Modern Quilt Guild Galway

Some days before the first Thursday in a month I get a reminder from Cindy for our little meet up. So yesterday we sat down in a lobby to have a chat, tea/coffe and did a little stitching. We really had a lovely space with lots of light and it was warm and comfy. So actually there was no need to bring my nerd quilt but I promised to show when it is finished. If you want to see more about it have a look at Fluffy Sheep. She also shows the amazing work from Annette which I forgot to take pictures.

And for Cindy, please let me return the favor. She brought her little donation quilt. It is so gorgeous. I love all the charms she used and so many lovely colors. You can not see the binding properly but the little flowers are just sweet. I really love it.

I had my new pouch filled with my paper piecing and my "Nordika" circles to work with. I finally decided I want to make them into a table runner. 

It was so lovely to meet you two yesterday. 

Blogmotivation

I can not believe it is already 2 weeks that I wrote my last blog post. I really have to kick myself more and as I read this week: it is not always about showing finished projects - the progress can be shown as well. As the last two weeks have been full with dancing. No! I did not start Irish Dancing but some might know that one of my girl is dancing. So last Saturday, when Rugby was cancelled, we drove to Claregalway and spent the morning in a sticky hall watching her and a friend dancing. I had my sewing with me but only did some stitches.

This one is slowly growing. Very slowly! I do not know what this is going to be but there is still lots of fabric left from the Nordica bundle so I keep going. On Saturday I took this with me again but this time I did not even touch it. I was neatly buried in my bag but I was not happy with my girls dancing bag the last week so I tried to make her a new one.

I chose to make her the the bag I found in the Modern Quilting Magazin. I am so  happy that Sara has the tutorial on her blog as there was a terrible cutting mistake in the magazin. With her instructions on the blog it was easy to follow the steps. When I did the trial run for Katy on her "Whole Lotta bag" (did you see the sew along?) I learned a lot about bag making. The best part this week was, I had all the supplies now at home and could make some changes to the bag.

The only thing I did not have was the handles and to be honest, I did not want to spent so much money to order them (Ireland is terrible in supplies). So I chose to make them out of linen but it is filled with bag webbing. This gives it a nice stiffness and hopefully it makes it stronger.

I also love pockets. The pattern did not have enough for me and I like to put things fast in a side pocket. So I had to add an other one on each the side. This is one "work in progress" as you can see the button is still missing.

The pocket on the other side can not be closed. To make it a little bit bigger it is filled with a rubber band. It holds my sunglasses quite tight. The last change I made is a grid in the bottom and bag feet. Hope this keeps the water away a little more.
I might use this pattern for my London bag as well but I need to make more changes.

The fabrics are mostly the ones my girl chose when we were in town shopping or on a market. Some of them are from the Japanese Charm Swap and the rest I got in a rainbow charm swap. Now I need an other one of these to get the missing colors again.


Linking up with Monday Morning Star Count 2014/.

Bee a Bee

Last week it was all about being a bee. No, I have to disappoint you, I have not been a busy bee .. just making bee blocks for January. I have been so lazy that I forgot to make pictures of all of them. First of all there was the Modern Irish Bee. Ruth asked for gorgeous blocks in ash grey with 1'' scraps. The tutorial can be found at the Modern Irish Quilt Guild.

The Modern Stitching Bee was a bit more tricky. The center of the block should be scrappy blue surrounded by three wonky borders in grey, white and blue. Did you ever make a block the size 18.5 vs 24.5''? How big is your cutting mat? Exactly! Mine is 18 vs 24''.  So there was no way in cutting the block to the right size. The only thing I could do was putting the mat on the block and cut around. So sorry Katy but I hope you can fix this!

There was one more block I made but I was in such a rush to bring the envelopes to the post office that I did not make a picture. This block is for Sarah in Bee Blessed. I decided to use up all the "cabbage fabrics" and make at least one bee block a month for Bee Blessed.

Last week I have also been working on the EPP but I got stuck. I am not sure which of the two designs I should be working on. What do you think?

Linking up with Monday Morning Star Count 2014/3