Mammoth Kit Making Session

I've spent the last couple of weeks making kits whenever I can. I've been out of Woollydale II and Mini Woollydale for a while so those were imperative to get back onto the shelf!! The reason for the Woollydale II being out of stock was because I can't get the jute tape trimming in the green colour I had before so I had to buy a near match and then try to dye it to match. It's ended up being slightly darker than before as I was distracted by a small person, who shall remain nameless, and left the tape in the mixture for longer than intended but it still goes with the colouring of the kit so I hope that you will still like it. 

I'm not sure if you are aware of just how much goes in to making one of these kits. They aren't mass produced, but are a real labour of love and everything is done by hand. I tried to remember to snap some photos of the little things that have to be done to make the kits as I went along during my recent sessions so these are phone pictures when I remembered to document the process. 

The thread cards possibly take the longest time. Each box of threads arrives in skeins of 8m and they all have to be cut down to 60cm lengths (partly because when I make a kit I measure off 60cm lengths to stitch with so that I know how much I've used to include in the kit, and partly because it's a nice, no-tangle length). Once the box has been Rumplestiltskinned into short lengths, each colour is counted out to the required amount and threaded onto a thread card, previously cut to the right number of holes. It's really hard to get hold of these pre-cut and they are surprisingly expensive. 

Stickers are then printed, hand cut and stuck onto the cards, as straight as possible! A big bundle of thread cards is a joy to see because they take so long to do it's a real achievement!! The Mother helps me out enormously here and will usually make up the cards for me, cutting the threads in front of Youtube videos of an evening and threading them up during the day. 

The fabrics are all cut by me, my trusty rotary cutter and a big quilting ruler. Then they are ironed (I really hate ironing so you are privileged to have fabrics ironed by me!) and laid out in the prettiest way possible so that you can clearly see the fabrics included in the kit. I always try to set out different kits in the same way so that there is unity across the designs. The backing calico squares are folded up to the same size as the A5 booklets, then the cotton fabrics arranged over the top with a feature fabric folded across the bottom if needed. Trimmings, which have also been cut to size, are arranged and then anything else that's included layered on top. 

I have a lot of distractions at the moment - small person in the above picture being the main one as his attention span isn't long enough for me to get truly engrossed in putting kits together. It can take several days from start to finish to make 20 or so of a design and there is lots of playtime, feeding time, settling for naps, nappy changes and goodness knows what else in between! We're going through some kind of 8 month sleep regression at the minute too so he only really sleeps for half an hour at a time. I'm amazed at the parents who manage to work from home with multiple children - you are fantastic. 

But he's just so sweet bless him and we'll only have these days once so I'm making the most of them. 

Anyway, back to the kits. I print out the labels for the thread cards on a clear printable A4 sticker and because there are always lots of gaps where I can't fit another label, I try to fill the spare spaces with other stickers. For the Woollydales, they all have a Woollydale family sticker added on the back which is another little detail that may go unnoticed but takes time. 

As well as Woollydale I've recently topped up the Bluebell Garden kits which have some beautiful beads in that have to be roughly counted out. I originally had the grand idea to weigh them but with my kitchen scales they don't register at all so I resort to popping what I think looks the right amount in little bags and quickly counting them in twos to make sure there are enough. It's roughly 40 of each type of bead so 80ish per packet in total to be counted. 

This kit also has two pages of templates and I've tried to make things easier for myself by having one page of templates the same for both versions of the kit (tape or lace) and then just the second page with the different trimming attachment instructions. The booklet itself has the same principle so it's the same inside pages but the cover is different as the trimming instructions are on the template pages. 

I asked The Mother very nicely if she might babysit Fin for me for a day a week so that I can concentrate more on the kits. I was able to take the baby and most of my cutting stuff and kit making paraphernalia to her house so I've topped up on Fire Flower and yet more Woollydale II kits! 

The Fire Flower is now on its last legs for this particular set of fabrics as I've run out of two of the fabrics and am unable to get any more of the lovely floral fabric as it's discontinued and nowhere seems to have any leftover stock. It's a couple of years old now anyway so chances are slim of finding a hidden stash. 

I have a little pile of kits that I will need to revamp or potentially re-cycle (Remember Summer Sweet?) so this will be added to the pile for whenever I can get around to it. I also have a second stash of half finished kit projects, The Lake/Log Cabin and Tiger Moon, and some piles of fabric that could be potential kits one day!

I would like to concentrate on this kit though which has been in the works for a while and is intended to be one of the Woollydale family of kits but in greyscale. I often get a lot of interest in any Stitchscape I make in greyscale so I thought this would be a nice one to try. The fabrics are cut and templates drawn, and I think I will use both of these laces, one on top of the other - what do you think?

Hopefully it won't be relegated to the 'in progress' pile for months like the others, but equally I haven't touched it since Monday and it's now Friday so...