Mini-project

Half an hour to spare? Just enough time for a quick spot of upholstery then.

New work for the weekend

Glad tidings! Due to helathy sales, I have been able to hang some new fabric collages (and more unframed ones in the browser) in time for the last two days of the Open House at weekend.

http://www.ninebynine.org.uk/

Tea's ready!

It's finished!

It's big picture and stretching that thin background fabric over the backing was very tricky. Now comes the even tricker part – getting it into the frame.

Here goes...

Cakes on the way

People so far seem unconvinced of The Good Idea that is making pictures of cakes out of fabric. Teapots worked, folks, why not cakes?

Undeterred, I'm three-quarters of the way through my third cake collage. This one's a large-scale teatime scene and I hope to be finished it tomorrow – it needs to be framed and on the wall in the Open House by Saturday morning!

(Close-up of George's Famous Lemon Tart. Those splodges are the still-wet glue.)

Fame beckoned, then it wandered off again

It's been over a month since my last post due to being manically busy with the Open House, http://www.ninebynine.org.uk/, but this evening a talk by Ameila, yes, THE Amelia, she of Amelia's Magazine, swerved as a timely reminder about the importance of the humble blog in the 21st century, so I'm back now.

What news then? Well, following an article I've had published online:

http://www.makeitandmendit.com/2011/04/19/meeting-our-sewing-queen-miami-member-carol/

Inspiration for using vintage remnant fabrics | Make it and Mend it

www.makeitandmendit.com

first thing the morning after it went live I had a call from Hampton Court Women's Institute asking me to give a talk! (Miss Anne Boleyn would like to ask...) and a few days after that a production company wanted me to talk about appearing on the telly.

Now, the telly thing sounds interesting but they dumbed it down soooooo much, not only would it have been patronising for viewers, but dull for me too. They really thought no-one out there had the capability to make so much as a cushion; I beg to differ.

So fame will have to find me in other ways. Meanwhile, I'm busy with the Open House and making cakes out of old lace and doilies. Gotta go!

Why walk when you could run?

I think it's fair to say that the phrase "running before you can walk" was invented for me. After re-upholstering two vintage stools (requiring only common sense and a staple gun in the way of technical expertise) I decided to re-upholster a chair I found in the street.

Having stripped the grotty specimen of its previous covering using only a pair of tile nibblers (any upholsterers reading may have to go for a lie down in a dark room at this point), I discovered not foam underneath wool, horsehair, burlap and springs.

Ah, so we have jumped froward from novice to advanced in one go here, but I am a tenacious sort and it takes more than that to put me off.

Three excellent YouTube videos and a roll of wadding later, I was well on the way to a new chair. (And, so enthused with the project that I never even found the time to change from my vintage 1960s green paisley dress and glass necklaces into more "suitable" clothes.)

I used a single 1950s curtain I'd been saving for something special for a long time to cover the chair, I adore this fabric and I've never seen any print quite like it.

I'm thinking of getting a tattoo of the word "Crafts" over a pair of scissors and a staple gun rampant. Home brew or macramé next, do you think?

One for craft fanatics. Otherwise, nothing for you here – look away now.

Last week at one of my regular markets, I unearthed this trashed 1950s blue satin dress.

I've no idea what on earth has happened to it, but the damage is akin to a cat sliding down a pair of curtains with its claws out. The front is ripped to shreds and the zip has been taken out of the back, leaving very little holding it together, but there were two glorious, sequin-encrusted, large patch pockets which I was able to get off in the nearest café using my Swiss Army knife keyring!

I'd originally thought about making a bag by sewing the two pockets together, but then decided a bit of garment customising was the order of the day. I found this heavy cotton sweatshirt dress in a sale, and not only is the sportswear-glam mix a tried and tested one, but the grey of the dress picks up the silver of the sequins and is much easier than trying to match that tricky blue.