Halloween Trick or Treat Blog Hop

Spooky time 👻👻👻

Jo from Serendipitous Stitching  has organised another fun hop around our blogs to see our Spooky stitching, find some Spooky letters and jump to the next Spooky blog 😱

Once you have discovered the Spooky Phrase hop over to Jo's blog and leave it in a comment for a chance to win a prize 😈

My Halloween stitching is all from a few years ago as I haven't done much lately, although this year I have for Needlecraft Haven Halloween Exchange. I can share the photos for that tomorrow after I know my partner has opened hers and hopefully mine arrives as it's not here yet :-)

2013 Exchange

2008 Exchange

Stitched for Michael

Stitched for Philippa

They are all stitched on perforated card, I quite like using it as it for ornaments when stitching characters. I backed both designs with felt, the tricky bit is always the cutting around. 

Here's my Spooky letter for Halloween Trick or Treat Blog Hop

Now you have my letter it's time to spread your bat wings or witches cape and fly over to 

http://thecraftyprincess.blogspot.com

As you know I love to change my mantle and sideboard for various times of year, Halloween is no exception although now our children are grown ups my decorations are mainly my candle holders and ornaments on a more autumn theme than being spooky. I have a few mini pumpkins this year too which I'll be baking soon.

Happy Halloween to you all -I hope you have fun with plenty of treats.

Coffee Koozie's holiday snaps

A very quick post to share Coffee Koozie's holiday snaps - very successful although it was quite a surprise at how the cups vary in diameter.

McDonald's pitstop on our journey

Day out with the National Trust

Besides the seaside, besides the sea

Coffee Koozie now lives in my handbag and will be with me on all my travels, so more holiday snaps soon!

Gifted Gorgeousness October

Gifted Gorgeousness is hosted by the lovely Jo at Serendipitous Stitching on the 15th of every month. It's a great way to share details of gifts you have sent or gifts you have received.

This is a short post from me as we are on holiday on the south coast of England- a last minute decision as the river cruise we should be on was cancelled due to low water levels. We've decided on a quiet week just enjoying reading, sewing, wandering around. We are doing the river cruise in December now with the added bonus of seeing the Christmas markets.

My GG this month is the wedding sampler I made for our friends' youngest daughter. They look gorgeous together, we had a lovely time at their reception.

Wedding Sampler

The happy couple 

As always my current stitching is gifts or exchanges so there will not be much stitching to share this month .... but Koozie is here on holiday too so look out for his adventures next blog 😉

Quilting - my first time

My Mum makes quilts, amazing quilts for family and friends and for many years she has been making quilts for Project Linus. In 2015 these two of her quilts were chosen to be in Ailsa Craig Quilt Festival in Canada. Mum was quite nervous about them being posted overseas but they arrived safely, were admired by many visitors and arrived safely back here in the UK.

Quilting is not something I have been tempted to do but when reading Barbara's blog post A DrEAmi Finish! Coffee Koozie I knew I had to have a go. I always find takeaway coffee cups difficult to hold; the Coffee Koozie was the perfect answer.

I'd be lying if I understood all of Barbara's post as not being in the quilting world I did not understand all the 'names' but I did manage to find the link to Patty's blog Elm Street Quilts and her post 'A cosy cup of tea'.

This lead me to The Jolly Jabber blog from The Fat Quarter Shop with great instructions along with a link to a downloadable pattern.

Pattern printed, instructions downloaded, sewing machine brought downstairs, a free afternoon ..... just needed to find some fabric! And I had it - added recently to my stash from Aldi (yes really).

Taking a deep breathe I started my first ever quilting project -

Fabric and tools ready

Lovely fabric from Aldi - free pattern too (I might be tempted)

Squares cut, backing cut, wadding cut 

Squares stitched onto the wadding 

Stitched and trimmed, ends to be sewn in

Turned out ok

My final piece - Coffee Koozie 

I really enjoyed making this - I was so nervous but so pleased with how the squares quilted together. The pattern calls for top stitching around the edge; I know Barbara has trouble with this on her machine and as my machine was not happy with this either I have left that bit off. I could hand stitch round but I'm quite happy with the edging as it is.

My finished Coffee Koozie

We are off on our first river cruise soon and I am definitely packing my Coffee Koozie. I'm sure it will be very handy at the airport, on the plane and in the cities we visit - I'll try to remember to take a photo of it's travels.

Thank you Barbara, Patty and The Fat Quarter Shop for inspiring me to have a go at quilting!