Red Cross Quilt

I've forgotten to show you the treasure I picked up from the Vintage Bazaar last month in Devizes, this has to be the best piece I've picked up in the long time, you know that feeling when you HAVE to have something and you just KNOW it's meant to be yours and live at your house?! I nearly didn't ask how much it was, as vintage quilts are usually way out of my budget, so when it was £35, I didn't dare put it down, even though it meant borrowing money off my lovely Mum!

It's very worn in places but the seller told me all about it's history as it's a Canadian Red Cross quilt, apparently in the Second World War for the war effort, the Canadian Red Cross organised making and sending quilts over to London for the bombed out Londoners who had lost everything. Due to time constraints, some Canadians sent out heirloom quilts of their own to help and this quilt seems to be one of these as some of the fabrics are Thirties feedsack. 

The colours and hand quilting are beautiful and I can't quite fathom the generosity of strangers to send this to people in need, would this happen now?

It's lovely to snuggle under, so soft and warm and large, I'm definitely going to look after it but I'm also not going to hide it away, it needs to be admired and seen.

Cogges Easter Fun

Well where did that easter school holiday go?! Working part-time always means a juggle of childcare and holiday days taken, so school holidays are never restful but I'm very lucky to have a lot of help from my parents, especially for the older two. With the weather getting nicer it's easier to find things to do to make the days go quicker, and this holiday all of us have spent many days down the road at Cogges Manor Farm.

We were very lucky with the weather as we had some cracking days, it was even ice-cream weather!

The eldest two enjoyed the new parts of the play park, which included a rope swing, which try as she might my eldest 10 year old just couldn't do, every day we went she tried but to no avail, we had to admit she was too big for it as her legs kept dragging in the mud :( It's no fun being almost as tall as your mother when you're only ten - it's also impossible to find clothes, but that's another story!

On Wednesday we enjoyed cake decorating in the kitchen.

On Thursday we enjoyed adding to the rag rug that's in progress.

And we all enjoyed dressing up!

When we got home, I was inspired to get my own rag rug back out, so I've started adding to it again.

We also found some new geocaches near us and even managed to pick up a trackable, which we enjoyed seeing online where it's been (Germany & the US), we hope to drop this off soon and get it on it's way.  We've also been trying to scout out good places to make our own first cache.

Who needs an expensive holiday when all this was right on our doorstop!

Sewing for Pleasure Treasure

I'm still without a trusty small camera, so my photo taking is somewhat lacking, I do have my large and heavy DSLR but it's not always practical taking it around, especially indoor events as the flash is pants!

So when I journeyed off to the NEC last month to the Sewing for Pleasure event I was sadly cameraless and it did feel weird, not being able to snap away at things I wanted to remember, or ideas. I'm hoping that I'll join the 21st Century soon and get an iPhone (used) as I hope the camera on that would do for these sort of occasions, especially when stealthy snapping is required.

So no photos of the event but I can verbally report back that I had a good day out with my Mum and succeeded in nearly all of my shopping list, which was my main reason for going, as locally it's hard to get good pieces of cheap/reasonable dressmaking fabric.

So what did I get....

2 metres of cotton lawn @ £10pm, I hoping for a top out of this, I'm not sure whether it'll need a lining though?

1 Liberty FQ

3 metres of blue jersey @ £6pm from Fabrics Galore, I've got a Prima tunic pattern in mind for this and I'm wondering if I'll have any left over for toddler leggings

1 FQ, just because I couldn't resist!

My mum treated me to the fantastic dress/tunic pattern from Sew Me Something, I really liked their stall and they'd had all the patterns made up in various fabrics, which was really helpful. We got this near the end so I didn't get any fabric for it but I know I won't make it yet, not until I've used all this other fabric!

1 metres of cotton lawn @ £10pm, I'm thinking of adding this to my blue Liberty stash and finally starting an EPP project

2 metres of jersey, which I'm hoping to use with last months Prima pattern, it's a bit garish but I think I'll use it for my first attempt at the pattern and then if it doesn't look right or if anything goes wrong I won't be too upset!

1 FQ, probably for EPP

They only thing I couldn't find was a good grey linen/chambray which I wanted for the hexies in my last post so I may have to source that online, it's a pity as I was in the mood to get going with that project.

That's left me with that uneasy feeling of what to start first.....and also it means I need to tidy up the dining table if I want to cut out large bits of fabric...it's the starting that's always the worst!

But as I've now posted, I hope that might shame me into getting on with something instead of procrastinating ;)

I'll let you know....