Diagonal decisions

A snapshot of my current work in progress. Deciding between sewing all the hexagon strips diagonally to form a diamond or whether to create a square - before adding borders and quilting.

Circle and Spiral Quilted pencil case

A small little project to use a practise quilt sandwich from the BOTM quilt.

Craftsy BOTM 2012 Quilt finished

Made by me, started on 23rd January 2012, finished on 26th April 2013.

This is the project that has consumed most of my creative time in the last year.  I have learnt so much and it has given me the hunger to continue with quilting.  I now find myself torn over some of the clothes sewing projects I stopped myself from starting or starting another quilt.  I have a few little projects on the go just using up some of the scraps and leftovers from this project as well.

This weekend's job

Is recovering after some minor surgery.  This will involve me planting myself on the sofa with Saturday Kitchen, a TV box set, and some hand sewing.  For this I got myself prepared and got my quilt ready to bind (when they say don't operate machinery for 48 hours afterwards I include my sewing machine). So watch this space for the big reveal.

Still here

Just fallen out of the habit of communicating. Last few months have been quite involved: some disappointments, an exciting purchase, some sashing, some basting, some quilting.....

A little support

It has been observed that I can't seem to have a new gadget for long without sewing something for it. So here is a handy stand for a tablet very useful for following yoga videos or TV in bed.

Whilst I can't charge it at the same time in landscape mode it does the job of holding my tablet whilst catching up with BBC iPlayer programmes very nicely.

I vaguely followed a couple of tutorials here.

Work continues.....

On getting my quilt finished. Although the Crafts BOTM 2012 is over pushing ahead with turning this from a UFO to something to keep warm with.

Craftsy BOTM 2012 Catch up 4

1. Craftsy BOTM 17, 2. Craftsy BOTM 18, 3. Craftsy BOTM 19, 4. Craftsy BOTM 20

The September and October Blocks were really completed in November - I had got that far behind.  But the fabric was bought so I am going to get this quilt finished.

Septembers blocks involved curved piecing, with the Chain block pattern and Cleopatra's puzzle block.  I tried a special foot for curved piecing (like my tools/toys) but with lack of experience and at this size it was a no-go.  I will probably return to this foot when trying a larger curved piece, but for these blocks I went with the plenty of pins method.  Once all the pieces were pinned the sewed up quickly. At least the templates and my small rotary cutter made quick work of the cutting for these blocks.

The October lesson involved paper piecing - which I found quite fun but needed a little planning up front to ensure the fabric pieces were large enough and placed in the correct areas.  The blocks are Friendship Circle and Circle of geese (template for this were designed and provided by piecebynumber.com).

Craftsy BOTM 2012 Catch up 3

1. Craftsy BOTM 13, 2. Craftsy BOTM 14, 3. Craftsy BOTM 15, 4. Craftsy BOTM 16

July saw me getting a little behind, but I got on track when I saw that it required (well not really but it was a good excuse) for a new tool.  It was the month of Dresden plates - one tradional and one a little more contemporary.  As I didn't trust myself to be that accurate with a homemade template, I treated myself to a tool for guidance - nice and quick with a mini rotary cutter.  I think the best bit was picking out all the different fabrics and mixing them up for the traditional plate.  I could see myself playing with my scrap fabrics and producing a cushion cover or a few blocks for another quilt this way.

August (well October/November) was a return to basics with some star blocks - Ohio & Double Star. Covering quarter square triangles and introducing flying geese in the double star block.

Craftsy BOTM 2012 Catch up 2

1. Craftsy BOTM 9, 2. Craftsy BOTM 10, 3. Craftsy BOTM 11, 4. Craftsy BOTM 12

The block stitching starting getting a little slower during the early summer, but were more or less finished within sight of the month there were introduced. In May I looked at the wonky log cabin. The really wonky one was a revisit for me to crazy patchwork land. I did some crazy patchwork in the early days of my City and Guilds course. One piece I did the base my machine (ans was frowned at by not slip stiching it all by hand), this time I refrained from adding embroidery - I think the Amy Butler prints are embellishment enough! June returned to something a little less complex in the form of modern 9-patch blocks. Not amazingly exciting but a good chance to return to some of the seam matching techniques from previous months.

Craftsy BOTM 2012 Catch up 1

1. Craftsy BOTM 5, 2. Craftsy BOTM 6, 3. Craftsy BOTM 7, 4. Craftsy BOTM 8

Whilst I have been more (or less) keeping up with getting my Craftsy BOTM blocks done, I haven't posted any of the images anywhere. These blocks were completed on time for each month.  March saw me learning about foundation pieceing, with the string block and the broken spider's web block.  April saw me "coming home" with English paper piecing - there was a time when I was first introduced to patchwork when I took it to just mean doing frustratingly inaccurate things with hexagons.  This time I completed the hexi stripe and sunny with a chance of hex blocks in good form after being introduced to the delights of using copier paper wrappers (the stiff paper kind) which do a similar job to freezer paper.  I did have some issues with my can of spray starch  - less spray more intense jet of starch which ends up discolouring and going yukky.  I have since picked up the tip from another quilter to use a pump bottle spray starch than a can of spray starch.

I really liked both techniques - both could be useful in using up scraps in my fabric compost.  The English paper piecing is a good portable project which can be done whilst TV watching or waiting about.

More to follow but - I need to pack for a pampering.....

Learning to quilt

1. Craftsy BOTM 1, 2. Craftsy BOTM 2, 3. Craftsy BOTM 3, 4. Craftsy BOTM 4

A month or so back I signed up to this course on Craftsy - I fancied having a go at some "proper" quilting.  I haven't really made a quilt before - just flirted round the edges.  I would not consider the sampler "quilt" I made from some college appliqué and patchwork samples a quilt. Even though it is proudly displayed on my studio wall.  The fact that the course is free was an added bonus. The course is running over 12 months with the first 10 months featuring 2 blocks of the month and using a specific quilting technique in a fun modern way, the last 2 months will cover putting the quilt together.  I am really enjoying the course, picking up all kinds of tips and learning different techniques to achieve similar effects. Also, I appreciate seeing some of the antique quilts and own quilts made by the course instructor, Amy Gibson, which feature the technique throughout.

I was so enthusiastic in February after I finished my blocks, I thought I would start small and try my hand at my first quilt.  A really small one in the form of a "mug rug" although I haven't had the heart to start using it at such, you are supposed to use the extra space for a cookie biscuit or two...

There are plenty of tutorials for various mug rugs, I followed this one from the split stitch for ease.

After that, I was still keen and using some of tips learned graduated to a slightly larger quilt.  A baby quilt for my friend P who has just had a baby, S:

It was quickly put together (btw 1/4 inch foot for my sewing machine has been one of the best investments) and then I sandwiched some wadding and backing and used ric-rac for the edging (no binding to grapple with at present).  I vaguely followed the instructions for this project from Learn to quilt by Sharon Chambers, although I think the project implied hand piecing it but I decided on using the machine.  It was, however, hand quilted in a nice naive fashion and I am now pondering a purchase of some sashiko needles and further investigation into thimbles. I am very pleased with the results, although I think I prefer the back: