Blood (a little), Sweat, (almost) Tears and Deadline.......

This is the story of a baby quilt for a great niece born in Japan on the auspicious date of 8/8/15 - she made it by about 5 minutes.

It's based on a quilt by Alex Anderson of The Quilt Show in a recent show
 and according to her the quilt top should only take about 3 hours. My guess is if you can cut straight and sew accurately that would be about right - and you would be correct in thinking it took me quite a bit longer as I don't always seem to be able to do either with reliable accuracy.......

Anyhow, the theory was good. Start with a themed piece of fabric (24.5" by 30.5"), add borders (3.5" - I mitred mine), then another border of flying geese(6.5" by 3.5") - easy.......

To make the flying geese Alex demonstrated this method......

Take a large square (7 1/4")  and add 2 small squares (3 7/8") which will slightly overlap  in the centre. Rule a line on the diagonal and stitch a scant 1/4" on either side of the line.......

These can happily be chain pieced......

Cut along the centre line.....

......and press.

Add another square as shown. Draw a centre line and stitch as before.

Cut on the line again, open and press.

Trim to 3.5" by 6.5". (Or, if they are like mine, unpick and restitch with scant seams until they are big enough.....)

Playing with the layout on the design wall......

Building the backing with leftovers.........

The binding (too) smugly ready for action.......

Quilting underway. I revisited Jacquie Gering's Craftsy class - 'Creative Quilting with Your Walking Foot' - and also bought her new class, 'Next Steps with your Walking Foot', which is just as innovative and informative......I wanted to maintain a modern feel and also keep it very practical. There is also a free show with Jacquie on The Quilt Show website.

Partly quilted.....

A close up of the quilting.

Pick the problem!  I was positive the binding would be long enough - I don't know how I managed that.........luckily I had enough fabric to make up the length.......

I attached the binding from the back so I could then machine quilt it as my hands are too sore to handstitch at present..and I think it will make it sturdier for repeated washing......

(I used YouTube tutorials to refresh my memory on machine binding a quilt and how to mitre corners. It's all out there....)

Note to self - the clothesline is not a good place to try and photograph a quilt on a breezy day.

Finished! (Pity about the photography....)

The back.

The beautiful baby.

The blood? I used flat pins to temporarily hold things together and accidently swiped my hand across a pin - yes - blood across the quilt....I remembered being told that the best way to remove YOUR blood from fabric is with YOUR saliva. It sounds disgusting but it works!

The sweat? Sew, unpick. Sew, unpick. Grrr!

The (almost) tears? See above.

But it's done. Finished, washed, dried, soft and ready to go.

Now to plan another one for the next baby due in February from the other side of the family.

Sue xxxx

Roses for Roxie

Some readers may remember that this little quilt started off in March as an exercise prompted by a chapter in Victoria Findlay Wolfe's book '15 Minutes of Play'. (See Playing with Scraps )

The challenge was to make something useful from scraps and recycled fabric......I pulled out bits of furnishing chintz and scraps of flannel and made improv squares which I then trimmed to approximately equal sizes and joined together in rows.

The borders were made with some larger strips of flannel leftover from other projects.

In the spirit of re-purposing I pulled an old mattress protector out of the linen cupboard to use as the wadding......

......and a length of cloth (polyester I think) which likewise had been in a cupboard for years to use as the backing.......These were (somewhat roughly) pin basted together,

I had decided I wanted to try a circular design using a walking foot (or in my case Dual Feed) so it was back to my Craftsy class with Jacqui Gering. (Creative Quilting using your Walking Foot - I can highly recommend this class. Jacqui has just released a new class taking this concept further and I will be joining that one soon, too).

Jacqui stresses a couple of things (note to self - pay closer attention next time) such as careful basting to avoid puckers and taking your time - going SLOWLY! I was in a bit of a hurry by this point and felt Roxie wouldn't be too critical of the quilting......the whole project was after all an exercise to make something useful out of scrap and to keep me occupied until I was able to get back to normal programming........

I stopped the quilting 1" from the edge so that I could use the front border as my binding. I turned to YouTube for this and found (among many videos on self binding) this one by Lorena's Quilting  called Quilt Binding Without Binding. What?

Usually this is done using the backing as the binding but I wanted mine to be the flannel rather than the poly print on the back. The flannel is a bit bulky, especially as I had random seams in odd places but for my purposes that didn't matter. (I don't pretend to be a perfectionist - sometimes I can't even draw a straight line with a ruler so why give myself unnecessary stress?)

I think the next pics are pretty self explanatory but a quick look at the video will clarify any niggling questions.

All that was left to do was machine stitch the binding down. I did 2 rows to try and make sure it would stand up to wear.

Final thing to do was product test.......

Did it pass the test?

I think so.

Was it worth the effort? Yes, for a number of reasons.

• It kept me occupied through a difficult time.
• I made something useful from scraps that most normal people probably would have tossed out years ago.
• I learned how to quilt a circular design using my walking foot.
• I learned how to make a self binding.
• I picked up tips on what I need to improve when I use these skills on a 'proper' project.
• The dog has a new quilt........(which hopefully will help to keep a bit of dog hair off the furniture.)

This is the first of a planned series - for other dogs in the family - which so far consist of bundles of scraps and titles. ('Lollipops for Lily', 'Balls for Breitling' and 'Bones for Bo'). It might be a while as it seems like a winter sort of project - we'll see what eventuates.......

Sue xxxx

Escape to the Capital

It seems my resolve to blog more regularly has already come seriously unstuck!

I was fortunate enough to be able to get away to the Canberra Quilt Show in early August and had every intention of a full report......it was the first night I had had away from home since my stint in hospital in September last year and was good for both body and spirit.

I was chauffered in style by a good quilting friend and whilst it was 9 degrees or less outside I was very comfortable in my heated leather seat - thank you very much......

The show was small but enjoyable (my first time there) and though I took photos I haven't asked for permission to share them here. I was also lucky enough to go to a meeting of the Canberra Quilters and picked up a few more good ideas....

Needless to say I slept like a log at my friend's sister's house - as I said earlier I was royally looked after. We woke to minus temps and fog!!! By the time we left the house the temperature had crawled up to about 2 degrees and the fog was beginning to lift. That hardly mattererd to me as we were on the way to my favourite Canberra destination 'Addicted to Fabric' (or A2F) ..... I actually went with a list of things I needed and managed to (mostly) stick to it.

The haul.........earmaked for various projects in the planing stage....and a couple of spares for the stash.....

I didn't buy much at the show itself (in anticipation of the A2F visit but did manage to pick up this pretty scrap bundle.....

.......which started off a whole new train of thought - a pretty, old-fashioned / modern double wedding ring or pickle dish quilt. This means a new collection. Rather than think in colour names I'm thinking milkshakes - strawberry, chocolate, vanilla, caramel, coffee and berry - a delicious palette.....do you see what I'm seeing?

In need of coffee we were next treated to a brief visit to the Arboretum - this will require an extended return visit sometime. The Bonsai house was an absolute joy........

Loved the colours and texture in the stone walls......

Etched hand rails on a viewing platform.....

Amazing sculpture - very clever......

By this stage the temperature had warmed up to about 10 degrees - but the sun was shining and there was no wind so it was quite a glorious day (for winter).

When I returned home I realised I had left my toiletries bag behind - doh! (to quote Homer Simpson). After my hostess had graciously posted it all back to me she discovered my travel shampoo bottle in the shower recess...... (double doh!)

Back at home there was a new determination to finish my 'Summer Quilt' (top) and it felt like considerable progress given that it had been underway for some time and that I had originally intended it to be on our bed last summer........(or was it the summer before??? )

The last three seams........

Finally together.......

Testing on the bed - it's big but dense quilting and washing will crinkle it up........

After that it was back on the road - but I think that's enough for now.....

Sue xxxx

Getting Back in the Saddle (aka the sewing chair)

Finally a bit of momentum on the sewing front - and it feels great!

The final four large blocks are done........

Proposed layout.....

I even remembered to check in black and white.........

Two smaller blocks done - and two more to go.......then I can put it all together!!!

Block for August meeting - just needs embroidery.....

Overdue block requiring satin stitch.........luckily the winner is not in a hurry to construct the quilt!!!

This pattern is from last year (arrowhead).......sampling it for a bed quilt.

First some chain piecing........

Then some 'un' chain piecing.........oops, got carried away!

Making more sense now.......

The redecorator continues to ply her magic - and keep us amused.......

And then there are the 'grand dogs'.....

That's all folks - nothing more to see here......

Hopefully back in the blogging chair, as well,

Sue xxxx