WIP Wednesday - Oh Christmas Three

Oh Christmas Three is a pattern by Hands on Design. Three small Christmas ornaments that should be a quick stitch. Perhaps if I had focused on this project, it would have been finished quicker. There is also a small companion piece called Pere Noel that I might stitch for 2024.

I purchased the pattern and linen from Peakside Needleworks but it is annoying that you can't see the required flosses until you have the physical pattern. In the end I just substituted the called for floss for what was in stash. I used DMC 347, B5200, 906, CV4075, Classic Colourworks deep blue sea and Louisiana Hot Sauce from Weeks Dye Works The linen is 32 count Belfast charcoal / slate grey.

 

I am lucky that a local sewing shop opens for two hours on a Sunday, so I hot footed it down to the store and bought the mini pom pom trim, narrow ribbon and silver bells. I was a woman on a mission, and I was successful in finishing the decorations with a lot of help from Gorilla glue. They are now ready to post to my son along with his advent calendar. The post is poor at the moment due to the persistent storm which interrupt the ferry services which take the mail to the UK, but I hope they get there by 1 December.

Monday make - Quietplay make mine mini

 

My final retreat from home finish was another Quietplay bonus pattern from the Make Mine Mini club. I started this at the Modern Quilt Club retreat in October and I had thoroughly prepared all of the fabric pieces and pinned them to each section to achieve the rainbow effect. Many of the fabrics were scraps from a recent Alison Glass project and the rest were from my scrap basket. As the scraps are divided into bags by colour, this made the process quicker.

I used my favourite Essex linen in Fog with its lovely sparkles. I had just enough to use it on the back too.  I quilted the panel with straight lines using Aurifil 50 weight thread in white and my walking foot. I first appliqued the circle to the centre and without stopping, I quilted lines out to each point and around the points. Then I did the lines from the outside and across the inside circle. Of course, I ran out of thread just as I was doing the last line of stitching.

I used cam snaps to close the back of the cushion and added a pretty Kylie and the Machine ribbon label too. I made the panel 20" square to use with a 20" Ikea cushion inner, but next time I would make the cushion 19" square or even smaller.

I had a successful retreat from home completing three mini quilts for donation to SCBU, a spice rack bag and a cushion. Looking forward to our next retreat in February.

Friday finish - 2023 collector's heart

I finished the 2023 collector's heart in October. I used a kit from Peakside Needleworks  which came with the 32 count Heartland linen by Picture This Plus and Cottage Garden Thread in JK02 leather bound.

I tried to frame this myself but cut three sides with a 2" margin and one side with a 1" margin. Whoops. I took it to a local framer who reframed it beautifully for me. I like the framer's system, if you drop it in on a Monday, you collect one week later, if you remember. November has been stressful for me, but I am definitely through the worse of settling my aunt in a nursing home and a video project with a US company has come to an end. 

These are the first two redwork pieces for a wall in our kitchen. A third larger piece is now in progress.

Leftover blocks

A friend was destashing these two 9" blocks and I quickly realised they would make a quick 18" mini quilt for SCBU. I didn't think I'd have any fabric in the colours Kim had used but I was surprised to find three that would work. I decided to just go with a simple finish with alternating plain squares.

Whilst the navy fabric by The Tattooed Quilter that I chose for backing and binding didn't match the blue in the quilt top, neither did it detract from it.

I used the quilting ditch foot on my Janome Atelier 7 to stitch down the binding from the front for a neat finish that will withstand the rigours of being machine washed. Another mini quilt ready to donate to SCBU.

 

Monday make - spice rack

 

Day 2 of Retreat from Home and it's now time to tackle a bigger project as in theory I have a whole day to complete the project. My plan had been to add a Sew Quirky applique to the outside of the Spice Rack pattern by Jess of Okla Roots. I was too enthusiastic and had cut out all of my pieces before I realised that I had planned to do the applique before cutting the denim cover. 

Plan 2 was to pinch a beautiful embroidered patch from my daughter's Sew Quirky mystery box. We share the contents and buy the boxes alternately.

I started with a interior fabric from Alison Glass from the basket on my work room floor and added all of the pink Ruby Star Society fabrics that I could. Several of the items including the embroidered patch, vegan leather, sparkly vinyl, label and zip were from various Mystery boxes. I am using previous boxes to store all of our continuous zippers in and another for the vegan leather.

The little 2.5" ruler I was gifted from a recent retreat, was very useful for marking the placement of the poppers and cutting the card holder.

I had purchased some premade bias tape locally, but I found this pink polka dot tape in my stash which goes well with all of the pinks. I am pleased with the finished product, the label holder could be a bit straighter!! I added two inches to the height of the pattern to be able to use it for my iPad mini but 1" would probably have suffice.

This was my only make from Day 2 of Retreat from Home as I had to visit a relative in hospital and make some call for her on my return home. We had a lovely evening at a restaurant we hadn't been to for a while but the weather was a bit wild again.

Friday Finish - Me Time delivered flying geese mini quilt

I think you might be seeing a theme in the projects I completed on the first day of my Retreat from Home. I had sent my Janome Atelier 7 to the sewing machine spa as the needle position needed some attention. whilst it was gone, I took the time to finish some blocks on the Janome Memory Craft 500E that I recently purchased. 

I was also inspired by Jess of Okla Roots on Youtube to subscribe to the digital version of Perfectly Pieced from Me Time Delivered. You can effectively foundation piece and quilt a block on an embroidery machine. I was hooked. This is the October 2022 pattern as you can purchase past patterns.

Again, I started this project with fabric from my scrap basket. I then moved onto Alison Glass fabric that hadn't yet been put away which is in a log basket on my work room floor. From that same basket I chose the backing fabric. As you can see once I had put together the blocks and appliqued a heart to the centre block, the only quilting I needed was a simple stitch in the ditch. One of the clever features of the design is there is no wadding in the seam allowance. Genius.

Back to my scraps and I found the binding fabric which was a scrap of 108" wide backing fabric and the colour picked up the grey in the background fabric. And yes, I forgot to add a label to this project. Three SCBU mini quilts finished on day 1 of Retreat from Home. Then off to a friend's home to play canasta and eat her delicious homemade cake.

WIP Wednesday - star mini quilt

 

I am a member of Quietplay's Make Mine Mini Quilt Club and this is one of the easier bonus charts. I don't tend to buy patterns without the intention of making them soon, so I am trying to make one of the patterns each month.

All of the fabrics are from my scrap basket and my scraps are sorted into bags by colour which makes it a very satisfying process.

I then quilted two 18" blocks side by side on an orange backing. I had bought the orange for something specific and then changed my mind, so it was good to use it for this purpose. The borders for this quilt are a bit wild and were cut from fabric leftover from a Quietplay 108" backing.

This will be another donation to the Special Care Baby unit to be used as incubator quilts. The mini quilts are perfect for using up blocks and trying out new techniques.

Monday Make - Kona mini quilt

Our local retreat this last weekend was cancelled due to Storm Ciaran and the damage the venue that we use had incurred. Fortunately we had already booked for February 2024, so we just rolled all of the arrangements back to February and have let our generous sponsors know. I decided to retreat from home instead and finish up some projects.

I had already quilted and trimmed two mini quilts, so they were quick finishes. This was a block from the 2024 Kona Block of the Month that I had seen promoted on Fat Quarter Shop's YouTube channel. I have plenty of Kona fabric and scraps which I thought would be perfect for sewing from stash.

I cut the half square triangles using my Accuquilt die cutting system, all ready to take to our retreat. I soon found when I was sewing at home, that I had used the background colour where I should have used the cream. Fortunately, I was retreating from home, so that was soon rectified.

I bound the quilt in the same orange fabric that I had used for the backing and even remembered to add my label to the back. I have almost used all of my printed labels so I need to look for another source for something similar.

Whilst working through my orange and red solid scraps, I have destashed quite a lot to give to my scrap loving friend. I have recently been feeling overwhelmed (some of it self-inflicted) and I realised that I didn't actually want to make a quilt from only plains and lots of half square triangles, so another mini quilt was born and I am crossing the Block of the Month off my list.

 

Friday finish - Quilter’s giant tote

Today should have been the first day of our local retreat but we heard a week ago that the venue had been damaged and regrettably our booking had been cancelled. The storm has devastated numerous properties and storm force warnings are still in place. Our members are safe and have sustained small amounts of damage to their homes and for that we have to be grateful. Fortunately, we had recently booked another retreat for February 2024, which at the time seemed too close to our November retreat, but all of the arrangements, menus, goody bags, make and takes etc. have been rolled forward to February.

I am delighted with the Quilter's Big Tote by Minki Kim made with all Ruby Star fabrics from stash. I thought use Bosal for this project but it wasn't wide enough, so I used some of the car interlining that had been recommended to me by my friend Pippa. 

You can see from the interior of the tote that the interlining has given great definition to the quilting, at a fraction of the price. We planned to try this product out at Xmas on a joint project, but I have pinched some to finish the tote.

The quilting pattern is Circuits by Anne Bright and I'm happy with my choice and the thread is a pale pink from Superior Threads. I even remembered to insert a label before binding the top edge. The label is from Kylie and the Machine.

My Atelier 7 is being serviced and "tweaked" so I'm going to focus on some cross stitch and machine embroidery projects for the next week.

 

October 2023 achievements

I have had a productive month with three quilts finished and other smaller projects. I'm planning that November will be about smaller projects and I plan to finish the 2023 mini block sampler after the last block is released in December.

In no particular order:

1. Maple and Eucalyptus quilt

2. Buttoned Up quilt

3. Messenger bag by Zeriano

4. Ruby Star charm square quilt

5. Wrist wraps for my son

6. 2023 collector's heart

7. Two mini quilts for SCBU

8. Two cushion covers for Matt

9. June cottage

Monday make - June Cottage

This project was chosen for our Guild UFO challenge as the project to complete in October. I finished it with two days to spare. It had sapped my mojo as the fabric, which I've used for all twelve months, is so crisp and unyielding. It's now finished and there are two months left of the UFO challenge. One project is finished, and one is almost finished. 

I've drawn up my UFO list for 2024 and two more of the cottages are on the list. I think I should at least start them before they are drawn!!

Friday Finish Maple and Eucalyptus

The #100days100blocks sewalong with Gnome Angel, finished in early October and my top hs been pieced together since then as I stitched each row together as I finished them. I loaded the backing and wadding onto y longarm about two weeks ago and the size of the backing put me off. 

I then decided to just start quilting the quilt with the idea of doing a few rows a day. I used Fast Feather digital pantograph by Christy Dillon with a multicoloured King Tut thread called Cleopatra. By the end of that day, it was all quilted.
 

I had planned to use a stripe by Quietplay to bind the quilt, but I realised how the stripes of colour from the backing (also by Quietplay) could be fussy cut and used to match the colours of the blocks as they graduated from mauve in the top left to dark blue in the bottom right.

It is difficult to get a photograph of the whole 80" square quilt so I had to resort to moving tables and balancing on kitchen chairs.

November 2023 plans

Having completed two large quilts last month and the final mini block sampler blocks aren't released until December, I am going to work on theoretically smaller and quicker projects this month. we also have a Jersey retreat in just two weeks' time, so easily completed projects are the way to go.

1. Combining two projects into one is making the moon bunny applique from the last Sew Quirky box and putting it on the spice rack folder whilst also increasing the height of the folder to be big enough for my iPad mini. What could possibly go wrong?

2. I picked up two orphan blocks from a recent Guild meeting and they are perfect to make into another SCBU quilt. I plan to make to more from MeTime delivered embroidery files too.

3. Not completed in October is the Zeriano giant tote bag, the panels are made and I think I'll quilt it on my long arm for speed.

4. One mini spilt pouch needs to be bound inside and I plan to make the medium or large size too.

5. Quietplay mini quilt which I pieced at MQC retreat and have left to focus on big projects.

6. Christmas decorations for my son. I have already stitched peace and have cut the circle to finish them.

7. Polar plunge by Hands on Design - I would like to fully finish two of the patterns for Christmas decorations for my daughter.

8. Tray with snaps for rubbish

9. I also have everything cut for the panda clams mini which I may carry forward until December.

My longer term cross stitch project is Bower birds by Hello from Liz Matthews to join my two other completed red work pieces.