CHSI Stitches show part 2

More highlights of the CHSI stitches 2016 show earlier this week.

On Tuesday I shared some of the yarn highlights from this years CHSI stitches show, today I have the rest. Mostly sewing, wowza there was A LOT of great fabric and sewing ideas, but also the other bits and pieces I saw and loved.

Dashwood Studio is a lovely UK based textile design company and their stand had quite possibly my favourite thing in the whole show.

I shared this on instagram whilst I was still at the show. I just think this is not only fun, cute and pretty but it is just a great bit of advice too. It was made by the super talented The Primrose Parasol (find her of Facebook here and instagram here)The Dashwood studio stand also had some really beautiful modern quilts. They are made by Joanne Jones, find her on instagram here.

This Tessepatch idea from Craft Yourself Silly really caught my eye too, a really clever twist on the traditional paper piecing patchwork.

The cats are my favourite but I think the little Scottie dogs would look amazing in black, white, red and tartan.
They come in 2 sizes as precut paper templates or studier 2 part templates for clever pattern placement if that's your thing.

Making your own knickers (underpants) is a real trend apparently, I saw a couple of companies doing really pretty kits.
This one from Flo-Jo:

And this one from The New Craft House:

What a lovely present idea for a friend who sews - you can never have too many pairs after all!

I really like this denim cushion, it is from The Denim Studio by AGF . I love the simple stitching with the patchwork, such a lovely idea.

With so many people enjoying the colouring in trend this "Colour me in" range from Pink Pineapple really caught my eye. They've got loads of ready printed fabric products for you to colour with fabric pens.

Such cute and modern designs. From their website it looks like this is UK only shipping at the moment.

Now just stop for a moment and admire this gorgeous heart canvas. 

This is by the lovely and talented Jo aka Shabby Dandelion. You can buy Jo's beautiful art in her etsy shop, she also teaches classes here in the UK. If you are from further afield her blog has loads of information about how she achieves her layered, shabby, "distressed to perfection" art.

My "most beautiful bunting or garland" of the show is this lovely lovely thing from Lea Lu Designs.

It is available (UK only again I'm afraid) as a kit and they have a whole range of beautifully soft fabrics and kits to make all sorts of things including clothes. 

Now I must apologise for this awful photo but I was very excited to see Stuart Hillard, from The Great British Sewing Bee's first series (I seem to recall a rather fab skirt with tulip pockets) He had just finished a demonstration to make a lovely bag, just out of shot, and this was the "Ta-Dah!" moment.

My day at the CHSI Stitches 2016 show started with a bloggers breakfast, where I got to meet some lovely people and was given a goodie bag from DMC. As well as the cotton yarn and crochet hook I showed on Tuesday the bag contained a new DMC product Custom by me. It's a self adhesive cross stitch design sheet which allows you to cross stitch onto anything easily. The sheet then just washes away leaving the stitching in place, perfect for beginners.

We also had some Coloris thread so I got to work over our tea and pastries and started a little sashiko inspired design onto my bag.

I'd like to add a little more and then give it a good press with the iron but the colours of the thread go so nicely with the navy bag with it's beige handles. I didn't feel embarrassed to walk round the show with it over my shoulder in it's unfinished state!

That's it, I won't bore you with more of the gazzillion photo I took! It looks like the craft industry is thriving and there are a lot of us who just like making things!

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Handmade fair highlights

Ribbon Gift Tag and Card Topper

CHSI stitches show 2016

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I'll be linking up at some of these lovely link parties.

CHSI stitches 2016

I was lucky enough to go along to the bloggers breakfast at the CHSI stitches (Craft Hobby & Stitch International) show this week.

This show is the largest trade show in Europe for the art, craft, needlecraft and hobby sector. What a lot of lovely people I met and what a lot of lovely things I saw. Way to much for one post so I'm going to have to split this up into themes, today yarn, next time fabric and other bits and pieces.

First off, the thing that everyone was talking about "Yarnia".
A- MAZ-ING!

My photos don't nearly do it justice, you start with a knitted brick wall and wardrobe with mannequins fully dressed in all knitted and crocheted outfits, even the suitcases were made of yarn.

Then you walk through the yarn wardrobe into yarn Narnia - "Yarnia" see what they did there!

Mr Tumnus, the lamp post, the Ice Queen, rabbits and foxes, even a wolf all a mix of knitting and crochet.

Then there is that tent ....... knitted!

This was created by The Creative World of Crafts and made with Bernat, Lily Sugar 'n cream and Caron yarn. I am assuming it is now going all over the place so lots of people can be as amazed and impressed as I am!

My other yarn based highlights were:

What a fun table cloth, some lovely ladies moved their drinks so I could take this photo but I'm afraid I didn't notice what stand it was - ops.

These lovely little fellas come in a kit from a Danish company called Go Handmade, so cute, and the kits contains everything you need to make both. They have loads of different designs too.

I see this bag in my future... It was on the Designeryarns stall and it's made with the most beautiful yarn from Noro called Obi. Designeryarns are the UK distributors and I don't know if it's sold worldwide but worth looking out for in your local craft shop. Actually I'm loving the colour way on the cardigan behind, that is another lovely Noro yarn called Ginga.

Could these toadstools be any cuter? This is another kit this time from The Crafty Kit Company. They ship worldwide too - hooray!

I think weaving is going to have to be added to my crafts to try list too, I really like this wall hanging from Juko Designs.

You can buy it as a kit from their etsy shop and they are another that ship worldwide - hooray again!

They also had kits to make a woven bag. 

The weaving was happening on both sides, going round and round, apparently there is no sewing up to do at the end. Sound like magic to me!

CHSI stitches is a trade show so it was all about looking at products, seeing new lines and trends and talking to crafty people. Nothing I saw was available for me to buy on the day, can you imagine seeing this: 

... and not buying a thing! 
I did get a lovely little goody bag courtesy of DMC and one of the treats in there was this lovely soft cotton yarn and quite possibly the prettiest crochet hook I've even seen!

This did soften the blow of not being able to buy yarn. I need to think carefully about what to make with it, any suggestions?

Running Stitch Embroidered Cushion Cover

Here is a really simple idea to fancy up a plain cushion or pillow cover.

 Today I'm over on The Pinning Mama again and sharing one of those rare projects - the kind that turn out better than you expected!
I love those variegated multicoloured knitting yarns that change colour as they go. Some times they give you a lovely mixed up design and sometimes you get a large blob of one colour for no apparent reason. 
Anyway, I hadn't realised you could get this kind of multicoloured delight in embroidery thread too.
Turns out both Anchor and DMC (that's the brands that our local craft shop stock) have quite a few different colour variations in both stranded and pearl thread.

I couldn't resist and chose one with bright pastels that go nicely with the rug in our living room.

A very plain cream cushion cover then got a makeover with a bit of very simple embroidery.

You can find a much more detailed tutorial on The Pinning Mama here.

Bedside Phone Charging Tidy

Where do you put your phone when it's charging? Do you have a special place for it?

We have coasters on our bedside tables, for that late night or Sunday morning cuppa. Very sensible, very normal. Except someone had a slightly odd habit of putting his mobile phone on his coaster! When you're carrying two mugs of tea you really just want to be able to put one down, not faff about moving a phone first.

I thought if I made a place especially for the phone it might help so this is what I came up with; a "Bedside Phone Charging Tidy" 

It started life as part of some packaging from a nail varnish set. I'd used this in our old house on my bedside table to corral my bits and pieces (pen, bookmark, hand cream, nail file etc) It was just too nice to throw away! Any study flat box would work for this though.

But in our new house we have a classy cream/white and gold look going in the bedroom so for this to work it was going to need a makeover!

First I sprayed the inside gold. 

This was just a little left over spray paint from my geometric DIY art work and gold heart pot.

The base turned out a little lumpy so I decided to cover that with paper along with the outside.

This paper is just a sample bit of wall paper, left over from my "divide and conquer" drawer dividers. As you can see I just drew round the box (using my cup of tea to keep the paper from rolling up on me!) then I just trimmed a few mm inside the line and checked it fitted inside the box nicely. I drew round the sides of the box to and cut those out as well.

Then I just used a layer of Mod Podge to stick the paper in position and another coat of the Mod Podge over the top to seal. 

I left it to dry on a tin like this so it didn't stick to the table.

The last thing was to cut a little hole for the charger lead to poke through. Once the glue was dry I just cut this carefully with a craft knife.

And look - the coaster is free, all ready for a nice cuppa!
I made a different kind of phone charging holder a few years ago, in fact it was one of my really early posts. You can find it here, it's one where you use an old plastic bottle and it hangs from the plug socket. They worked great in the kitchen at our old house, the kids have them in their rooms now. 

Celery Pinterest Fail

Growing a new celery plant from the leftovers of a previous bunch sounds fab doesn't it? So where did I go wrong? 

So today, a Pinterest fail - let's be honest, we've all had them! 

Last summer I saw on Pinterest that you can regrow celery stalks from the stubby end bit of a bunch. If I remember correctly the pin said "Never buy celery again" or words to that effect.

"What a great idea" I thought, and "I must try this" 

It all started quite well, see the photo above, how exciting.

Then the stubby bit started to go a bit mouldy and I thought it would be running out of goodness so I planted it up into a pot of compost. 

Then about 3 weeks passed and this happened: 

I'm not quite sure where I went wrong. I kept the soil moist, it was on the windowsill, it just sort of collapsed, withered and died.
Should I have buried the stubby bit in soil completely do you think? Should I have left a longer stubby bit? Did it need to be planted outside in the garden? 
Has anyone actually managed to make this work? I'd love to hear how. 
My fail hasn't stopped me loving Pinterest though, funny that!