Good Start to January!

I've been getting cracking on my blocks for January - most likely because I've been on holidays from work! (Back to work next week - don't you just wish holidays could go on forever?).  Anyhoo, I have finished my Quilting Block Swap Australia block for January.  I was partnered with Deb in Queensland, who requested any star in purple, preferably bright or dark and no florals. Funny how some purples just don't seem to work with each other so I ended up making two blocks as this one reads almost pink (until you put it next to something pink!).

So after a visit to Spotlight (at which time I may have bought more than just purple fabric!) I came up with this one:

Purple is a bit hard to photograph accurately sometimes, I wonder why that is? This looks a bit blue but is actually a deep purple.  The block is called Brasstown Star which I found on Quilters Cache here.

I actually had these finished by New Year's Eve so a whole year ahead of time (hehehe!).

I've also joined the And Sew On BOM at Quiet Play. There are 9 paper pieced blocks which will end up being a great wallhanging for a sewing room (or hallway if you sew where I sew!). I have done the first one 'Measure Twice, Cut Once', which wasn't overly tricky if you've done paper piecing before.

Looking forward to trying some of the other more tricky ones soon! If you haven't visited Kristy's blog before, its worth a look. She designs some amazing paper pieced blocks and has them listed for sale here on Craftsy.

I'm also taking up the 13 in 2013 UFO Challenge with Aunt Marti at 52 Quilts in 52 Weeks to get cracking on my To Do list for 2013!  So far so good as my first project is my Wildflower Wallhanging and when I got started on it again, it didn't really need a lot more quilting. I had to stop quilting it to get Christmas projects done and now I've finished the quilting on it and am ready to square it up and bind it. Woohoo! One project nearly ticked off.  Even just getting the other projects bagged up and numbered was a cathartic experience as I feel like I'm more organised and not just dealing with a lengthy list!  No photos yet, I'll wait until its all done!

Aunt Marti is amazing and has just finished making 52 quilts in 52 weeks (hence the name of her blog!) and not for the first time, this is two years in a row. I'm fairly sure she doesn't sleep like the rest of us mortals!

How is your start to 2013 going? Are you getting stuck into it too?

Thanks for reading my blog today,
Cheers,