Farm Visit…

Spring just isn't Spring until you've been to the farm and seen baby chicks and lambs.  And if you have been reading my blog for any length of time you’ll know I love to get pictures of farm animals and have posted about our trips over the years… So are you ready for a few more?

Our family day out took us to Stonehurst Farm near Leicester.  It’s a lovely family farm which is well set out with plenty to see and do.  They have a farm shop and tea room and the friendliest animals.  They are clearly used to people and love the attention that the visitors give them :o)

As well as lamb feeding both my girls got a chance to cuddle with a lamb…a highlight for my knitting DD1.  It was a lovely way to spend a sunny Friday!

Until next time...♥

Can I have a Drumroll Please…

Fifteen years ago I started this quilt with some friends in Montreal.  They were each working on the 1998 Piecemaker’s calendar quilt and as I was late to the party I started the 1999 calendar quilt.  We met in each other’s homes about once a month and shared our progress along the way.  I had never tried applique before and my friends assured me that they would guide me along the way.  What a way to learn, starting with a quilt that was so big!!

Starting with the ship in the comer, freezer paper templates were made for each shape and thread basted to fabric before being hand-stitched down. 

The process was slow and as other projects took my fancy this one kept being put to one side.

By about 2002 I got it together as a top, but the sheer size of quilting it overwhelmed me, so once again it was put away until I could work out what to do next.

Then a couple of years ago Liz offered to get it onto the long-arm and put in some stabilizing quilting which would not only get the quilting started, but also act as basting so I could go in an hand quilt the rest.

I used Perle cotton (size 8) and quilted in the relief in the landscape.  That went fairly quickly before it was time to start on the borders

I used a cable design on the borders and used up literally all the blue cotton off one reel.  If I had had to thread one more strand I wouldn’t have had enough thread….it was that close!

So here it is all done… TA-DA  Completed, washed and on the bed…I’m so relieved it’s finally finished!!!

Until next time...♥

Strawberry Fields Forever…

Back in March I shared a quick way to use up a layer cake with very little waste. Well the quilt is finished and I have to say it is my most favourite quilt I've made. The whole thing from start to finish was a joy to sew, stitch and quilt.

I think part of the reason it was so lovely to work with is in part because of the gorgeous fabrics, but also that I used Hobbs 80/20 fusible wadding…it makes the basting process painless and held the layers together perfectly for mindless machine quilting.

On the backing I added something extra.  This was my DH’s idea as he thought the quilt would suit the caravan perfectly.  So I have appliqued a caravan and car and stitched “we’re all going on a summer holiday” in variegated Perle cotton.

Until next time...♥

Two Tops…

These tumbler quilts weren't planned, but were simply a case of sewing and sewing until I ended up with a mass of blocks. I think I got a little carried away, but I sure had a good time making them and even better, the crumb box was empty for all of 5 minutes! Woohoo!

I tried two different arrangements…one where every other block was a plain to a pieced tumbler…

…and the second which consisted of mostly pieced tumblers.

I used half tumblers on the edge and bordered the top and bottom with the same fabric to give them a frame.  I think I like the second one best, but either way they will make fab i-spy quilts for Project Linus.  Now I just have to get them quilted up. :o)

Until next time...♥

Talking ‘bout the Next Generation…

After completely 12 weeks of Sewing Club at the school the one person that I can really see has caught the sewing bug is my own daughter.  When she started joining me on a Monday afternoon I think she did it because she “had” to, but as time has gone on and her skill has improved she has started to ask to sew outside of class time.

I still have a few repairs to make to this Singer hand-crank, but as it is working DD2 wanted to have a go with it to work on her book cover that we were making in school.  The nice thing about it is that as she is the “motor” it can’t get away from her. 

Not stopping at book covers, she made a little duck for her friend’s birthday.  I helped her find a pattern and pressed the fabric wing with starch and freezer paper, but she did the rest on her own.  Little did I realize that while I haven’t been looking she has learned to thread her own needle, knot it with a quilters knot and also knot off at the end.

Until next time...♥

Medallion with Seminole…

Do you recall THIS rather bright star block that I made back in February.  I think is was my attempt at bringing some much needed colour in my life, but now that the days are getting longer and the light is changing this block went from cheery to plain old in-your-face-loud! 

So what’s a girl to do, but make an attempt to tone it down and, more to the point, make it a useful loveable object! :o) So sit back and see how something that started off as a 16” loud block became a rather pleasant quilt top ready for some pretty quilting.

So the first thing I did was add some flying geese to the edge to echo the flying geese in the centre and then I added a plain pink border.  I had this idea of a Seminole border so I needed to add another plain border so that it would fit.  This also gave me the opportunity to add some more red to tie in the red from the centre.  I actually made my Seminole sides first and then worked out the size my inner square needed to be and then sized the red borders to fit.

The four patches in the Seminole border measure 3” finished so on point they measure near enough to 4 1/4” on point (3” x 1.414)… that made a decent width and was also a number that was easy to work out the maths for the pattern repeat on the sides.

(as an aside do you know about 1.414?  Take the finished measure of a square block and multiple it by 1.414 and you’ll have the measurement of the block on point)

As the four patches need to be 3” finished, I used 2 strips 2” wide and then oversized the sides by 1/2” so I would have room for error. 

Once my strips had been sewn together I segmented the sets into 2” strips.

By rotated each strip I could start to see the four patches taking shape and the border layout emerging.

I sewed all my strips into 4 patches.

Then each 4 patch set was sewn to the next, off-setting it so the blocks ran diagonally down the strip.

Once the whole strip was sewn I added a 4” square top and bottom to finish off the corner.

Carefully I trimmed 1/4” away from each point all the way up the strip and squared up the top and bottom.  Then it was just a matter of sewing it to the quilt like a regular border.

Another solid border was added before a piano key border was added to bring the quilt out to a good size.  What started as a pretty loud block has been transformed back into something cheery and perfect for a girl who loves pink.

Until next time...♥

Sew Busy…

Last time I posted I told you how I was having some quality time with my new machine. So far I've sewn 3 tops and quilted 2 quilts...and I'm having a ball! As a result I'm not short on blog posts for the next couple of weeks so I'm lining them up ready for them to post through the upcoming Easter break. Goodness knows that once the children are home there will be no time for sewing or the computer.

So first up...The sunglasses quilt: I first posted about it HERE and HERE. This was a result of a combination of a donation of bright fabrics to Project Linus and seeing a great tutorial on the Missouri Star Quilt Company's YouTube channel.

 

It was the last thing I sewed on my old machine and the first to be quilted on the new one...and the results are great.

Hopefully it will be well liked and loved and will bring a little "bright" into someone's life.

Until next time...♥