A Village Quilter

Hi - you can now find me at: sarahtextileart.blogspot.com

Hello all, Apologies to you for the gap between posts.  I've been a little preoccupied with getting our bathroom sorted. It's amazing how you can have work done in one room of the house and the rest of the house turns into absolute chaos. And why has everything started to break, microwave, washing machine, kettle...  Anyway - as I keep being reminded it has to get worse before it gets better! Our little kittens are growing fast - they are quite leggy now and still very fast. I'll try to get a photo of them. It will have to be when they're asleep. On the sewing front I'm still working on my NYB swap. I'm making progress but the deadline is a little nearer than I'd like. Tomorrow I hope to be able to make some more progress with the NYB without my little helpers. An exciting development has also been happening. I've been teaching at Coles in Nottingham. They have a really well laid out spacious first floor room for classes.  It has a l...

Hello all, For those of you who I met at the Market Bosworth Quilt Show in June you'll know that I was hoping to sort out a class to teach stamping and printing - well we've got there. The class will be on Saturday 18th November in Ratby organised by Quilteez. I hope those of you who expressed an interest will be able to come - I'm really excited about meeting you all. In addition, this Saturday 9th September I'll be demonstrating at the Region 10 Area Day in Gotham. Here are some details for you: Venue - Gotham Memorial Hall - it has lots of parking 10 - 4 Faith lunch Speaker: Gail Lawther Me demonstrating Sales -  Quilteez   I'll also be bringing along my quilt 'Postcodes' that was exhibited at Festival of Quilts in the 'In the Spotlight' exhibition. And I'll have some samples made during the process. Hope to see you soon.

Hello. Well, I survived 4 days at Festival of Quilts. I had a great time, met lots of lovely people and am really inspired to crack on. I was particularly excited this year as I'd been selected to represent  Region 10 of the Quilters Guild in the 'In the Spotlight' exhibition. The theme was 'No place like home'. I decided to use the postcodes of all the places I'd lived. Although I was really pleased with my quilt, I was a little nervous about it being exhibited and how it would look next to the others. I must say I was very impressed with how it was displayed.  Also exhibiting in the same gallery representing Region 14 was my friend Sarah Humphreys. She chose to use house numbers to illustrate the theme of 'No place like home'. Another really great example of a modern quilt and as ever amazing machine quilting.  As well as participating in the 'In the Spotlight' exhibition Sarah Humphreys also managed to make another amazin...

Where does the time go! It's August already. Not much sewing done as Millie and Pebbles provide all the entertainment at the mo. Yesterday I received my catalogue and show guide for FoQ 2017. Getting the catalogue early means I can find my friends competition quilts and also read about all the specialist galleries. I'm looking forward to seeing all my textile friends during the 4 days I'm there. Have fun

 Hello all, Apologies for yet another delay in posting on my blog - but as you can see I've been a little distracted with Pebbles (Silver tabby) and Millie (brown tabby).  They arrived last week and they've wrecked my sewing room but are absolutely hilarious. So no sewing done for a few days. Flo is unsure about her new energetic friends and we hope to get the together very soon. She does know they have arrived and has enjoyed sniffing where they have been.  But I would like to let you know that I have a quilt being exhibited at the Festival of Quilts - I'm in the 'In the Spotlight' exhibition. If you follow the link there's a photo of my work in progress on the webpage. It's the first photo - grey improv pieced.  I'm very excited about seeing it on display as I haven't been able to take a decent photo of it. I'll be there for all 4 days so hope to bump into you during that time.  I'll be stewarding on the 'In the Spo...

Hello all, I had a lovely weekend sewing, talking, drinking tea and eating cake. What more could you ask for! I saw lots of friends and met lots of new people too. I'm also hoping to teach later in the year - making your own fabric with fabric paint, stamps and screens. Keep your eyes open and I'll post details as soon as I have them. It would be lovely to hear from you if you visisted.

Hi All, Just a gentle reminder that I'll be demonstrating this Saturday and Sunday at the Parish Hall in Market Bosworth. I'll also have work on display and samples and work in progress for you to look at. I hope to see you there.

Hello all, It's been far too long.  I hope you're all OK and that you'll have time to pop along to my blog to my blog to see what I'm up to. I have some exciting things coming up. The next exciting event is taking place in our village and I'll be there on the demo stand, free motion quilting. I'll also be able to show you all some samples of free motion quilting I'll be using in classes. So please do pop along to say 'hi'. I'll be posting more soon so keep your eye out...

The Lutterworth Embroiderers Guild were very fortunate to have Jean Littlejohn teaching. I think most of the class managed to finish their morning piece - which was a small stitched picture that we then embellished.  For me it was a first with an embellisher and Jean generously let us use her machine.  The second piece was stitched with a more open weave fabric than many of us were used to sewing with. Jean generously provided this fabric that was dyed and she also provided a size 14 Chenille needle - again much larger than we were used to, but the big eye enabled us to use a thinker thread to fill the space. We then bond webbed and foiled over the stitches,  So - a great class. Here are some photos from the day:             I'll post more photos as the work progresses.  

Hello all. Where has the year gone? How come it's July already? And apologies for not having posted for some time. I've been very busy so hope you'll like some of the photos I have to share. So, I was very fortunate to attend a class with Jean Littlejohn with the Lutterworth Embroiders Guild. Here is my work in progress:         And here are the pieces at the end of the day    And here is a piece I finished from my last class with Jean: I had a fab time last weekend.  It was the village arts festival and I was asked by the Market Bosworth Quilters to demo FMQ on the Saturday. Well - sitting sewing, drinking tea (which was brought around by the lovely Andy) and talking - it was a no brainer.  I had a lovely time. I also had a quilt on show.  A little blue Disappearing Nine Patch that I hand quilted. I do love hand quilting - but it's a little too warm at the moment to have a big q...

So - yet again a bit of a gap between posts - but I do have some photos at least.  The photos were taken on my phone and I'm rather impressed with the quality. Much easier that lugging a camera around. So, on Friday I went to the Bramble Patch for their annual Strawberries and Cream Exhibition . The main part of the exhibition was work by two of my favourite artists: Edwina MacKinnon and Catherine Nicholls . The premis of the exhibition was they both produced a piece of work based on a visit to a location they made together.  The work was very interesting and showed their breadth of skill really well.  A very thought provoking exhibition.  Also at the exhibition was examples of English Paper Piecing. The Bramble Patch launched a mystery club at the start of the year - which is still open now. Here is a photo of one of the examples: I also went to an event by the Tudor Tailor: Dressing Elizabeth I. It really was fascinating. It...

Hello everyone. I hope you've made the most of another Bank Holiday. I've been very lucky and have been at a sewing retreat.  It's great fun - an opportunity to sew and socialise and learn new things. So here are some photos of what I got up to: Still to be quilted but nice bright cushion covers  A 'doodle cushion' which looks very complicated but as it was well thought out was actually as easy or as hard as you wanted to make it  Disappearing nine patch with a lovely charm pack - Persimmon by Moda, plus a few of my own and the spotty fabric to pull it all together.  Cut and come again - a workshop by Edwina Mackinnon which I keep on at. I really like the results. And finally a bowl I am very very pleased with. The original fabric was truly horrendous and this is a massive improvement. Now there was a catastrophic event on the retreat. My machine broke on Saturday morning - not even...

Hello all. So, yesterday I attended a workshop with the Leamington Embroiderers Guild with Christine Plummer . And, amazingly it's one of the first workshops where nearly all of us finished the item we were making - and those who hadn't finished were very near to. Another added bonus was that if you wanted you could buy a kit! Happy days. So here is my offering: Off to put all the stuff away ...

Hello all. In the UK Bank Holidays have a reputation for having rubbish weather, which suits the British as we love to moan about the weather.  This weekend has been a typical mixed bag. Friday was very nice and I managed to split a Japanese Anemone, and replant the parts. So I was pleased when it rained heavily yesterday as it saved me watering them in. The weather also gave me the opportunity to spend the day tidying my sewing room. I have managed to tidy the cupboard. It's all labelled, and hopefully, it makes a bit more sense. I must say it was very satisfying. So no excuses now .... I went to the British Quilt and Stitch Village at Uttoxeter Racecourse last weekend. It's a relatively low key event, well anything is compared to Festival of Quilts. There's a good mix of quilting, embroidery and traders. So, here are a few photos from the event:  This is a beautiful example of embroidery. Beautiful muted fabrics and lots and lot...