Sew Together bag

I started making this bag as a present over a month ago on my return from Berlin. I purchased the bee linen fabric in Berlin at Frau Tulpe. I've learnt a lot making this bag, including remembering to add interfacing where it tells you to. This would have made the interior pockets firmer. Buying the right sort of zip and also not cutting off the stopper, which resulted in me having to take out the long zip, which I had almost finished. Next time I would also sew the bottom binding to the exterior first rather than the interior.

 

And what I haven't shown you is the aqua Cotton & Steel on the inside of the zippered pockets.



I hope that the recipient of this make likes it.

Black and white Perkiomen

This is Jenny's quilt that I finished this week. My last customer quilt for 2014. I noticed a block was wrong after I quilted the first row, but Jenny took it away to rotate the block by 180 degrees. It looks much better for the alteration.

 

 

This was from a workshop with Carolyn Forster.

Mr Snowman

Having finished Lori Holt's Quilty Xmas sewalong on Instagram, I started some of the snowman blocks which are so cute. And I've made four blocks into a seasonal cushion. Having asked friends for suitable buttons, I decided to use some crystals to emulate coal.

 

And here's the cushion along with the Quilty Christmas quilt.

Unless I manage to sew a Christmas present today, this will be my last finish for 2014. I am taking away my knitted Christmas bunting and my London cross stitch on holiday. That's about all that's ready to pack. Eek. Leaving it late as usual.

Have yourself a quilty little Christmas - finished

And it's finished. I finished the binding at our guild morning meeting last week, just in time to enter it into our annual challenge that lunchtime. And I won. What did I win? A lovely Clover combined cutting, pressing and tracing mat.

 

My bows didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped, so I added three buttons to the centres and I was happy. These buttons are definitely vintage as they came from Esther's Mum's button tin which Esther gave me a few years ago. There were three perfect red buttons still stitched to the card they were bought on.

 

 

And the lovely Riley Blake backing. You can't beat a good dotty fabric. The binding was from my stash. I assume I bought it from Pink Castle, but I have no recollection of buying it. Oops.

 

I have about half a yard left of the spot which I hope is enough to back and bind my snowman cushion. My plan is to prepare it ready to stitch on Wednesday morning again at our Guild meeting. I plan to get at least two rows of stitching done on my last client quilt. Progress has been delayed as I decided to pick out a whole row. An hour to stitch a row and more than a few hours to unpick it. I should only manage two rows as I have two hospital appointments (one this morning and of course, one this afternoon), I'm helping to get a hall ready for a party this evening and the party this evening.

Siblings Together - December

Fortunately, I only had one bee commitment for December. Having sewn my binding on my Xmas Quilty Fun project at my Wednesday morning group, I cut and pinned these blocks ready to sew.  We're making 4 patch snowball blocks measuring 16.5" unfinished. It's the snowball block from Hannah's Christmas quilt pattern in Fat Quarterly this month but we're skipping the stars and the blocks will be sewn together to make a big simple snowball quilt. Limited colour palette please of aquas, greens and blues.

 

 

Here's my block - a combination of Carolyn Friedlander, Bonnie & Camille and Grunge from Basic Grey.

 

And here is my block alongside Jane's block and they will both be posted to Hannah this week. If I don't get to the Post Office before Saturday, I can post from the airport.

Have yourself a quilty little Christmas - binding buttons and bows

I have made good progress on my little Christmas sewalong quilt. I have gone from the thirteen completed blocks to

 

All of the blocks put together, borders added and quilted.  On a couple of blocks I had not added the right size borders or missed borders, so there was a little remedial work before I could sew the blocks together. I had hoped to put the quilt top together yesterday at our Guild UFO day, but as I hadn't taken any background fabric, I only finished piecing the borders. The borders are simpler than Lori's but I managed to sue up most of three mini charm packs as they were the correct size (2.5"). I combined stash, Simply Colour, Joy and Daysail.

 

I was particularly pleased that the 3D tab on the stocking wasn't in the way of the quilting - a complete fluke. I now just have to add the buttons, bows and binding. Though I may have to ask friends for mini buttons for the tummy of the gingerbread man. I know I have some red ones, but I think they'd look better if they were multi-coloured.

 

I was hoping to get a client's quilt substantially finished today, but I spotted a block that was wrongly orientated, so have let the client know so she can undo it if she wants and turn the block 180 degrees.

As I failed to complete my November goal of finishing my Wishes quilt, I think completing this will be my December goal.

 

Schnibble - mini stems

 

This month (November) the AYOS pattern was from Fig Tree and call mini Stems. I finished this one very quickly from scraps. I'm not sure if the green overpowers the other fabrics or not, but it's finished after sewing in a couple of ends.

 

Three's company

I finished quilting this on Sunday. It is a biggie at 70" by 88" and the maker couldn't find the fabric for the last border which would have made it even bigger. A number of us in our group made this quilt from Thimbleberries which came in three different colourways. I still have the pattern as I like the blocks and want to make some again.

I used a pantograph called Vine which picks up some of the patterns in the backing and some of the focus fabrics. It's all trimmed and ready to return to its maker at our Wednesday group. It's an all day session but I'm not sure which project to take to work on.

Have yourself a quilty little Christmas again

 

As of yesterday, I was up to date again. We have just one more block to make and then we're onto borders, Lori announced on Sunday. There is a label to come which is going to be used for my Quilty Fun Christmas projects. I'll have to be careful when quilting this project as there's a 3D hanging loop for the Christmas stocking.

 

I'm interested to see how things get put together as the only blocks that seem to match at the moment are the house and stocking. we have two units sewn together already - three blocks on the top left including the spools and five blocks on the right including the gingerbread man.

Gingerbread men

I love everything about this cute cot quilt - the use of ginghams and checks, the bold spotty print as the alternate blocks, the straightness of the quilt when quilting it. This is Barbara's second quilt and I think she's hooked. She's now looking for a more adult quilt.

 

 

Simple quilting using the Popcorn pantograph in white.

 

This was the second of two quilts finished yesterday, but the first quilt is a biggie so I trimmed this one first as it was a quick finish.

Have yourself a Quilty little Christmas update

As soon as I have cut the pieces for the latest block to catch up, then another pops up. Apparently we have made thirteen blocks so far. Strange but I only have twelve, eleven completed and one in progress.

And here's the first sub section sewn together.

Now to find which block I have missed.

Siblings Together blocks

 

For November we were asked to make two 12" finished slab blocks. Having seen the blocks other ladies have made, I realise my pieces could have been bigger and would probably have made the process much quicker.

 

I think I could have pieced a whole simple quilt in the time it took me to make these two blocks. they have now arrived with this month's bee mama who commented that the colours were cheerful and bright. I have realised that i don't have many purple fabrics in my stash, another excuse to shop.

 





Improv and wonky lines are not in my nature. I need structure and rules, but I think I achieved what was required in the brief. I must check if any of our groups are taking November off as we are away for two weeks in December.

Have yourself a quilty little Christmas

I spotted a little Sewalong that Lori Holt was having over on Instagram. If you don't do Instagram you can see the nine blocks so far over on Lori's blog - Bee in my Bonnet. I made the latest block on Friday evening which I then had to throw in the bin as it was wrong, Jane suggested a solution yesterday, but it was too late, it was gone.

 

 

Yesterday I logged into Padgram, the ipad version of Instagram for reading updates to find Lori had made three more blocks over the weekend. I had spent Sunday starting a much overdue tidy up of my workroom, so had completely missed her posts. So Monday's task in between the gym, an afternoon of canasta, meeting with workmen at another property, lunch with Jane and a meeting yesterday evening, was to work on some more blocks.

 

The gingerbread man is so cute. Lori added three buttons to his tummy, but I'll wait until it's quilted before doing that step. The ric rac icing is such a lovely detail.

Next a quick star block, but only if you have all of the points going in the same direction. I had just enough fabric to redo one point. I found this fabric in my tidy up along with two other star fabrics in cream / white. Delighted to use things I've rediscovered.

 

 

I love the fabric I've used for the candle flame. Though I realise today, that I have two more border strips to add to the top and bottom of the candle.



 



 

And here are my blocks so far. Just the candle borders to add, a new set of lights to make, a candy cane to be added to the mug and an ornament block with cute ric rac detail. 

 

Moda Modern Building Blocks 2

 

 

I have received lots of blocks for this quilt from the Bumbling Honeys Bee, I think I still have a few more to come. I now need to devise a plan to sew the remainder of the blocks. I think I might start with section D as I have 3 of the 5 blocks completed.

 

 

 

How are your blocks progressing? Do link up below.

 

An InLinkz Link-up

Bumbling honeys bee - November 2014

 It was Teresa's turn to be bee mama in November and chose this block using either aquas or reds, or both together and directed us to Thimbleblossoms for the sort of colours she was thinking of. Fortunately I have quite a stash of Bonnie & Camille fabrics so knew what she wanted. In the end Jane finished her block first and I added some extra scraps to the scraps she liberated from my stash.

 Here are our blocks together. You wouldn't think they've been well pressed. The tutorial for this block can be found at Don't Call Me Betsy

Siblings Together November

 

I will admit that I had to unpick the partial seam in this block as there was a tuck in it. This is for November for Nicky from the Siblings Together quilt bee. Almost all of the fabrics were from my scrap bags apart from the lighter blue and the low volume background. The centre square was to be fussy cut and I chose this cherry pie label from my scrap bags. It is from the same range as the cherry on lime fabric.

ALYOF November 2014 - The Wishes Edition

 

October went by in a flash with two trips - Venice and cruise for Nick's 60th and Lizzie and I got back from a trip to Berlin last night. Next she wants to go to Pompeii. So what to choose to focus on in November. I think I'll chose the Wishes quilt by Fat Quarter Shop. The blocks have been finished for some months and at last weekend's UFO day I sewed all of the blocks into four rows and three of the rows have been sewn together. So all that remains (doesn't sound too much if I say it quickly) is to add one more row to the centre and decide about the outer border.

 

 

 

And this is how the quilt should look when finished. Mine uses a Bonnie & Camille FE stack not the Sweetwater Wishes range. I've also substituted a couple of blocks that weren't my style - for example the basket block  - I like basket blocks to be the correct way up and not on their side.

 

Christmas layer cake

Third of the four quilts delivered last Thursday which has now been collected by it's maker. A great use of a layer cake for a lovely finish.

 



Again I used the Vine B2B pattern by Anna Bright which didn't overwhelm the piecing.

 

Another first quilt finished

Another fabulous first quilt - this time by Barbara for her 3 year old grandson. This was all hand blanket stitched and bondawebbed down first. I love the way Barbara has used stripes so cleverly on the boat hulls and sails.

I used a pantograph called Tickle which gives the feeling of splashes of water. I used Sew Fine in off white and this meant the quilting didn't overwhelm the lovely applique.

Blogger's Quilt Festival ROYGBIV

 

My second entry into the Blogger's Quilt Festival is another bee quilt and I've chosen it because it was a popular quilt at Fat Quarterly Retreat. It was made to donate to the charity Siblings Together and used 2.5" squares in a rainbow of colours, each bee member made two blocks with the star randomly placed. It was made for a child and fits the brief well.

 



 

The binding was made from my box of 2.5" scrap strips and roughly follows the rainbow around the quilt. The binding was adhered to the back of the quilt with Steam a seam and then machine stitched down from the front.

 

 

The quilt was quilted on my long arm with a pattern called Allium on a Tula Pink backing.

 

 

 

Do go and have a look at all of the entries on Amy's blog. Voting starts on 1 November.

 

Bloggers Quilt Festival scrappy quilt

 

 

Having just finished binding this quilt today, I thought I'd enter it in the Blogger's Quilt Festival in the scrappy category. Many of the blocks were made for me by members of Hive #5 of The Stash Bee. The design is the popular Japanese X and + block and I asked for warm colours for the points, black crosses, texty white backgrounds and turquoise ends.

 

 

I love all of the different fabrics. Many of which I'd not seen before. I particularly liked the New York cityscape which I understand can only be purchased at The City Quilter.

 

 

 And one of the fabrics I used was Sweetwater's Sew text fabric.

 

I used a new Border to Border quilt pattern called Vine by Anna Bright which I was very pleased with and I have used it on a recent client quilt too.

The backing is a Robert Kaufman wide screen print from Fat Quarter Shop bought in their recent promotion and I love it as the binding too. It really hides the joins on the sashing.

If you're in need of a pick me up, do visit Amy's blog to view all of the quilt's entered into the competition. Mine is in the scrappy quilts category and voting starts on1 November.



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