Fabric Play - Musings At 5am

So yes my day began at 5am....no, noone else in the house was awake, just me.

In the attempt to try and go back to sleep I started mentally planning my Black & White quilt swap...which then lead to thinking about skills I needed to learn...which then lead to curves.....aaaand yes I am now wide awake searching Drunkards path quilts on Google!!!

According to Instagram these were purchased via Massdrop in August last year! High time they were used and curves are mastered I think!

 Excuse the superlight pic...afternoon sun :)

Always choose the fabric first....done!

Now there are quite a few tutorials, and initially I was looking at glue basting....but then I saw that the master piecer of ANY crazy tricky block had a tutorial that showcased a technique void of pins or glue!!

Red Pepper Quilts, one of my favourite blogs and a super nice lady (Rita let me use her Hummingbird block for a Bee at no extra charge ) has a great pic filled tute that shows you exactly how she does it.

So while you're supposed to be cooking dinner....run downstairs to the garage and sew a block LOLOLOL

I must be learning something....test on not so favourite fabric first!

It was relatively stress free, shorten the stitch, go slowly and voila!!

About 1/8" out at the finishing end....I might've stretched the large piece just a smidge

Next attempt....starch the background.......beginning and ends meet beautifully...YAY!

I pressed the seams to the darker fabric and there was no resistance or puckering regardless of the orientation of the curve...bonus!

And although both came up slightly smaller than the expected 7 1/2" unfinished block... I'm pretty happy with the result

The curved seams match beautifully ....so starching may be helpful but not a game changer, at least not at this size....the 3 1/2" template could be a whole different ball game?!

So the next step when I'm not supposed to be sewing something else???.....is to get some more Drunk blocks under my belt...drinking may or may not be recommended after a few...

I will let you know.......

And Behold Some Finishes - Baby Quilts!

Yes it's me again there is no need to adjust your screens!

I'm ever so slowly getting back into the blogging groove so let's start with a couple of finishes and a f*#k up just to keep it real LOL

The pattern is Fancy Forest by Elizabeth Hartman and as much as I love it I am never going to get around to making it....lets be real,...so I've been breaking the critters down into doable amounts and using them for baby quilts...high fives herself!

Little OWB doesn't nap in the afternoon anymore....so so sad for the Mumma...so quilting is restricted to nighttime or when she's happy to Netflix for an hour.

Hazel Hedgehog had an unwanted facelift due to night sewing when tired...DO NOT SEW TIRED

Fortunately the redo's ( is that a word ?) went alot more smoothly and in the the Mummas chosen colour scheme of yellow, grey and white, they turned out pretty snazzy

This quilt was for my new nephew and since Dad is an all round Kiwi Bloke (read,  fishes, builds stuff and likes to shoot stuff ) I put some deer on the back in a lovely soft flannel from my local Spotlight. Sandra from Wise Owl Quilting did a very cool all over spiky panto that looks great on a hedgehog quilt!

Aaaand since there's nothing worse than the new baby arriving after much anticipation and he actually does NOTHING of interest to a 3 year old...Big sister got a quilt too LOL

And since her theme is Owls look what Sandra did!! Owls and Mumma and Dadda birds with two babies...cuteness overload!

And the O's were also for Olivia not just Owl.....

This was the perfect amount of fabric for the background but oh my lordy lordy what a beeyatch it was to work with!! It's a DS Yard Goods fabric from when Denyse Schmidt was designing for Spotlight and although it has a lovely soft hand it has a VERY open weave and frayed like you wouldn't believe

But it quilted and washed up so purdy, so I forgive you terrible fabric

And a couple of closeups of the sparkly Hazel and the gorgeous quilting

Not quite the same size but both big enough to wrap a couple of cuties in!

Linking up with the girls from Quilt Story for Fabric Tuesday, cause it's been foreeeeever

Baby Quilts - Proof I Haven't Been Twiddling My Thumbs

Hi Again!

I've got a few finishes to show you guys this week but I thought I would start with two of the oldest!!

This Fabric is mostly from Art Gallery Fabrics Nouvelle range and according to the dates on my blogroll it was purchased in July 2014 and made into a top  in October 2014......nuff said!

 It's been quilted with another Chenille (candlewick bedspread ) in cream as a backing.

It was tricky to photograph but it has a gorgeous all over swirling flower and vine Panto, perfect for a wee baby girl quilt.

The binding was the left over scraps and I hand stitched it down.

The next finish is from this post here.

I'm not repeating the title as for some reason ( that I really don't want to think about ) this particular post has had over 12,000 hits and I suspect in the sometimes grubby world we live in it has something to do with the French title and the word "boy" sharing the same sentence? 

You all know I've a slight obsession with plus quilts and this was just a made up pattern with Kona Snow as the fill in background.

This was also backed in Vintage Chenille and quilted all over in a geometric type box panto.......all my own English Grammer folks LOL

Purely because of time constraints and to save my hands I've started machine stitching the binding down.

This one was to the front but usually I choose to stitch in the ditch on the front and have the thread show on the back binding.

Both have gone to the same family, a Three year old boy and a brand new wee girl.

Mum sent me a photo of the 3 yo asking to be wrapped up in his quilt....which of course is exactly what they are for.

Linking up with my girls Heather & Megan and the Lovely Alyce

Possum Magic Border # 6 - Mrs Peacocks Quilt

Possum Magic is almost at it's end!!

Where has a year gone??

If you're new around these parts then you can read about Possum Magic here and here

Mrs Peacock as she has been christened by Carla is also known to her family as Wendy, both these ladies are prolific Crafters and very good Bloggers....they even keep their blogs up to date???...who does that these days LOL

If you haven't visited already I strongly urge you to, or even check them out on Instagram...my shameful bit on the side

Anyway, this is how Wendy's quilt was looking when it arrived lots of Blue,Purple,Teal ( hence the Mrs Peacock ) and with some gorgeous splashes of Cerise and Lime

So this is the stack I pulled, quite alot of Kaffe in there as I know Wendy is a fan

What I really wanted to do was the Sun Rays paper pieced block  but when I printed out the 44 blocks I needed I realised that the pattern was actually TWO HALVES pieced together making it 88 halves and a bucket load of point matching......I admitted defeat...there was no way I was going to get it done on time!

But I still wanted to repeat the spikiness somehow of the centre star, and neither the half X block or the Wonky Star block were cutting it....so when in doubt lay it on the floor and just stare at it...

AAAAAAANNNNDDDD Stare some more...then make a cuppa and surf the Net

 

Then Voila you see something jiggle it around on the photocopier, chop it in half and it becomes the perfect block...YAY...happy dance

 

Block is one half of this Quilt Pattern by Rashida Coleman Hale
 and all I did was replace the 4 segments in the diamond with lime string blocks so that they echoed the pointy star in the middle....whaddya think?

Auditioning very very thin borders....I think it was 1/4" finished....nightmare against the biased seams of the star edges

 

But I really did love the finished look

 

And some of the gorgeous accidental  fabric match ups and with careful fabric placement I think you could really highlight the 3D effect you get, which was difficult to show in these pics.

 

A whole quilt done like this is DEFINITELY being added to my Bucket list....

 

The last few borders are making these quilts a little large to photograph well

 

So the before work shots were pegged to the fence LOL

 

Even standing on Little OWB's table didn't make me high enough....the neighbours think I'm Bonkers leaping around my back yard at 7.30 in the morning!

 

I'm already over half way through with Alice's border for her Possum Magic Quilt and it's of a completely style, which is what keeps this Round Robin fun and stimulating.

I really will be sad when it's over, but can't wait to see all the finished tops!

Doing the Linky thing with Alyce

No I Haven't Been Smothered By My Stash!!

Contrary to popular belief I haven't disappeared under a pile of fabric!

I am also in complete disbelief and denial that its been 2 MONTHS since we last spoke??

Damn life that keeps getting in the way LOL

OK moving on.......Below is the gorgeousness that is Alison Glass fabric and her deliciously saturated colours and the basis for my Alison Glass Mini Quilt Swap run on Instagram.

Some of them really smack you in the eyeballs like the Corsage and Party Streamer Lines

And even the Bike Path range is colour heavy although it reads to me as more of a stash builder fabric as it's less of a dominating  feature fabric

image sourced from http://alisonglass.bigcartel.com/category/fabric

Text is probably the most familiar range on a visual level, simply for the big "text" following particularly in low volume prints these days.

Now you've had your brief Alison Glass lesson I will flood you with Pictures of my Mini

My first plan was something paper pieced....Surprise Surprise you say

But the more I played around with the fabric I wanted to try something that would showcase ALL the fabrics not just a select line or only a few fabrics.

I used the teeny tiny Dresden that I got from Westwood Acres for free with one of my orders...the cuteness was ridiculous!

Then I decided to add some Butterflies and hand stitch them down with Perle 8 thread.

It wasn't without a few trials and tribulations, including melting the invisible thread AFTER I'd appliqued the centres down, and having to redo two centres as the seam allowances popped out in the embroidery hoop!

But I think that's what these minis are all about? Trying something new, different or challenging on a small scale...but I do wish I was brave enough to be more adventurous with my FMQ. It's non existant!

And just look at this BEAUTIFUL mini I received from Shirley @simplesew

Shirley has used the Art Theory Panel in White and Charcoal and appliqued it down on some quarters  and also cut  a feature from another in the range to put on the "Bitch" background fabric which is a nod to the Profanity Swap I did back in February

My photo doesn't really do it justice but I'll try and capture a better on for Instagram tomorrow

Little OWB was suitably impressed and as excited as I was....I'm training her well LOL

Shirley packaged it generously with some lovely selvedges...which I do collect

And some generous extras, needle minder by @whatthebobbin and a nifty two finger magnetic sewing machine screwdriver, plus some charms.

A great Swap!!

Linking up with Heather and Meg cause I miss Fabric Tuesdays