more quilting to add to my to do list

  I said no more projects as I already have a list longer than my arm and longer than I will ever get to complete when what happens along comes Women of the Bible  a free BOM from little quilts.com and I find I have signed up to do this too.  The first two blocks have been posted Eve and Rachel and what I love about this is they tell you about the women the block is named after so interesting to read.   I plan to download all the blocks as they come on line and make the quilt in 2015,  I find this easier than doing a block as they appear and I can place my fabrics better this way.  If anyone is interested I think it might close soon and you only have a short period of time to download the block before it is removed.   Her is a picture of what it is all about

I have also started the spiders web quilt with  Pat Broe from life in the scrapatch,  this is just  a quickie,   we did  part of it yesterday and the next bit is to do is the black curves,  I have got the right template for this so hoping all will go well.  It uses 80 2.5" squares and fortunately I had lots left over from my steps to the Altar quilt so no new cutting to do.   Was going to share a photo of what Pat`s looks like but don`t know how to do that. Oh yes I think there is a photo of the quilt on my blog on the right hand side with all the BOM`s etc, dare not look as I will probably lose this epistle.

I have also become a great aunt again,  the ages go from 18 down to a couple of weeks and Katie has said she would like a quilt made with lemon, cream and green pastels,    still trying to find the fabric but whilst in one shop they showed me a baby panel which was only £2 so bought it and have quilted it by hand and will give it to Katie but will also make what she requested when I track down suitable fabric.

Now for my big spend,   this computer is going so slow it is nearly going backwards and has crashed a few times recently so today I have bought a laptop,   well a baby one, the screen is only 11" but it should be okay and means I can use it all over the house,  that is when I pluck up the courage to open up the box,  maybe my youngest brother from Sheffield will come soon and he could help me.  I was served by the assistant manager of the store and he took me to the till then gave a code to the operator and went away,  the operator said it was my lucky day as he was giving me a free external hard drive for backup   how lucky am I,  I use memory sticks at the moment and have 4 and needed to buy another so now will not have to.    Wonder how long it will be before I can use the new one   next year probably!

two completed quilts

Here are two more quilts completed.

This is the one done with Jennie Rayment on the create and craft tv channel.  One of the blocks  the celtic knot has been omitted and replaced with a court house steps block as I could not do the fiddly bias for the knot.  The binding has been made form the left over fabrics in the blocks. Unfortunately it was a bit windy when I took this photo.   it is 43" square

This is the back,   as you can see I have quilted each block to suit the block pattern

My second quilt has had a name change,  when we were shown at the Yorkshire MQG how to make this quilt it was called a vomit quilt!   I think the name comes form Katy Jones of I`m a gingermonkey fame but have since found it n a book and it is called steps to the altar which is a much nicer name.   Not sure if I have quilted it enough, will maybe have to add some more but living with it as it is for now.  It is a little smaller than it should be as I pieced all the blocks on my elna little machine which is light enough to take to class  (weather permitting)  it does not have a quarter inch foot so the seams were a bit bigger but as I continued to make all the blocks with the same seam allowance it worked out okay.   It measures 41`" by 55"

the photo was taken indoors as it was raining outside.

Two other little things done this last week,    the hexie block for the BOM challenge this month was candy corn which was new to me and the bee blessed charity block or rather a double block for this month too.

these blocks were made as 2 strip blocks then cut in half diagonally and swapped around, the strips were assorted sizes,   think I might make a scrappy quilt like thus when I have a bag enough supply of scraps.  It had arrived safely in Ireland where a group of ladies meet and put all the blocks together and  make into quilts.

I wonder if anyone else is having problems leaving comments on some blogs.  The blogs I follow that have a comment box that opens in a separate window I have been unable to comment on as the window will not open,  the same goes if I try to pin form these blogs the pinterest window will not open,  this does not happen with the blogs that the comments open up below the blog     if you know what I mean.  if anyone can throw some light on this problem I would be very grateful and if you are wondering why I have not commented you now know.    This is not happening all the time   sometimes it will work for a couple of blogs        modern technology sometimes it is way above my head. 

Charity quilt find

Tuesday really was my lucky day,    I went out looking for some backing fabric for a quilt and came home with a wonderful hexagon flower garden unfinished quilt that I found in a charity shop for £10.
 I will have to unpick a row from the top or bottom to complete one of the sides which is 3 flowers short and then hopefully finish it.  The papers are still in it and although not newspapers there was one piece with the date on advertising a holiday, closing date 12/12/79  of course it might not have been made then but it is the only date to go on.

not much else to share,    this is my crazy block for october

I also entered 2 pieces into the local show which had textiles, art, photography, other crafts, flowers veg etc  and was held in out local park.  The show has been running for 6 years now and I entered the first 3 and won each time, I did not enter for 2 years then at the last moment  decided to take one of the Tula Pink throws and my crazy hanging down,  I came away with a 1st and 2nd in the textiles and a 1st for the overall winner covering all the crafts,  this was not a big deal as there were only a few entries.  I now have a great big trophy which I have to own up and say is on the windowsill in the down stairs loo!  The trophy gets returned in a years time.   Needless to say I am feeling pretty pleased with myself!

a completed quilt

I am delighted to blog that I have finished the wristwatch quilt which I did with Paula the Sassy Quilter and it is now on the back of Helen`s sofa.   It stayed as a flimsy for a while as I could not work out how to quilt it but then we decided to do butterflies and hand quilt it all.    My fingers suffered,  I had a thimble on my right hand but struggled to use one on the left hence the sore finger.  Helen   she is my younger daughter wanted a quilt in pinks and grey and she loves butterflies and cats so with having the patterned butterfly fabric we decided to repeat them in the grey rectangles.  These were traced and then stitched with perle cotton 16 and I also did some squiggles and smaller butterflies in grey perle on other spaces and just did diagional stitching in the patterned blocks.  I do not know how quilters do tiny stitches, I struggled with these but I am glad to say I am more than happy with the final result.   Unfortunately when it came to binding I could not find any of the fabrics I had used again so opted for pink with the white spots, I think it worked well.  Even made a label and used the trial butterfly for it. Machine skills not good enough to embroider the label so used a permanent pen.   The backing was a dark grey sheet, disappointed as it was thin and when I washed the quilt tiny bits of wadding came through so might have to add another layer one day  needless to say that will not be quilted. I used the eco friendly wadding and how nice it was to hand quilt   just as well as I have a 15 metre roll of it!  Sorry I have prattled   now for the photos.  The quilting on the main photo did not photo well so have done close ups but don`t look too closely!

The whole quilt  unfortunately the wind was blowing,  it usually does here!

The single butterfly was quilted on all the grey rectangles on the outside of the quilt 10 in total

These were used on alternate rows so 4 of these were stitched making 8 in all

these were sitched in the other alternate rows again 8 in total

This is the label that I hand stitched to the back.

 
I am now working  on the sampler quilt but this is being quilted with the bernina,   I must admit I prefer to hand quilt, it might take much longer but it is not a wrestling match I don`t think I could ever do a double bed quilt by machine.

eye candy from two quilt shows

I am just going to share one more quilt with you from the festival of quilts that was made by my dear friend Cheryl who not only is a quilter but also has a degree in theatre costume design and makes wonderful wedding dresses.  Cheryl has just completed her city & guilds in patchwork and is about to start the diploma course at Missenden , her tutor is Barbara Weeks.   Her inspiration came from the Virginia Creeper that grows in her garden.  All the fabric was dyed by Cheryl

  Now onto Harrogate quilt show,   this is the winner of the pieced section and also won the award as favourite of one of the judges and a merit from the judges.   I am privileged to also know the lady who made this.  Liz is a member of the Yorkshire Modern Quilters Guild that I also belong to and this quilt was made to celebrate the tour de France that started here in Yorkshire

   here are a few more of my favourites from the show

Hope you enjoyed these.   The next blog with a bit of luck will have my largest quilt to date on, have just finished hand quilting it and now have the binding to do then into the washer with it, fingers crossed all will be well!

completed quilts and other bits

I did not realise how long it is since I posted any of my quilting attempts so now have a few photos to load
   This is another small quilt completed using 24 of the  tula blocks which is now on the back of the second couch to hopefully compliment the one on the other couch.  I machine quilted each block individually they all vary as they are all different shapes an then quilted each side of the seams on the sashing.

and I have used some Ikea fabric on the back

The spring sampler I did as a BOM and was not happy with is also completed,  having shown a photo of it to Jennie Rayment she advised me to add turquoise in each sashing block,  not having enough I added the owl fabric and it seems to have pulled it together a bit better, I do still not like the white sashing but can live with it now,  it is on my bed not that it is big enough but  it looks quite nice.

                                           This is the sun the hexie block for august show

                                                 and now the september block a cute birdie

Still doing the CQJP challenge and here is september,   3 to go and then will have to decide how to put them together   sorry no, no doubt Helen will want to take control of that as it is for her

My monthly block I do for bee blessed   this month it is a sail boat and have heard that it sailed over the Irish sea and arrived safe and sound

   Not sure what happened on a previous blog but when I looked back to see what needed adding to this one I saw the wonky block was not there so here it is now. Can`t recall where I fond it but hope to find it again as I rather like the effect and would like to make some more, maybe a table runner in Xmas fabric would work

I am now busy hand quilting the wrist watch quilt for Helen,  have done 26 butterflies so far will post  photo on my next blog

Festival of quilts 2

As promised here are a few more quilts that won prizes at the FOQ.   I seem to be behind myself these days s I have been to the Harrogate quilt show since Birmingham so much catch myself up,  means a few blogs over the next few days.

This is the winner of the Quilters Guild challenge, the theme was gardens and this quilt was made by Yvonne Brown

this is the winner in the my first quilt category,   made by Jill Johnson and quilted in the quilt as you go method,   very nice, this one really caught my eye.  This one got a lot of attention,  a first quilt and beautifully made, what impressed me too was her fabric and colour choice

this is the art quilt winner by Merce Gonzaez Desedamas in Spain called sunrise, moonrise

 

winner in the 2 person quilt section was this one by Mark and Bridget Mann who are mother and son. Screen printed onto recycled men`s suits creating a portrait of the mathematical code breaker and founder of the Computer Science   sorry do not know his name, not in the catalogue

this is the secondary school winning quilt, made by the Rebecca Palmer original sewing group form Cappamore Ireland

this is the group quilt  winner, made by Tanglewood Textiles a group of 6 

seem to have slipped up here and have no details of this one but I am sure it was in the winning section

this is I believe the winner in the miniature section,   Roberta Le Poidevin from St Peters stitched this one

 I did not find the section with all the miniature ones in,   this was in the section where they had all the winning quilts.

Hope you enjoy seeing these,   sorry will not be sharing all 700 with you all but maybe will share a few more in a couple of days if anyone would like to see more.

Festival of quilts

I am finally getting round to sharing some photos of the amazing quilt show I went to in Birmingham.   Over 1000 quilts and 300 traders,  although I was there 3 days I did not see all the quilts or various demonstrations that were happening but had a wonderful time.  It was lovely to meet up with Queenie from Japan who I met last year and I also got to meet Benta another blogger and some of her friends who also blog.  Cheryl my friend from London was there too and she had a quilt in the show but unfortunately the 3 photos I took have her on them so must make sure she does not mind me sharing her as well as her quilt with you, I am sure she will have a photo that she can email me and I can add it on a future blog.

There was a lovely display of quilts made for the cat protection charity that were being sold to raise funds,  here is a collage of them all.

Now for some of the winning quilts.

this was in the young quilter/embroiderer  12-16 age group,  done by Millie Ayres,  think we will be seeing lots more by this young lady

best in show winner,   completely reversible,  meant to go back and get a photo of the other side as they were going to turn it round but did not have time.   Sorry did not make a note of the number of this one  and cannot find it in the catalogue

how amazing is this,   a working grandfather clock that one the quilt creations award,   made by Kate Crossley from Oxford,   this really had the crowds around it     so beautifully made and was working, keeping perfect time.  Not sure how it was transported,  thought maybe it was in sections but someone said no it was a whole piece,  brilliant,   you can tell I was in awe with this can`t you.

This is the winner of the pictorial quilt section,   created by Janneke de Vries-Bodzinga from the Netherlands using silk, hand dyed cotton and cotton.

  What a beauty this is,  winner of the tradition section and made by Phillippa Naylor from Beverley,    think this was a favourite of a lot of the visitors      a wonderful traditional quilt.

hope you enjoyed these,  will share some more in a few days.