Posh Jewellery Stands.

I went to the "Festival of Quilts" at the NEC last weekend, while I was in Penarth visiting my parents. Knowing that anything I bought would have to fit in my case to be brought home via the London Underground, I had no intentions of buying anything.

But fabric is so much more compact than yarn!

I bought a 3 metre piece of lovely cotton with the plans to make a new skirt and top set. That is the floral piece in the background.

Then I saw this stunning hand dyed fabric. Very expensive but soooooooo gorgeous. It is made by Farbstoff. The lady was lovely and spent ages helping me find the right colours. Originally I was looking for a pice to photograph my work on but I ended up getting two pieces, the second one to make jewellery stands with.

Yes, I know they are going to work out very expensive jewellery stands but I need something special for when I finally get around to designing the silk jewellery.

I used a template I found online. Stella & Hodge show you how to make some simple stands that fold flat. They make theirs from card. The template is perfect for what I wanted to do. I just wanted them posher.

I had also bought some very thick interfacing at the show. I went stash diving and found the Bondaweb and then I was ready.

As interfacing doesn't score and bend like card, I cut one full piece. The second piece was trimmed just inside the dotted lines of the template so that the pieces didn't touch.

I ironed the pieces all together and then got out the sewing machine. I tucked ribbon between the interfacing and the fabric. I did a single line of stitching, from the back, along the centre of the gaps in the second layer of interfacing.

As my machine does embroidery stitches, I used some to decorate either side of the lines. This was done from the front. This is partly to make it pretty and partly to make sure the interfacing stays firmly in place. I know from exereience that as Bondaweb get older, it loses its "stickiness". I do not want my stands falling apart while on display.

Finally, fold the hem over, sew a single line of stitching from the back to hold it all in place. Then a decorative row just inside from the front.

I only had enough interfacing for 3 stands so bought some iron-on interfacing to make the other two. It was no where near as thick so I used three layers to build it up. This way worked out a lot cheaper than the using the thicker interfacing and Bondaweb, it just meant more cutting out to do.

If I make any more, I would just use one layer for the full template and build up the strength in the separate pieces. This will give a much sharper fold line and make them sit better. I would also use thinner ribbon and magnetic catches in stead of having to ties bows each time.

Now all I have to do is design the silk jewellery to display on them.

Having a Murphy Day!

Actually, it started yesterday. The sewing machine wouldn't work. I took it all apart, cleaned it out then the door bell went. It was Sue for my class which I had forgotten all about. Actually, I had forgotten it was Wednesday but that is just a minor fact.

Then last night I managed to turn the computer off at the plug before it finished shutting down. When I switched it back on this morning it threw a temper tantrum or two. I had to leave it scanning and fixing the hard drive.

Then I put the sewing machine back together and it still wouldn't work. Very strange since it worked perfectly the last time I used it. Turns out there was a rogue bobbin in my box which I had just happened to use. I rewound the thread on to another bobbin and we were well away.

Back to the computer. Everything working fine - except for Kaspersky. It was complaining about a few things so I had to re-install.

Back to sewing. Going along nicely until I realised I was running low on thread. No thread that colour in Chatteris so it was off to trusty old eBay.

And the title? Murphys Law - Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong!