Block swap complete

I'm a couple of days late but I've finally finished up all 25 of my block swap blocks. 

I just need to sign them all - not my favourite job - and then I can get them in the post tomorrow morning. Then I all I have to do is wait for my package of goodies to arrive back from America!

WIP Wednesday No. 8

Just a quick post while I babysit for my sister. Brother-in-law has just had an accident on his bike so sister has had to rush him to the A&E, not sure of the details but I hope he's OK. I keep telling them exercise is bad for you but they never listen!

Block Swap
I'm very tight on time. I have a couple of days to turn these three piles..

...into 25 of these...

It's a race against time!

I'm working so much at the moment that there isn't much other sewing going on (or, at least, no sewing I'm allowed to keep). Most of my WIPs look like this

So pretty but it doesn't belong to me - boo!

Why not pop over to Freshly pieced to see what everyone else is up to this Wednesday.

Progress Report

Day 2 of my self-imposed timetable and I'm still on track. Here's the proof:

108 half square triangles

and

A new pile of stuffed animal parts.

I sometimes think my desk looks like a kind of stuffed animal abattoir with bits of elephant, goose and fish spread all over it. I need to come up with a storage solution. I tried pinning them up but that just looked mean!

WIP Wednesday No. 6

Here's a quick update before I hop into bed for a good night's sleep because it's my first day at Woolaballoo tomorrow!

Completed projects
I made these sweet little draw-string bags for my three nieces. They each have a little animal on the front that match the stuffed toys I made them along with their initials. They also have gorgeous floral linings but I forgot to photograph those - sorry!

Heffalump is all done and gorgeously, huggably cute. I think he's got a really smiley face.

I found some cotton yarn that was exactly the same colour as his ears. A quick plait and he has a beautiful tail.

Hexalong
Only a single lonely block this week but I think it's my favourite so far.

Something about that lime green and aqua together really makes me smile. It kind of reminds me of a sunny holiday somewhere.

Block swap
I went to my LQS this today for an afternoon of sewing with my mum. I did promise myself to stick to the sale rack but these Whimsy prints were calling out to me.

I decided on the Weathervane block (see yesterday's post for the other options) and set about making a test block.

Amazingly my maths was right first time so, when I came home, I had a marathon slicing session. I have all the pieces ready to go for the other blocks. Next step: draw diagonal lines on 168 squares - definitely a sitting in front of the telly job!

Other Projects

• Strawberry Patch - Quilted around a couple more blocks. I've set myself the target of finishing all the echo quilting by the weekend so I can concentrate on the motifs.
• Neutral jelly roll bear paws, It's a hoot, Frosted window panes and Antique quilt - No progress. 

Why not pop over to Freshly pieced to see what everyone else is up to this Wednesday.

Block swap dilemma

I signed up to the latest block swap over at the Missouri Star Quilt Forum. The idea is to make your favourite block using any floral fabric as a focus. I don't really have a favourite block so I dug out the book I bought at the Festival of Quilts thinking that I would choose one from there:

I don't know how anyone can pick from 5500 blocks. It's virtually impossible! I ended up riffling the pages, closing my eyes and pointing at random blocks. After ignoring the ones that looked way too difficult, the plain bizarre (really? A swastika block? Is that absolutely necessary?) I narrowed it down to four.

 1) Annie's Choice   2) Flying Dutchman

3) Japanese Lantern   4) Weathervane

I think I'm erring towards the Japanese lantern. My LQS has some lovely Japanese fabrics. I think that if I choose some jewel colours with a dark background, they will look like they're really glowing. But then I think the weathervane would look lovely also.

What do you think?

Nine tenths preparation

For a lot of things in life it seems like the work is nine tenths preparation and a tenth actually getting done.  Since I managed to get home from work a couple of hours early today I thought I would put the time into getting some prep done.

To prepare for my return to university work I've given myself a much larger desk.  The great thing about the mix and match table tops and legs from Ikea is that I just needed to buy a new top and recycle my legs which works out a whole lot cheaper.

So here's my brand new desk with the old table top on top so you can see I've pretty much doubled my work space.  Very handy for textbooks.

In preparation for quilting at university (I'm determined to squeeze it in somehow!) I've bought some new feet for my sewing machine.  I've been using my mum's very swish quilting machine for the past year and when I got my basic machine out I realised that it wasn't that well equipped.

On the left is a quarter inch foot so that I don't have to stick a mark on my metric machine and on the right is a free motion foot.  As a bonus my machine is designed for dress making so has dual feed as standard which meant that I didn't need to buy a walking foot.

Time to break them in on my block swap stars!

Christmas block swap

The strip twist quilt is halfway through the binding process and I think I'll take it to work to finish off in my lunch break.  Next project is my second block swap from the Missouri Star Quilt forum.  I finished all my cutting out this evening and I am ready to piece:

As you can probably tell the swap is Christmas themed this time using white or cream fabrics and contrasting coloured fabrics. We're going to be making simple star blocks using Jenny's fantastic jelly roll tutorial:

>

If you want to join us you can sign up until September15th on the forum and then you have until November 1st to get your blocks done.  We have an international bunch of people joining in this time with large chunks of the US covered, Australia, Canada and me flying the flag for the UK.  I'm excited to see what I get!

Blocks Swap Blocks done

My blocks for the block swap are finished and packaged up ready to go to the post office in the morning.  I think they turned out pretty cute.

I'm going to have to do some work on the one I kept before I can do anything with it.  Spot the (not so) deliberate mistake.

I can't even blame George for that one.  It was just simple lack of concentration.

Why George Clooney is bad for quilting.

Here we have 48 half-square triangles neatly sewn to 48 squares and pressed into a nice crisp seam.

Unfortunately the squares were supposed to be sewn along the side of the turquoise fabric, not the pink -oops!  Moral of the story: don't watch George Clooney films while you're sewing, he's just too distracting.

Wedding quilt finish

I made it!  The quilt got finished, the dress got finished and they both made it the 350 miles to the wedding without being lost, damaged or stolen.  I managed to take some pictures of it before I handed it over to the bride and groom.

By the way, I don't live in a castle and sleep in a four-poster bed every night.  That's just the hotel room but maybe some day ........  

Don't the bride and groom look happy.  You can see where I got my colour inspiration from - I was there when the bride bought the fabric for her dress.

 

Oh well, on to the next project, a block swap on the Missouri Star Quilt Forum.

A distraction before I go entirely insane

I've been hand quilting this wedding quilt for so long I've completely forgotten what it's like to cut and piece!  I come in form work everyday, I plonk myself down in my little corner and I sew:

Look at that vain kitty.  Always doing her hair!

It's come to the point when I just can't face sitting in that seat a night longer so I signed up for my very first  block swap at the Missouri Star Quilt forum.  The theme is very loose but it has to be summery and it has to use floral fabrics.  I had a spare hour so I drove up to The Fat Quarters and bought some gorgeous Tilda fabrics.

I chose them because they aren't available in America so it'll be a nice treat for the other ladies (I hope).  Now if I can just finish the block I'm hand quilting I can start cutting!  (I feel like a surgeon who's been denied time in the OR).