More tiny togs

When I purchased the t-shirt pattern from Brindille and Twig recently I also bought a pattern to make matching leggings for the soon to arrive new grandchild.

Making the leggings involved tangling with knit fabrics and elastic! So I procrastinated for quite a while before taking the plunge.

Finally I decided that it was time to get off that fence and have a go :) I misread the measurements for the first pair so the stitching of the elastic top was narrower than it should have been, which I corrected in the green spotty pair. I was thrilled to bits though that they were instantly recognisable as baby leggings!

Then I might have got carried away and made some more pairs :)

So have ended up with five pairs made to date and plenty of fabric left to add to that total.

Well, a baby can never have too many changes of clothes in the early days can they??

I have just seen the really cute hooded top that Cathy at Blueberry Patch whipped up on her brand-new serger, I am so tempted to give that a go too. 

Linking up to

New to Me in a new location!

Welcome to another monthly celebration of all things New to Me

The Link Party where we applaud the trying of new things whether they are ultimately successful or not.

My New to Me's this month have defintely been varied!

We have moved into our new home in Scotland so I have been enjoying beautiful sunsets like these right on my doorstep.

And this glorious old lady has been chugging past my door several times a week!

I have joined a new Patchwork and Quilting group too so will, hopefully, have some new projects to share as a result soon. Don't hold your breath though as the ratio of stitching to chatting is definitely skewed in favour of chatting :)

I have tried my hand at a sew-in purse frame for the first time,

and tried a New to Me method of constructing positive and negative nine-patch blocks courtesy of Generations Quilt Patterns, now that my sewing machine has finally been liberated from the box!



So that's my New to Me's this month, now it is your turn to share the highs and lows of trying out something for the first time. As ever please help to spread the word by linking back to this post in your post and/or adding the blog button to your sidebar.








Check out the other links too and, maybe, leave an encouraging comment along the way. The emphasis of this link party is to celebrate the trying so a little encouragement here and there would not go amiss! 
The link will remain open until 23.59GMT on August 31st, so you have some time yet to try something new and link up and join the party :)

An InLinkz Link-up

Pretty pouch - Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew

Welcome to another Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew Link party!

Not that I want to worry you or anything but Christmas in July has come and gone, the Christmas fabrics are in your LQS's now and well it is only 130 days till Christmas!!!!

Definitely time to start flexing those Crafting muscles to ensure a calm, stress-free and crafty Christmas Holiday in 2016. Which is where the Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew link party comes in.

Each month we add a brand-new Christmas or Holiday project to the Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew archive. Click on the button at the top of the page to see all of the brilliant projects dreamt up to date by our fabulously talented guest hosts.

This month's great project comes to you courtesy of Sally, who blogs at Wonky Patchwork.  Sally was the brains behind last year's brilliant Nutcracker Dolls so you know you are in for a treat again this year.

As ever there is another great prize lined up for one lucky linker and this month's prize is a beauty, courtesy of the delightful Katie at Japan Crafts

Katie has donated one of her lovely Hana Bag Kits, which will make the most stylish wrapping for that precious gift for someone special.

To be in with a chance of winning this great prize head on over to Wonky Patchwork and link up your Christmas and Holiday makes. As ever no blasts from the past please, we are all about keeping it current here!

The winner of last month's bag pattern from Sew Sweetness was Pam at Threading My Way who has been known to stitch up a bag or two in her time :)

My own Christmas crafting this month is also bag related. I have had the kit for a clasp purse lurking in my stash for a while so I decided that it was definitely time to get it out and have a go. In the past I have always used glue-in frames when making a clasp purse but this kit used a sew-in frame so I was keen to find out if they were easier to handle.

I used a pink perle cotton to attach the purse body to the frame and the jury is still out on whether it was any less fiddly to use than my usual glue-in frames :)

 The lipstick pen that I found in France was the perfect size for the purse, so another gift is tucked away and ready for the big C.

Now it is over to you, head on over to Wonky Patchwork and link up your Christmas and holiday makes for August and be in with a chance to win that lovely Hana Bag Kit. The link closes at 23.59GMT on August 31st so you have plenty of time to get that project finished and linked up.



Thanks again to all of these lovely sponsors who have provided such great giveaway prizes as an extra incentive to get those gifts done and dusted.

  

 

Sewing Machine Memorials

A few weeks ago we had the opportunity to visit the National Memorial at Oradour sur Glane, which remembers the 642 inhabitants of the town who were massacred by 200 Waffen SS soldiers on June 10th, 1944.

The remains of the bustling market town have been preserved as they were left after the massacre to serve as a witness to the tragic event that took place there, and to help educate future generations of the realities of warfare.

 The town of Oradour sur Glane in 1944 was a popular spot with several cafes, a couple of garages and even a fabric shop!

On the night of June 10th, 1944 the men of the town were separated from their wives and children and marched to several locations around Oradour, including one of the town garages. Once herded into the chosen locations they were summarily executed by the SS soldiers.

The women and children were taken to the church and locked in, where gas and grenades were thrown into the building and anyone attempting to escape was gunned down.

This plaque commemorates the fact that, amazingly, 6 men survived the initial executions and burning of the buildings, although one of them was then killed during their escape. Only one women, Marguerite Rouffanche, survived the carnage in the church by escaping through a rear window and, despite being shot, crawling to hide in nearby bushes.

 The remains of the town have been deliberately frozen in time to relay the horror of the massacre. Littered around the town are the burnt-out belongings of the town's inhabitants as they were left on that fateful evening. It was particularly poignant for me to see burnt-out sewing machines such as the ones above lying abandoned in the ruined buildings. The women, and men maybe, who had used these machines before the massacre presumably struggled with broken needles, skipped stitches and tension problems just like you and I do with no conception of the fate that would befall them.

It was a truly humbling and thought-provoking day.