Step back in time to the 1960s

One of my favourite shopping expeditions is to hit the charity shops in a town to see what treasures are waiting. My latest find was a Woman’s Realm sewing and knitting supplement from 1967 for the bargain price of 49p!
  

So what has this mainly monochrome magazine got to offer? My favourite project has to be this “upcycling” feature on how to give two hats a brand new look by cutting holes in one and sewing the patches onto another!
  

 

Festival of Quilts 2013 - trying to fit a quart into a pint pot

(... or rather trying to fit seeing everything at Festival of Quilts into four hours)

If you had asked me a few days before Festival of Quilts if I were planning on visiting the show my answer would have been no. Then along came a ticket giveaway from The Crafty Quilter and my plans changed. Fortunately I was able to book annual leave at short notice and last minute train fares were not prohibitively expensive, so on Friday I found myself heading down to Birmingham.  The times of the cheap trains meant that I only had about four hours to spend there, but I was determined to fit in as much as possible.

I had been lucky and won a pair of tickets, but could only use one so the first thing I did was find a random person in the ticket queue and share my good luck with them. Next was to try to work out the stand number system and find the Sizzix stand in the hope of getting a space on one of their workshops.  I was successful on all counts and had great fun trying out the Big Shot machine and making a block using the square, rectangle and half square triangle dies.

I then had 45 minutes free as I had arranged to meet Helen from the undomesticatedscientist blog for lunch and to hand over some spare dinosaur fabric scraps for her dino-loving daughter.  I used the time for a whistle stop viewing of the quilts, taking photos of any that caught my eye.  There were a lot of quilts that were just not my “thing” (such as pictorial and pixelated quilts) and a couple that I felt stretched my definition of a quilt. I'm pleased to say that the only patchwork clothing I spotted were these shirts in the children's display area.

The quilt that I found most relevant and inspiring on a personal level was one of Cathedral Windows in which different coloured "frames" had been used and not every “window” had been filled.  After learning this technique at Fat Quarterly Retreat, I was intrigued to see this interpretation of the pattern and it is something I will consider when I try making my own Cathedral Windows quilt.

After lunch, it was time for a wander around the stalls. There was nothing I desperately needed, but I had managed to come up with what looked suspiciously like a shopping list whilst on the train. I didn’t deviate too much from the list, though I changed my mind about the weight of Aurifil thread and couldn’t resist some FQs when only £1 or £1.50 each (from Doughty’s and Fabrics Galore, respectively), nor some scrap bags from the Project Linus stand. Then, before I knew it, it was time to head back to the station and to get the train home.  

Four hours is not really enough time for the show – looking at other blog posts there seem to be so many quilts that I missed seeing.  With a last minute trip like this, many of the official workshops were fully booked and so perhaps next year I would like to go for a couple of days and book some of the workshops in advance.  I’ll end this post with photos of the quilts that caught my eye for various reason, and I apologise for fuzzy photos and not getting any of the quilt makers’ details.

Review - Sewing World Magazine

Sewing World has recently been revamped and I was sent a copy of July's issue to review. I used to subscribe to the magazine, but my subscription lapsed over a year ago and so this was the first time I had seen one of the new look issues. My first impression from the cover was of a much brighter and more modern magazine.

I received the printed version of the magazine for this review, but the magazine also thinks of those who prefer digital issues and the pattern sheet is available to download from the magazine website. Each side of the pattern sheet is available as a separate file, with each file having about 10 pages to print and stick together. However, I couldn't spot a size reference square in the PDF, making it difficult to check if your pages have printed at the correct scale. A single digital issue is approximately £1 cheaper than a single printed issue.

Looking at the contents page, I was pleased to see articles relating to dressmaking still featured strongly in both the technique and projects sections as other magazines have dropped these in favour of "home" projects. This issue had 10 projects to make - two items of clothing (plus one from the techniques section), a doll, a bag, a sunglasses case, a machine cover, a quilt, cushions, coasters and a machine embroidery project.

The project instructions are presented in a variety of styles with some authors using photos to illustrate their instructions and others using line drawings. Some of the projects assume prior knowledge, for example, the quilt project just said "baste and quilt" and "bind as desired", but with information being readily available on the internet, this shouldn't be too much of a problem. I liked the mix of projects - some were quick and easy projects that could be made from your stash and others would take a little more time and planning.

The magazine also features many giveaways each month - in this issue there were nearly 40 prizes to be won, as well as a subscriber only competition. Again, the magazine has thought of its digital readers and the competitions can be entered via email. Unlike some women's glossy magazines, the number of advertisements are not over whelming and you don't end up flicking thorough pages and pages of adverts looking for something to read.

In conclusion, I was impressed by the mix of projects and articles which seemed to cater for various abilities and interests. I do hope that the magazine will continue to feature dress making as I think the UK magazine market is lacking in this area. After seeing the new look magazine, I would certainly consider buying future issues, though probably as the digital not the printed version.

Disclaimer: I was sent a copy of July's Sewing World for the purpose of this review. All words and opinions are my own.

Fat Quarterly Retreat - giveaway winner

Thank you for all your comments on the giveaway post. I hope that those of you who have not been to FQR yet will be able to go in the next few years.

In order to make sure that everyone got their full entitlement of entries, I numbered all the comments and let random.org do its work and the winner is ...

Kiwijo!

 
Congratulations to Jo and I hope you enjoy the little bag of goodies.

Fat Quarterly Retreat – sewing, shopping and swapping

I’m back from three days away in London at Fat Quarterly Retreat and I could do with a day off to recover but I’ve learnt lots such as:

• The weather forecast was right for once and there was no need to pack a raincoat.
• I’m rubbish at remembering names and faces.
• Unpicking is not fun when you used a stitch length of 1.3.
• You have no hope of winning the pub quiz when you have more team members than points.
• Cathedral Windows can become draughty windows if your points are a bit iffy.

I didn’t take many photos during FQR as I seemed to be too busy sewing or talking, but here’s a quick rundown of the weekend.

Fat Quarterly Retreat – the final countdown

With just two days to go, I hope that apart from packing, everything is done. This is what I hope, but I know that the reality will be lots of last minute sorting and may be even some sewing on Thursday evening.

I signed up for the sample swap and decided to make pincushions as I’d seen some rather cute ring pin cushions on the Liberty Craft blog.  I altered the size to fit the paper hexies I already had and, keeping with the Liberty theme, I made them with some Liberty Bloomsbury fabrics. After seeing what other were making for swaps, I thought just a little ring pin cushion rather miserly, so I decided to make large caddy pin cushions to go with them. These were made using some Mama Said Sew fabric and a novelty sewing fabric. I hope to add the pattern to the blog as a tutorial once I've recovered from FQR. After seeing the little and large pin cushions together (can you see a pattern developing?), I decided that it would be nice to give my swap partners the option of going matchy-matchy and so last night I finished a second batch of ring pin cushions.  All this chopping and changing means that I will have some spare ring pin cushions at FQR - if you would like one, come and find me after the Sample Swap at FQR and see which designs are left.

In an attempt not to leave everything to the last minute, I made the most of a day off last month to get my class supplies sorted and packed. I also managed to pick out the fabrics for the scrap strip swap and the ugly fabric swap and get those folded and bagged. Despite the glorious weather on Sunday, I spent most of the day indoors and had a productive time making an ironing pad that will actually fit in my sewing bag and a notebook cover so that I can have pen, paper and cards all to hand in one place. I had planned to make an insulated cosy for my travel iron, but my travel iron has disappeared off the face of the earth (that might be a bit of an overstatement) - oh well, less last minute sewing I suppose.

If I don't find my travel iron this evening, then I think that all have to do now is to sort out my sewing kit, label everything and get that packed up. Unfortunately, as I hadn't anticipated sunny weather in July, I have realised that my sewing bag doesn't go with any of my summer clothes, but there is no time to make another bag or more summer clothes, so anyone going to FQR will just have to put up with my mismatched wardrobe and accessories.

Fat Quarterly Retreat - my name tag has arrived

Look what waiting for me when I got home from work the other day – it’s my name tag for FQR. Sarah from Duckeggthreads has made it to match colours on my blog and has cleverly included two pockets on the back which will be handy for my Oyster card, room key, small pair of scissors, loose change – in fact most of the essentials I’m likely to need could be kept close at hand.

My photos don’t really do the tag justice – I amazed by how teeny and neat the stitching is and that she has included my rather long blog and twitter name.

If you spot me at FQR, do come and say hello and admire Sarah's teeny stitching.