Christmassy Nine Patch in progress

This one has been going on forever and a day. I only ever worked on it on retreat so no surprise it never got finished. "All that's still needed" is the backing and that proves a bit of a struggle ...

Dr Seuss Kiddie door pockets

Another finish from the retreat ... and they look darling dangling from my kids' door handles!

Finished: Twoo-Hoot

I took a number of projects on the quilt retreat, this was one of them and I'm pleased to say that it's finished! I'm not too sure about the colours and fabric design but I liked how fast it came together and I really like the quilting on it. Also, this was quite the deviation from my usual fretting. All I did was divide up squares into light and dark and assemble as they appeared in their piles.

slow but progress

It's very slow going but I am enjoying hand quilting this beast again. When finished, we are looking at 220 * 220 cm of cotton glory. And yes, I now understand the benefits of trimming and exact measurements, going through five layers of fabric is quite a pain!

twoo hoot, twoo hoot, finally finished with the quilting

I have no idea what took me so long but after a false start - with the wrong colour - I just whipped through quilting this top. Straight line quilting is my new love!

Getting back onto the horse

During summer it seems that sewing and other needle crafts came to a complete halt here ... the last quilt related accomplishment was auditioning quilting thread for the owly quilt:

Round 1:


Round 2:


Apparently then I completely forgot about my decisions and started quilting using white thread, which looked somewhere between ugly and weird. So I recently spent an evening unpicking it all ... only to realise that I really couldn't for the life of me remember the selection I only made less than three months ago.

Well, thanks to my blog-keeping, I had an excellent source of intel. Not. I hadn't even recorded the above yet. Let's hope I won't forget again! And that I stay on the horse!

Mixed Media kiddie craft

canvas sampler with appliqued treasures, click on this link to view = perfect kiddie craft for dark winter weekends ... thanks to Nova.

Packing in ...

My sewing room will be renovated / painted because we are selling our house because we have bought a new place that we will move into sometime next spring.

So I need to pack in a lot of my fabric loot ... yikes! That means that I need to plan ahead what I want to work on until we move next year.

- Night on the Tiles
- Twoo hoot
- Christmassy Disappearing Nine Patch

There will have to be one "creative" or scrappy project and one woolly one, probably this cowl. The scrappy project is a bit of a challenge so maybe I should peruse http://scrapquilts.com/ ...? Or maybe even doing a Fading Charms quilt?

This should be interesting!

Ruined it ...

So I was fiddling with possible templates and blogger decided to swallow my custom template and not allow me the revoke the change ...

but it is a good excuse for an overhaul and upgrade, isn't it?

UPDATE: I hate the new template interface ... can't seem to add any buttons, flickr, my finished projects broken down by year ... lost all my links to tutorials ... not a happy camper here.

UPDATE 2: slowly getting there but not quite happy yet ...

UPDATE 3: ok, finally getting there.

Catching up on UFOs

The upside of having a few UFOs knocking around my sewing room is that during that weird period after finishing one piece and before beginning a new project, there is satisfying work to keep me busy:
Baby Zig will go to Greta, sister of Helena the Great and Emergency Elisa.


HST Neptune was a fun little project and I love the quilting on it. Just ignore the white wine spills .... I only need to finish the corners and tie up loose ends on both of those. And then there is an owly UFO awaiting sandwiching and basting ... it's already taped to my sewing room floor.

Another finish: Nostalgia

It was a race against time but I made it and am pleased to report that Nostalgia was finished just in time for my BFF's big 4-0. And she LOVED it. In fact, she and her guests loved it. Two of my close friends - of Vague Heart fame - actually approached me to ask whether they could order one from me. I was beyond chuffed.

Next up: tablet cover

Once I am done with Nostalgia - deadline is this Saturday, I will make myself a cover for my tablet using this tutorial from One Shabby Chick.

Progressing with Nostalgia

I've been making good progress with this piece though every time I get to a part of the process that I don't enjoy, I really have to give myself a pep talk. Now "all I need to do" is add a simple cream border, sandwich, quilt (straight line modern to offset the nostalgic fabric) and bind before June 22. Easy-peasy ...

Bloggers' Quilt Festival: Almondesque

Following a cheeky comment how she unfortunately had all her children before I started making (baby) quilts, I decided to make this quilt for two of our closest friends as a homewarming gift. They had just moved into a Bauhaus inspired new home and because of their love of New England and Edward Hopper, blue stuck itself to my mind in terms of over-riding colour.

I had spent some time "researching" Bauhaus patterns, aka browsing Flickr and finally settled on this design. With pencil and paper, I calculated the size, different amounts of fabric etc. and then set about trying to find coordinating blues ... that resulted in quite the stash (and another project: "Helena the Great")



Despite my usual tendencies to not waste too much time ironing and cutting properly, I took great care with this project, probably also because I had the time, kicking it off during last year's retreat. And I am pleased to say that this care really paid off. The corners align well, making straight line quilting so much easier.


This is the result: I am really pleased. It was inspired by this photo on the left:

The quilt was very well received and a total surprise for my friends, taking pride of place on the lounge sofa and getting a lot of use.

Vital Stats:
105 * 185 cm, roughly
Kona Solids
Gütermann and Aurifil threads
Freudenberg 100% cotton wadding
lotsa fun to make! .... more

Nostalgia

With the most recent project delivered, I am onto the next: Nostalgia, using the "Nostalgia" line by April Cornell for Moda. I have two charm packs with 40 squares each, and combining them with a cream solid, this should make a nice snuggly quilt ... for my very bestest of best mates!


I have a layer cake with this pattern as well ... so I might make myself a throw for my new guest room from that ....

Helena the Great

Helena is a great kid and dearest friend of my elder daughter. She's proud and headstrong and sweet and loyal and all-around wonderful. So when it transpired that her family were moving to a new house, I asked my girl if she wanted me to make a quilt for her very bestest of best friends ... silly question, mummy, of course! So here it is:
Sadly not such a great effort at photography ...
Vital Statistics:
Kona Solid and Kaufman fabrics
Freudenberg wadding
Gütermann and Aurifil threads
100 * 170 cm in size
Cut with Go-Baby
machine pieced and quilted
lots of fun making it
perfect match to the accent wall in recipient's room - wall was painted the day the quilt was gifted.

Assemblying in rows ...

five columns .... ten columns
Next job: ironing the seams!

Slow moving ...

So I've begun assembling the 160 squares that will make up this quilt and it's sloooooow going, partially because at the end of a long day, I am simply shattered and can't seem to find my mojo. Which is a shame because once I have spent even a little while sewing, I feel so much better.

What's also holding me back is that the above looks notably different from the below:

I had originally whizzed through laying out the squares, trying not to over-think it. And I thought I had been really diligent about pinning and taking down. Looking at the photos again, I already noticed a few boo boos.

So this is what I will work on tonight.

Helena the Great, part 1

This quilt is for my older daughter's bestest friend in the whole wide world, Helena. About 2 years ago, I made an Emergency Quilt for her little sister and it only seemed right that Helena should have one too. Her favourite colour is purple, the colour of kings and queens.

I spent two evenings watching telly and breaking in my Accuquilt GO! Baby to cut 180 squares measuring 4,25 inches. Tonight was spent on all fours trying to arrange them in a "meaningful way" ... Initially, I had planned on 10 by 18 squares. But something didn't go according to plan and I ended up with 10 by 16. Which doesn't look as long and narrow as 10 by 18 might have. And the arrangement was relatively pleasing. So here we are. With 160 squares laid out on wadding. I will have to pin them in place. And then I will have to attach them to each other ...

Deadline is 10 April 2012. Rock on ...

Whatever will I do with them all?

The centre is a left-over from Crocheting Madness 3 ... just such an easy project to pick up and play with in the evening!

Back to Square 1

While I loved the feel of my cowl, it was waaaaay too long to actually wear so I frogged it all - took me two sittings because of how well I had woven in the loose strands - in order to do it all again!

Only issue currently: can't find my circular knitting needles!

Twoo Hoot: First finished top of 2012

To get out of my sewing funk, I went straight to my newest purchase of 3 charm packs of an owl-ey fabric .. all different colours, all different motifs, all the same size.

Usually, I then set about planning and pinning on my design wall to make sure that colour distribution is just so and drive myself crazy in the process. This time, I divided the charms into three piles by value: dark, medium, light and then counted. Drats, some large, some small piles ... so I divvied up the medium and ended up with two similar ones and then paired a light and a dark one each. Making strips of eight charms each, always beginning with light, then dark, then light ... I then attached the strips, one row starting with light, the next with dark. I paid very little attention to which pairs went where, only taking care to not have the same design in the same direction neighbouring each other.

That was way out of my controller comfort zone. But it was fun and fast. Now I am auditioning binding in a bid to avoid looking for backing in my stash ...

Twoo Hoot

Getting out of my sewing funk

Whenever I finish something, I have a head full of ideas and can't seem to choose the right one to pick up and run with so ...

88 ... 8*8=64 and 88-64=24 - and 24/3=8 so 8 wide and 8+3 tall ...
and 2 left over ...

We shall see! twooo hooot!

Rainbows in a Bottle

I love the idea of keeping small scraps in jars and then using them in projects like Ticker Tape:

Resolved to sew: Resolution 2012 and a give-away

Ever since I completely failed at my resolution of not buying any fabric during a particular year (I bought even more than usual, so the fail was epic), I have stayed away from NY resolutions for my quilting endeavours. This year however, I will attempt to make as much from stash - and there is a lot of that, believe you me - as I can. There is a vague list in my head of quilts I want to make so let's see if I get around to them:

- quilt for C's bestie mate
- quilt for my bestie mate (her daughter already has two)
- finish my Night on the Tiles in Manchester

Everything else will be a bonus and I will be happy if I get additional projects to the pre-binding stage.

Seeing how I want to mainly work from stash, I might as well attempt to add to it by winning a give-away called "Resolved to Sew 2012 at Very Berry Made. Click on the link to see what is to be had!

Happy New Year

Christmas has come and gone - and despite the best of intentions, there was minimal crafting to be had this time around. I think I will just have to start earlier in the year ...

2012 has been kicked off with work on UFOs, I finished one top and failed at stippling, thankfully, straight-line quilting is so much more NOW:

Another WIP is almost quilted. I had originally chosen too thick a wadding and now had to sandwich etc. the whole thing again. But with the straight-line quilting almost finished, I am quite pleased with the results: