Fabric Bowl workshop - May 2018

On Saturday 19th May 2018 we held a workshop to make fabric bowls. We had 9 participants and worked for 4 hours. In this time every one completed a bowl, some participants decided they had a more suitable thread at home to use on the bowl edge. Flowers and foliage were a popular theme for the fabrics, with some striking colour combinations as not everyone chose traditional colours for flowers.

We recommended the use of Fast2Fuse for the bowls, but had some trouble bonding the fabric to it. We came to the conclusion that the irons were perhaps not powerful enough. The use of steam seemed to help. The instructions have been amended to reflect this. There were two styles of bowl to try, one a hexagon using cut darts and the other a round bowl using overlapping darts. They both involved a lot of satin stitching, it can be difficult to achieve a neat finish, unless you alter the top tension. Participants were encouraged to test out the satin stitch on their machines, using the 'fabric sandwich' scraps left over after cutting the bowl shape. If you use a dark fabric the white stiffener can show through even after 3 passes with satin stitch around the edge. It may be of benefit to colour the white edge with permanent marker of a suitable colour before you do the satin stitch on the top edge. 

This workshop was a great success, as everyone had a complete bowl at the end of the 4 hour workshop. Our most annoying problem was with the bonding of fabric to the interfacing, it took longer than anticipated and required reinforcing at intervals with a bit more steam.

The instructions can be found below and on the patterns page of the website. You will have to make your own patterns, instructions for making a hexagon are included. 

Hexagon bowl and template

Round bowl

May 2018 - Cathedral windows demonstration

This month we had the Cathedral window demos by Marion. These were rescheduled from March, when we had to cancel due to bad weather. There were several examples to look at, giving ideas for the use of this technique.

Two pincushions and a purse using Cathedral window technique

Here are the WIP's;

An example from a WIP

There were some  finished candle mats from the workshop earlier in the year.

Halloween themed 

Awaiting beads

We also had several quilts that had been finished and one being quilted.

Attic window quilt for Project Linus, has a lovely green patterned fleece backing

Started to practice machine applique

Made at a Creative Quilting workshop with Gail Lawther. Present for makers son, a tree surgeon, hence the tree fabrics

Lovely bunny baby quilt. this one used the Pineapple technique

Some other WIP's included;

Camper van quilt for Grandson

Hexagon Christmas project

EPP using multiple shapes