Sunday Stitchalong, Old Patterns, and Winner of Draw.

A big welcome to all of you, and special hello to my new followers - it's lovely to have you here!

It's that time of the week again to join up with Chrissie and other friends for our happy Stitchalong sharing time once again. I find that Sunday's are usually a bit involved with family and other happenings so I just want to let you know that the most of my stitching is done  through the week when I have more available time, and I share my progress on Sundays. 

It's taken me quite a bit of time to finish up the couple of projects that I showed you last week, but I am quite pleased with the results; I have to say that joining up with Chrissie has encouraged me to work  more of my projects through to completion, thank you Chrissie!

The first pic here is from last week's post and the next one is the placemat, ready to go! Please excuse the inconsistent colours due to fluctuating lighting.

So then I went on to make a second mat, and this time decided to have a play with my compass again, which gave me a few guide lines from which to begin experimenting. Basically, on paper, I just gradually added a couple of motifs that I had already drawn and used in the past (you may remember the butterflies from the two little framed pictures I did for my friends a few weeks ago) and followed my intuition, with the intention of giving the design a nice balanced look.  Then I traced the whole thing and transferred it onto the fabric.

(Again I apologise for the variation in colour - who would believe that this is one and the same mat!!!)

These mats were stitched totally with running stitch, in keeping with the Sashiko style, very easy and so relaxing! Afterwards they were backed with matching fabric and a cotton wadding sandwiched in using my trusty sewing machine, a process which, I might add, was not without slip-ups. The first one I did just happened to have the wadding sandwiched on the outside, silly Joy, how could such a thing happen! What a waste of time unpicking it - I didn't realise what I'd done until finished stitching and turning the mat out the right way. What was that about living and learning? I know I've committed that crime before - it's not good to repeat such a bad thing!

And the red snowflakes? Well here is what happened to that little piece, after much humming and hawing! In my fabric stash I found a scrap of leftover fabric from the pants made for 'Annie' doll, a few weeks ago, and decided to utilise it here; what do you think? The rod threaded through there is a pruning from our crab apple tree; it's a beautiful colour and does the job very well I think!

(Just a little 'aside' here: Hubby recently used a couple of these prunings in the garden to support a plant that needed a little help, and low and behold, a few weeks later we found that the little sticks were alive and growing new foliage!)

Now then, what else have I been busy with! Ah yes, take a look at this Paton's pattern book: I have had this for so long and think that some of these yarns are not even available any more, it's THAT old. This is an Australian issue but, when I was a youngster in the UK and working in an office, the other girls and I would knit during break times and my friend Peggy used this pattern over and over again - and her knitting was beautiful! When I came across the pattern in my file the other day I knew it was time for me to have a go at this, even if only for old times sake, and particularly because I'd just taken delivery of a fresh supply of Bergere de Paris Ecoton from  Deramores  (remember the grey cardi I knit recently) and I want a neat new cardi suitable as back-up for summer. The yarn is different so of course some working out had to be done with needles and tension, but hopefully I've got it right and this will turn out well.

 Do you love the colour? I do, and this is the absolute true colour!

Here are a few pics from our walk around the park on a fine day this week; we enjoyed lovely sunshine - how I wish it had lasted! That little building top right is called 'The Sanctuary' and is where groups of folks get together for meditation and the like! It's been very cleverly done with plantings on it's roof to enable the building to blend in with the surrounds. Clever eh! The bottom right pic is a close up of tree bark which I think is rather beautiful. What about that lovely old oak tree - there are three of them!

And a few more quick pics of blooms from our garden.

Last but certainly not least we come to the draw for the little striped cardigan: I wish I could give this to each of you who have put your name down but unfortunately that cannot be done! My lovely Hubby agreed to pick a name out of the bowl, although he felt a bit hesitant to do it! He gave the bowl a good old shoogle and turned the names over and over, then he lifted one little piece of paper out and - the winner is -  Forgetmenots Blue . Congratulations FB and I'll be in touch with you regarding your postal address soon!

So that's it for this week folks - I'm looking forward to catching up with all your posts and lovely makings and, until next time - be well, be happy, and enjoy your crafting!

❤Joy xo