Love this #61: Making a triangle pouch, or two...

September 23, 2015

A while back I stumbled upon this tutorial showing how to make a Triangle Pouch and bookmarked it for a later date. In fact I was so taken with them that I even bought some zips for the day that I felt the urge to make one. For some reason I have five zips, so perhaps I was anticipating a surge of demand for triangle pouches, who knows...

I've made two so far...

The second much quicker than the first and with less unpicking too, so that's something. The tutorial was clear, it was just my novice sewer experience that slowed me down.

The finished pouches are about 4 inches in size and they don't take that much material at all, so they're great as a scrap-buster project. The largest piece of material you need is for the lining, and that's only 8.5 inches x 4.5 inches.

With the four strips sewn together, and the seams pressed I was starting to see what my triangular pouch might look like.

The tutorial uses fusible wadding, but I clearly hadn't read that far before I started and didn't have any. So I improvised with a thin layer of non-fusible wadding. It seemed to work, but I did add extra rows of stitches on the outer edges to keep it in place.

With the wadding trimmed, it was time for the clever bit. And that's to cut it in half and turn it round to form the pattern. Easy huh?

I got the zip in too - although I was lazy and didn't change to the zipper foot. With some strategic zipping and unzipping I managed. It's the first time I've done a zip for a very long time, and while my stitching isn't super straight I'm pleased with it and myself.
After the zip and some checks to make sure the lining was showing as I expected, then it was time to start assembling the triangle.

The bottom seam was sewn, and the ribbon in place - I learnt from my first try to pin it to the right side, so it didn't pop inside. It's not much use having a handy ribbon holder on the inside was it?

And then before I knew it, two were done. Cute aren't they?
I've got three more zips, so I think there'll be some more. And who knows, I might even buy some more zips!

They are pretty cute, and I've no idea what I'll use mine for. The other one's for my mum - she'll know which one is hers.

Sunday Stationery: The Geffrye Museum Notebook

September 20, 2015

I had a fab afternoon last week visiting The Geffrye Museum in Shoreditch. It's a museum of the home, set in some old Almshouses and is free (although donations are very much welcomed), and of course there's a shop which I didn't leave empty-handed.

I left with a notebook (no surprises there), some wrapping paper and some seeds. Today I'm just going to share the notebook as I've plans for the wrapping paper (and not the usual sort of plans) so I'll most likely share that another time. There wasn't much choice of notebooks in the shop, but it didn't matter as this one caught my eye straight away, and the man in the shop assured me they were stocking up on notebooks very soon. That's good news for my future visits, but I'm still not sure how they knew I was coming!

And in case you're wondering the cover is an adaptation of a letter written by Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth about London in 1801. Who knew that Hipsters were around then?!

Inside the front cover there's a lovely Robert Macfarlane quote too:

I've no idea yet what I'll use this for, but I couldn't leave it on the shelf and I'm sure when the time comes I'll find a use that's just perfect for it.

The future's bright...

September 16, 2015

Well on the High Street it is at least! On a recent trip to Oxford Street I was struck by how colourful the displays were, so I thought today I'd share what I found. I saw all of these and more on visits to John Lewis, Debenhams, BHS and House of Fraser.

So if we buy what's in the shops now, and let's face it there's a high chance we will, then we'll have colour in our bedrooms, bathrooms, living rooms and kitchens. So let's get started...

Well I'm a sucker for nice crockery (remember these bowls at West Elm) and it was a window display with these items which drew me back into the shop and looking for the homeware department.

CLASSIC AND COLOURFUL JOSEPH JOSEPH (DEBENHAMS)

Another exciting discovery was the West Elm concession at John Lewis. Im still in love with their bowls!

Right moving on - and away from the bowls - the cushions in Debenhams were definitely striking.

AND THERE'S FLORAL CUSHIONS TOO (DEBENHAMS)

Not everything needs to be full on colour for it to be colourful. This photo frame caught my eye and is a lovely way to introduce colour into a room.

While crisp, white bedlinen is a treat (except for when you need to iron it!) there's a lot of colourful bedlinen available too. I was pleased to see there's still quite a bit of yellow around, that's especially useful for me as we have pops of yellow in our bedroom.

CALMING BUT STILL COLOURFUL BEDLINEN IN HOUSE OF FRASER

And then there were the towels! I fell in love with these bobble-edged ones in House of Fraser and did well to leave them on the shelf. The hedgehogs and the ducks were cute and a fun way to introduce some character in your bathrooms. And something I'd not noticed before was towels coordinating with bedding, so you can get the look right through into your en-suite. Clever.

So as you can see, my browse around the department stores in Oxford Street was quite a colourful experience. I love colour - in our house and wearing it - but do you? How do you "do" colour?