Money Raising Goes Awry!

 I've mentioned before that I had a little idea to raise some money. It involved getting rid of some clutter at the same time, and I set out with high hopes; but things didn't go according to plan. I gathered together a random selection of items that were languishing in drawers, or just lying around the house, and took them off to a local auction house.

Outside effects being auctioned in the sunshine

A couple of weeks later the items had been sorted and labelled and were ready for auction (amongst hundreds of other varied and strange items). OH came with me and I was quite looking forward to the day. We didn't have to be there to see our items auctioned but, not having attended an auction before, I was interested to see how it all worked. When we got there, we picked up a buyers' number - just in case.....

Most of the items we took went for only a few pounds, and 2 items (a clarinet and a watch) didn't reach the reserve I put on, so we brought them home again. This pair of Staffordshire spaniels, which came from my MIL's when she passed away about 6 years ago, made £22.  Not bad since one of them was 'crackled' all over. At least now my daughter doesn't have to explain any more, to friends she brings round, how we acquired them and that they are not our chosen style of decor!

 I took a chance entering this pen as a separate lot, but it had the name 'Esterbrook' on the nib so I listed it as such and crossed my fingers. I'd had it since I was in secondary school and remember using it and filling it from an ink bottle. I was surprised when someone on the internet got it for £16. Altogether, I made £59 (before fees and costs) which I was quite happy with. But..........I somehow managed to spend over £100.

You really can't blame me, though, when this little beauty was up for grabs. A couple of people were bidding for it in earnest but came to a stop at £65, so I pounced and got it for £70 plus costs etc!!!!!

 I also nabbed a useful box of fabric for £17.50, which was also quite popular in the room. When I got it home and had a proper rummage, I found this vintage, 2.5m, unused piece of Liberty in the bottom, which is probably worth more than what I paid for the whole box.

Crafting has also continued at The Thread Shed with a phone case, child's bag and a cushion sold to friends. The bag above is a new design I tried out, and it worked quite well. Instead of my usual 2 handled shopper type, I tried a single handled shoulder design.

I've also finished this randomly pieced, rustic-looking quilt. The centre panel is made up of squares, HSTs, half-square-rectangles and 4-square patches. I started by cutting the bigger squares, then kept cutting smaller and smaller shapes as it got less and less. It was still too small to be useful so I dug out some larger pieces and made 2 large random borders.

I machine-quilted the whole thing with 2" criss-cross lines. Then, because I didn't want to bind the edges, I added a piece of tea-dyed sheet to the back (by sewing front-to-front and turning) and did some hand quilting to hold it all together. I love the finished result!

Bye for now.

Teresa x

Uphill Climbing.

On Friday evening my OH announced that the following morning we were going to go to Monmmouth and climb The Kymin. I had a coffee morning to go to but I didn't protest too much because I knew I had to get some practice/training in for the BBMC on May 15th which is fast approaching.
-
We set off from the car park in town and walked to the base of the hill where the climb starts on this wooded path.
Then out onto the road for a little while (sorry about the dark photos, I was taking them into the sun and don't know how to adjust for this. If you look at them from above or tilt your screen forward they are a little clearer.)

More paths through the woods.

Waiting for my OH to catch up.....ha ha, the other way around more likely!!

Up a hilly field.

Then through a couple more fields and another wood to the top. It was a gorgeous day but the view was a bit hazy.

This is the roundhouse on the summit.

And this is the older temple.

Which has unfortunately been damaged by the snow and frost over the winter.

On the journey back down I took more notice of the plants and flowers that were in abundance .

A carpet of wild garlic.

I had wild garlic in my veg delivery this week and there it was spread out over the hill, but we're not allowed to pick wild plants!

There were many different woodland flowers but I'm afraid I'm not that hot on identifying them.

Celendines (I think).

Bluebells amongst the ivy.

Primroses

Wood anemones (I think)

And another purple one I don't know the name of. I didn't get a photo of my favourites - the forget-me-nots.

-

I did get to the coffee morning, by the way, which was held to raise money for the flower festival the church is organising later in the year. I arrived just in time for the raffle which they postponed for a few minutes to allow me to buy tickets, while someone went to the kitchen to make me a very welcome coffee. And, what do you know, I won a prize (I chose a Body Shop gift set which I've given to my DD to use for her parties).

-

No stitching progress worth showing, I'm afraid. I have, however, decided to give the pincushion I've started to my mother for her birthday in May if it turns out ok, so I'll have to make another one for myself now!!

-

Oh, and I nearly forgot. I managed to get half an hour on Saturday to get a tune out of my clarinet. Maybe I haven't got the technique right yet, but it takes an awful lot of puff and I can't manage many notes in a row before having to breathe. But it's a start, and I learned 4 notes!!

-

Bye for now

Teresa x

A Cushion and a Clarinet

I've finished a project tra la la....la la....la!! I'm so happy now that the felted pieces are off the table and have been turned into this cushion. I think I was procrastinating a bit before because I wasn't sure it would be successful, but I'm very pleased with how it's turned out. I can't imagine how I'm going to feel when I've finished a whole quilt!! I stitched all the pieces butted up together with a wide, close zig-zag onto a piece of backing fabric for stability.

It's edged and backed with a flowery curtain-weight fabric I bought from a charity shop a while ago.

I find envelope backs are the easiest to make (and to take off for washing) so long as the overlap is big enough not to gape open.

I was browsing ebay a couple of weeks ago to see what vintage bits and pieces were around and put a bid in for this little pile of goodies. The whole lot, including postage, came to just over £10. There are over 20 zips, good long lengths of braid, lovely big buttons for bag fastenings and the seller added a cute piece of fabric as a extra bonus. I like to have lots of stash available to browse through when the creative urge takes over.

I also had another (accidental) win around the same time!! How, you may ask, do you win something on ebay accidentally? Well.............you know how sometimes you have a dream that maybe one day you could learn to play a musical instrument or something similar? No!!! It can't be just me!! Anyway, after chatting to a friend who plays the saxaphone, I had a browse at the clarinets available. There were new ones and used ones and vintage ones and they were mostly selling for around £60 unless very special. I saw one that was not used, but ex-shop display, on offer starting at £40 (with an option to 'buy now' for £150). I put a bid on for the £40 thinking someone is bound to out-bid me (apparently it's worth £250 new). But no-one did!!! So here it is!!!

In all its glory!!!

I've bought a beginners book to learn how to play and have so far managed to put it together in the correct order. There's no reed with it so I can't attempt to play it yet. If I can't get a note out of it or don't get on with it, the friend who plays sax has already expressed an interest in buying it from me.

-

I know!! I know!! I don't have the time to start something new but if I don't try it now, I don't think I ever will (and it was just....sort of.....meant to be!!). I'll let you know how I get on (one way or the other) :-)

-

Bye for now

Teresa x

-

P.S. The Shed Warming Party was postponed due to bad weather. The holiday-viewing gathering went ahead though on Sunday evening and 15 of us had loads of fun re-living 2 holidays with a break for some delicious food put on by our friend.
Bye for now
Teresa x