Wintry Garden

Wintry, cold, wet days and the garden is showing Winter's colours.

                                          The Snowball tree.

Yellow, Red Hot Pokers.

The Magnolia Tree

Three more blocks for the Sundial quilt. Each block has to be made 4 times and there's plenty of variety. Not much to show but time is spent doing the preparation for these and my trailing vine, leaves.

Progress

This is April's block for the BOM from Canton Village Quilts. No. 8 already, how the time has flown.

I have now finished and attached the third vine and started on the fourth. Adding each vine and sashing seems to give me an urge to get the next one stitched because I think it looks better each time. Even finishing a branch   and being able to pick the fabrics for the next one is enjoyable. I have set aside a basket of fabrics to use and I've made sure I have a large selection to pick     from. I don't want to run out before it's finished and I don't really know how much the leaves will take.                  

Winter has certainly arrived, it has been bitterly cold and very wet. Definately the best time to stay home,keep warm and sew.

The Same but Different

Saturday was a trip to Catlemaine for the Applique Society bi-monthly meeting.It was a beautiful blue sky and sunny day. The first photo is part of the Birds of a Feather quilt, with a dark background and vibrant colours, really lovely.

The second quilt is one of Annie Downs designs, the two ladies holding it up got rather wrapped up in it trying to show it both ends of the room at the same time.

This was a beautiful basket quilt with great cheddar coloured fabric and made by Fiona Lindsay

 

 

 

The next quilt I don't know the name of but as you see is absolutely lovely.*It is called Queen Daisy by Susan Smith.

Merri and I decided to show our quilts together and although basically the same pattern so different in colour. It was wonderful seeing them both together. 

After lunch we had a long visit to the patchwork shop and to finish the meeting off I won a door prize, a bundle of fabric donated by Corliss of Threadbear.

At the machine

Since finishing off my Mary Brown quilt I've spent a lovely week at the sewing machine, stitching a quilt for my GD to hang in her bedroom. I bought the pattern and kit from Material Obsessions recently and started it as soon as it arrived.

It is called Hooterville. Most of the applique is felted wool in very bright colours and the butterflies were my addition, fussy cutting them from a fabric I had in the cupboard. The owls and birds still need eyes, the flowers, birds and leaves all have material added on top along with embellishing stitches. I have machine buttonholed all the wool applique which was simple and quick and the hand sewing will be a nice change too.

We have the wettest, coldest day for a long time. I kept having a look at the thermometer which hangs outside but can be seen without having to go out. It sat on 7C for almost all of the day. I'm not a winter person.

Finished

The wind blew, the sun came out and cast shadows then a peg came undone. I need a couple of tall people to hold it up for a decent photo.  At least you get a look at my finished Mary Brown.

Yesterday

Yesterday, I went to this lovely old building,The Royal Exhibition building in Melbourne for the annual Australian Quilt Show. It was a beautiful day with the sun shining and blue skies as you can see.

Here are a few of the quilts on show. The majority of the photos are by one person and I've included the information on a couple of them so you can get an idea of what these quilts are.

and a close up of a tiny part. It is all needleturn applique. Each and every little piece of fabric, some no bigger than the head of a pin.

   

This is  just a small piece of another one.

They were all amazing.

Nearly Insane by Tara Sniedze. I have seen a few of this pattern but never made with a light coloured sashing and border. It was really lovely.

This had been made by Chris Jurd. A real eye catcher.

I bought some fabric,some felted wool, a few ready made perplex templates and a bag pattern which unfolds to be an ironing pad for the 'away from home' sewing days, and as a bag holds your iron. I think I now have a bag for everything. 

I had a request to change my heading photo by Julie. She requested my Antique Sampler quilt and I'll change it over, when I take a more recent photo of it, now that it is quilted.

A Little Bit More

Another little piece of my Mary Brown quilt. In the small border between the centre of the quilt and the outer applique blocks I asked Katrina to quilt large feathers, between my black applique feathers. I wanted to do Trapunta,
in other words, stuff them. This is a rather slow process but I have finished one side. I think the photo shows it up quite well and I'm really pleased with the effect it gives.

Just 3 more sides to go, then I'll show it .

Monthly Catch-Up

Month 7 and another block from the Canton Village Blog BOM. Now that I've done a block without green I'll have to do one without red or maybe just a hint of red and lots of green.

This is my Sundial quilt with the blocks from Month 2 completed. I like how it's coming along. It's just all pieces, I haven't sewn any of the blocks together yet. I just pin them up as I make them and I'm rapidly running out of space. 

The next block is just that. I'm making a little quilt with it and it just needs some quilting and the binding done.

 My friend and I started this one last Sunday, it's Frost on the Ferns by the Blackbird girls, Alma and Barb. My one is all blue and brown and hers is all pink.The colours give it a totally different look. I haven't sewn a stitch on it yet and as you can see the freezer paper is hiding most of it. I've been spending the evenings sewing the binding on my Mary Brown quilt but it's not ready for a reveal, yet.

Just a preview

On Thursday I picked up my Mary Brown quilt from the quilter, Katrina. I am still to sew on the binding so just a preview in this strange light to show you some of the quilting. I love the swirls.

and large circles of more swirls and feathers. It is so lovely to look at and see all the different shapes and how much it all enhances the quilt.

Autumn has arrived and the days have cooled considerably. The Cyclamen have started shooting again and the pots of bulbs have come out from under the hedge.

If I'm not blogging I must be sewing.

I have been sewing but  it's not a quick project. Vine No 2 is finished and I decided to sew on the left hand border and two of the sashings. I really wanted to see if I had the right fabric for them. It was what I wanted but would it all go together and it has. It's exactly the look I was after.

I've included a close up too.

Now for Vine No3.

New

Just back from the quilter and the binding is on. The quilt is called A Little Porch Time by Lynda Hall. I am a member of a Yahoo primitive patchwork group online and we decided to make this quilt like a BOM, showing our blocks as they were made during 2010-11. It is mainly made with Brushed Cottons with some of the applique done in felted wool. It is a large quilt, hence the reason it is lying on the floor to be photographed.

I have also made a start to Karen Cunningham's, The Marriage Quilt. I am making it with felted wool applique on a cotton background. This will be the centre block.

Autumn has arrived and the heat of last weekend has gone and it is cool and

wet. The garden was desperate for a drink. Great days for staying in and sewing.

Something Old, Something Blue

Not quite all of the saying but I don't have anything New at the moment. That will be next week and you'll have to wait. There is no Borrowed either, I can't remember the last time I borrowed.
Instead a couple of Oldies and both Blue, made about 2004. The first is a Blackbird design.

and a photo to show the quilting. The feather continues around the whole scalloped border.

The next quilt is called Love in the Mist

and a picture of the quilting. It was done with a variegated  blue thread and an overall pattern in the centre.

They are from my early quilting days with not a single piece of applique to be seen. How times change.

Decisions!

When one of my friends returned from London and the V & A quilt show she gave me this postcard of the Sundial Quilt. It has been sitting on view in my craft room ever since. I just love the colours that were used to make it and all the small designs.

Then last December I was given a V & A calendar and February was a close up picture of the Sundial quilt's centre.

 I have joined Karen Cunninham's Correspondence class online and the pattern I have chosen of hers is her Sampler quilt  which is similar to the Sundial quilt.  

I have been trying to decide on fabrics and colours and I've also changed the centre piece. Karen's is made  in a Dresden plate design of hearts. I'm not very fond of hearts. Below is what I've decided on. Pinks, turquoise/teal, cream and chocolate. I also love the block that has the initials and date and I have been working on them this week.

The brown floral in the 4 corners is a really nice fabric but I only had a Fat1/4 of it. How lucky am I, not only to have remembered where I bought it , but they still had plenty in stock, for me to buy more, a lot more. 

I am still working on my Trailing Vine and I have finished the first strip.This is a photo of Megan holding it up at Castlemaine on Saturday. It is a great project for taking out and about although I heard a few murmurs and groans.

A Wonderful Day at Castlemaine

Yesterday morning up early, very early for me. I'm not a morning person. No springing out of bed done here. Linda drove us up to Castlemaine with a stop at Woodend for a coffee. The Applique Society meeting had the lady from Aurifil threads to give a talk and we learned so much about weights and thicknesses of sewing threads including the Lana, wool thread on a reel which I use for hand and machine sewing of felted wool applique. On a large piece of wool applique using it on the sewing machine with a large eye needle and the tension turned down, the Lana thread makes a wonderful blanket stitch around the edge of the piece without biting into and flattening the edge of the wool. On smaller pieces I use it to whipstitch by hand.
The Show and Tell was wonderful. I showed my Aunty Green quilt, the one in my header. There are several people making it and I thoroughly enjoyed seeing them in different colourways. Here are a few photos of what I saw.

The first is the Dancing Dollies quilt.

2nd was this small Clamshell quilt.

A version of the Ann Daggs quilt.

This is the centre of a large quilt which really caught my eye.

A small section of another large quilt. I took this photo to show the quilting.

A quilt centre in the making.

All the pieces shown were wonderful.

Keeping up to date

Back at the beginning of November I showed you my blocks from the Canton Village blog's BOM but I haven't shown you the ones I have made since. Here is a picture of the first 5months. The blocks are chosen each month by a different designer but they are all made, using the same 5 fabrics.I decided to use a Layer Cake of Rounneries fabric that I had. It has cream,beige, red and dark pink fabrics and I added a green. I have 5 colours instead of 5 fabrics. 

There is a BOM button on the left side that will take you to the BOM blog page.