My Brain Was in Overdrive Today

 Today Sharon sent me photos of her Veronica settling into her new home.

"This is Chase, the cat's scratching tree but I really like this king-sized watermelon bed!".

"I get my own toothbrush?

"This is a very comfy bed. We kitty cats like to sleep a lot".

"Do I have to wash all these dishes?!?!"

"I love the great outdoors! What a nice patio chair!".

"Some say I'm very photogenic (whatever that means). I love how my sweater matches these dahlias".

"We ladies always have been partial to roses". 

At stitching this morning we all got a tour of Barb's craft room. She is very organized. One object that caught our eyes was a crocheted sheep. 

Jennifer4 (yes, my Jennifers are numbered) found the pattern on Ravelry "Shoop the African Flower Sheep" by Heidi Bears. Of course I became obsessed with making one and realized I had previously made a blanket for Daisy using the African Flower crochet stitch.

I was all set to run out and buy yarn when Barb reminded me that I had a bunch left over from my Persian Tiles and Mystical Lanterns blankets. Next will be to purchase and download the pattern and start crocheting this.

I gave Jeanette the second project bag. Like the first one, she'll stitch down the binding on the back by hand. She liked the quilting I had done on the back. This afternoon I put Barb's together and this time, machine quilted around the borders of the Queen of the May 2025 on the front.

I also quilted the back - 30º lines, 3 inches apart.

The script lining and border is such a nice touch. It's one of Jane Austen's works, I believe.

And I love, love, love the Wm Morris-ish fabric on the back. You can purchase the panel here. There are two versions to choose from.

I did the binding on this one differently from Jeanette's. I attached the binding to the front then wrapped it around the edges to the back and secured it with pins and some washable glue. Then using my blind hem foot to stitch in the ditch on the front, I attached the binding to the back.  It took a couple of tries. After I adjusted the needle to stitch just to the right of the 'ditch' and used the colour thread, I got the job done.

A couple of the gals purchased the Needleworker's Companion and Pincushion panel and plan to assemble it at our stitching retreat at the end of the month. Nicola has a good tutorial on YouTube on how to construct it. I was intrigued by the cheater hexie fabric on the exterior. It gave me a good idea about what I could do with the hexies I can make from the striped fabric I already have.

Here it is opened up.

And the back...

I used a bunch of hexies for the back panel of this project bag. 

I still have lots of this fabric left for the Companion project. I'll have a good look at their panels and measure the pieces.

And finally, Judy and Bev have been working on this Sashiko Biscornu project. 

It's kinda faux sashiko as it uses a counted technique rather than drawing the pattern on the fabric and weaving the needle in and out that way. I'll have to check my stash to see if I have any dark blue linen or eveneweave. If not, I could use 22ct white Hardanger fabric with blue threads. 

With the way my head swirled with all these crafty ideas today, it was all I could do to not kit up the biscornu project, too.