Holiday Sewing

At Last the Wheel of Fortune quilt top is finished. It's not very big but those diamonds were such a pain, I was glad to see the last squares being stitched in.

I had about 20 squares left and a few diamonds and I laid them out and arranged them in a neat little square with the diamonds acting as a border. My no. 2 son, who loves tessellations, asked if he could play with them. He created a fantastic new pattern that I have never seen before. I spent the next day cutting more fabric to complete his idea. Now I will have to be working with diamonds again. I'm not showing his lay out yet. I need to psych myself up to drawing all the seams and pinning them all together. May be a few months away yet.

I also made a square block which I will be sending to Japan to be part of the Tokyo Quilt Festival. It was originally blogged about by Ayumills . The thing I like about this idea is that the block will be joined to other blocks, sent in from around the world. The blocks will be made into quilts which will be shown and then auctioned off with all proceeds going to the tsunami victims. Last show they put together 86 quilts!

What else have I been doing these holidays besides freezing?

I've started a quilt using some of my 30's reproduction fabrics. They have been sitting on the shelf for way too long. I have 19 blocks finished and 11 half done.

I made a couple of pot mitts for a teacher friend who just got married. The teachers all pitched in with money for a big present but I just wanted to add a little something extra for her on a personal level as we team teach our class and I was dying to use some new fabrics I bought.

I added an extra pocket at the back to fit your fingers in to get a better grip but stupidly quilted the mitts vertically whereas had I done it horizontally the mitts would have folded in your hand much more easily. Live and learn.

Diamond quilt is being hand quilted and it is looking beautiful.

Snowball Quilt is stretched.

I guess that is where most of my sewing time has gone. I can't believe I go back to work on Monday. I do have a crochet class to look forward to on Monday night though! Wish me luck.

Signed, Sealed and Hopefully Delivered

I finally finished all the hand quilting on this autumn quilt.

In most of the plain coloured squares I hand quilted outlines of some of the leaves in the fabrics.

I took lots of photos of it because this may be the last time I see it! It's in a postbag, on it's way to Sydney.

So I have signed and sealed the bag and hopefully it will arrive safely soon.

I have never really given away a quilt that has had so much work put into it and I have to say I feel really pleased. I become very attached to all my creations and have always felt like a part of me would be missing if I gave it up yet in this case I am so excited to be sending it off to a family I know will love it as much as I do.

Hand Sewing and some Machine Quilting

It's been a weekend of nothing new.

But also a weekend of working on.

This was the first time I put the binding on a quilt by machine. It was just something I had to try. It looks okay but I think hand binding is so much nicer and for me, it gives me a chance to say good bye to my quilt. I love the final process.

I've been spending every chance I have hand quilting this too. I have decided to give it to my son's girlfriend's family. He has been living with them for the last 5 months in Sydney while he has been studying. They have had to put up with his mess, washing, and for sure, his commandeering of the TV and couch. The have had to watch Aussie rules instead of NRL and I think they are saints. They already had 4 kids and took my boy in without blinking an eye. He took my Marimekko comforter up there and they were saying how they were going to miss snuggling under it while watching TV so I am excited that this quilt will fill the gap. When he comes home in August, this will be finished and in it's place.

I started machine quilting the Bicycle Quilt.

Another round is on the Wheel of Fortune.

I guess it's been a good weekend.

Birthday Books

Last month was my birthday and my husband, as usual, had no idea what to buy. I mentioned that I had a wish list on Amazon and lo and behold my wishes came true.

I am only half way through looking at all the pictures.

Bloggers Quilt Festival

               It's the Blogger's Quilt Festival and here is my entry.

The quilt was originally a kit.  It came with instructions and the most glorious range of fruity fabrics and checks and stripes. 

I didn't know many tricks of the trade so it is full of mistakes. The knots from my hand quilting are still visible because I didn't know how to hide them between the layers and the binding was put on back to front with awful corners. I didn't use perle cotton so the stitching thread is not as soft as it should be but I don't care!

The kit was was given to me for a birthday by my sadly missed sister-in-law Susan, who died  a few years ago. We used to go to all the craft fairs together, did our first quilting classes together, had sewing afternoons, knitted, stitched and shopped together. We both had a total love of textiles. 

Susan bought me this kit from Patchwork on Central's stall at a quilt show. She knew I couldn't afford it and bought it for my birthday. It's very special because it reminds me of our fun together. 

A bit of Hand Stitching

I'm not really sure how I will finally quilt this but I just couldn't resist doing a bit of hand stitching.

I used my new marking tool to trace out the leaf shapes.

And I used lots of different Perle cottons because I couldn't decide which one I like best.

Maybe I'll just hand quilt in the ditch around all the window panes. Winter is coming and hand stitching will keep me warm. If anyone has any good ideas, please let me know what you would do.

Free and Quick

With a few hours free I thought I might work on my wonky autumn quilt. It is so liberating not to have to think about straight lines and even blocks. It took me about 2 hours to straight (crooked) line quilt the whole piece. I didn't plan, just tried to quilt in the ditch wherever possible.

I had a bit of sewing thread left on the bobbin so did a few extra lines around the edge.

Now I just need to buy some binding. Nothing seemed to work from my stash.

Flu? It won't happen to me!

My Supplies 

"I never take time off work..

No I don't need the flu shot.."

Wrong!

Actually the flu shots were given out on Thursday at school, a week too late for me.

So I've done only a tiny bit of sewing despite being holed up at home for days. I've just been too tired. Panadol is my friend!

Under the influence of my friend's few pain free hours I sewed on the binding of this little Kimono fabric quilt.

I haven't finished all the quilting but it's moving along slowly.

On the bright side, it's just 4 more school days before holidays so if I can just get through the next few days I will have a much better time at home.

March UFO Challenge

March UFO Challenge

My UFO for Judy's challenge for the month of march was the spool quilt. My goal for each month would be to get the quilt done that month. Or at least move it to the next step, or work on it a little at least.

So

January--- Broken Dishes Quilt--- finished the UFO

February--- Star BOM---- made a couple blocks pieced the blocks and sashing got it ready to quilt. Hoping to quilt it by the end of the year.

March----- Spool quilt------- made the back and basted the quilt so it's ready to quilt. Afraid to start quilting because I not sure how I want to quilt it. Tomorrow I will start.

So I'm falling a little behind but, at least making some progress. Now to go dig out April's UFO.

March UFO Challenge

March UFO Challenge

My UFO for Judy's challenge for the month of march was the spool quilt. My goal for each month would be to get the quilt done that month. Or at least move it to the next step, or work on it a little at least.

So

January--- Broken Dishes Quilt--- finished the UFO

February--- Star BOM---- made a couple blocks pieced the blocks and sashing got it ready to quilt. Hoping to quilt it by the end of the year.

March----- Spool quilt------- made the back and basted the quilt so it's ready to quilt. Afraid to start quilting because I not sure how I want to quilt it. Tomorrow I will start.

So I'm falling a little behind but, at least making some progress. Now to go dig out April's UFO.

Last of the Basting

Here are the last 3 quilts I basted before I ran out of pins. Guess I have a few quilts to quilt now.

Last of the Basting

Here are the last 3 quilts I basted before I ran out of pins. Guess I have a few quilts to quilt now.

A Little Basting Challenge

A little Basting Challenge



Since I was going to baste the star quilt I thought I might as well make it worth it to dig out all that stuff. So I'm challenging myself to use up all the batting I have stuffed away here and there. Yes even all those pieces. I hope to do at least 2 a day. I have pieces of time through out the day and will have to push to keep making progress on the basting. So yesterday I got 2 done. The Dresden plate and the snails tail quilt. The Snails tail quilt was started at least 10 years ago and I've probably had the top done about 5 years. It's an oldie. Today so far I have one done the green one with the crazy strip sashing. I get these out after so long I can't believe how nice they are why haven't I finished these up. I report agine when I have a few more done.

A Little Basting Challenge

A little Basting Challenge



Since I was going to baste the star quilt I thought I might as well make it worth it to dig out all that stuff. So I'm challenging myself to use up all the batting I have stuffed away here and there. Yes even all those pieces. I hope to do at least 2 a day. I have pieces of time through out the day and will have to push to keep making progress on the basting. So yesterday I got 2 done. The Dresden plate and the snails tail quilt. The Snails tail quilt was started at least 10 years ago and I've probably had the top done about 5 years. It's an oldie. Today so far I have one done the green one with the crazy strip sashing. I get these out after so long I can't believe how nice they are why haven't I finished these up. I report agine when I have a few more done.

Does anyone know about freezer paper?

I was looking at other blogs when I noticed that Liz listed freezer paper as one of her top 5 quilting tools. It got me thinking about freezer paper and why it is so hard to find in Australia. Maybe I am looking in the wrong places and also I have not bothered trying to find any lately but last time I did, no one knew what I was talking about. It just so happens I have used my last scraps of it and I was hoping someone could tell me where to get some in Australia.

This is what I have used my last bits of paper on and why I find it so useful.

I just made a quilt with lots of straight lines on the back as well as a square/rectangle pattern on the front.

So the question came as to how I was going to quilt it because if I stitched in straight lines the back would have all these stitches that didn't line up and I would be really unhappy with the mess and it would make the irregular shapes look even more irregular.

So I decided that I would hand stitch it with circle shapes because they wouldn't mess up the lines.

I used freezer paper to make my stencils. I traced lots of mugs and glasses from the kitchen to get a variety of circle sizes.

Then I ironed on a few of the circles to the quilt. They can peel off so I only did a couple at a time.

Sew around the edges.

Peel off the paper carefully because you can use it several times and there is your outline stitched onto your quilt. Easy.

You could make stencils for any shape so it's very versatile and saves using water soluble pens etc.

I have also used it instead of paper piecing and made this quilt.

It made the whole process much quicker and simpler and it's very accurate.

So if anyone knows where to find this wonderful paper in Melbourne please let me know so I can get some more!