Jennie's Threads

There are so many nappies in your life with a 15-month-old... and every time we go out we lug a huge changing bag around with us. Nappies, nappy bags, wipes, sippy cup, bottle, milk powder, change of clothes, pouch of food, snacks, bib, spoons, dummy and increasingly, books and toys.  But it's a big bag, with a shoulder strap that slips off and if we're just nipping to the shops it's pain to drag it around. What I need is a small pouch I can shove in my hand bag with the bare essentials. I searched on Pinterest for nappy pouch and inevitably found nothing. It turns out the correct term in "diaper clutch". I'm so very English.... nothing really did what I wanted so I made my own up. I'm calling this "proof of concept". Which means it needs considerable tweaking.  At a basic level it's a mini quilt, with two squares off pockets on the inside and a velcro strap to hold it all together. I was clever enough to put two bits of velcro so it...

My aim for a Lovely Year of Finishes for May is to make sure I don't fall behind on the Moccasin BOM from Gen X Quilters . I didn't complete April blocks in April because of the small matter of moving house, and I could easily slip further and further behind... this is my way of getting back on track. But this post should be called "Three nearly [lovely] Moccasin Blocks"... So here are April blocks - this was my first time making string blocks and I really enjoyed it. It definitely won't be my last. And a single block for May - this will be the focal point of the quilt. It was also another technique I don't often play with - Dresden circles. Unfortunately, despite carefully making sure the printer was set to no scaling, and being very careful with my seam allowance, the circle is 3" too big. Yes. 3". I have no idea where it went wrong. I'm going to leave it for now. If, once I've pieced all the blocks, I have enough fabric left t...

If you follow me on Instagram then you'll know what I've been playing with this weekend. I have had the whole weekend to sew, while Michael and Mia have spent time together and it has been wonderful. I was all set up in the conservatory with my sewing machine and I've been binge watching Harry Potter! I've made Mia a quiet book, for when we go on holiday next weekend - in the hope it will keep her quiet in the car! I'm allowed to be optimistic. Warning - the rest of this post contains A LOT of pictures! I spent hours playing with felt and ribbon! The front cover is pretty straight forward... the whole book fastens with velcro The inside front cover is also very simple - we saw the cat fabric in the shop when we went to buy the felt and Mia saw it and started saying "cat, cat, cat"! I'll be really upset if this is her favourite page... But then the pages got a little more involved - Mia loves lions: "what noise do lions make?" ...

As you can clearly see from last Wednesday's " Addicted " post I really do enjoy EPP... and with so many projects on the go, I need to organize them, and make sure that I can grab and go with a project (especially with a holiday coming up!). So the last few evenings I've been working on a new 2-in-1 zippy pouch ( pattern from S.O.T.A.K handmade ). I made a few of these at Christmas and for swaps and loved how quickly they came together. But my one needed something more. I added that tag on the left too - not sure what I'll do with it... I changed the size - made the bigger one bigger so I can fit in finished 3" hexagons. I added an internal pocket - at the moment I'm thinking it would be a great place to 'park' wonderclips (I've found the to be really useful when piecing long edges such as joining 3" hexagons - they take the strain off my hand). But the interior panel is where I made the most additions...I added another pocket, ...

I can't believe how quickly the Bloggers' Quilt Festval has come around again - I was totally unprepared with no idea what to enter. And then I remembered this quilt. Not only do I love this quilt, but it's story is an important one. This is my Mix Tapes Quilt. Or rather, Chloe's Mix Tape Quilt. This foundation pieced tape block design was in issue of 10 of Love Patchwork and Quilting magazine and I made one because I liked it and thought maybe I'd make a mug rug with a single block. And then I made another. And another. And another until I had 15 in total. And it was about then that the purpose for this quilt became apparent. A good friend of my sister-in-law has a daughter called Chloe. When she was little, she survived cancer. And now, aged 13, her heart was failing her. Very quickly she went from a normal teenager to the transplant waiting list, spending each day in hospital. Steph asked me to make this quilt for her. I surrounded the 15 mix tapes wit...

To English paper piecing. Or so it seems! I thought today I'd do a round up of the numerous projects I have underway... starting with my newest project! This is the first round of the first rosette of the New Hexagon Millefiori quilt. It took me a while to twig on what this quilt was. It's based on the book The New Hexagon by Katja Marek and you have to have the book to make the quilt, but the quilt itself isn't in the book... the book contains the building blocks and each month Katja is releasing another rosette which combines those building blocks. The first rosette has 37 individual hexagon blocks in it and each of the hexagons is a pieced block - each of these is a 3" finished hexagon which means this is chunkier piecing that La Passacaglia. You can find more info on Katja's site - I dare you not to join in. I've decided to make mine using the low volumes and neutrals in my stash which some splashes of colour thrown in - this makes it very differ...

I've spent some spare time this week picking and cutting a lot of fabric. Over 120 different fabrics came out of my stash and onto the cutting table! The reason is this: A new quilt for Mia. She's now big enough to have a quilt and a pillow for bedtime, so Mummy needs to make her a quilt and pillow cover. And she loves cats. Absolutely loves them! It's a shame we have two dogs really... but Elizabeth Hartman's "The Cat Quilt" is perfect - it appeals to her because it is cats and it will be colourful, and it appeals to me because it is a sampler quilt - each cat face is different. And once the cutting was done, the piecing comes together SO fast! pretty trimmings Each cat face is a solid plus 2-5 print fabrics. Twenty-five faces equals a lot of different fabrics. And whilst I was cutting for the cats, I decided to cut a 2.5" square and a 5" square from each fabric too. The 5" squares will go into my charm square pile - I have a plan, ...

Better late than never...I finally succumbed and started my version of La Passacaglia. I was put off this project originally by all the fantastic fussy cutting going on on Instagram... you know who you are. It's not that I'm against fussy cutting, it's just that in general I don't have a very fussy-cuttable stash. But I started my Patchwork of the Crosses quilt amidst equally fabulous fussy-cutting and decided not to bother, so I don't know what was stopping me with this one. So when Paper Pieces had one of the lovely sales, I caved and bought the book and the starter pack of papers. Once I'd unpacked my stash I set about picking fabrics for the first cog, and I found that although I don't have fabrics with motifs or great big florals to cut and create kaleidoscopes with, I have a fair few stripes in my collection, and even blenders can be fussy cut... those metallic Xs are from a Cotton and Steel basic! But I made a decision whilst basting this f...

To make a change, I've decided to may my May goal a "catch-up" goal rather than a "finish" goal. I have plenty of incentive to finish up some projects thanks to the Finish Along, but I'm in danger of slipping behind with the Moccasin BOM as I missed out on April due to the move... So my goal for May is to add to January, February and March, pictured in this post. I need to complete three blocks - 2 from April and 1 from May None are particularly complex, but it's really important for me that I don't fall behind! Linking up