FQR quilt bee October

Yippee the last of my October bee commitments is finished. I think Carol's blocks that I have seen so far are going to make a lovely quilt. Carol's brief was it was to be two blocks - one of the theme of "It's a Wonderful World" and one filler block from the low volume fabrics she provided.

 

I offered to do an owl or feathers and Carol chose feathers. This is a pattern from the Forest Quilt along hosted by Shape Moth and Juliana.

 



For the filler block I went with a simple random log cabin block. I added a couple of my own Zen Chic fabrics and some strips again from the FQR scrap strip swap.

 

 

I think the two blocks combined look good. I hope Carol likes what I've done.

 

 



Simply Solids bee

On Monday morning it was a quick job to finish Nat's dancing stars. I now need to package them ready to send back before the end of October.

 

 When I checked the Flickr group for the Simply Solids Bee on Monday, I was pleased to see Celine's instructions for these pyramid log cabin blocks. as we were using our stash for these, I added them to my to do list and they were soon finished. My Simply Solids blocks are now up to date. I also have some other blocks to send to Celine so only one trip to the Post Office.

 

I still have my blocks from about May to put together for this bee. 

Sunday UFO day

My aim at our Guild's six hour UFO day was less UFO and more Bee catch up. I progressed the blocks from the pile of raw materials and foundation patterns, to something which looks like the final product but it's not quite there yet. I am hopeful that I'll finish both by the end of the month. no pressure.

 Firstly are these dancing stars blocks. The cutting instructions were a bit mean on fabric and wasteful too which had me puzzled for a while. I was please I printed these onto Carol Doak foundation papers as they tear out so easily. Later I wished I'd used the same paper for the other foundation blocks. There are three to make so I was pleased to get two out of three completed.
 

 

 

 

For the FQR bee, I chose a foundation pieced feather block by Shape Moth for Carol's month. There was no way I was going to finish this at one sitting, but you can see how the pieces will come together. Look at how small some of those pieces were and one of the fiddly bits, I had to unpick and start again as I had my blue and low volume fabrics reversed. There are two feathers in this block but I'm going to leave them separate so Carol can choose how to use them.

 

Siblings Together Bee 2

Céline provided a coloured drawing and instructions for this block which she designed on her blog. I hadn't realised she'd posted instructions until I saw the thread today and she confirmed receipt of someone's block. Oops. I dug out my box of 2.5" strips from the FQR scrap strip swap, added in some Sweetwater reds from my Sweetwater basket and I was ready to sew.

 

I have two other October bee blocks to sew tomorrow. One is a foundation pieced block x 3 for the Simply Solids block. I have avoided this one as it is not obvious how to use the pre-cut pieces. The other block is for Carol for the FQR quilt bee which is to be a foundation pieced feather designed by Shape Moth and a low volume filler block. Both should get done at the Caesarea Quilters UFO day tomorrow as I won't have any other distractions.

Striking Seminole quilt

 

This quilt was made by Janet and is very striking. It uses Seminole strips from a series of workshops by local quilter Angela Rybarczuk. Angela's classes are always popular as she puts a lot of thought and preparation into each session with great hand outs and samples.

 

I quilted it using a Japanese clouds pantograph and Stone Age by King Tut for Superior Threads.

Sewing Room swap goodies received

 

Whilst the posting date for this swap was at the beginning of September, stuff happens and my partner had to move her family of nine with one month's notice. I can't imagine coping with a family of nine, let alone finding time for myself. I've found myself chasing my tail recently, but I seem to have come out the other side and after unwrapping my parcel of goodness from Lisa yesterday I caught up on four months of bank statements. Tomorrow I'll start on the credit card statements. How did I get so behind?

 

We had to send our partner a "large" item and a "smaller" item for their sewing room taking into account their fabric preferences. I think I asked not to receive an ironing board cover but requested a sewing machine cover. Tick. Have a look at the first item out of the parcel. I think the background fabric used is Essex linen paired with V & Co's Simply Style range which I have also used recently.

 



 

The second item was an embroidery hoop with a hand stitched saying which co-ordinates with the cover. This is, I believe available as a free pattern on http://www.sewmamasew.com/ but I can't access the website for a direct link at the moment. I picked up an extra seam ripper at the Knit & Stitch Show so this is definitely me.

 



 

The lucky girl that I am, there was more - a coordinating basket. And it even has a firm bottom to it.

 

 

And then there was even more - lots of lovely scraps. Other people's scraps are always more interesting than your own. I particularly like the polar bears and the two text fabrics. Text fabrics was something I was looking for at Knit & Stitch and all I managed to purchase was three Fat Quarters. And I mustn't forget the two reels of Aurifil thread and some large Lifesavers. Or what we call Polo Mints.

 

 

Tomorrow I'll have a customer quilt to share with you and I have yet to share what I sent to Cindy for the Sewing Room swap.

 

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Deck the halls with boughs of holly

The Frosted Pumpkin have just started sign ups for their two Christmas cross stitch patterns. As a Halloween Speedy Stitcher I was lucky enough to win both patterns. I ordered some linen and the other threads I needed on Sunday an they arrived on Tuesday. I must not start stitching the frames for the Twelve Days of Christmas.

 

Photo by Amanda Elizabeth Jennings

 

Firstly there is Christmas on Gingerbread Lane. You can see the variation in colour of the bricks due to the hand dyed weeks threads used. With this Pattern Subscription you will be sent PDF Patterns:

• November 15th
• November 22nd
• November 29th

 

Photo by Amanda Elizabeth Jennings

And then we countdown to the 12 days of Christmas. This song is a popular quiz question but I can only remember from 7 downwards. The first PDF for this arrives on 29th November. But first I must finish my bunting.

It's a good day

Thank you to Jenny who helped me make progress with binding my Deckade the Halls quilt at our Guild last night. Many hands do indeed make light work. Ella had also brought her version along with a lovely cream / gold background in more traditional fabrics. Having them side by side illustrated how different fabrics can make the same pattern look so different.

 

The two weekly blocks have been lovely to make and now it's ready for Christmas.

 

All of the blocks are lovely from the mugs of cocoa to the wreaths and presents.

Hanging out the Christmas stockings and decorating the tree with ornaments.

 And eating a delicious gingerbread man. I am delighted with how mine has come out with it's modern choice of fabrics from whatever I had in my stash that I thought would go with the blocks already made. All tied together with the snowflake white on white background from Moda.

Now I'm in the Christmas spirit, I think I'll finish the squares for my knitted Christmas bunting. Just two left to knit, I think. And thank you to Matthew for holding up my quilt. He had just returned from successfully passing his driving theory test, next task is to book some driving lessons.



No sewing at the moment

I am full of a cold and feeling sorry for myself. I hope I am better by tomorrow as I am off to Guernsey for two days of geocaching with Jane. I am doing some knitting and sofa surfing today, so have made a few more squares of bunting.

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Confidence

Thank you to Betty for her unswerving confidence that not only would I be unable to resist starting the bunting (correct) but that I can finish it in one week (LOL). I might have made one more bunting square on Sunday had the electricity not gone off ten minutes before the end of Downton Abbey. Talk about bad timing.

 

 

 

Yesterday I managed to complete one square of week 4 of The Frosted Pumpkin's autumn sampler. It was a busy day with a literary luncheon which took three hours of the day. We were invited onto top table with Lucinda Lambton who talked about lavatories!! The a music lesson but no shape and polish for me as I'd cancelled this week's appointment instead of next week's. Blame my age. Then I was the speaker at St Martin's WI in the evening. I was very nervous but it seemed to go down well.

 

 

Today is a whirl of Zumba and picking up a freezer full of meat from town. I'll also take my Halloween cross stitch to be framed and I need to do some banking. Oh dear, I also need to finish our WI accounts for the auditor tomorrow, I guess there'll be no sewing until this evening at the earliest.

 



I must resist

 

Claire has already finished knitting two of her Christmas bunting squares. I must be strong and resist until I've finished my autumn sampler. However it'll be a good Wednesday morning project as it's small and portable.

 



Autumn sampler week 3

 

You might be asking yourself, I don't remember seeing weeks one and two. And you'd be right. Somehow I didn't buy two of the thread colours so week one's progress stalled which rolled on into week

two. However the good news is that I have completed all of week three and can work on the earlier weeks today before week four is released tomorrow.

Last week's little blocks included sock knitting, an autumnal house, that makes you want to move right in, a girl playing in the leaves, pumpkin cupcakes (what a good idea) and apple pie.

I think I'll go and work on block 8 now which is destined to be a scarecrow in a corn field. Only a week until the Christmas projects are released and although I have won both projects, I will only do one of them.

 

Amanda has shared part of the borders for the twelve days of Christmas on the Facebook group. So cute.

 

Back from Knit & Stitch

Our mini break to Knit & Stitch is over with just a few photos to share. I didn't buy a lot. I went with a list and other than the knitted bunting kit, pretty much kept to plan. On Wednesday we enjoyed watching a taping of loose women at the ITV studios on the south bank and next door we found a lovely handbag shop. Claire was kind enough to buy my Christmas present. Down Regent Street we stopped in Anthropologie where I bought the red and white utensil pot.

 

The magazine subscriptions were a bargain, three issues for £1 and another issue to take with you along with a shopping bag and three balls of wool.

 

Needle threaders, thread magic, sparkly cotton for cross stitching and a few typography fat quarters.

 

 

Lastly, knitted Christmas bunting kit, and Claire has one as her early Christmas gift from me. I have bought the required needles today so I am ready to start but need to get my cross stitching up to date.



Slow progress

Despite Nick having been away for over a week and being free during the day I seem to have got very little accomplished in all aspects of day to day life.



Today I have decided to focus on a client quilt. This belongs to Alvis and is for a granddaughter who has gone off blue and now prefers pink! So Alvis took advantage of this to pink up the quilt with some appliqué flowers to cover a small burn mark.


I sewed on the binding on my Deckade the Halls quilt at our Guild UFO day on Sunday but I was also teaching a complete novice to make some blocks, so the binding was all I achieved. I hope to hand stitch the binding tomorrow evening as part if Friday Night with Friends.

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