My machine embroidery design website is now closed.

Sadly I have made the decision that due to new EU legislation which I can’t comply with, I will have to close Embroidery Crazy. So as this blog is linked very largely to my website I will not be posting here any more. I will be starting a new blog which will be about my sewing and craft hobbies, and my passion for vintage sewing machines. I have yet to create this but will add the blog name once I have. Thankyou to all my past followers.

 

Christmas is coming.

I can’t believe how quickly this year is disappearing and that it is almost Christmas! I am so behind with everything this year. Normally I have done most of my present shopping by now. This year I haven’t even started! With 4 grandchildren to buy for, not to mention anyone else, I really need to get my act together and get spending. The problem with living in this beautiful rural seaside area is we are a long way ( an hour’s drive) from any decent shopping centres, and I do not like buying everything online. So I think this week I need to take myself off in the car for a day. Being a crafter I am of course making some presents. I inherited a knitting machine this month to add to my growing collection of sewing machines! So some christmas jumpers will definitely be appearing. Yes my sewing machine collection has grown, adding an immaculate and pretty hand crank New Home machine that I ‘rescued’ from a local second hand shop. It is a solid metal beast and will sew through anything! It also has a lovely floral scrolled faceplate.

I will be sewing some gifts too of course.

The Embroidery Crazy website has been updated with some new designs this month, and the usual two free downloads. I was pleased with this pretty lace butterfly I have added.

There are also some musical note designs and this cute children’s reindeer design.

Today I have sixteen small Christmas cakes, that I am going to hopefully sell, to ice and decorate so I had better get busy!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Summer is over so time to get sewing!

Sadly this week our lovely weather has finally disappeared and it is definitely autumn. It has been fantastic to be able to enjoy the beach in warm sunshine for so long. Today is very windy and a little wet. We had a busy summer, especially with our daughter’s wedding in the very picturesque Lake District. Everything came together beautifully for her vintage and handmade style wedding in the gorgeous Cragwood Country House hotel on the side of Lake Windermere. (Highly recommended for anyone wanting a wedding venue up there!) A photo later. Now it is back to my daily sewing and beside the sea life.

The Embroidery Crazy website has been updated with six new designs this month plus two designs free to download as usual. We have three designs especially for dog lovers, a new snowman design, a cute little fox and a cupcake design for those making kitchen items.

I said I would post a photograph of the wedding venue, so here it is.

 

The stunning wedding venue

The next photo is one of my beautiful daughter in her vintage style lace wedding dress, accompanied down to the outdoor pagoda for the ceremony by my two very cute grandsons. The eldest one, who is only five, was very proud to walk his mum along. Two year old Ben was not so sure and started to cry!

The beautiful bride.

 

 

Busy Summer!

First of all I have to apologise yet again for not updating my blog for so long! This is due to a string of family happenings, including illnesses, and also the fast approaching wedding of our eldest daughter. As she is having a vintage/homemade themed wedding it has involved me in lots of sewing and kept me very busy! The wedding is now only a few weeks away so I am down to the final few things left to do. After the summer things should calm down a bit for me and I can get back into a routine.

We are very excited about the wedding, which is being held  next month in a beautiful country house hotel on the side of Lake Windermere. I can’t wait to see my daughter in the stunning vintage style dress she has chosen. She will look amazing, and, as it is second time around for her, she is being escorted in by her very handsome five year old son. There won’t be a dry eye around! I promise some photographs to follow.

I have just added some new designs for July to the website, including a cute children’s design aimed at twins, a rock and roll dance design, a rock music design and this summery beach hut design.The free designs to download for July are this lovely Campanula floral design and a cute little yacht.

 

Apology

Sorry to anyone visiting my website or blog that it has not been updated but my husband has been in hospital with heart problems.

He has now had surgery for his problems and is recovering well so I will be updating my site next week.

 

Signs of spring.

At last our weather seems to be picking up, after what seems like months of rain. We are in a luckier part of the country too, with not nearly as much rain as the west coast of Britain has had. We have however had some really bad windy spells and our local beach front is in a terrible mess, so much damage to beach huts and the promenade. Hopefully gradually it will get sorted over the next few months. There are lots of signs that spring is coming, daffodils galore in my front garden, lots of early flowers – in fact the roses haven’t stopped flowering all winter as, although very wet and windy, it has not been really cold. Lots of trees in our town are coming into blossom, which is really early. Today the sun is shining and it looks very inviting outside. A walk on the beach later!

The website has been updated with three new designs this month. With thoughts of spring there is this cute seasonal design. I also added a design made for anyone who sews. There is also a pretty butterfly design.

Our free machine embroidery designs to download for March are an Easter design and a ballerina silhouette.

My Singer 15K

I painted my sewing room lilac to brighten it up and I am pleased with it. I also had a good clear out in the process and reorganised everything. I even managed to fit another sewing table into the room after moving it round without cluttering it up more! I found a bargain in a local charity shop, which was a vintage Singer in lovely condition. After an oil it sews beautifully. It was too pretty to leave!

My Singer 15K

I found a couple of  lilac flowered single sheets in a charity shop and recycled them into a patchwork double duvet cover and pillowcases for the guest bed in my sewing room. It worked really well, I’m pleased with how pretty they look.

Finally I can’t post without spring photographs, so here are a couple of my spring flowers.

My front garden daffodils.

Pulmonaria is flowering on the shady side of my garden.

Our elderly cat, Cyrus, was also enjoying the sunshine this morning. This photo of him made me smile as I caught him with his tongue out!

16 year old Cyrus

 

Crafting Show.

On Friday I went with some friends to the Creative Crafts show at Five Lakes, near Tiptree, Essex. It is the first time I have been to a large show for crafters rather than a craft fair. It was held in a very large venue and was very well attended. I was pleased to find that the price of goods was lower than I expected, with most suppliers discounting what they were selling. It is a great opportunity to buy good quality fabrics at a very reasonable price. I had to restrain myself and just bought fabric I needed for my daughter’s wedding makes, apart from one pretty piece of cotton to cover the cork notice board in my sewing room which has just been painted. There wasn’t as many sewing related stalls as I had hoped, the event was much more aimed at card makers. However I did get some good ideas as I wandered around and it was great to see how many people are interested in crafting, it was incredibly busy. There were some good workshops to do, although I didn’t join any of these as I hadn’t budgeted for the extra cost.  I shall definitely be going again next year, and now that I know what the event is like I shall be making the most of the cheaper prices!

Five Lakes complex

 

New Year and a new start.

Okay so I have been really, really bad and not updated my blog for months. Life and family circumstances have got in the way some of the time.

I was quite shocked when I realised quite how long it had been since I last posted so here I am full of good intentions for 2014.

The Embroidery Crazy machine embroidery designs website has continued to be updated and we added a large collection of dance silhouettes, such as this ballerina, at the end of last year. 

This month we have our usual 2 free downloadable designs – a cute hibernating bear and for music lovers a nice little guitar. Five more new designs have been added, including this very cute penguin in the snow.

He will look great on children’s clothing. I would even put him on my own t-shirt he’s so cute! We have also added a great set of ‘Family Rules’ to machine embroider and frame. I gave one of these to my daughter for a Christmas present as she has three young children to keep in order and regularly a fourth when her partner’s daughter is there too. It has a good mixture of behaviour reminders for a positive, loving family life. As an ex teacher I know anything visual is very helpful with young children. Here it is.

I do hope everyone reading this has a happy and successful 2014. Our family have a summer wedding to look forward to when our eldest daughter remarries her lovely partner in August. I’m really looking forward to it, they have chosen a really beautiful location by Lake Windermere for their wedding venue and my sister-in-law is coming all the way from New Zealand in August so will be there too. My daughter wants a ‘handmade’ wedding so lots of sewing involved!

 

Time for a change as summer ends.

Well the changes to our website took far longer than expected so apologies for the big gap in blogging. The new shop software was so different it presented challenges to get it all working properly, but my lovely hubby has done an excellent job and the new site is finally up and running. It doesn’t look very different on the surface, but the shop format has lots of changes and we do hope customers will find it a lot more user friendly. We felt the site update was also time to increase our prices for the first time, so to compensate we will be having a launch sale, starting tomorrow, until the end of September.

The September free embroidery downloads reflect the arrival of Autumn and are our popular silver birch leaf, and a black bat. The new embroidery designs this month are aimed at children. There is a large design for young football fans.Any child who likes the circus will enjoy this colourful clown. This cute little starfish would look lovely on any make for a baby or toddler.

Finally a humorous design for the ‘little monkey’ in your life. I know who I am going to use this one for!I think his mum would agree with me!

We have had a really lovely summer here on the Essex sunshine coast. It has certainly lived up to it’s name! Our little town has been bursting at the seams every day for the last couple of months, which is great news for the local traders. We had our eldest two grandchildren to stay without parents for a week and had a lovely time taking them out and about. Of course we spent lots of time on the beach too. It all went far too quickly.

One of the highlights of the summer was the air show on Clacton seafront. As usual this was a fantastic show. My favourite is always The Red Arrows, photographed below.

I was also very impressed by the huge Vulcan bomber. This seagull must certainly have got a surprise!

We hope you like the new site software and changes. Do let us know what you think.

 

Change is on the way.

We decided our website needs an update and so my other half has been working hard on using new software to run the site. It won’t look too different, but hopefully will be a lot more user friendly and more informative. The new site will be ready to publish very soon. Meanwhile I have added some new designs and will be adding more once the site is updated. We will also be having a sale to launch the new changes.

Our new designs this month are varied. This bright red dragon comes in two sizes so is suitable for a variety of projects.

It looks great with the gold parts done in metallic thread. I am going to put one on my jacket.

This floral design is pretty and would look lovely on a T-shirt. There is one for cat lovers in this little brown cat with lovely green eyes. Finally I have added a large flamingo as they are a current trend. I think it would look gorgeous stitched on to a cushion.

I have not been out with my camera very much recently as we have had so much happening so I am posting a few old favourites for my photos  this time.

First of all on our pier we have the oldest carousel in the country, and I love the colours in the horses, so here is my photo of one of them. The painted detail is so beautiful.

The next photo was taken on the backwaters. I just love the contrast in colour between the dark skies and the jumble of rowing boats on the quay.

 Finally I just like the reflections in this one. I have no idea what the old wreck is or if the man actually lives on it!

Happy summer days to all my readers.