Fat Quarterly Retreat Linky Party

Hello! Next weekend is the Fat Quarterly Retreat in London and I'm getting excited! I'm joining the FQ Retreat linky party going on over at the Fat Quarterly Blog with a lot of other bloggers who'll be there next weekend.

For anyone who is new to my blog, I am Fiona, I'm 37 and I look like this on a good day

And this on a no-make-up-Sunday.

Actually, although the second picture is a few years old, I look more like the chubbier version now as I've piled on the pounds in the last few months.

I live outside Glasgow with my husband, 3 kids and our springer spaniel puppy. I work part-time doing technical support and I've been sewing since I was a little girl when I made stuff for my Sindy dolls on my Granny's old hand-crank Singer. I made clothes for myself all through school and uni. I'm tall at 5'10" and got fed up of always buying men's trousers because the women's ones weren't long enough!

I discovered quilting about 5 years ago and I love it!

I'm travelling down to London by bus overnight on Friday night (urgh!) so I might be a bit bleary-eyed when I meet everyone on Saturday morning!

On Saturday morning I'm doing Frame Purses with Katy, Saturday afternoon Embroidery with Aneela, Sunday morning Freezer Paper Piecing with Kerry and Sunday afternoon Portholes with Lu.

I'm staying Saturday night at the Radisson and sharing a room with my lovely pal Terri

I'll be wearing this (made for me by the lovely Lisa)

and carrying this

and I can't wait to meet everyone!!!!!!

Fiona x

Bags and another finished quilt

I wasn't going to mention going to the FQ Retreat in London in a couple of weeks because there is family event on at the same time, that I will not be going to. But I'm getting too excited to not blog about it, and I don't think my family even know I have a blog, so I'm hoping there will be no upset caused....

I'm getting really excited about the Retreat and decided to make some pretty bags to take with me. Usually when I go away I concentrate on packing all the kids stuff and then at the last minute I fling all my stuff into plastic supermarket bags and hope that I've not forgotten anything important. This time however I only have to pack for myself, and I'm getting a bit carried away with ideas for making everything pretty.

I made myself this laundry bag out of some gorgeous Heather Ross fabric that was on sale at M is For Make. I think I may struggle to actually put dirty clothes in this bag, but the fabric just begged me to buy it and make a laundry bag. How could I say no? ;)

I also made a tote bag for storing my little cutting mat, rulers, rotary cutter and other supplies. I just love this fabric and had bought it to make some cushions for the living room, but my poor husband has told me that we have too many cushions already and he can't cope with any more. So a bag was made instead :)

I've also managed to finish another quilt for the Siblings Together charity. This quilt was made using a bundle of Kona that Katy (Monkey Do) donated. The backing is a duvet cover that was on sale at Ikea, and there's enough of the duvet fabric to use for backing for the third quilt that I'm making for Siblings Together :)

Here's a little close up of some hand quilting that I added.

There has been a bit of a disaster this week. My sewing machine has broken! It has decided that it only wants to wind bobbins and not do any actual sewing. It's only a year old, but to be fair I have worked it hard over the last year! It maybe deserves a holiday :) I'm waiting in on a courier coming to pick it up, and take it for a trip to the Sewing Machine Spa. Meanwhile I have dragged out my very old and basic machine, because I have Bee blocks to make, and I'm in the middle of making myself a dress, and now I've started on bags, I really need some more bags in my life ;)

Hope you're all having a good week!
Fiona x

A Scrappy Liberty Peacock

I've finished my Pincushion for my partner in the Fab Little Pincushion Swap on Flickr.

My lovely children bought me The Liberty Book of Home Sewing for my Christmas and I think it is a really beautiful book. I decided that the Peacock Pincushion would hopefully be something that my partner would love.

He looked a bit like a deranged duck to start with but after some great suggestions from the others in the swap group I mixed the Liberty scraps with Kona solids for his tail and I think he's turned out rather nicely. My partner may have mentioned that she/he would like a little thread catcher so I used this tutorial to make one. It was so quick and easy!

So Mr Peacock will be off to his new home tomorrow. I'll be a bit sad to see him go.

Happy Tuesday!

Fiona x

Siblings Together Quilts - Chapter 3

I've rustled up another quilt top for the Siblings Together charity. For this one I used a bundle of Kona solids that was very kindly sent to me by the lovely Katy. I added in some of the scraps from my previous Siblings quilt top to add some little flashes of colour.

Again, I've made this one with a teenage boy in mind, and I'm anxiously awaiting my oldest boy getting out of school to get his verdict on it. Who would have known the opinion of an 8 year old would matter so much when making a quiltthat's not even for him? :)

Here are a couple of snaps of Murphy. I swear he's 3 times the size he was a couple of weeks ago, and he has also transformed into the Tasmanian Devil!

Have a great weekend!
Fiona x

Zakka Style with a twist of Liberty

I used some gorgeous Liberty scraps that I bought from the lovely Jo at The Organic Stitch to make the pencil case from the Zakka Style Book compiled by Rashida Coleman-Hale as part of the Zakka Style Sew Along The dark fabric is Kona Laurel and is a very dark purpley navy. Mine is going to be a glasses case for me, and I just love it!

Here it is with my specs to give an idea of the size.

This such a great little project. I'm going to make another one but slightly bigger for my sewing shears. I'll make it using linen and some more of my beloved Mendocino to match my sewing kit from last week.

Happy May Day :)
Fiona x

Fresh Sewing Day

It's ages since I've linked up with Lynne's Fresh Sewing Day and I was curious to see just how much I'd got done in a month. I'm so glad I checked! I've made loads more than I thought I had :)

I'd forgotten how much fun Fresh Sewing Day is!

Fiona x