And I was even more delighted when the owner got in touch to offer me some free felt sheets to try out… I’ve been having a little play with the felt today, and can vouch for its excellent quality and the wonderful fuzziness that you always get with proper wool felt (I am a felt snob, I admit it).

In my continuing obsession with all things miniature, I made a tiny little pincushion using a bottle top for a base. Here it is:

In spite of being utterly uninterested in the doings of the Windsor family (am a grumpy old curmudgeon), I seem to have caught Jubilee-itis, and this pincushion started out a bit red, white and blue…so I threw lots of colours at it in an attempt to save the situation..!

You can get a better idea of how small this one is from this pic:

I even put little magnets in the bottom thinking that it would be useful to be able to stick a pincushion to your sewing machine – then I realised that my sewing machine is plastic!  But they are very useful if you have dropped a pin/needle and can’t find it…

Anyway, back to the subject…

Some more about the Wool Felt Company

Although it’s a brand new shop, the Wool Felt Company is the brainchild of the owners of one of my favourite online fabric shops, Fabric Inspirations, so, as far as I am concerned, they have a proven track record. Currently they are stocking 100% wool felt sheets in a lovely wide variety of shades, but the intention is to stock a good quality 30% wool felt blend too. Definitely a shop to add to your list when you are looking for wool felt.

I wanted to share my luck with you lovely readers, so I have cut all the felt sheets in half and I’m giving away this lovely bundle:

And I will throw in the Nearly-Jubilee Pincushion I made today, and a felt craft book too.

To be in with a chance of winning, all you need to do is leave a comment on this post telling me about your jubilee party / holiday weekend plans, or you can just shout ‘I hate enforced national celebration/I don’t live in the UK (delete as appropriate) just send me the gorgeous felt’.

You have until midnight on Sunday 3 June to leave your comment.

Good luck! 

I’m hoping that they come back tomorrow…!  It has been incredibly noisy and, although the blokes doing the work have been brilliant, it’s always so odd having 2 or 3 strangers hanging around the house, eating your chocolate biscuits… Can’t wait for it to be over, in more ways than one!

In amongst all the upheaval I managed to do a bit of work on a few things. I am taking part in the House of Pinheiro pincushion swap (never can resist a pincushion), and have almost finished what I wanted to make. I just hope my partner likes it. Here’s a little sneak peak:

Of course I am using Liberty fabrics and linen. Speaking of Liberty fabrics, I also set up a Facebook page for the fabric selling side of my life (which I hope is going to grow!) – if you’d like to follow Very Berry Fabrics on Facebook, that would be wonderful…

I’ve also done a few rows of a crochet project that I have underway. I was lucky enough to be approached by Abakahn to do a regular monthly slot on my blog using their products. I decided to use some of their lovely Sirdar Simply Recycled cotton yarn to make a market/produce tote bag. I am hoping to share the pattern with you by the end of the month (fingers crossed!).

What I can say already is that the yarn is an absolute pleasure to work with – highly recommended.

And finally, I did the draw for the interfacing giveaway. Here’s the winning number, provided by the Random Man:

And the winner is Kathie, who chose Joey Potter from Dawson’s Creek as her fictional heroine. Congrats to Kathie – I will be in touch. And a huge thanks again to Julia at Gone to Earth for providing the prize.

Photo © Stitch Me Lane

Jennifer has been in touch to tell me about her new shop Stitch Me Lane Fabrics. It’s looking pretty good so far, with a good selection of fabrics and haberdashery. I’m planning to do a proper review at a later date, but, in the mean time, it’s a good place to check out, so do take a look.

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Another new shop that will be coming to the Big List of UK Fabric Shops very soon I am sure, is owned by Jo, who writes one of my favourite blogs, Bear Paw. Jo already has a bricks and mortar shop in Edinburgh called Avery Homestore where she runs craft courses and sells supplies. The good news for those of us who don’t live in Edinburgh is that she is now selling fabrics and yarn online too. You can read more about it in this post on Jo’s blog, where you can also enter her AMAZING celebratory giveaway. The other good news is that there is a 15% discount on any craft supplies ordered through the website until the end of May with the voucher code LAUNCH. If you are making summer bunting, a good choice might be one of these cute bunting packs:

Photo © Avery Homestore

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If this gorgeous weather is inspiring you to think about making some summer dresses, then you might want to pop round to Sewbox and invest in this really interesting new booklet from Serendipity Studio – Fashion Formula Dresses. Apparently it will help you to draft your own personalised dress patterns with lots of lovely maths!

Photo © Serendipity Studios

Sewbox also have lots of lovely bargain summer fabrics in their sale too, as well as a vast array of other sewing patterns. There’s plenty of inspiration here.

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This week’s M is for Make limited edition bundle has a gorgeous refreshing sea-green feel to it:

Photo © M is for Make

As ever with these gorgeous bundles there’s 10% off until 8am on Wednesday 30th May – you can find it here.

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This week at the Village Haberdashery there is 10% off Curious Nature from Parson Gray until (I think) the 31 May.

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And I’m going to give my own shops a bit of a plug… There’s 15% off EVERYTHING in my Very Berry Etsy shop until the end of May with the code MAY15. There are also new 6″, 5″, 4″ and 3″ Liberty squares in my little fabric shop.

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Enjoy the rest of your weekend… I’m about to scrub our wooden floors, which really need doing (children and bare feet!), and it’s been too hot until now… What a thrilling way to spend a Sunday evening – hope you have better plans!

So today’s Saturday Recipe is all about creating refreshing treat for a lovely warm day. It’s so simple, and so delicious, although it does need a bit of planning ahead and you’ll need an ice cream maker.

Iced yogurt

Note: If you are using ordinary yogurt you need to strain it first – this takes around 6 hours, so remember to leave enough time! This recipe makes 6-8 servings.

Ingredients

500g Greek yogurt or 1kg (or close enough, I used 2 pots of 450g) natural whole milk yogurt
1/2 cup caster sugar (ordinary granulated is ok but caster is better)
a few drops of vanilla essence (optional)

Method

• To strain the yogurt, line a large sieve with 3-4 layers of muslin or paper kitchen towels and place the sieve over a large bowl. Pour in the yogurt, cover and refrigerate for at least 6 hours. Once the 6 hours are up you will find that you have a lovely soft cheese-like yogurt in the sieve – you can discard the liquid that’s collected in the bowl.
• Put Greek yogurt or strained yogurt in a bowl and stir in the sugar and the vanilla. Stir until the sugar is completely dissolved.
• Refrigerate for 1 hour.
• Use your ice cream maker to freeze, according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

And that’s it! If you don’t eat it all straight away, store it in a plastic box in the freezer. It does freeze pretty hard, so remember to remove it from the freezer around 30 minutes before you want to eat it.

We’ve been eating it with a compote of fresh rhubarb from the garden, orange juice and chopped crystallized ginger, but I keep imagining how delicious it would taste with a warm chocolate brownie, or with sticky toffee pudding. Which shows that even when it’s warm outside, I still crave a rib-sticking dessert!!

I  hope you have lots of lovely plans for a summery Sunday… I might make some chocolate brownies…

Sadly, just the patchwork kind… This is my first ever pineapple block.

But because I am slightly obsessed with all things miniature at the moment, I decided that it would have to be a teeny pineapple.

Doing tiny complicated piecing with Liberty cotton should be right up there on the list of things not to do when it’s hot outside…!

So my plan is to make a load of these to use as a border on my first ever mini quilt. Is that bonkers? I shall no doubt have several 1000 more grey hairs by the time I finish them all.

But I did come up with a clever idea. I had a sheet of this fabric you can use in your printer left over from another project, and thought I would try printing out my templates to save having to draw all those fiddly little quarter inch grids. Here’s how it came out:

It worked really well, I think that’s one of the reasons why my block is so very accurate! But it’s an expensive method because the printable fabric is pretty pricey. I have a feeling that there are cheaper ways to avoid drawing template after template. Tell all quilting friends…

If I’m making anything with an inner and and outer – bags, wallets, crochet hook wraps etc. – I always use 2 kinds of interfacing. On the outer I generally use a low loft fusible fleece, and my preferred buy is Vilene H630 (available here at Gone to Earth), because it provides structure without bulk. I generally prefer use an iron-on interfacing because you don’t get fabric ‘creep’ as you sew in zips and sew seams, and as I don’t have a walking foot for my sewing machine, this is essential. This fusible fleece is soft but doesn’t give a huge amount of bulky padding – which of course you don’t want when you are sewing small stuff like this wallet:

Hopefully you can see that this wallet has just firm but soft effect I’m looking for – otherwise, just look at the pretty fabric!

H630 is really easy to use, you just cut a piece the same size as the piece of fabric you want to fuse it to, minus the seam allowance. Place the fabrics together, cover with a damp pressing cloth and press firmly with a hot iron for 15 seconds. Here’s a brilliant video at the Vilene website, showing how to use H630.

H630, along with its fatter cousin H640, are brilliant, but the totally indispensable interfacing in my sewing is a different Vilene product – the truly wonderful G700. This is a medium weight iron-on interfacing, but what makes it so brilliant is that it is woven. When ironed to a piece of quilting weight cotton it gives weight without that awful cardboardy stiffness that is so common with other iron-on medium weight interfacings. I found out about it from Julia, who runs Gone to Earth, and now buy it regularly from her – here it is. It’s pricier that the ordinary non-woven interfacing but worth every penny. I always use it to give weight to fabrics I’m using inside my products. For example, in the inside of my Red Riding Hood wallet I used it to interface all the pockets, and the inner fabric itself, and both sides of the tab closure, to give added strength around the magnetic snap.

Again, the trick is to cut a piece of interfacing the same size as your fabric piece but without the seam allowance – this stops your seams getting incredibly bulky. Around the edges of this wallet there are up to 6 layers of fabric, the last thing I want is layers of interfacing too! Here’s another excellent (and strangely relaxing) video about how to use G700.

So, do you want to get your hands of some of this alchemical sewing essential? Well the good news is that I told Julia I was going to write this post, and she offered to put together a lovely pack of these crafting essentials together as a prize for a lucky Very Berry reader.

Interfacing Giveaway

• The winner will receive a half metre each of H630, H640 and G700.
• The giveaway is open to anyone, anywhere in the world.
• Just leave a comment before midnight on Sunday 27 May to be in with a chance of winning.
• As Little Red Riding Hood seems to have a starring role in this post, why not tell me your favourite fictional heroine (or as usual, you can always just say, ‘Pick me!’).

A huge thank you to Julia for her generous offer.  Good luck everyone!

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We are very slowly re-landscaping our sloping garden into terraces. It *is* slow progress, but I am  proud of all that we have done so far. Here’s the first gabion wall we built last year:

And here it is now:

Still a bit of bare earth, but I am loving the way that the thymes, alpines and sedums are making themselves at home on the gabions.

The alliums are about to flower:

Looking at last year’s garden pics made me realise that these are coming out a whole 3 weeks later than last year – it has been so cold and grey here, I can quite understand why it didn’t feel like coming out until now. It’s good to see them spring into life.

The Camasssia is just coming into flower too. I love this beautiful plant – I am really hoping that it naturalises in our garden, it’s so pretty. I’m rather proud of this photo:

Something that has been flowering, for weeks now, is this white saxifrage that I planted on the gabions. It’s still going strong too:

I’d like to get some more of saxifrage to grow on the gabions, I have been enjoying it so much during this miserable May – we can see it directly from our kitchen window.

The cultivated Veronica I bought earlier this year is also looking so pretty:

And here’s the wild version (bottom right corner), commonly known as speedwell, which, along with the daisies, is invading our uncut lawn. The best reason I know for not mowing the lawn…!

Hope you got to enjoy some sunshine today too!

I’m adding  a new shop to the Big List today – a big welcome to Dragonfly fabrics.

As you can see from the logo, dressmaking fabrics are the main focus, so this is a great place to go for jersey, linen and corduroy as well as cottons. You can browse by season (great if you are looking for dressmaking fabrics), by colour, by type of fabric (always useful) and by designer. The main brands stocked at the moment are Hilco, Westfalenstoffe, Tilda  and there are also lots of beautiful bio-linens, amongst all the other goodies. Another nice touch is that you can order fabric samples before you buy. Payment is via Paypal (you don’t need a Paypal account to use this) and the standard price for First Class delivery is £3. They have a brand new blog and a Facebook page too.

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Other News

After a long wait, Lu Summer’s Summersville has arrived almost everywhere (M is for Make, Seamstar, Sew Me Happy, Celtic Fusion Fabrics, Eclectic Maker, Ray Stitch amongst others), so I guess it’s just a question of going to your favourite shop to stock up on it, it’s bound to by flying off the shelves. But, if you CAN wait, I hear that Seamstar are going to be having a Summersville giveaway really soon – it make sense to sign up for their newsletter so you don’t miss it.

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The M is for Make limited edition bundle is looking good, as ever. There’s 10% off this collection sweet squirrely fabrics  and it’s available until 8am on Wednesday 23rd May. 

M is for Make is also now stocking a selection of Kona solids.

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Over at Quilt Me Happy there’s a rather wonderful 20% off Parson Gray’s Curious Nature. Look at all the lovely possibilities:

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Sorry it’s so short today! It’s been a long day and I have to go and sort the wreckage in the wreckage in the kitchen before I can have my supper… And watch the final parts of The Bridge of course. Enjoy your Sunday evening!

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My brief is to create a set of pouches and purses for the show’s main character, intriguingly, one of the pouches is for a nutmeg grater and fresh nutmeg. Fortunately I already had a mini-grater to use for my measurements! I had an inspiration that Michelle’s cute dumpling pouch pattern would be ideal for this, and here’s the result.

The purple fabric is from a set of cotton napkins I found in a local charity shop, and the snazzy accent fabric is, of course, the gorgeous Bloom from Ruby Star Spring.

The other pouch was considerably less fiddly to make, although making bias binding always takes a little patience!

For this one I’ve used some grey corduroy from an old pair of trousers for the main outer fabric and some red linen for the lining. The floral binding is made with some Laura Ashley fabric that my mum and I bought in a remnant sale in 1988. I remember the date because we also bought some fabric to make the dress for my school leaving dance! 24 years definitely makes it vintage I would say (which makes me ancient!).  I think the outside is a little bit plain, so I’m wondering about adding some red linen flowers to jazz it up a bit. Not too much though because I think the heroine of the show is feisty rather than floral..

It feels brilliant to be led by the fabrics that I have available to me rather than buying the fabric specifically for the project. I really would like to make room for a bit more of this in my sewing.

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Nearly forgot! The winner of the Make Do and Mend book is:

Kerry left comment number 45, so well done to her – Kerry, I will be in touch for your address.

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Hope you are all having a great weekend. I am off to watch the second half of the Champion’s League final, enjoy a beer and crack on with some crochet. I’ll be back tomorrow with lots of lovely fabric news.

If you’re guilty of this kind of stashing (I am refusing to call it hoarding in case Channel 4 come round and make a documentary about me), then Make Do and Mend by Rebecca Peacock and Sam Tickner is just the thing for you. The book is aimed at people who are newish to the Make Do and Mend philosophy and who might have to blow the dust off their sewing machine before they get started, so there’s lots of really useful sewing basics in here, as well as lots of ideas and techniques for actually mending clothes in the first place. These are such fantastic skills to have, and such a shame that people don’t learn this kind of thing any more. It’s great to learn the basics of darning, for example.

Where the book really comes into its own is with ideas of what do do with stuff that’s just too far gone to repair. There are bags made out of T-shirts, scarves made out of blouses and T-shirts, skirts made out of old jeans, jewellery out of T-shirts and buttons. There’s also lots of ideas for making household bits and bobs like coasters, cushions, blinds, curtains, laundry bags out of remnants and thrifted fabrics.

The instructions are good and very clear, although I really miss the presence of colour photographs to illustrate the projects, but that’s a little quibble, and it feels harsh to moan about it, especially when it’s a book so full of good ideas. It’s just that I’m just the sort of girl who needs a bit of colourful styling to get inspired! A big plus point, on the other hand, is the lovely list of resources, fabric websites and good blogs at the back of the book. Just the sort of info I like!

If you’d like a copy of this book, I have one to give away. Just leave a comment on this post before midnight on Friday 18 May telling me the last thing you mended… The last thing I mended was Danny’s homemade Kikwi toy - the nagging of small children is very persistent!

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Funnily enough, I have been delving into my stockpile of thrifted fabrics this week, because I’ve been asked to make some props for a musical that a friend of mine is stage managing, and they want to keep the costs down. It struck me that a good way to make the recycled stuff look good was to pair it with some smaller scraps of new stuff.  Here’s the first pouch I’ve made:

I’ve used some recycled denim and some polkadot cotton from a Top Shop dress (which sadly you can’t see!), snazzed up with this fab floral from Melody Miller’s Ruby Star Shining collection. It was great to make a dent (no matter how tiny) on the huge pile of ‘just in case’ fabrics… Hopefully there’ll be more to come, otherwise we’ll have to give up even more of our cupboard space….

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Speaking of fabric hoarding… there’s some more Liberty charm packs available in my shop right this minute, if there’s a little space in your stash for them. They’re only small..!