Archive for the 'Quilts' Category

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2013′s first quilt finish

Published on 15/01/2013 by Mary in Babies, Boys, Patchwork and Quilts. 14 Comments

This was how I started the year with a stack of these blocks, 40 in total:

I don’t like things sitting around unfinished so I signed up to A Lovely Year of Finishes in an attempt to try and get some things done.

So last week was spent arranging blocks:

Stitching them together, sashing, basting, quilting and binding so then I had a quilt finish:

I’d like to have done more quilting but I’m having some physiotherapy on my back which has reduced the time I’m able to spend at my machine in one sitting.

Labelled:

A rare moment when the rain stopped and I had time to take a few photo’s outside:

The mathematical among you may notice that 40 blocks were not used on the quilt top, I’ve used them in the centre of the back but there’s no photo to prove it, just take my word for it.

Quilt Stats:

Size: 38″ x 38″
Fabric: Alphabet Soup jelly roll by Zoe Pearn, My Minds Eye for Riley Blake
Backing fabric: Klona Cotton Taupe
Binding: Alphabet Soup beads in green by Zoe Pearn, My Minds Eye for Riley Blake
Quilting: Quilted by me on my machine with straight lines along the sashing and then around the centre of each block
Batting: Hobbs Heirloom Wadding Natural 100% cotton with scrim
Pattern: Missouri Quilt Company Youtube video designed by 3 Dudes Quilting of Phoenix, Arizona

So I’m feeling pleased with myself, a quilt finish and no extra supplies were bought in the making of it!

I’ve got a stack of other things to sew and potentially a date of 1st February for the building work to start so I’ll be moving on to the next project (once fabric arrives). I hope your start to the year has been productive.

Linking up with:

A head full

Published on 07/01/2013 by Mary in Babies, Patchwork, projects and Quilts. 8 Comments

I have a head full of things I want to sew and need to sew. Time is even more precious as we are having building work done on the house which will mean that for 8-10 weeks we will only be able to use the living room – yes that does mean no kitchen or dining room which in turn means no sewing space.

I am in denial right now. So much so that a tidy of the fabric stash happened yesterday!

Doesn’t it look wonderful? It was so bad that there is not a ‘before’ photo.

In the tidying I remembered that I did have at least one unfinished project:

I have 40 of these blocks that need to be made into a quilt. So my one aim for this month is to get it finished, not just the top but quilted and bound too – wish me luck.

As a motivator for me to get this done I’m linking up with:

And now to sew…

2012: another year of sewing

Published on 31/12/2012 by Mary in Boys, clothing, gifts, Girls, Patchwork, projects, Quilts, Scraps, teaching and Zakka. 5 Comments

It’s the end of the year so I’m having a quick look back at what I’ve achieved in the last 12 months, I am pleasantly surprised!

Eight big quilts (and a few baby size), six of which I have given away! Quilts for Siblings Together was a big project in the early ‘summer’, it was a joy to sew for others and wonderful much later in the year to read Lynne’s post about the giving of the quilts. I already have plans for next year!

A selection of bags, purses and pouches that have been made, featuring heavily is the Lined Drawstring bag (pattern by Jeni), I love it.

At the beginning of the year I joined in the Sewing for Boys sew along, I guess I managed 4 months before life got in the way. But it inspired me to think about sewing for the children again, and I love the Treasure Pocket Pants pattern, making 5 pairs of those.

There was other ‘stuff’ cushion covers, zakka style sew along items, gifts and I even wrote a few tutorials, and of course the weekend away at FQ Retreat.

A big step for me this year was teaching. I’ve never done it before, but I lead a couple of evenings at a friends home sewing for Dress A Girl Around the World and Siblings Together. In July I taught my first workshop at Arrietty, teaching six ladies how to make frame purses. I’ve done a few more since then and have also taught some private one-to-one sessions. I’ve loved teaching, sharing knowledge, inspiring and giving others confidence in their abilities (and starting fabric habits in others – hahaha!).

So that’s it for today, I have vague plans for 2013 but output may well be determined by building work on our house.

Here’s hoping you have a wonderful 2013.

Pieced Scrap Border Quilt – finished

Published on 27/11/2012 by Mary in Patchwork, Quilts and Scraps. 14 Comments

A few weeks ago we had a dryish day and we went up to visit my mum and eldest brother to chop wood and stage a photo shoot with a couple of finished quilts.

They have a large and beautiful garden, great for the children to run around in and explore:

So while they did that I stood holding up the quilt:

You can read a bit more about this quilts progress here.

I bought some yardage in Randi’s sale a month or so ago with the back of this quilt in mind. It was brilliant value, working out with shipping costs at just over £3 per yard!

So I pieced together some of Lizzy House’s Outfoxed prints (bright green Jewel in Outwitted, Foliage in Outwitted, Tufts in Outwitted and Foxglove in Outwitted).

I machine stitched the binding to the front of the quilt and then hand-stitched it to the back, I had a it of time spare to do it and I do prefer a hand-stitched binding.

Not leaving it quite to the last minute I designed a quilt label, I had some injet cotton fabric sheets (from here) and printed onto that. I then hand wrote the details on with a permanent fabric pen.

At the weekend we went to Joanna and David’s wedding and gifted the quilt to them. They had a quick peek at it and I believe they were delighted but they have now left the country for sunnier climes so won’t be needing it just yet!

Quilt Stats:

Made for: Joanna and David
Size: 55″ x 65″
Fabric: Scraps from my own collection and others from Johanna, Cindy and Kerry. Better Value Cotton White from Seamstar. Binding – Rings in red by Khristian A. Howell from Desert Daydreams collection
Quilting: Quilted by me on my machine, stitching 1/4″ from each seam line and then a cross hatch across all the blocks.
Batting: Hobbs Heirloom Wadding Natural 100% cotton with scrim
Pattern: Pieced Scrap Border Quilt by Red Pepper Quilts – tutorial here

Linking up with:

Octobers’ projects

Published on 01/11/2012 by Mary in Patchwork, projects and Quilts. 9 Comments

Welcome to Fresh Sewing Day, a quick review of what I did last month. I don’t think I was twiddling my thumbs but when I looked through my flickr stream to see what I’d done in October I didn’t find much:

Three zip pouches, taught one zip workshop, made 1 quilt top and 1 quilt (finished and started in 3 weeks!). So I’ve just reminded myself that it’s quality not quantity that’s important. I have also patched some jeans, sewn on a button (which was funny to hear my almost 8yr old ask if I could sew on a button!) and got acquainted with my new sewing machine! Whoops I nearly forgot that I also set up the UK and Ireland (and anywhere else really) Vintage Sheet FQ Swap on flickr, I’d be delighted to have you join us.

I’m taking part in the UR Priceless blog hop which starts next Monday 5th Nov so have sewn some items up for that but you’ll just have to wait until 12th Nov to see them… For now, that is it, I’m linking up with Lily’s Quilts, pop on over and see what others have been sewing.

By the skin of my teeth – Bloggers Quilt Festival

Published on 30/10/2012 by Mary in Patchwork, Quilts and Scraps. 15 Comments

Welcome if you’re visiting for the first time via Bloggers Quilt Festival.

Over the last few days I’ve been admiring the hundreds of quilts (471 as I write this) that have been linked up. I have a few quilts that I could link up, but I made them earlier this year for Siblings Together and so they have new homes now and have sort of fallen off my radar.

But I have been working on a couple of scrappy quilts this last month.

As I have very full scrap boxes I decided to join in with the Ellison Lane Scrappy Stash QAL:

As you might expect from a scrap quilt they conjure up memories, a number of the fabrics can be found in other quilts in our house, some of the yellows have been hanging around for 10 years or more! Not a colour I use a lot of but I did use it in one of the first quilts I made.

The yellow on white print is a fabric that an old lady passed to my mum over 20 years ago!

How life has changed since then, from trawling around fabric shops which then (and now) were far between we now have the wonders of the internet and the ability to order fabric from anywhere in the world. So my fabric collection has grown and so has my scrap box. I’ve had scraps contributions from a number of friends over the years which have been delightful to rummage through and put to use.

A whole load of scrap busting has gone on and this morning I finished the binding and into the washing machine went a finished quilt.

So fresh from the dryer is my bright scrappy log cabin quilt:

The back; I don’t have lots of big pieces of fabric in my stash and despite Hadley’s suggestion to do the same on the other side I opted to go for one large log cabin:

I quilted this myself on my new Janome Horizon, I bought it last month so this is the first item to be quilted on it and what a dream to have such a large throat space. I was debating how to quilt this and saw the back of Sarah’s entry to the festival and sat down and sketched out a square design which I didn’t stick to as I quilted but it was a good starting point!

I bound it using Metro Circles in black and I like it!

Machine piecing was done with Aurifil 2021 and quilted using 2530 from the Pat Bravo box of threads that I won from Alex Veronelli!

Bloggers Quilt Festival entry no: 476

Finished quilt: 47″ x 55″

Quilted by me

Best category: Scrap quilt, Throw quilt

Thanks for visiting and thanks to Amy for another amazing festival.

More scrappity scrap

Published on 26/10/2012 by Mary in Patchwork, Quilts and Scraps. 5 Comments

Back in September I mentioned that I had started a quilt and I showed you some of the blocks:

Well a month later I’ve sewn some more and incredibly have a finished quilt top:

One which I do quite like, alot. It’s full of scraps from so many projects of mine, but also with scraps from Johanna, Cindy and Kerry. We have a family wedding at the end of next month, I’m debating whether or not to give it as a gift to the happy couple…the wadding and backing is on order so there shouldn’t be any excuse for not getting it finished in time.

I’m just loving playing ‘I Spy’ on it with the girls and being amazed at how many different prints they recognise and place including tiny bits left over from the Siblings Together quilts I made earlier this year.

And thanks to my lovely assistant for helping out with holding the top on a grey October afternoon.

WIP Wednesday

Published on 24/10/2012 by Mary in Patchwork, projects, Quilts and Scraps. 9 Comments

I feel like I’m pretty much house bound with a poorly 5yr old who appears to be suffering with a virus and has done since the beginning of October. She’s not contagious so I was going to send her to school this morning but after feeding her breakfast to her and her shivering and complaining of a headache I sent her back to bed.

After a few hours sleep she came and joined me and and helped me to pin blocks for the Scrappy Stash QAL onto a lovely vintage sheet (Tobit brought it back from his trip so San Francisco the other week)

She has carefully considered the layout but any suggestions from you would be gratefully received.
I could make it bigger as I have overflowing scrap boxes (still) but think this will make a good size.

Linking up with:

Zzzzips

Published on 22/10/2012 by Mary in Patchwork, Quilts, Scraps, teaching and Workshops. 14 Comments

Yes it has been quiet here on the blog but that doesn’t mean I’ve not been busy elsewhere with illness, all my family visiting (some from overseas) and sewing stuff.

Last week I taught my first zip purse workshop at Arrietty. In preparation for this I made a few more samples:

Something more masculine using some lovely prints from my stash

And lined with a ripstop fabric so it can be used as a wash bag without fear of messing up the lining

There’s a man in the house who may well have tried to lay claim to this one!

On the afternoon the day before the class I forced myself to put away these:

and these:

As you can see I was in the mood for working with scraps so made another zip pouch working with just the pink box:

Ok you’re right the lining is blue but you get the idea.

I had some great students who were a real pleasure to teach, one lady had not yet completed the beginners sewing course but managed to make a great zip purse with a boxed bottom:

So if you want to learn how to make a zip purse and you’re new to sewing it is not impossible! Contact Arrietty or me about courses if you’d like to attend.

Linking up:

I have been sewing…

Published on 19/09/2012 by Mary in Patchwork, Quilts and Scraps. 14 Comments

I’ve made a start on a quilt (or 2). Using the scraps I mentioned here along with some extra wide white cotton from Seamstar.

I’ve also had a jelly roll of Alphabet Soup (boy colourway) in my stash for too long and decided it was time to do something with it. It’s now all cut and sewn into blocks:

I’ve got 40 blocks I think, I just need to decide how to put them together and whether or not to sash and or add a border – oh life is tough!

It’s been so good to reacquaint myself with my sewing machine.

Linking up with: