have any joins landing on the corners, if you do have joins hitting corners, that's a nightmare you won't like!
Once the binding is stitched in place and the ends carefully joined together, press the binding from the back side to make a good crisp seam, this will help a lot when you pull it over to the front.

You really need to use your Walking Foot with all the layers.

Having just told you that, it is very tricky to sew your binding right in the ditch of the piping with a walking foot, only because of the width of the foot's plate. See how you go.
If it's too tricky, try your zipper foot as you need to get up close to the piping really. 

This zipper foot, in my photo, is a Walking Foot!!! I kid you not... the Juki UX8 has a built in Walking foot that can be used with lots of different feet, even the Quarter inch one. (I know it's extravagant and pretty pricey) but it makes the BEST faux Piping with the most accurate and wonderful finish.

I'm not brilliant at describing stuff like this but, if you want to pop in to my shop, I can go through it again and give you a little sample to guide you. I keep all the left over bits exactly for that purpose. Alternatively come for a little lesson?

If there's a small group interested, we could make a sample together, like a workshop. I'm sure I could cope with that, ha! 

Here We Are Then, 2025!

Sewing Prevention Season should be in your rear view mirror by now. I say should be because it's still here in my world! I enjoyed having the break, not watching the clock is rather wonderful. Not knowing what day it is is a bit weird though. I believe today is Saturday! Snow is in our weather forecast from tonight, fingers tightly crossed it comes because that means we might get to sew a little something.

I just needed to pop this little post to let you know that I'm trying to gear up for Tuesday 7th, when life gets back to a sort of stitchy normal, weather permitting!
I do have a few photos taken during the last few classes of 2024, so I'll be back soon to show those off.

There's a Checkley Sunday Funday on 26th January, which is only 3 weeks away so it is time to be booking your place, if you haven't already.

Happy New Year to you all, lets hope it's a good stitchy one.

Stitching News

There is a lot of sewing happening in my classroom but, as I've mentioned before, I can't show you any pictures. I could tell you that it's all secret sewing but the truth is, though a lot is secret work, I just haven't remembered to take pictures. Luckily, some customer remind me!

Deb had decided that she wanted to make a quick quilt. Using a pre-printed panel for the front is just the ticket, with no piecing needed. We had sorted the backing fabric, the wadding and the binding a few weeks ago, but no further progress had been made. Deb arrived for class and spotted spare tables. Lick-etty-split, a sandwich session was in progress.

Toot toot toot Deb, a fabulous, finished and festive quilt was ready, in the one day.

 It went home to warm her knees. 

One happy customer, just as sewing prevention season is upon us.

Christabelle had decided to fussy cut her border strips, that was a bit of a job, but she patiently did it. Sometimes the extra fiddle-i-ness pays off. The rich orange-y inner border helps pop the kaleidoscope blocks too, don't you think? It's sandwiched now, in readiness for a bit of quilting, Chris has great plans on the design.

While I'm here, I'll just tell you about Sewing Prevention Season shop hours and days.

Tuesday 17th Open 9:30am - 4pm

Wednesday 18th, closed, as normal.

Thursday 19th, Open 9:30am - 4pm

Friday 20th, Open 9:30am - 4pm

Saturday 21st, Open 9:30 - 4pm 

If you need help out of these hours just ask, If I can help you spend money in my shop I will try!

My shop will then be close for the holidays.

Open again from Tuesday 7th January, weather permitting!!! We might get snow, you never know.

Stitching News

I'm not sure a title of Stitching News is realistic. There is a lot of stitching getting done, but it's secret sewing time, so I can't show you. Not that I've had a minute to take pictures anyway.
You will, I hope, be pleased to know that most of the last large order of new fabrics has been found a home, either on a shelf or in a trolley, it took some sorting I can tell you. There's not a lot of wiggle room on my shelves! All their Fat Quarters are sorted (the new fabrics) and ready for you too.
Then last weekend, I ran out of the wonderful, and very popular, 6-Packs for the Eye Spy quilts. They take a long time to prepare with 31 x 6 inch squares in each pack with no repeating designs.

And once the squares are all accurately cut, they have to be sorted into piles, I'm still working on those piles but they will be ready later today or at latest, tomorrow.

As it's now December, of course you noticed! It's crazy in the 'other' shops! I keep my shop pretty calm for you, no jingle bells tunes, no white Christmas etc, at all!

That leads me to Holiday Time opening hours for my very own shop. Decisions have now been made with the class ladies, so here goes, please take note:-

The last shopping day is Saturday 21st December.
Then it will be all closed up for Sewing Prevention Season.
My shop will re-open, and be getting back to normal-ness on Tuesday 7th January.
That's not too tricky to remember is it?