Another UFO Bites the Dust!

Well May is nearly done and I have finished my May project for the 13 UFO's in 2013 quiltalong(see this post on 52 Quilts in 52 Weeks for details).  The lucky number for May was No.12 and my project was to take some leftover Australian native floral fabric and make it into a table runner as a Christmas pressie.

I didn't have a pattern in mind so I spent a bit of time thinking about this one but ended up using the See Saw block from Quilterscache which was one of my favourites from my Red All About It quilt.

 

When I initially put this one together, I was a little concerned that it was all a bit too busy but after quilting the floral fabric did quieten down a little.  Still, its not as contrasting as I would have liked but lesson learned!

I discovered how hard it is to take a decent photo of a long skinny item too (particularly when its windy)!

I used this as an opportunity to practice my stippling, which is improving (and hard to see):

 and then did the black areas in one of my favourite designs, a looping leafy vine design.

I also machine stitched the binding using a diamond stitch (you can see it in the photo above) which I find works quite well for this.

The stippling shows up better in this one!

No label for this one as I think either side could work as the quilting shows up quite well on the back.

Thanks for visiting my blog today!
Cheers,

A Little Block Update

I've been missing from blog land for a little while as my PC is giving me grief. It has a tendency to just switch itself off when the mood takes it so I haven't been able to get enough time to blog. Hopefully it will be friendly and let me at least get this post done before it has a hissy fit!

I'm a member of the Quilting Block Swap Australia blog and my partner for May was the lovely Kelly. You might remember I sent her this block:

During the week I received my block from Kelly, this lovely purple and green combo:

Thank you Kelly, that should be the last one I need to have enough now to put together.  Not sure how I will lay them out yet, but I have a few ideas - watch this space!

From June I have picked this block to collect. Its a Scrapbuster block from the Little Miss Shabby blog here.

I thought I better make a practice block and it really is true what they say about scrappy blocks. It doesn't matter if some of your fabrics are a bit ugly, when you mix them all up (particularly when they are all tiny bits) it looks great.

Now I haven't blogged since Mother's Day and I know its a while since then but I just had to share a couple of photos! Firstly Mr Quilty Bits gave me these lovely flowers:

My older son Kieran made me brekkie in bed (sorry, no photos - I was in bed!), then my younger son Simon made dinner (which was part of a school project so hence the photos!).  He made me this lovely Penne Carbonara:

Simon wants to be a chef, so in the interests of practice, I'm always happy to help test anything  he makes.  Here is the 'ta da' moment!

I don't often get a smiling photo of Simon so just had to share!

Hopefully I can manage to blog again this week, PC willing.  Thanks for visiting my blog today,
Cheers,

Sunday Stash - Prize Winnings

I just realised that I haven't blogged about the fabrics I won as part of the Something New Sampler quilt along which saw me put this little baby together earlier this year:

You can see more photos here if you are interested.  Anyway, in the voting my quilt top 'Pole Dancing' came in third and I won a fabric bundle from Sew Me a Song.

Now I'll be the first to admit these fabrics are outside my usual style. I LOVE bright colours in my fabrics and these are very muted for my liking.

Some have a bit of a vintage sewing theme:

The others are more sort of more depression era style which I have to say is not one of my favourites. 

Not sure what I'm going to do with these so into the stash they will go for a bit of a think until their turn comes up! 

Anyone have any suggestions for them?

Linking up with Sunday Stash at Finding Fifth!

Pressing Board and QBSA Block for May

A little job I have been wanting to sort out for a good while is to make a pressing board to have near my sewing machine.  Up until now I've been using a folded up towel and while it works, it slides off and moves around and is generally a bit blah.

I finally remembered to ask my lovely other half to cut me a square of wood from supplies he had stored up in the rafters in the shed (hence why I needed him to do it - I wasn't grovelling around in the dust and cobwebs up there for anything!).  I measured up the spot I wanted it for and left him with it.

Later he brought in a (thankfully) dust and cobweb free piece of board, nicely sanded all around which fit perfectly.  I promptly wrapped my old towel around it and gave it a test drive and even in that state I loved it!

No time to sort it out that day but today I made an envelope using the old towel and then covered the lot with some fabric I had and here it is:

Yes, I know, its not very exciting to look at but I love it because it fits perfectly!  When the sewing cabinet is fully open it looks like this:

I use the bit on the right for my small cutting board and to layout the pieces before I join them and now I can't wait to get started on a project to test it all out!

Before I go, my partner in Quilting Block Swap Australia for May is Kelly from Queensland and here is the block I am sending her:

Kelly was after an Ohio Star block in pinks and as she is collecting blocks to make a quilt for her grand-daughter's 'big girl bed', I thought the little sleeping animals would be just right.  I hope she likes it!

Star Seams Pillow

The other day I shared photos of a paper pieced star I made using the Star Seams tutorial at Six White Horses (see this post for links):

and I figured that I would one day make a pillow.  Well 'one day' arrived a lot sooner than I thought!

On the weekend I had a bit of time and decided to play around with some fabric and this is what I came up with:

This is the first time I've made a pillow and I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out!  I just realised I forgot to take a photo of the back but its just plain in the aqua fabric with an overlapped opening, so you're not missing anything exciting there!  I quilted around all the narrow dark blue lines and I was tempted to quilt the white area but I really love the crispness of the plain white so I decided to leave it be.

I think I'll be making some more pillows soon, its such nice quick project to do.

Thanks for stopping by,

Star Seams from Six White Horses

A few weeks ago I stumbled across a post by Anna on her Six White Horses blog for a tutorial for a paper pieced star block called Star Seams which really caught my eye and I just knew I needed to give it a try one day.  Well last weekend I had finished all my April tasks and had a bit of sewing time so I thought ' Now's the time!'.

I had a fossick around in my stash and decided to make the block using some of my favourites at the moment.  I'm thinking I might make it into a pillow for our bed.

Anyway, here's how it turned out:

I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out, although do I wish I had changed back to darker thread when I was joining all the segments together.  The stitching shows up a little in the middle (as you can see below) but on the whole I think it looks good.  Hopefully by the end of the month I can quilt it and make that cushion cover!

I really love the effect of this star but I'm not sure whether I'll make another one!  There was a bit of fiddling around and I had to get a little creative when joining my halves together.  No-one was more surprised than me when it lined up as well as it does (luckily you can't see the back!)  Still, never say never - I may just feel the need again one day.

I have to say I probably saved my sanity in places by sewing the wedges together with a long basting stitch on my machine and checking they lined up before stitching them together with a short stitch.  Much easier to unpick that way when you don't get it quite right!

Thanks Anna for sharing your lovely design!

And Sew On - May Block

I love it when the first of the month falls on a Wednesday as its my allocated sewing day.  It lets me get stuck into that month's projects straight off the bat!

The block for May for the And Sew On BOM was Keep Calm and Press On.  Funny how I'm happy to fire up the iron for pressing anything quilting related but drag it out for actually ironing clothes? No way, too much trouble!  Anyone else have that problem?!

Anyway, after considerable muckups, unpicking and starting over in the case of one piece of the pattern, along with some sessions of, lets say, language which was not child friendly (luckily I was home on my own!) I finally managed to finish this block yesterday. I can't believe it took me most of the day!  I should point out that the problems I had were all of my own making, not related to the pattern itself, which was perfectly fine!

Pretty happy with it, although I would have liked the patchwork on the ironing board to stand out more.  That was my fault because I changed my fabric choice for the ironing board at the last minute and didn't think about how it contrasted with the patchwork bit.  Never mind, its okay!  It should fit in nicely with my others:

Just noticed how washed out that photo looks.  The yellow fabric on the cotton reel block is the same fabric I used on this month's block!  Not very yellow in this photo.  Oh well, I'll take a better photo down the track!

Cheers,
Thanks for dropping by,