Other makes of 2025

I quite enjoyed recapping my Quilts of 2025, so I thought I’d do the same with my other (sewing) makes of the year. You’ll not be surprised to learn that there’s a lot of pouches - my love for them continues, and I think there’ll be plenty more this year too.

But I did make more than pouches, there’s even been a dress and a pie-carrier, and plenty of embroidery thrown in. Many of the things I’ve made have had previous lives - as t-shirts, dresses and even covering a headboard. Seriously. There’s been small fabric samples too, and I’ve even used materials cut out from the larger books, and I’ve already found a use for the sample books I picked up at the Harrogate show in November.

I’m hoping that in 2026 I’ll have even more ‘other makes’ but first let’s look back at my 2025 makes.

Here’s what I’ve made in 2025

In January I completed my mandala pouch which continues to be home for my poppers, and all the tools associated with that. I also found time to add some sparkles to my zumba pouch (I’m still missing that class which stopped in the summer - sad face!) and knocked myself up a quick felt pencil case for some of the supplies I needed to take along to a workshop.

In February there were more pouches, obviously and I made an appliquéd velvet pouch and a impromptu saucepan saver as I discovered how to use my new sewing machine. And then making use of a block left over from the Noughts and Crosses quilt, I made myself the ‘all the patterns’ project bag.

Then it seemed I had an ‘other makes’ rest for a few months, as it wasn’t until June that I completed my next make - and that was a big one for me, it was my dress.

Let’s gloss over the fact that I’d bought some material (still not used) to make this dress back in 2023 though! This was the toile, or test run of the pattern, which if it didn’t work then I’d never have to wear, and I wouldn’t have spoiled my lovely bought fabric either. But as it turned out I have worn this dress, quite a lot in fact, and it continues to bring compliments which is also nice.

Even better it still hasn’t fallen apart. But I’ve not yet made it in the original material, nor some of the other material I’ve bought since either. Maybe 2026 is the year…

In July I was making things up again and created a really useful velvet box pouch from various fabric samples I’d collected over the years. This one’s purpose is to keep the foot pedal of my ‘take to’ machine safe during journeys, and to stop it banging against my second new sewing machine of the year.

The end of the month saw me create an incremental update for dad’s birthday bunting - I hadn’t worked out how to attach it to the original banner, but then again I also reckoned that really wasn’t my problem!

In August, inspired by the workshop I attended at the Festival of Quilts I stitched two kantha inspired landscape scenes, including one with a hare for the bedside tables in our spare rooms.

Though clearly by now I was experiencing some pouch withdrawal symptoms - but don’t worry another eight were to be completed by the end of August, and I jest but they were the perfect project to get used to my ‘take to’ sewing machine, and well, pouches are always useful. I don’t know where they go, but the pile soon disappears!

Actually I made another project bag as well in August, but I haven’t shared that one here yet so when I do - I’ve another one on the go as part of the ‘set’ - I’ll add a link in here.

In September I was clearly busy finishing quilts, so it wasn’t until October that I became obsessed with and made myself a small pie carrier, and while it’s a bit smaller than I’d like it’s still useful. I still need to make myself a slightly larger, less prototype version, so that should be along this year too at some point.

In October I also had a bout of repurposing old clothes into, yes you’ve guessed it, more pouches and project bags - and this is definitely something that will continue this year.

I ended the year with some more Christmassy items - a Scandinavian folded fabric star which tested my ability to follow instructions, and several ‘sheep in Christmas jumper’ Christmas cards, as you do.

And of course, some more pouches - this time as presents, so add three pouches and a further project bag to my year’s ‘other’ makes. Not a bad year at all, and I’m hoping that 2026 is even more prolific - with maybe even a new style of pouch too, who knows?!

This December...

Well, December has been a lot.

The month started with the usual yoga, pilates and massage sessions ahead of a weekend away visiting family in Devon. We’d decided to stop en-route in a new-to-us part of the country overnight, which as it turned out didn’t actually result in any less driving, but never mind.

A few days before we were due to set off we learnt that the hotel we were staying in had had to close which meant we wouldn’t be staying there after all. We’d booked through Mr & Mrs Smith and they were brilliant helping us find alternative accommodation. We were fairly relaxed about the location as long as it was in the general vicinity of the original hotel; they provided three alternatives and we chose Number One Bruton in Somerset, which turned out to be a brilliant choice.

It’s a great little town, and it felt like we got the VIP treatment unbeknown to us arriving on their ‘Christmas evening’ when the town was packed, the shops were open late and Santa abseiled into the festivities, like you do. The hotel and its restaurant Briar was fabulous too, and I’m sure we’ll be back again - it was that good.

We also spotted a sofa we liked in one of the windows and went in to find out more and try it out. As the sofa was in the window, we also climbed into the window to test it out - and added to the live theatre no doubt in Bruton that night! MOH originally pointed it out he says as a joke, but when we looked we realised it was actually rather nice and will go well in our lounge, and be the basis of changing the decor in there. I think he’s partly regretting it already!

A perk of being a hotel guest was entry into the gardens of The Newt in Somerset and no surprises but the gardens were amazing, even in early December. I’ve so much more to share from there, in fact I was part way through writing a post about overnighting in Bruton when life took over, so look out for that soon. Everything at The Newt was done on a grand scale and with no scrimping, I mean this was the Christmas decoration as you entered the main barn, see what I mean?

Travelling on to Devon later that day was ‘interesting’ - I’ve never seen so much water on the roads, and nor have I driven through so much standing water (well standing is a misnomer it was teeming off the surrounding fields with nowhere else to go). We arrived at family safely though, even if we were a tad bemused and bewildered by our onward journey.

While in Devon we visited one of our all time favourite National Trust properties joining in the celebrations to mark 100 years of Coleton Fishacre. As well as the house and gardens, there was the added learn to Charleston sessions, and my personal favourite - the Speakeasy, serving real (but understandably tiny) cocktails.

Preparing for Christmas

It really did feel like a Christmas started that weekend. Back home it was time to collect the wreath for our back door and with so much going on this year I ordered a wreath from the florist whose workshop I would have attended if time allowed. Isn’t it gorgeous?

I think the bad weather must have followed us home though, and the wreath spent its first week or so in the heat pump trellis enclosure sheltering from the winds, and to save me retrieving it from around the garden. But thankfully since it’s been on the back door the weather has behaved a bit more, and we get to admire it every time we go in and out.

I’ve even relented and for the first time ever we’ve had some outside Christmas lights. Well they were the twinkly garden lights we had strung across our old garden which have been in the garage since we moved. I had the creative idea to use them to decorate the green garden obelisk which is also having its first outing from the garage!

When they’re lit at night they look just like a tree might do - in the daylight they look a bit odd, but it is what it is. I also managed to snap a weird reflective picture, which I sort of quite like but I’m not sure why!

The lights have been such a success that we think next year we might get a real tree and have that outside on the patio instead, and instead of having a tree in the house. I think secretly MOH is still hoping for those inflatable kind of decorations, but deep down he knows that’s not going to happen.

I went along to two Sewing Group Christmas evenings on successive nights and both were successful. At the first one of the ladies shared the recipe for her fantabulous Baileys trifle I’d admired and tried to recreate last year, as well as bringing a trifle along for us all to taste - taking her bowl home empty too. At the second we all made a folded Scandinavian Star which, while pretty once it was done, was a bit of a head scratcher!

I’ll probably make some more at some point, but there was no time this month as I’d already decided, fairly last minute, to embroider some Christmas cards - unusually being relatively realistic with the number I could complete, and therefore only block printing a sensible amount.

Embroidering sheep in Christmas Jumpers - on some of those sample fabrics from Harrogate - became my December task, and I’m really not that sad about it. They were all different, and they all turned out fab.

Not all plain sailing though

Which given the amount of water we’d driven through in Devon feels entirely inappropriate, but as a turn of phrase it’s a good summary. The utility company from our previous house (yes, the one we moved from in the summer of 2023) decided that this month was a good time to send us a final bill. In fact it was the third final bill we’d received from them - the first we were expecting and paid as you would; the second was a surprise and due to an error on their systems so they waived the majority of it. So a third final bill felt a tad unnecessary, especially as it covered a period of some 16 months when we weren’t the legal owners of the house - and it took them over a year to present it.

Calling them to discuss it didn’t solve anything, in fact the line went mysteriously dead when I asked them to explain why ‘back billing’ wasn’t relevant. It wasn’t an insignificant amount either, and was clearly not right and paying it wasn’t right either. In the end we got some great advice from our local Citizens Advice Bureau and raised a complaint with our previous supplier. I filed that on Christmas Eve and by the final Monday of the month it was all resolved, the bill cancelled and our previous account closed as they said they would do back in July 2023.

And the reason given for cancelling the bill? Back billing, which I’d asked about in that first phone call - it’s all so unnecessary, and has caused unwanted stress and paperwork. I’m sure we aren’t the only ones either, and I’m also sure that saying that unless it was resolved satisfactorily we would raise it with the energy ombudsmen didn’t influence things at all. But anyway it is sorted, which is a big relief.

And then our dishwasher and our heating decided to join in with both of them having a hiccup or two. The dishwasher stopped mid cycle and said ‘no more’ and so we need to call out an engineer. In the meantime it’s washing up for us - which reminds me daily of why we’ve had dishwashers for the last twenty plus years!

The heating decided to join the fun and have a blip on Christmas Day, thankfully we weren’t hosting Christmas this year as no dishwasher and temperamental heating would have made it ‘fun’. We do have an engineer booked to look at the heating for early next week as that’s our priority to be fixed as you’d expect. It is working kind of and we do have hot water, it’s just the system isn’t very happy and isn’t right and I have more photos than I ever thought possible of the messages and status of the main thermostat. But at least it is no longer alerting us every 46 minutes (yes, I timed it) which meant that neither of us got a whole load of sleep on Monday, so that’s something!

Shaken not stirred

There was more gallivanting before Christmas too with a night out and subsequent shopping day in London. For the past few years we’ve been out for a pre-Christmas steak at the Hawksmoor in Air Street, and it’s one of those things that has fast become a favourite thing to do. This year we stayed over near Kings Cross and headed back towards Regent Street the next morning to secure our traditional mince pies from Fortnum & Mason and check out their Christmas department, and their windows. London was busy though and we were glad to get back home, but not before we tried the new Martini Bar in the Hawksmoor’s newest venture in the St Pancras hotel.

That too was very nice, and somehow I think we’ll be back there before next Christmas as it’s a very civilised way to wait for a train!

If you want to read my ramblings from previous monthly updates then please check out my ‘This is’ series.

My pie carrier prototype

Sometimes things unplanned happen, and just have to be acted upon. I mean, I never knew I needed let alone wanted a patchwork pie carrier, but when things collide at just the right time you just have to go with it.

Let me explain.

Scrolling Instagram a post from @suzyquilts for a quilted pie carrier caught my eye, I looked a little closer before thinking that I’d quite like one, and then how hard can it be. Which as we know is dangerous.

So I dived into my stash and emerged with a gloriousness of pink, butterflies and fruit.

And at around the same time my love for flying geese was reawakened with the Cloud Nine block by Debbie Maddie in the Moda Blockhead emails which I’m subscribed to and rarely act upon. I was smitten, and realised I could combine my new yearning for a pie carrier with this Moda block, and then I really would be on cloud nine.

Assembling the block

Well this was the easy part as I had instructions (yes, I still hadn’t bought the pie carrier pattern), and after a morning sewing group session I was well on the way to finishing the Cloud Nine block.

It’s busy, but I thought that will hide any spills when it gets used - practical and honest! And mostly I’m happy with it - if I were to use these fabrics again I think I’d make some changes to the flying geese (outer row) block on the top left - there’s not quite enough contrast between the two fabrics I’ve used. But I decided to live it with and carry on - it’s only a pie carrier after all.

I also knew I’d need to add some borders to my square to give it a chance of being big enough, and it’s at this point that the patterns all went a bit crazy, but I was ok with that, as I said it’s a pie carrier and honestly it will get some use, but only occasionally.

I followed loosely Madam Sew’s pie carrier tutorial , adapting things such as the corner handle length, and decided to pin it together to see how it might work.

Phew. It was looking as if it might work…

I also decided to ‘bag’ my square rather than sew the wadding to either the top or bottom fabric, and I’d remembered to add in and secure the corner loops before I connected the top, wadding and backing layers.

I even remembered there were pins in evidence when I turned it through, which was something.

And it still looked like it might work (the longer ‘handle’ strap is still pinned on in this photo).

Adding some detail

With my newfound Bernina BSR skills and keen to practice them at home relatively soon after my training day I decided to add some machine stitched detail to the central butterfly. Tracing the outline of the wings, body and markings freehand.

It’s easier to see where I went on the backing side - and I’m pleased with that, especially given it was the first time I tried it on my machine for real.

That only left the longer handle to attach, and with plenty of securing stitches that’s just what I did.

And it works, just. I’d forgotten to allow enough for a seam allowance so any pie in an 8 inch tin will get a bit of an airing. But carry pies it does - or rather it has already successfully carried a flourless chocolate cake. I think though this one will be better size for my small quiche dish, but that really doesn’t get taken out much!

So this one is really to test the process, and to have a bit of fun - but I’m planning to make another, larger and more practical one just as soon as I can decide what fabrics to use, or rather where to place the fabrics I’ve chosen.

Watch this space, and if you’re lucky I might even bring a pie (or something alternatively sweet) with my non-prototype pie carrier!