Casalguidi workshop and a tea shop renovation

Yesterday a friend and I ran a workshop at our Saturday Stitching group on Casalguidi embroidery. There were twenty ladies taking the class - which was quite a lot to teach - including one lady who had only ever worked cross stitch before. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves however and they all managed to work a small oblong of four sided stitch for the background and a raised stem bar. 

You can see these stitches in the sample below ...

The raised stem bar is the fat 'sausage' shape in the centre. We also showed them how to do the bullion knots over the ends of the bar. We'll show them the woven picots (the leaves) and buttonhole triangles (the flowers) next time. This was the piece that I worked when I first learned this kind of embroidery at a workshop at Gawthorpe Hall in the North of England.

Since then I've played with the technique a little

Lots of woven picots on this piece.

Here I've entwined the wrapped cords through a square of hardanger embroidery.

And although this isn't really true Casalguidi, this little bag does use some of the elements. The four sided stitch background is there, together with buttonhole bars and wrapped threads but this time I've incorporated lots of beads to give a bit more modern effect.

The technique was traditionally worked white on white but those of you who know my work will already know that I don't really do white embroidery - hence the colour in all of my pieces. I do love those hand dyed threads!!

I started this morning to clear some space on my workbench in my garage in an attempt to see what (if any) miniature items I might need to buy at next weekend's minis show at Pudsey. Inevitably I got sidetracked as I came across some pieces that I'd been making for the tea room renovation project. So the projects are now better organised, even though my workbench is still fairly full. I won't show you. I'm sure you all know what a cluttered workbench looks like :-)

Some pieces made their way into the apartment above the tea room however ...

 The bedroom is just about complete now I think. The bed looks inviting with its patchwork quilt, folded blanket, smart cushions, hot water bottle and nightdress case.

I added a dressing table and stool and, although I still need to add a few accessories to the dressing table, it fits well against this wall.

A little leather handbag, pretty bottles and boxes and a beribboned hat top the combination wardrobe and chest of drawers and a parasol and set of floral patterned luggage complete this side of the room.

The attic room needs more items and it still looks a bit too clean.

The tea room itself now has six newly painted chairs though I may repaint the green one, which I reclaimed from another project. The trolley needs painting too and there will be shelves and pictures on the walls.

I added a small collection of tiny wooden mushrooms/toadstools to the kitchen window to echo the collection I  have on my own windowsill.

Jam and a bedroom

Spring has finally arrived here in my Yorkshire garden. I love, love, love these little snake's head fritillaries which bloom alongside my wildlife pond. There are already tadpoles swimming in the pond and the fluff I take from my tumble dryer filter and put out for the birds has almost all gone so proof that the nest building is coming along well too. 

The whole garden is awash with muted purples and yellows with primulas, primroses, daffodils and grape hyacinths. So full of promise.

I bought a large punnet of plums from the supermarket and turned it into jam for my storecupboard too. I intend to do lots more of this this year.

Now ... onto the grand spring clean in the Tea Rooms ...
I've never been happy that there is no staircase up from the first floor to the attic rooms in this building so I've constructed a back wall in the bedroom and added a small door. In real life this would only actually be about 3'6" tall but at least it hints of a way up to bed. The gaps need filling down the side and along the top but I'm quite pleased with how this is coming together now.

I did the same paint job on the furniture here as I did in the living room and turned the bed around to back onto that new wall. There are new cushions to tone with the wallpaper. Tiny slippers on the bedside rug, fluffy towels and a water jug on the stool and a lacy corset draped on the chair.

A trunk filled with linens stands at the end of the bed and a hot water bottle with a cosy knitted cover for cooler nights. The patchwork quilt is my favourite (there are more quilts in my Etsy shop).

A flower-trimmed hat sits atop the wardrobe and matching parasol leans against the pretty floral patterned luggage.

Miniatures today

Two posts in two days! Can you believe it? Today I'm updating you all on progress with my miniature projects. I haven't done all this work in the past week, I assure you - I do sleep occasionally, and this week the sunshine has lured me out into the garden to plant seeds and tidy up the borders.

 However ... there is progress on the tea rooms spring makeover and on the Swan Inn (as my little 48th scale pub is now called). I'll show you the tea rooms first.

 

 I made a new cover for the cushion on the desk chair, which now fits in with the overall colour scheme.

The rocking chair has two new cushions too.

 I made an armchair from foam board and card with two pieces of dowelling for the arms from a tutorial on Kris' blog http://1inchminisbykris.blogspot.co.uk/, and then covered the shade on the standard lamp to match.
So this room is now finished I think.

If you enlarge this photo you'll see that there has been a mini earthquake which knocked photographs over, a book off the bookshelves and one of the fire irons onto the hearth rug. These have now been put back in their proper places and all occupants of the flat are quite safe.


The Swan Inn is almost finished too ...

... apart from curtains at the bedroom windows and books for the bookshelf in the living room - oh, and some pictures for the walls.

And this is my 48th scale village street. There are more cottages to add. The little house which stands between the cottage stores and the Swan Inn is actually a money box, but it's the right size to fit in here.

Spring makeover and handbags galore

Time to give you an update on progress with the spring makeover in the tea rooms. Well to be honest there hasn't been much progress this week at all as I've spent most of the week making handbags. However ... this is where we're at at the moment.

This was the furniture following its paint job, all sanded to look a little worn and given its final coat of varnish.

The four chairs are heading for the tea room itself.

The rocking chair will look more inviting with cushions and a blanket draped over the back.

I'm particularly pleased with the side table - I even managed to get what looks like a water-mark from a vase of flowers onto the top.

Although now it's dressed it's not so easy to see the water mark.

The book case looks much better with the cupboard doors added to the base and new books filling the shelves.

So here's the room at the moment, with everything back in place - oh, apart from the rocking chair which I left out just so you could see the little shelf unit with its new ornaments in place.

All these handbags are now in my Etsy shop.

My miniature bookends and Christmas

I finished the 48th scale bookends! Cute aren't they? You can't get inside but, as you can see, they're supporting all my little books from Petite Properties and I love them.

There are more houses of this scale waiting in the pipeline but it will be after Christmas now before I make a start on them.

I've made a start on my Christmas minis. There are trees for the Tea Rooms, the Retreat and a small one for the 24th Scale Georgian Manor House...

... and I also got out the Christmas Kitchen room box to assess what I need to add to that.

I have some more goodies already waiting to go into this display but I'll keep those to show you another day. It all looks a little tidy for my present taste so there's quite a bit of work to do in here over the next couple of weeks.

The sewing room roombox has some new additions ...

 

I fitted the ceiling light in place, finished filling the cupboard, covered the mannequin with lace, set up the cutting out table and the sewing machine table, found a chair and lots of cats to play in here.

Do you see all these naughty little kittens? There are two playing with reels of ribbon on the floor, one supervising the fabric cutting, one in the basket of cloth and there's one on top of the cupboard, with another one just out of sight on the bottom shelf.

 

There's a cat behind the sewing machine, and another on the chair. There's still work to do in here with lots more bits and pieces to add and perhaps even more cats.

And here is my own naughty cat who looks just as though he's reading that list on my table.

I also completed my miniature embroidery frame. This has gone into the living room of the flat above the Tea Rooms.

I keep adding new pieces to this so you might notice there's a standard lamp in the corner, which wasn't there last time you looked around, a new plant on the bookcase and an orchid on the side table.

There's also a smart new cash register in the cake shop along with a box of scones and a jug of flowers on top of the bread display.

And herb pots on the kitchen windowsill.