A Friday Finish

It's been great fun being on holiday, I think I need more holidays in a year. During the day we've been out visiting places and walking but in the evening I've been catching up on my hand stitching. Last year I took part in the Bag Ladies stitch along organised by Barbara from Cat Patches. There were 12 ladies to stitch, one for each month. With one thing and another happening last year I only completed 3 and one or two of them were hardly started. So for my holiday stitching I bought Buelah along and spent some quality time with her. She is now completed and is looking fabulous.

I really enjoyed finishing the stitching on her especially the flowers. I had taken a couple of the other ladies along as well just in case I needed some more stitching. I've chosen to work on Abigail next. We worked on Abigail last October and this is how far I got.

As you can see I'd made a start on her coat and her tackle box. On Thursday evening I did a little more stitching on her coat.

My goal for April will be to complete Abigail.

Yesterday we travelled home. It wasn't a fun drive as it had snowed quite a lot overnight. The roads were clear and we knew that lower down the valley there wouldn't be any snow. The other problem at the start of the journey was the visibility due to fog. We hoped the weather would stay fine as we drove but the rain started before we'd covered 50 miles and it kept raining all the way to London.  It was great to get home and Scamp was very pleased to see Picasso again

I'll tell you about the rest of our holiday over the next couple of days. As the weather got worse I wasn't able to use my phone for internet connection as the network became unstable. 

To celebrate my Friday finish I'm linking this post with Amanda Jean for Finish it up Friday For now I've got to go and do some more stitching on Abigail.

Lyndsey

Lots of Waterfalls

Today we went to Ingleton and visited the waterfalls. We has considered climbing Ingleborough but decided against this as I wasn't sure if Scamp had the energy. The journey to Ingleton was fun and on the way we saw the viaduct from the Harry Potter films. The weather today was perfect for a walk, warm and sunny but with a gentle breeze that stopped you getting over heated.

We also saw a lot of lambs frolicking in the fields but unfortunately whenever we saw lambs there wasn't a place to park and take photos. I also had problems with my camera over the day as without realising it I kept catching one of the buttons and altering the settings. This meant quite a few photos were out of focus.

The car park for the fall trail was easy to find and had a cafe that served really good coffee and tea and really great carrot cake. The trail is a circular walk with the first part following the River Twiss through Swilla Glen to the Pecca Falls. On the way we passed the money tree. It has been considered good luck to put a coin into the tree and over the years it has become completely covered.

The Pecca falls are made up of 5 falls that drop 30 metres over sandstone and slate.

After the Pecca falls the path climbed steeply and at the top there was a small snack kiosk. I had a vanilla ice cream that was delicious. Scamp always likes the last bit of my ice cream. I also bought some flapjack as my vet advised me to carry some when taking Scamp for strenuous walks as being a small dog his blood sugar levels can drop. 

We passed Hollybush Spout and on to Thornton Force. This provided inspiration for the artist William Turner. At Thornton Force the river tumbles 14 metres over a limestone cliff. Here there was a comfortable bench and and picnic area to enjoy the view.

From here the path follows the river through the Twiss valley and we crossed the river by a footbridge before climbing up to Twisleton Lane. Twisleton Lane is an old Roman road leading into Kingsdale with spectacular views. As we dropped down to the farm we could see Ingleborough, which is one of the three peaks of the Yorkshire dales.

Further on we came to the Beezley Falls on the River Doe. At the Baxengyhll Gorge we walked out over the river on a viewing bridge to get a better view of the fall. I'm not great with heights but it was well worth the panic.

Finally there were the Snow Falls

From here we walked back to the town by the Twistleton Glen. We enjoyed another coffee at the cafe before heading home. A really fabulous day.

Because I ended up deleting a lot of my photos because they were blurry I lost track of which of the falls they were. I'm not going to waste the photos so I'm adding a couple of them here.

I think this photo is of the Pecca falls.

Hopefully tomorrow I won't mess up the camera settings and I have some decent photos. We haven't decided the itinerary for tomorrow yet but we have a few ideas. I haven't done much stitching today but I'm going to spend half an hour now before going to bed.

Lyndsey

Slowly stitching by the fireside

On Friday I finished work for the Easter holidays. Well this week is holiday and next week I am taking some time back for the weeks I've worked five days instead of the four I get paid to work. So that there was no chance I could be asked to work I booked a holiday cottage in Yorkshire for this week. It's right up at the top of North Yorkshire, nearly into Cumbria and is about 5 miles from the Hawes. We have great views across the fells from the windows and all you can hear, except for the occasional car is the sound of bird song. The journey here yesterday took several hours as it's approximately 300 miles and travelling with Scamp meant we had to make frequent stops for comfort and walk breaks. Early on there was a fine misty rain but as the day progressed the sun came out and it made for a very pleasant journey. We opted to travel by motorway, so once across London we travelled by the M1, M18 and the A1(M) until we had roughly 34 miles to do. The final bit was done on the smaller A roads.

The cottage is very comfortable and the owner had lit a fire for us so yesterday evening we settled down to watch TV with the fire burning brightly. This evening John lit the fire and we are planning on starting the 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle that we bought with us. 

I bought some stitching with me. I had originally planned to bring the Luna Lapin book and the felt to make the rabbit but in the end I decided to bring my grandmother's garden quilt and the Bag Ladies that I haven't yet completed.

Last night I sat and did some stitching on Buelah. I stitched her lanyard for her scissors and just had to attach the little scissors to see how they'd look. I stitched her legs and then took ages to sort out which thread I'd been using for her hair. I hope to finish her hair tonight.

This morning I attached some more blocks to the Grandmother's garden quilt. I've now added 17 of the 30 blocks. I hope to get this row finished by the end of March.

This afternoon we took Scamp for a walk over the fells. The weather is cold here so we all needed our warm coats including Scamp.

Scamp really enjoyed all the new sniffs. The viaduct  carries the Settle Carlisle railway

Underfoot the ground was very boggy.There is limited soil over rock and with the rain and snow recently there is a lot of water about. Scamp was occasionally walking with the water well over his knees. He just kept on walking and his tail never stopped wagging whilst walking.



There are a few cottages in the landscape and dry stone walls, and not many trees. It feels huge. Scamp really enjoyed the walk but was very dirty. Once home I had to wash his legs and paws

He is now curled up, fast asleep. Walking through the mud has really worn him out. 

Dinner is cooking and smells delicious, the fire is burning brightly, Scamp is snoring quietly and I'm about to do some more stitching. I'm linking this post with Kathy from Kathy's Quilts for her Slow Sunday Stitching Go and check out what everyone has been working on.

Tomorrow we're off to Ingleton and possible follow the waterfall walk to visit the 6 waterfalls. Richard wants to try taking some good photos of the falls. We may also walk up Ingleborough. We have no set plans, we'll go with what we decide we want to do tomorrow.

Lyndsey

Quilt Qwasy Queens

Today the Quilt Quasy Queens blog hop continues celebrating International Quilting Day and it's my turn to share what I've been up to.  The idea of this blog hop is to talk about our UFO's and to finish one or some of them up.

At the end of February I hunted through my UFO's and found I had more than I thought. There's the grandmother's garden English paper pieced quilt which I started several years ago. I've recently been working on this one but as it is all hand stitched this will not be finished in the near future.

I have  another quilt that includes hexies which I started as my Rainbow Scrap challenge in 2015. I pulled this one out and thought seriously about finishing it but I want to add another row of blocks to make it bigger and  in hunting through my scraps I found I didn't have any large solid colour pieces for the backgrounds. I put this one to one side.

I also decided against this one as I just didn't want to work on it.

So that left my  Compass quilt.

I finished this quilt top last September and put it to one side ready to be made into a quilt sandwich. At the end of August I had a mastectomy and before I dealt with the quilting I needed my scar to heal and also to complete my radiotherapy. At the end of November I bought the backing fabric and the wadding I needed and in early December I spent a day basting the quilt. It took me all day because the chemotherapy had caused me to have neuropathy and handling the heavy quilt caused me pain in my hands. Therefore I needed to do a little at a time. 

Having decided to work on this quilt I got out my Brother machine which has a large aperture under the arm making quilting easier. I hadn't used this machine for a year as being bigger it is heavy to move. I practised using the machine to refresh my memory of the controls and was finally ready to begin when the weather turned colder and blew in with lots of snow. My hands started to hurt a lot and moving the quilt around was impossible so I reverted to hand stitching some hexie blocks.

The great thing with quilting is it's a hobby that doesn't need to be rushed so there is time to get my UFO's completed once my hands have settled down. 

Several years ago at Guides we made prem baby quilts like this one for the neonatal unit at a local hospital.

Recently a couple of the girls had used fabric that we had left over in the cupboard to make some more little quilt tops. So I added the fleece fabric to the back of them since I couldn't get on with quilting my compass quilt

If the girls want to make any more  we will have to get more supplies as we have exhausted all the fabric we had. I haven't made any baby quilts recently so haven't added any suitable fabric to my stash. This was a relaxing job and one that needed doing. I finished them on my Elna machine stitching the fleece to the wrong side and turning them. The opening was closed with hand stitching.

Just as my neuropathy was settling down again to be manageable and I thought I would get at least some quilting done we had the return of the cold snowy weather at the end of last week and my hands are once again very painful. Hopefully as we move into the warmer months I will be able to get my quilting done. I really want to be using my compass quilt on my bed later this year.

There's a give away for you to enter. Good luck everyone.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Here's the schedule for today and tomorrow;

Tuesday, March 20, 2018

| Words & Stitches | Sew Many Yarns | Quiltin’ Grandma’s Blog |
| Books, Hooks, Sticks, etc. | Adventurous Applique and Quilting |

Wednesday, March 21, 2018

| Kathy’s Kwilts and More | Seacoast Quilter |
| DesertSky Quilting | Seams To Be Sew |

Have fun visiting and seeing what everyone has been working on. It's been great seeing the UFO's that have been finished and I wish I had been able to complete mine but at least I got the prem baby quilts finished and we can now give them to the hospital.

Lyndsey

Slow Sunday Stitching

This is a very quick post as this week has been a very slow sewing week. I've had so many emails over the week saying 'Urgent we need ...... by tomorrow' that I seem to have spent all week working and had no time for fun. This evening, having spent most of today working I sat down to watch Endeavour and complete some slow stitching. Last weekend I made some new hexies. They are perfect for prepping when you only have a couple of minutes to spare. Anyway tonight I carried on stitching the latest round of blocks to the grandmother's garden top. I've added 10  blocks so far. The top is slowly and I mean very slowly growing.

I wish I could manage to use a thimble successfully as my one finger has holes in it from pushing the needle through the fabric. My mother always used a thimble but I have never mastered them......similar to the fact I've never mastered putting on eye makeup but far more useful. If any of you have useful hints on how to use a thimble please send them my way.

Next weekend is totally free so I've already booked my sewing time. Until then I'll be adding more blocks to the grandmothers garden quilt. Hopefully I'll finish this round. I also have two weeks off over Easter and I have my sewing all organised. We're going to Yorkshire for the first week and I'm taking my machine with me. The idea is to do some walking during the day and sewing in the evening.

I still have to tell you about our trip to Slimbridge and I hope to have time to write the post this week. We saw some fabulous birds.

Starting next week is the Quazy Quilt Queens blog hop. Here is the schedule.

Thursday, March 15, 2018

 | Quilting Queen Online | Tu-Na Quilts, Travels, and Eats |
| Melva Loves Scraps | The Quilted Snail | 

Friday, March 16, 2018

| FunThreads Designs | Elizabeth Coughlin Designs | Quilting with Vanda |
| Life in the Scrapatch | Thrift Shop Commando |

Monday, March 19, 2018

| Just Because Quilts | MooseStashQuilting | Pumpkin Patch BC |
| Quilting Affection Designs | Ms. P Designs USA |

Tuesday, March 20, 2018

| Words & Stitches | Sew Many Yarns | Quiltin’ Grandma’s Blog |
| Books, Hooks, Sticks, etc. | Adventurous Applique and Quilting |

Wednesday, March 21, 2018

| Kathy’s Kwilts and More | Seacoast Quilter |
| DesertSky Quilting | Seams To Be Sew |

I'm linking this post with Kathy at Kathy's Quilts for her Slow Sunday Stitching Go check out what everyone's working on this week.

Lyndsey

Small, smaller,smallest blog hop

Welcome to the first day of the Small, smaller, smallest blog hop organised by Carol from Just let me quilt Thank you Carol for organising the hop, it has been fun creating the projects for it.  I really enjoy joining in with blog hops because it makes you get on and create something. I find it very easy to spend weeks considering what I could make and what fabrics and colours to use and never getting started. With a hop you have to plan and get on with it in order to complete your project in time.

I had planned to complete three items but I have only two that are finished. The instructions for the hop were to produce something small, nothing larger than a baby quilt. That instruction made life easy as I can do small very well.

My small project is to make a cover for my Elna sewing machine.

 We live in London and like all large cities a lot of dust gets into the house from all the activity going on outside. It gets worse in the summer months when you want to have the windows open and when Picasso is moulting his winter coat I find lots of his fur all over it if I leave it set up on the table as he likes to lie across it or lean against it. I had a look at several methods of making a cover on the internet and it all seemed very straight forward plus I had the perfect fabric for the job so no need to buy anything.

My first decision was not to make a hole in the top for the carry handle. The handle goes almost the full length of the machine and I felt that making a hole would distort the shape unless I added a fastening. In any case I have a carry bag for the machine should I want to take it anywhere and I just wanted a cover to prevent the dust and cat fur getting into it,

After careful measuring and cutting the pieces were basted to the wadding so I could quilt them

The picture part was quilted between the pictures and around the frames. The top of the cover and the sides was quilted with a meander. Attaching the side pieces was rather like setting in sleeves on a jacket or shirt.

I love the colours in the fabrics, they are just so cheerful.

My second piece is smaller and is also a cover but in this case it's a cover for a portable hard drive.

My older daughter is an art and design and textiles teacher at a secondary school (11 to 18 year old). She had been using a pen drive to take her PowerPoint presentations to school with the information about artists and their work but she realised that they are easy to lose and also get damaged quite easily. Her brother sourced a hard drive but she wanted a case to keep it in as the hard drive is in a plastic case which could break if dropped. I used this mad scientist and technology fabric to make a case that holds both the hard drive and the USB lead to connect to the computer. It's quilted with a small meander. The top is held closed by two velco spots

It all fits very nicely into the case and keeps it safe in her work bag. An added bonus was that this project used up the last bit of this fabric that I had left in my scrap pot.

The third item I was going to make was a small quilt for a bed in my doll's house. I have some lovely Liberty lawn that will do the job perfectly but my brain refused to do the maths on the size I needed to make. My doll's house is 1/12 scale so a reasonably easy calculation for a double bed size quilt but I wasn't sure if I'd worked it out right so put everything away until later. I'll make a start on that later this month. It will all be made by hand and I will have quite a bit of time to work on it when I travel to Reading by train on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Thank you for popping over to see my projects. Now you need to visit the blogs of all the other participants today.

Kris Loves Fabric

Creative Blonde

Tu-Na Quilts, Travels, and Eats

Lily Patch Quilts

Needled Mom

Quilt Fabrication

Sew Many Yarns (You are here)

Meanderings Along Lizard Creek

Melva Loves Scraps

I can't wait to see all the projects. There are so many beautiful projects to see and I always get a lot of ideas for things to make in the future.

Lyndsey

Slow Sunday Stitching.

There has been quite a bit of hand stitching going on this week but remember that not all hand stitching is created equal. At the start of the week I had a lot of mending to do with several buttons to sew on, a skirt zip to mend and a hem to restitch. Yugh mending is my pet hate.

It's not all gloom and doom however as I got some fun stitching done as I've currently been making some hexie blocks for the next round of my grandmothers garden quilt. Tonight I will be changing pace and occupation. I had started a jumper for John but last year I found it very heavy going as it is knitted in the round and uses thicker yarn. Having reached the armholes the weight of the knitting was too heavy for me to hold. My neuropathy seems to be improving, although it is very slow so this evening I am going to pull out my knitting, re-acquaint myself with the pattern and see if I can manage to knit some rows. I have added the arms so there are a lot of stitches and a lot of weight but as they say 'you don't know what you can do until you try.'

I've never made a jumper on circular needles before and keep on worrying that it's not going to be big enough but when I measure it, all the measurements are correct.

Tomorrow the 'Small, Smaller, Smallest' blog hop starts. Here's the schedule;

March 5

Kris Loves Fabric

Creative Blonde

Tu-Na Quilts, Travels, and Eats

Lily Patch Quilts

Needled Mom

Quilt Fabrication

Sew Many Yarns

Meanderings Along Lizard Creek

Melva Loves Scraps

March 6

MooseStashQuilting

Vroomans Quilts

Creatin' in the Sticks

Beaquilter

Quilt Doodle Designs

Den syende himmel

Quiltscapes

Quilt Taffy

Hazel’s Daughter

March 7

Selina Quilts

Cynthia's Creatng Ark

Sunshine Quilting

Marjorie's Busy Corner

Elm Street Quilts

Kathy’s Quilts

Pamela Quilts

That Fabric Feeling

Words & Stitches

March 8

Sew Incredibly Crazy

What About Rheema?

Kwilty Pleasures

All Thingz Sewn

Ms P Designs USA

Ridge Top Quilt

Life in the Scrapatch

Seams To Be Sew

Blessings of Thread

Just Let Me Quilt

I'm linking this post with Kathy from Kathy's Quilts for Slow Sunday Stitching Why not visit to see what everyone is working on.

Lyndsey