Nosey Parker in the Neighbourhood #3 – The Sewing Edition

For those who don’t know, Nosey Parker in the Neighbourhood is a little linky party to help us get to know each other. At the moment there is one per month. Each time I publish a list of questions on a topic and we each answer those in our own way & link up to get to know each other more.
You have a whole month to link up to this party, so take your time to put it together (although this one should be pretty easy to put together quickly!) & make sure you keep stopping back to see what everyone else is up to 🙂

My answers…

1)  How long have you been sewing? Are you a first generation sewer or was the knowledge handed down to you? Basically tell us about your journey…

I have been sewing for about 18 months, give or take. If you don’t count the sewing I did when I was at primary school that is… I don’t because that was nearly 20 years ago now (eeek am I really that old!?) and I don’t remember a thing I learned!
My Mum can sew, and has in my lifetime, but purely on a need-to-sew basis. She was never a hobby sewist. So I grew up with a sewing machine in the house but the majority of the time it sat in a cupboard covered in dust (where it still sits today…).

My parents then gave me a sewing machine for Christmas in our first year of marriage. It pretty much came out to hem trousers and that was it. I did buy a few patterns at one stage and sew a few pairs of trousers for myself – but the passion never really took off.

But what really sealed the deal for me was learning quilting at the beginning of last year. I made Hannah a quilt for her 2nd birthday and in the process discovered the online modern quilters community. After that I was hooked!!

2)  Where do you sew?

I am lucky enough to have a dedicated sewing/craft room. I justify it because I sew for business, otherwise I’m not sure I’d be able to justify it since we have 4 people living in our 3 bedroom house & I take up a whole one of the bedrooms! But while I have the luxury I appreciate it every day!

3) What does your sewing room/area look like today in it’s real state. Take a picture of it if possible and show it to us real 🙂

My craft room is incredibly fluid – it looks different on every day of the week. I generally prefer it tidy and like to tidy up in between each project because that helps me feel more relaxed when I sew.
{I know. I’m odd.}
However just because I like it tidy doesn’t mean that it always is! For example this is what it looks like right this minute…

So basically it has ALL of the things I hate going on right now…

**  No clear desk space
**  Fabric and other “stuff” all over the floor
**  Way way too much stuff in there in general
**  And all my lists are a mile too long (on my white board you may notice my lists – Blog, Home, Business… – that’s how I keep track of everything important going on and prioritise)

But it is a well worked in environment so that’s why it changes rapidly and often gets out of control, can’t even open the door for bags of stuff, messy. Mainly I have too much stuff crammed in there now for my liking!

4)  What is the first thing that you made which you were really proud of? Show us pics of your favourite project.

I was incredibly proud of my very first creation – my first quilt. Still to this day I love it to bits, warts and all. I can’t actually believe I was so brave as to free motion my first quilt either – on possibly THE worst sewing machine going. Seriously – these days I would rather sew by hand than use that horrible thing (I’m surprised it’s still alive to be honest – I’ve been tempted to take to it with a hammer on a number of occasions – like when I managed to break 6 needles in 24 hours free motion quilting on it). But I survived making about 5 quilts on that thing before I decided that this sewing bug was for real and I could justify buying a “proper” sewing machine. Aka one which actually had consistent or reasonable tension and didn’t keep trying to take my eye out with broken needles. (I haven’t broken a needle fmq since changing machines by the way!)

Anyway here it is… the quilt that started the whole journey off…

As well as free motion quilting the whole thing I also made up my own pattern. Which just about made my head explode when it came time to match up all the columns with that big break in the middle. But never mind, we got there in the end…
I’m still not good at following patterns as yesterday’s post (and this afternoon’s meltdown tantrum hour) demonstrates yet again!

5)  Do you always stick to the “rules” when you sew, or are you more improvisationally minded?


Absolutely no rules in this house. I am the laziest sewer going and if there’s a short cut I will take it! I also really love improvisation in general. My second big quilt was improv quilting and to this day I still remember how much I enjoyed the process of making it…

Terrible photo , and I can’t believe I didn’t iron it first, but you get the idea. It shows how far I’ve come in 18 months in that too though!…
That quilt now lives with Neil’s Mum – Orange is her favourite colour & the butterflies were to symbolise me…


I do actually know HOW to follow the rules, but more often than not I choose not to. My favourite sewing sessions are always those where I’m inspired by a piece of fabric or a person, have a roungh idea of what I want to achieve and then just go with the flow to see what eventuates. 
Yep, love just making it up as I go along!
Here are a couple of my favourite improv projects that I’ve done…

As you can see I often use traditional styles in an improv manner.
Love blending the two…


So that’s all about me. How bout you?


Link up here when you are ready 🙂 …