the (less than) 24 hr quilt

 ok so it's not the largest quilt in the world but it was done from start to finish in less than 24 hours.

i'm impressed and quite frankly you should be too.

 a charm pack of the new heather ross briar rose landed on my doorstep yesterday. i'd seen a few glimpses of this and to be honest wasn't bowled over by it, thinking it was a bit bright and busy for my taste.

 i take it all back.

yes it is bright and busy but it is heather ross and i should have known better.

it is just gorgeous and the collection all works so beautifully together.

 because i didn't want to dilute the designs i decided to go for a simple patchwork using all the charms together and just a touch of kona solids - more because i needed a few extra charms and just to break it up a teeny bit.

i backed it with a fab Paul Smith pink
crosshatch that works really well pulling it all together. for the binding i chose a green candy stripe - just enough of something interesting without clashing with all the delicious fabrics.

i fmq'ed it with a random swirly pattern and if you don't look too closely at the varying stitch lengths i'm actually quite impressed in how that's come out.

i am sure there will be plenty of intricately designed quilts with briar rose in the coming months (swoons and wonky stars would work really well) but i'm generally a big fan of simple designs letting the fabrics do the talking and this range is definitely one of those times.

i also anticipate lots of beautiful summer clothing for little girls and am feeling a little sad i have no little girls to sew for. would it be wrong to start a collection for the potential grandchildren? my eldest is almost 16 after all...

on that note i'd better get this out of the house quickly...it's available right here.

giveaway winner...and so long...

First up today the winner of the Glimma giveaway...altho I was tempted to accidentally on purpose forget to draw a winner and keep the extra Charm set for myself...but that would have been wrong...

So drawn by my beautiful assistant...

numero 35!

 hueisei said...

I will make a tote or pouch :D
Thanks for the chance to win

(please email me your address Hueisei and I'll send off your charm pack after xmas!)

 This will probably be my last pop by before Christmas, and if my family have anything to do with it before 2013 too.

 I would like to say I'm on top of all those WIPs that have been waiting in queue for half of 2012, but that would be a big fat lie.

I am determined to complete my Umbrella Prints quilt, my low volume quilt and also my Glimma piece.

Yeah, like any of that is going to happen.

 However what I have managed to finish are my 2 new screen printed baby quilts. I really really enjoyed printing these and what is going to be wonderful is that due to the printing process every one will be different. And they will be customisable too...want different colours? different background? different size?...all accomodateable (that's not really a word, but you know what I mean).

These 2 are up in my Etsy shop if you need that special new baby gift or if you would like to talk through customising one I would love to speak to you.

All that is left to say is to wish you all a very Merry Christmas with your loved ones and here's to a wonderful 2013 and all it may bring. Thank you for following me through 2012 and leaving your much appreciated comments and look forward to catching up in the New Year xx

I've been lucky to get a fair few commissions recently for already designed pieces, but with an individual touch. It's great to have a twist in the process. The general theme remains the same, so no design time needed to work it out, but just a little different detail to make it not seem repetitive.

On this occasion, the quilt for the new born baby in question was requested with a heart theme. Whilst I wanted to stick to the simplistic style, I decided on embroidering a row of hearts across a linen strip.

Newborn quilts aren't too big so any fussy design doesn't do it for me. So to do a second row of hearts didn't seem to quite fit in. And repeating any fabrics didn't work for me either. So, here we have Grazia's quilt (that's Grace to you and me), a simplistic, pretty, snuggly baby quilt, that hopefully she will have for years to come.