Just a quick reminder that my print-on-demand shops will close in ten days’ time on 31st October, so this is your last chance to buy pre-printed fabric for daily stitching.
pre-printed fabric for daily stitching
You can find pre-printed fabrics at Spoonflower, and (for UK customers) at Woven Monkey. There won’t be a pre-printed version of the new 2027 template (coming soon as a PDF and it will be fairly straightforward to transfer it from paper to fabric).
For transparency, 90% of what you spend goes to Spoonflower or Woven Monkey, and the remaining 10% is paid as commission to me.
Downloadable PDF versions of all templates will continue to be available in my Big Cartel shop.
If you’ve ordered previously, thank you so much for your kind support.
This is just to let you know that I will be closing my Spoonflower shop at the end of this month, 31st October. If you want to purchase fabric pre-printed with my daily stitching templates, please order it before the last week in October.
I will also be closing my shop at Woven Monkey on the same date.
Please do remember that you’ll be buying from Spoonflower (or Woven Monkey, a UK-based print-on-demand shop), not from me; I don’t receive any information about who buys what so I can’t help you with your orders if anything goes wrong.
For transparency, the only payment I receive is 10% of whatever you spend, though Spoonflower withholds a further 30% of that because I’m not a US taxpayer. 90% of what you pay goes to the print-on-demand site.
If you’re buying from Spoonflower, I recommend their cotton/linen canvas, and you will need a yard of it if you want to stitch the whole year.
Thank you all for your previous support; I am sorry if this decision causes any disappointment for anyone.
Just to let you know I’ll be taking a short break next week for a week or two, depending on how much down time there is. It’s all been very full-on this summer, as you know, and I think there’s space for me to slow down a bit now.
I’ll be closing the shop for tangible items (thread and fabric) from lunchtime on Friday 11th September, and I’ll re-open later this month. My Teachable school doesn’t have a holiday mode so that will remain open as usual. If you need to contact me about any problems with access etc, please be patient as I won’t be checking emails every day.
You may have noticed my hand-dyed threads have been temporarily unavailable in the shop this week.
Recently there have been a few hard weeks, and I’m currently having another very full week arranging a residential care home placement for my mother, who is unfortunately no longer able to continue living alone. I’ve been unable to manage the shop on top of all that.
There has been a different kind of sewing. When I was at school (and that’s a very long time ago) my mother patiently sewed name labels into all my school clothes. And now I am doing the same for her.
laundry marking
It is a strange feeling. The wheel turns, time carries us along, and at some point we come full circle.
I need a few more days to gather together everything she will need, and also to get myself to a point where I can think straight, but threads will be available again soon – probably next week some time. Please keep checking the shop if you’re waiting.
Also, threads may be intermittently available if I have to be somewhere else for a while. If you visit the shop and don’t see thread, please just check back later or the next day. Apologies for the current unpredictability, and thank you for your patience.
Comments are off on this one; I will be back soon (ish).
This is just a short update on availability (my own, and my threads). Unfortunately, last week was not the relaxing break I’d been hoping for. There has been a family emergency which will take significant time and effort to resolve.
The shop is now open again for PDFs only, because they are automated and require little input from me, but threads will continue to be unavailable until such time as I am able to be here more reliably for packaging and posting.
When threads do become available again the shop may continue to open and close fairly erratically, depending on where I need to be and what I need to do, and I may not be able to respond to email enquiries as promptly as usual. If you find the shop closed, please just check back in a day or two.
Comments are off on this one, but thank you for your patience and understanding while I navigate the very unpredictable path ahead.
There hasn’t been much happening front of house for a couple of weeks because I’ve been busy back stage working on some new PDFs. If you subscribe to my YouTube channel, you might have seen a preview of this in my video earlier this week.
I’ve had a lot of messages and social media comments this year from daily stitchers asking for more direction on what to stitch. With over four years of daily stitching behind me, I have more than enough to share.
daily stitching
So I’ve spent the last few weeks developing four themed PDFs, 60 designs in each:
lines/bands/stripes
circles/spirals/swirls
flowers and foliage
little/scatter patterns
PDF volume 1 for editing
I need to work up some more samples for the front covers and find another couple of pages-worth of designs, but I think I’m nearer the end than the beginning.
I’ve had requests for a book rather than PDFs, but there’s no way I have the head space to tackle a book right now. Books can take months, often years, to get from idea to publication; I hope there will be one at some point in the future though. In the meantime PDFs are relatively simple to make, and much easier to distribute.
Also, and this has made me do the hollow gallows laugh, a couple of friends suggested the PDF thing after I’d already started quietly working on it. Responding ‘you’re never going to believe this but…’ is hardly ever convincing but I think I got away with it.
Anyway, for now – more proof-reading/editing, a little more drawing, and some quiet stitching. It’s been really enjoyable rediscovering some previous designs and working them up into samples.
sample grids ready for stitching
I hope you’re enjoying your creative stitching too.
The shop will close for Easter on Thursday 2nd April and will re-open the following week, by which time I hope to have at least some of the new threads available.
In other news, there is Quite A Lot Going On besides work. I don’t generally say much about my personal life here, but some of you will know that I’m the primary carer for a parent with moderate to severe dementia. Occasionally I may have to close the shop randomly for a short time while I attend to issues or problems caused by their cognitive impairment. Sorry for any inconvenience caused by temporary absences, and thank you for your patience and understanding.
Comments are off today; this was just a quick update on where things are at right now. I am ok. Hope your week is going well.
It wasn’t much of a week off in the end, because – surprise – this happened:
hand dyed threads drying in the sunshine
I just got lucky with the weather – decent light followed by a good drying day – so thought I would seize the day and all that. I’ll have a couple of easy days this week to make up for it.
I did manage to catch up with myself a bit on the other days. I got to the end of Tabula Rasa, and I’m not sure that’s its name any more but I’ve yet to think of a better one.
Tabula Rasa, the far end
I also enjoyed a little mixed media sketchbook exploration with some motifs based on the stitching.
circlesmore circles
The thread will take a while to wind but in the meantime there is probably enough left in the shop to cover thread-based emergencies.
For various reasons, I’ve decided to streamline and simplify my shop contents. For the time being I won’t be making more fabric packs, so most remaining fabrics are currently in the shop on sale to clear. Prices have already been adjusted so you don’t need discount codes, and when they’re gone they’re gone so be quick if you’re interested. I hope you can find something lovely to add to your collection.
Back to work after a holiday used to mean my apathetic return to the office where a thousand emails were waiting for me. These days back to work means winding beautiful thread by an open window listening to a robin singing in the garden. What luck. Hope your week is going well too.
I’ll be taking a break soon so my online shop will close at lunchtime GMT (ish) on Wednesday 25th February and will reopen week commencing 9th March.
Teachable doesn’t seem to have a vacation mode, so that will remain open and accessible for online classes and PDF template downloads. If you need to contact me and it can’t wait a couple of weeks, please be patient because I won’t be checking emails every day.
There will probably be a daily stitching video on my YouTube channel tomorrow but after that I’m largely unplugging from social media for a week or so.
I’ll be having some quiet time at home, maybe working a bit on these:
Tabula Rasa, detailTabula Rasa, detailunnamed quilt, in progress
My new year’s resolution to work smarter seems to be going well, and for the first time in years I find that I do in fact have some time for my own work as well as the business.
I did a little more on the winter sketchbook. It may be early spring, and the snowdrops are looking beautiful, but the weather is decidedly behind the curve so I feel justified in clinging to glorious cold winter for as long as I can.
winter sketchbook page with found poetry lineswinter sketchbook pagewinter sketchbook page, mixed media collagewinter sketchbook page, handmade paper collage
I’m also trying to be a bit more organised about what goes where. My Ikea drawers are very slightly short of A4 size in the width, so I made some custom trays out of mount board and they fit nicely, two per drawer.
mark-making tools, rounded up and contained
The sides are covered with 2″ wide washi tape that I found hiding in another drawer. I should probably line the boxes to make them prettier but for now I’m happy enough with functional.
stencils and collagraphs all neat and tidy
And finally, I’ve resurrected a patchwork quilt top that’s had quite a few false starts.
quilt, take three or four
I had a look at it, wasn’t happy with it, and decided to unpick everything and start again. I wanted a fairly big circle on the surface and didn’t have a yarn that was anything like what I had in mind.
I’ve ended up stringing lots of thin threads together to create something like what I wanted. It’s a very fine silk noil yarn that dyed beautifully but is no good for stitching with – breaks too easily, too nobbly – but a few strands together are couching down quite nicely.
couching a bunch of fine threads
I’m wondering if maybe the whole thing will be couched rather than quilted. Always an adventure.
