christmas craft + free shipping

A few weeks ago I was embroidering a Verano "Petals" motif, and this is why ...

I wanted to make a christmas ornament for the annual Yardage Design Christmas e-newsletter (which subscribers would have received yesterday). After embroidering the motif, I cut it into a circle and backed it with some contrast Liberty Print, including a matching loop to hang it from a tree, then loosely filled it with some stuffing so that it sort of ended up a puffy disc shape. I really like the scandinavian vibe of the finished product, as well as the red, white and blue colour combination.

I really enjoyed photographing this project in Retiro Park, much to the amusement of the passing Spaniards! It was fun trying to find the right tree, the right branch, with the right sort of light ...

... and then wishing I'd made a hundred of them to fill a whole tree ~ how excellent would that be?!

Now that it's November, Christmas feels close! Between now until 20 December, there is FREE SHIPPING worldwide for orders greater than $35 from the Yardage Design online shop. Simply enter the code word CHRISTMAS at the checkout, and  your shopping cart will automatically update once the order is over $35. Enjoy!

Playing along here today.

a sterling find ...

I found this beautiful silver, delicate, flower dish at the Bermondsey Antique Market a few weeks ago in London. It's a great little market ~ antiques, vintage stuff, and lots of silver.

The seller told me that this piece is Scandinavian and made in the early part of the twentieth century. Who knows if that's true or not! I just like it ~ the detail is amazing.

This is one of the loveliest things I have bought for myself for a very long time. It certainly wasn't a bargain at ninety pounds, but it was one of those times when I saw it and knew I had to have it!

More lovely finds over at Flea Market Finds today!

Have a lovely Sunday!

P.S. Half price pre-cut fat quarters of my handprinted fabric in the shop today ~ here!

embroidery

I'm teaching myself how to embroider. Nothing fancy, just some stitches around one of my petals motifs for a little project I'm hatching. I'm using this book to give me ideas and show me how to do some of the stitches, but mostly I'm just winging it. I'm really enjoying it ~ I've discovered that embroidery is very relaxing as long as you embrace the wonk!

Have a great weekend!

bunting satisfaction

At last, I have finished (redone) my bunting flags for the swap ...

This time, I stuck to my sewing instincts and used strips of my Verano fabric, which still gives the patchwork effect I was after, but is less complicated and "busy". I love the colour combination of crimson, navy and sea green ~ I'm thinking about doing a larger scale quilt in these fabrics. Now I have to get these babies into some envelopes and mail them to their new homes ... only a tad late!

Much more creativity here today.

P.S. Don't forget to enter my blogtoberfest giveaway for a chance to win The Liberty Book of Home Sewing ~ go here to enter!

styling with raspberries

The results of my (brief) styling stint during the week with some of my fabric and a bowl of raspberries!

I'm pretty happy with this shot - using only natural light and my (limited) skills using the manual settings on my camera. No photo editing required ~ it's au naturale!

The raspberries went on to be eaten with chocolate truffles after dinner ~ win, win!

Have a great Sunday!

i love lamp + a surprise!

Do you like my lamp? I covered the shade myself yesterday with my new Verano Petals fabric in ink blue, which was immensely satisfying! I think the scale of this pattern works well on a lampshade, and was one of the projects I had in mind when I was designing it.

I used a kit from here, which was quite easy except for the bit where you have to attach the rings ~ I could have used an extra set of hands, but I managed to do it (slowly) by myself. I'm pretty happy with the result ~ it looks like a bought one!

I still have to make a matching one for the other bedside table in our bedroom ... slowly making things a bit more homey here with some splashes of colour (thanks Ikea) and some of my fabric.

And now for the surprise ... you can use the following discount code in the Yardage Design online shop all day today and receive 15% off your order ... enjoy!

YARDAGE

Many more creative spaces here.

Have a great day!

trial, error and going against my sewing instinct

I've finally had time to sew something ~ hooray! I signed up for the bunting swap a while ago and the bunting flags are due to be posted this week, so this was my priority project. I like using these swaps to experiment a bit. I had an idea a while ago about using patchwork, so I started where I always do ~ cutting and sewing strips of fabric (loving these colours together) ...

I'm with Tania about loving the back of patchwork tops ...

Then I thought I might cut these into strips, crossways ...

This is where things start to go a little pear shaped ~ I joined the strips together, creating a tiny patchwork ...

It looks OK, but I think the back looks fab!

So I keep going ... cutting out the bunting template ...

I even join up the offcuts to make another bunting flag, back them and here they are ...

I don't love them, but I don't hate them. My sewing instinct told me to just stick with the strips ~ I think that would have resulted in a better outcome. Still, I enjoyed sewing these, and sometimes you need to do things a little differently every now and again. It was a small amount of fabric (from my new Verano range - available here) and about an hour's work, so not a total waste. I think I will try this again but with the strips ~ I have a new idea in my head.

Happy sewing!

new fabric designs ... at last!

I am so pleased to be able to finally share my new fabric designs with you! There are two new designs, each printed in two different colourways, that collectively I'm calling Verano. Verano is a Spanish word meaning "summertime", which I thought was appropriate as I designed both patterns whilst I was here in Spain in July.

The first design is called Petals. It is a large scale print reflecting the ancient architecture and art nouveau that surrounds us in Spain. Petals is printed in ink blue and sea green on off-white linen/cotton fabric (140cm wide).

The second design is called Leaves. It's a pretty little curly leaf that I drew one day after a walk around the town. I really enjoyed devising the repeat for this design ~ it's a six spot repeat for those interested. Leaves is printed in crimson and powder blue on off-white linen/cotton fabric (140cm wide). It's really hard to capture the powder blue colourway with a photograph - it's very pale and delicate.

Each of these fabrics is available in the shop now by the fat quarter (multiple fat quarters are cut as a continuous piece), and incase you can't decide, there is also a Verano Fabric Pack which contains a 35cm x 35cm piece of each fabric.

I would also like to welcome my friend Pam to the Yardage Design team. Pam will be cutting, packing and posting orders for the Yardage Design online shop while I am here in Spain, so it's business as usual!

I can't wait to hear what you think of these new designs. I'm also looking forward to seeing what people make with them. I'm planning to make a summer quilt over the next couple of weeks.

Pop over to our creative spaces to see what everyone else has been up to this week.