New to my craft room in May

Like last month there’s been some essential spend. This month it was the turn of my ‘take to’ machine, somehow just as I was packing up at patchwork group I caught the shank, which holds the presser feet in place, and part of it fell off. It’s a consumable part, so after a quick email with my sewing machine man a new one was put in the post - but at least this replacement only cost me a fiver!

Thankfully it was right at the end of the sewing session as the machine is pretty much useless without it - it’s photographed in the second image below, right in the centre of the Le Crueset manual, which in case you’re wondering why I’m keeping that it’s because I think the printed pages will be good for cards at some point!

I actually don’t have much new stuff this month, but as it’s my birthday month I am including two of my birthday presents, the first of which is these 12wt Aurifil threads, the Foundation pack, with its beautiful jewel like colours and which will be great for hand sewing and embellishing some appliqué I have in mind.

The fabric on the left was a total bargain and an unexpected purchase. In Newark last week and looking to get a new citronella candle for the garden I spotted a clearance sale in the fabric department of one of the larger shops, well I had to take a look. This fabric was marked down to £3 a metre and so I thought I’d have 3 metres and see how much was left on the roll, as I didn’t think it would be much. They measured it out, and I thought they were being quite generous as they did and as luck would have it there was exactly three metres left. When I got home and remeasured it, because I was curious there was just over 3.6 metres, so a total bargain.

MOH bought me these rainbow plant dyed materials for my birthday and they are as gorgeous as the threads above, which is just as well as my plan was (and still is) to use these together somehow, I’m just not sure quite how yet. I decided to treat myself to a couple of Aurifil storage cases for my threads as they make things so much easier to find, and while I was there I added a spool of ‘dove grey’ thread which Jo Avery recommends for appliqué - and that’s a big clue as to where my head is going with this rainbow project!

It was all going so well, then at my sewing group I left with two books, a pattern and two small pieces of material with a donation to the group funds - it’s dangerous when they’re clearing out their stash!

So that’s another month in my craft room, check out my previous updates for earlier additions, and remember to let me know below what you’ve added to your craft supplies this month.

New to my craft room in April

Once again this month I’ve had some essential spend after somehow breaking my automatic threader on my Bernina. I’m not quite sure how it happened, but I do remember thinking how well my sewing was going, and feeling slightly pleased with myself. Next thing I knew something had fallen off, oops. The machine still works and I can thread the needle manually, but I’ve come to rely on the automatic threader, which to start with I wasn’t sure I’d ever use.

So a new one was dutifully ordered from where I bought the machine. And while I was on their site I happened to notice their sale section, so I added another bargain grey for my collection for the background to my floral fancy.

In some long awaited but equally unexpected news, one of the outstanding items from a pre-Christmas order arrived - the pink D-rings below. The final item remains out of stock and so a refund was given for this. It’s taken a while, and I was happy to wait as it wasn’t something I had an urgent need for, but thought I’d use at some point. Though at the time I probably had a use in mind, but I’ve no idea what that is right now!

This month I also ordered the gorgeous variegated blue and green thread, which I’m planning to use on my mystery block of the month quilt when the time comes. I also needed to buy some wadding for that quilt, as without that I wouldn’t have a quilt, and so now I’m also the proud owner of a 15 metre roll of wadding. Well, it’s actually less than that as I needed some for my first charity quilt of the year - more on that soon.

The next bundle of green fat quarters, ribbon and a spent glow stick are from our recent trip to Wales for my youngest niece’s wedding; the ribbon and the glow stick are from the favour bags, and the material I picked up on our look around Ludlow, and thought they’d be perfect for the start of my green collection for leaves for my at some point in the future floral fancy.

At the end of the month I was at the Quilt & Stitch Village show in Uttoxeter, and I did make a few purchases there, including these scraps costing £1.50 at the Project Linus stand - and yes, that’s the charity I donate my charity quilts too if you thought it sounded familar.

I never expected to buy any fabric with onions or beetroots on, but that’s what I did - there was just something about them that grabbed me, and while i was there I also picked up a toning plain to save me the headache of finding one when I need it. I’m not sure how I’ll use them yet, but they do make me smile.

I also could walk past yet more newspaper like text on fabric, it could be said that my curiosity definitely was piqued (again).

The final addition to my craft room this month is a book, on an embroidery discipline that I wasn’t sure I wanted to tackle. But I’ve been one over by the sheer number of geometric patterns included in this book, and my love for hand sewing. I’m looking forward to reading more about the basic principles and seeing where this will take me.

So that’s another month in my craft room, check out my previous updates for earlier additions, and remember to let me know below what you’ve added to your craft supplies this month.

New to my craft room in March

Like last month it’s been a mixed month for the arrivals in my craft room; there’s been some essentials, some bargains and quite a few bits from my mum’s ruler box, and a bit of a splurge - but it was worth it and totally gorgeous!

The essentials were replacement sewing machine needles after breaking two making the impromptu flying geese tote, and it’s good to have these to hand in case I suffer any more breakages, and actually I probably should get into the habit of changing my needle - both on my sewing machine and for my hand embroidery - more often.

After seeing my shabby chic rosettes mum was quite keen to have one herself and so I pulled various pinks from my stash and made her one. While I was doing that I thought I should probably get some more brooch backs and hair clips to finish this and the ones I’d started at the Newark Quilt Show, so that’s almost an essential purchase too right?!

Now most people would have bought a tote bag pattern before they actually made a tote bag, not me - clearly for me the right time was immediately after I finished my flying geese bag! In my defence I saw it on Instagram and was smitten, I searched for it online - it comes with options to make three different sized bags - and put it in my online basket. A few days later another site was offering 25% discounts on all patterns, and checking this one was included - so it would have been rude not to buy it, wouldn’t it?

The cheerful Union Flag fabric is a fat quarter I couldn’t resist from a stash rummage at my patchwork group, and it’s 50p well spent. The skein of wool is one of a kind dyed by Vicki Brown as part of her annual 100 skeins project. I’ve bought one of her 100 skeins for many years now, and they are all stunning - and each one is different. You get an option to state colours you like (and dislike) and I’m really pleased with my mustard, pink and orange request this year.

At a recent visit to mum’s I finally got to look through her ‘ruler’ box, and to help myself to the ones she no longer wants. So I’ve added some quilting stencils and a hole thing to my ‘to play with pile’ along with a ruler for Cathedral Windows and a Dresden Plates template - and yes the price ticket on it does say £4.15, mum’s clearly had it for a while (and it is open even though it looks as if it’s not).

Something using the Cathedral Window design has been on my long-term list for quite a while, though my idea was to use denim and I’ve had many raised eyebrows each time I moot the idea, so I’m guessing it’s not ideal because of the thickness and stiffness of denim, so I probably should take that advice when it actually makes it onto my list.

My splurge item is these Type/ography 10 inch layer cakes by Lori Holt of Bee in my Bonnet for Riley Blake, and you may recall seeing these before as they have immediately made it onto my list of quilt plans for this year as my Word Star quilt.

As I said in that post, it shouldn’t have made the list but it has - and I’m not sad about it.

There’s more than just the red/white and white/red varieties, and I think that together they could make a great ‘star’ quilt but I haven’t really looked at the how yet - I’m still in the admiration phase!

I’ve even had them out of the packet so I can admire them even more closely, but not for long! They’re stored away safely for now, while my thoughts percolate and research takes place on how I can make this happen.

So that’s another month in my craft room, check out my previous updates for earlier additions, and remember to let me know below what you’ve added to your craft supplies this month.