After Something Old - Something New

Last post was about something old-ish , this time I have something new to talk about !

I am  great fan of  Karen over on Selvage Blog , which explains why I have this mound of selvedges:-)

and yes, I have used some of them for a cushion,  a couple of tote & gift bags and even  a mini quilt in the past.

Besides encouraging quilters to use up their selvedges, Karen is, amongst her many other talents,  a designer , and I've just fallen in love with  Diamond Dish her latest string quilt pattern,

(photo courtesy of Selvage Blog)

I've often thought about making another one of these, but am not sure if I'd get bored making it a second time, but this pattern is just different enough to make me think seriously about it.

I 've just received a copy of the pattern, and straight away started to freak out as I realised it is made using the dreaded Y seams - something I have managed to avoid so far during my quilting life ! However - thanks to the lovely clear instructions in the pattern and with some help from  Kay Woods, I've managed to make a  few passable sample blocks !

First attempt was with scrap fabric

 then with strings

and another just because !

Maybe not  100%  perfect, but I'm happy with the result, so it's all systems go now for tackling the quilt.  Not quite decided yet whether to go with the white as in the sample block or switch to a bright colour as in Karen's quilt - what do you think ?

Do pop over to Karen's blog, and look at all the great ideas there,  and if you're a lover of antique quilts, check out Thursday's post too !

Free Motion Quilting Challenge

 I have to admit that I fell behind with the FMQ Challenge  hosted by SewCalGal during March, which is a shame really as it was a great tutorial by one of my favourites,  Ann Fahl.  Luckily I managed to download it before it was removed from the website and am now able to add it to my folder.  

There were a number of examples of fmq shown in the turorial, and these are just a couple squeezed onto my sample piece.

Not too bad, but think my 'circles' need a bit of work :-)

April's challenge was set by Don Linn and is really interesting as he shows how to create your own quilting stencils using tulle. Some of you may already know this technique, but for those who don't and are interested, you can find the video here.

Using the tulle, embroidery hoop and some markers, this

and this

became these !

Not too bad for first efforts, and certainly something I will use again, so big thanks to Don for the tutorial.


Sorry about the poor quality of the photos, but grey, dark and wet is the order of the day in Brittany at the moment !

Playtime

After my last moan about the grey weather, we had the most amazing hot spell that I personally have ever experienced at the end of March with temperatures around 30C !  Not ones to let an opportunity like this pass we  took off to the Finistere coast for totally unplanned break and had a wonderful time!

I will write more about this beautiful area in a future post, but what I wanted to ask you is - have you had a play with the new Picasa softwear yet ?  No, well let me show you .

We stayed in this lovely Chambres d'Hotes

or was it like this ?

maybe this ?

or one of these  ?

Go try it yourself and see how much fun it is :-)                                         

Flying Start

I'm off to a flying start for February with 3 finishes already!

Number 1 - Tessellation doll quilt  quilted and binding done

In case you're wondering, the chair was made for DH when he was 2,  and ,  like him, it's  getting on a bit now :-)

Number 2 - DGD got herself a   RED  'beginner's sewing machine' for her  8th birthday on Christmas Eve ,  and is all ready to make her dollies some new clothes.We are due to see her and her new sewing machine on Sunday, so as well as a parcel of  goodies for her to play with, I made this mini Charmer tote bag  (Penny Sturgess pattern) to pack them in and maybe double as a work basket too.

Number 3 is another mug rug, which I can't show you yet, but I can show you this one which is the one that stayed at home!  I wasn't too happy with it in the end so decided to make an alternative to swap and keep the reject for myself :-)

Don't know why Blogger has turned the photo again!

Quilting on the Pineapples is on stop for the moment as my wrists have been aching so badly, but  I have finished all the white 'stars' and  5 of the coloured ones too, so another 7 to go plus the borders. If  I get the quilt totally finished by the end of the month I'll be more than  happy as we've a couple of busy weeks ahead and can't see much more getting done :-)

Been Playing Again

I've often looked at Tessellation quilts and wondered at the way they go together and how difficult it would be, so over the weekend I decided to have a try and see if I could work it out from a photo - Voila!

Another little quilt just under 12" x 16" and in need of a good press. (it does lie flat in real life - honest!) It took me a little while to work out the angles etc but it went together OK in the end.

I must say this about quilting, tackling  projects like this certainly keeps the old brain ticking over, and it looks like Lucy Doll has another quilt in the pipeline !

Confession Time!

When I first caught the quilting bug, several years ago now, no one was more surprised than I  as to how addicted I became in a very short time - after all I hate 'sewing' to the degree that DH has resorted to replacing  all his missing shirt buttons instead of having to beg and plead with me to pick up needle and
thread ,whilst repairs and alterations to clothing can lie in neglected piles for weeks on end.

Now, my sewing machine has become my most treasured possession instead of being left to gather dust in the bottom of a cupboard and I can't wait to get all the mundane daily chores finished so that I can get into my room - but then patchwork & quilting isn't really 'sewing' is it , but rather a form of expression and enjoyment as opposed to a 'chore', well, at least that how I feel about it .

Having got to the stage where I am reasonably happy with the quality of my work and have even got over the dread of  stipple quilting (let's face it I am NEVER going to hand quilt as it would mean using a needle) I really want to move onto a bigger variety of quilting patterns -  so I armed myself with a whole load of books

which quite frankly scare the pants off me at first :-)  I even invested in the Pajama Quilter  videos which have been great fun to watch, and with the help of the workbook.....

 

........which Dawn was kind enough to sign for me......

 .....and after hours of drawing all kinds of weird shapes on the white board - I still can't quilt!!!  The 4 inch sample squares are fine, but when it comes to a whole quilt everything goes out of the window so its back to a  of scrap batting & fabric and the practice..practice ..practice routine

...and maybe someday my feathers will end up on an heirloom quilt, but in the meantime I'll settle for them looking less of a mess!

Twelve blocks finished for the  'Soot & Ashes' quilt along

Number 13 is available, but rumour has it that the last 2 blocks are appliqué and as that would mean using the dreaded needle - maybe I'll be sticking at 12 :-)

April Finishes

Two finishes for April, a day late I know , but our weather has been so horrible all week - wet & cold with a couple of thunderstorms thrown in for good measure - that photos have been impossible!Today the sun is back, could this be a good sign for May , I certainly hope so as these grey days do absolutely nothing for my general health & temper :-)


Some dry weather would be very welcome for this coming week, as we have the builders in on Monday to start the attic conversion (one step nearer to a new workroom !)- and as it's my birthday at the end of next week too, it would be great to have at least one sunny day to make a well overdue visit to the coast!!


Finish No 1 is my first attempt at a Quilt As You Go stringy started from scratch in April - not sure if I am sold on this method but it was certainly a good way to use up a lot of those 'what was I thinking about' fabrics ! Bright and cheerful though, and I am sure it will be put to good use out in the garden on those chilly summer evenings !

Finish No 2 is a Quiltville pattern from my UFO list, although somewhat smaller than Bonnie's coming out at approx 4ft 6ins x 5ft 6ins. This is about as big as I can manange to quilt at the moment, but I live in hope that one day.............!!

The border fabric colours haven't come out very well, which is a shame as it does have a very pretty floral pattern on it

This quilt is destined to be very well travelled as it has been promised to our DS & DIL to join their new 'baby' - a recently (lovingly!) restored VW camper van !

The picture was taken outside the 'old' part of our house which as you can see has local stone for the lower walls and and cob on the top, and look at our lovely rounded doorway! The window just above the camper roof is where my new work room will be in the old 'grenier' or attic - I can't wait for it all to happen!!!!

Just to finish, have you seen the lovely BoM that Jenny is giving away? Well, if you haven't then hurry along and have a look it is a stunner in my book !

Birth of a Monster!!

Sometime weeks ago, Kate had a block 'clearaway' on her blog and I swapped this mini...








..for 9 of these blocks!




For the last couple of weeks I've been laying them out, shuffling them about and having finally decided on a setting, spent hours debating on what to use to try and complement the many colours in these scrappy blocks!! I think I must have pulled every piece of fabric in my (modest!) stash before coming up with a combination that I thought might work and then set out to try another 'first' for me - on point settings!


Now, anybody with an ounce of sense tries out new techniques on small items - yes? You won't be surprised to hear then that starting out on 15 inch finished blocks was not a good idea but one guaranteed to cause big problems!! No rulers long enough to cope with diagonal cuts ; no square ruler big enough for the job either (20.5 is my largest!!); no single cutting mat that big , arms not long enough (!).......need I go on ???


Eventually, after getting DH to help with the drafting and cutting of a couple of templates from some very sturdy card, clearing off our dining table and taping together several cutting mats and praying that the multiple rulers didn't move off line under pressure , which was achieved by virtually lying on on top of them across the table (not a pretty sight I assure you!!) setting triangles finally appeared !! I am sure some of you out there know an easier way to cope, but this was the best I could come up with on my own - nothing about this dilema in any of my books or mags!!


The top is 4 ft 8 " x 6ft 8", a lot longer than I'd thought it would be even though I only used 8 of the blocks !! At one time I was going to make additional blocks to try for a better setting - then it would really have been a monster!!


So, without any further ado, some not brilliant pics (mainly!) because of its size , this is my latest UFO !!

The sashings are chocolate brown , the corner stones quite a strong pink and the setting triangles are tan with a small red/brown all-over folky heart pattern even though it looks like polka dots from a distance!

Now that's over with, all I have to cope with is - how many sleepless nights will be spent worrying about quilting it!!!!! May even manage better photos then too!!

Santa's Late Delivery !

Look what's arrived !

Well - not late really(!) just that I held back the order during the manic Christmas posting period! I think this might have been a good move , as I've had one gift parcel go AWOL en route to a dear friend in Miami and another going to my daughter in the UK !! Very annoying, but on the whole not a bad record when I think how many parcels have come and gone in the last 8 years, and listening to some sob stories, I seem to have done very well !

I have to say that one thing I would never complain about is a late delivery from the Fabric Shack , I've probably already told you that their service is amazing! I placed this particular order via their web site on 8 January, was notified of despatch 9 January and it arrived today - not bad at all in anyone's book, and this is quite normal! I think I would say that this is quicker (besides being a lot cheaper!!) than buying fabrics from the UK , as I've noticed a number of on line stores advising a couple of days delay before dealing with orders let alone posting them!

At least now I can get on with some more of these finished !

Not in any particular order and I am sure there will be a lot of shuffling of 'quarters' before they are put together - not trimmed or finally pressed either, so you get to see them warts and all!!The PP wasn't too bad in the end as there was a very easy to follow tutorial in the book , but the arcs - well, that was another matter !!! Some of them are reasonable but then some of them not so good !!

A couple of new links on the side bar for those who've not already found these lovely sites - there are just so many free BoMs at the moment it is getting very difficult to decide which to do and which you should turn your back on ............decisions, decisions.................!

Busy! Busy!

Not a lot of sewing going on over the last few days as it was DH's birthday on Sunday! The place been like Piccadilly Circus with all the comings and goings all over the weekend, and added to the days of preparation before hand, I am ready for a long lie down in a dark room!!! Actually, it has been good fun with good company and lots of laughs !!

All I have to show at the moment is a new book

which contains what is possibly my next project - what do you think !!

This will be another first for me as I have never really been a fan of paper piecing, but I would love to try the New York Beauty block and this pattern is certainly in my comfort zone !! Can I do it I ask myself or will this turn into another step too far !!!!

Liberated !!!

By now anyone dropping in to the Blog will have realised that I am a 'Scrappy' quilter, but I have read so much about Gwen Marston's techniques recently I got to thinking that anyone who could make me stop worrying about my points (not always good !!) was worth taking a closer look at ! Trying to find a reasonably priced copy of Gwen's 'Liberated Quilting' is like trying to find stardust as many of you know.However, I did put my name down on Tonya's virtual petition to AQS to try and get the book reprinted (the news at the moment is that there is a very slight definite maybe for a go ahead!!). So I bought this whilst in the UK , to get me going at least

Looking for something easy to start, I found this

and over the weekend made this

Not exactly the same quilt as in the illustration, I decided to make it square so that it can be used as a table topper, and of course, not quite the same standard of quilting :-) It is finished though and I am quite pleased with my first 'liberated' attempt!! What I've really got my eye on next is this, as I think this is one Wedding Ring pattern I might achieve !!