Wow, that was a long day. I’ve finished the patchwork, beaded the crown, backed everything, attached the national emblems and added the 2012 and WCHS lettering but the banner is now officially finished.
This is the finished beaded Elizabeth II panel…
... and this is the final banner. I’m really pleased with it…
Day Seven sees me break out the sewing machine and start the patchwork. That’s right folks, the main part of the new 2012 WCHS banner is The Union Jack – surprised?! I thought the shapes of the embroidered pieces were a bit of a giveaway myself but I had the diagram all along.
I had lots of other things to do as well today so I only managed to get the bottom half done but I hope you’ll agree that I made a good start. I think that one more long day should just about do it. Half the time of the Olympics themselves, that seems appropriate somehow.
Ok, so I have to say that I am VERY annoyed with one aspect of this banner that hasn’t quite gone to plan. There is an unforeseen problem with the patchwork. I don’t think my lengths of fabric were ever long enough for me to have avoided this happening but with longer pieces I could have got it spot on. Now I have the added complication of having to make the error consistent on the top half too! My challenge to you all is to spot the issue (which will, undoubtedly, irritate me forever…)
Sunday was Day Six in this project and I managed to complete three panels. They need no explanation…
This one took hours and I was very bored by the end of it. This panel represents Woodford’s part in the Redbridge concert at the Royal Albert Hall this year. Our Music Department took a huge choir to the event and 2012 has seen a huge increase in the popularity of singing at Woodford.
Four panels down and four (bigger ones) to go. I’ve now printed off the designs for all of the panels and am hoping to get most of them done this weekend. I’m writing this on Friday so it’s not a ridiculously ambitious task but the remaining ones are probably the most intricate and time consuming. I’m going to visit IKEA on Monday and so hope to get moving on the patchwork then. Can I finish by the time David gets home from drinks Tuesday night? We’ll see.
In addition to working on the banner, I have learnt how to make paper gift bows today. I used the instructions from How About Orange but I think my magazines were a little small. I couldn’t cram the full number of turns into my gift bows. I think they look pretty good though.
Another two panels almost completed. One representing Olympic sports and the other to commemorate the Diamond Jubilee. I say almost completed because I need to stitch beads onto the crown but cannot do it until the whole banner is assembled.
I have left the tissue paper on the crown so that I can use it as a guide for placing the beads. It shows you how I am doing this embroidery, which is to trace a design onto tissue paper and then stitching through it. Picking the tissue paper apart with my tweezers can be a little fiddly but it’s worth it.
I had intended to complete the patchwork aspect of the banner today but I did my calculations wrong and ended up cutting some of the pieces too small. This means that I need to visit IKEA and get some more fabric. It’s not a costly or time consuming error but it is an annoying one. Anyway, once I’d cut everything out and realised my mistake I decided to set to work on the piece that celebrates the Thames Diamond Jubilee Pageant. The piece looks better in real life but I’m happy as long as you can tell what it is – what do you think?
Two of the Silver Badges (Senior Prefects) at Woodford have designed a new banner to commemorate this incredible year. I am not going to share their design but I will give you some regular spoilers.
Today is my first day creating the pieces that will make up the final banner and it must be ready for our school birthday parade on 29th September. These are hand embroidered onto felt. I particularly like the English Rose…
Katryn and I headed to my Auntie and Uncle’s house in Liverpool this week to escape the madness and get some quality crafting time together!
So that Katryn would feel “less embarrassed” sleeping in a boys room we first made a butterfly mobile to hang up. It was a kit we bought from Sainsburys which had really good instructions and was pretty easy to make although gluing all the pieces together for the twelve butterflies was a little tedious.
The following day we were busy creating pretty things from felt and buttons. We made quite a few brooches, a hairclip and a flower chain for Auntie Liz that we left on her fridge. I did the stitching but Katryn did everything else…
Finally,I want to share a picture that Katryn did for Mum a few weeks ago. She had been studying bees at school and I just love her attention to detail. Look at the hexagons (there are a few that actually have six sides!) in the bees nest and the protective mask on the bee-keeper. Her phonetic spelling of honey did make me chuckle I have to admit.
