Christmas Post... better late than never !!

Merry Xmas Everyone... a bit late I know but here it is.

Here is a picture of some of my christmas cooking.  Gingerbread Men, Fruit Mince Slice, Xmas Tree shortbreads and Chocolate Cake Balls.  All very yummy!!

Had a lovely day with the family and got a new sewing table and a Jeeves mini steam iron, amongst other lovely goodies. Once I got the table I was inspired to clean up a bit in the sewing room, re-arange tables and desks.. Lots of stuff got packed into plastic storage containers, probably never to be opened again LOL.. Mainly other crafts and stuff you try along the way.  I might have to sell some goodies on Ebay.  Here is a picture of the new table and workspace.

I am busy working on a few new projects and also finishing up some others from during the year.  I have signed up for 2 online projects.  One is a quilt-a-long called "Oh My Stars".  I have done the first 2 weeks homework.  Here are the photos of my stars.  For the finished quilt we will do approx 110 stars.

The other on-line project is the 2012 Free Motion Quilt Challenge I am busy getting sandwiches of fabric and batting ready for this one that starts Jan 1.

I will still be attending a class (with not teacher) with the ladies from my Thursday class from the Patchwork Heart,starting in February, so I will be looking for a new challenge to do with them.   I am also going to sign up for a Debra Louie 's Spring Floral Applique monthly class, with an afternoon of free motion quilting. Here is a link.

OK so that's all I got for now. I'm off to trim my trupunto and make my backing for my big quilt, as I am going to see Carolynne shortly to get the quilting underway.

Happy sewing

Caz

Lots more Progress

Hi

What a week !!

I have managed to get alot of things progressed this week.

My Vingnette Block 1 has only 5 more satin stitched flowers to do.  I was ready to complete it this afternoon while I was waiting at the school to pick up the kids.  Then disaster struck.... I popped the needle in my mouth for a second whilst I went to grab the floss, the needle dropped out and went down beside the seat.... AHHHH it was the only one I had with me ..... So that was that.... Oh well there is always tomorrow afternoon.

I have pieced together Block 2 & 3.... Here is a quick pic

I added a litle woodland fabric by Natalie Lymer... Can you see the mushroom houses... No... OK here is a close up !! LOL

There was quite a bit of fussy cutting... but I am loving how it turned out.  Now I need to transfer the stitchery pattern and then start stitching this one.

I have totally sewn together my Michelle Marvig quilt "World Traveller".... Oops I have previously been calling the pattern "Around the World". It is quite a large quilt so once sewn it has been very hard to get a full shot.... Here are my attempts.... In two shots on the floor...


Here is it hanging on my washing line... which was wound right up as far as it would go.... I had to put towels on the ground because it was dragging.... and of course as soon as I pegged it up the wind came up and made it very difficult to photograph.

While I was taking the pictures Hunnigirl was running around barking at the man she could hear in the front garden reading my electricity metre... AHHHH.... The funny thing is her running out from behind the quilt just as I take the photograph.... Peek a boo....

I spent all day today working on the trupunto dresden designs on the quilt ready for class tomorrow.

I am ready to trim up tomorrow, and also work on a surprise Xmas present for my Mum !!  I'll leave it at that in case she is reading this and post a picture after Xmas.

Anyway til next time.

Caroline

A long time between posts

It has been a while since my last post.  So many things have been going on that I have found it hard to stop and write it down.  My Mum went into hospital for a routine back op and has spent the last month still in there as things have gone wrong, it has been very scary for us and for her.  She is alot better now, even though she is still in hospital and fingers crossed she will be home by Friday.

So on to my projects....  Here is some pictures of my Around the World quilt up on the design wall in class.

All thats left to do now is the outer dog tooth border, I am 3/4 way through that and hope to have it all together for class on Thursday.  I have bought the wadding and the fabric for my backing, I am going to get my lovely friend Carolynne to quilt this beauty for me.  Here is a picture of Michelle Marvig's orginal design showing her quilting, there is a bit of trupunto (is that how you spell it??) on it.  I am not sure exactly how I am going to have it quilted yet .....we'll see.

Alas the Tail feathers quilt hasn't had any more quilting done by me yet, but definately soon I promise.

Another project under construction is my Vignette Mystery quilt.  I am using the Monica Solorio-Snow "Happy Mochi Yum Yum" fabric.  It's a 16 block quilt designed by Leanne from Leanne's House, the patterns are released through her Vignette Magazines.  I have only just started so although the magazine is up to Issue 4 and eight block patterns, I have only sewn together Block 1 and am still completing the embroidery.  Here are a few pictures.

Here is block 1 traced out and started to be completed.

A close up of my embroidery.

I have just removed the hoop(which you can see, to take this one to show my progress now.
In the quilt there are 60 shoo-fly blocks.  I can report that these have been all sewn together.  I hope to have the next two blocks together by the end of the week also. 

All going well that is ... fingers crossed.

Happy Sewing

Caroline

A bit more show and tell

Ok so I have taken a few more shots of the tail feathers quilt and once I saw it lying there on the bed all sad and unfinished I felt sad. :-(  (Note to self - find time to do a bit of quilting)(Note from self - Yeah right... time there is not enough minutes in the day)

So here is a couple of full shots - Well as much as I can get in whilst cramped inside at 10 o'clock at night.

I have completed all the ditch quilting, I've done a lovely zig zag across the 1 inch block strips, and half completed some curves on the log cabin blocks.  Here are some close ups.

I'm only a real beginner with the quilting so at the moment I haven't ventured past stitching straight and curved lines with my open toe walking foot.  I need to do a class to do some free motion quilting because I do need to outline the features in the stitcheries and add a bit of texture I think.

So as I said on my last post I do a class on a Thursday afternoon with Michelle Marvig, and once I had begun quilting my Tail feathers I started on my next project "World Traveller"one of Michelle's patterns.  I decided to do this as a wall hanging for my lounge room and chose to do it in chocolates and aqua.  I have just about completed the quilt top, I only have to do the foundation piecing of the dog tooth border.  Here are some shots.

This is one quarther of the quilt and the last dog tooth border with face in towards the other. I couldn't open it right out as there wasn't enough space. I will use the design wall in class tomorrow to try to get a full shot.

There are two different backgrounds : a tiny spot (above) and a bigger spot (below)

In the centre of the dresden I still have applique an aqua circle and then the brown medalion on top of that the same as between the points.   I learned a lot of new techniques.  I love foundation piecing, the preciseness is lovely.

Anyway that's enough for now... gotta get ready for class tomorrow.  I have also just posted on the Vignette in Stitches Blog ...... because yes I have yet another project on the go.... LOL.

Have fun

Caz

In the Beginning

Wow where to start..

I have always loved to sew, any type of sewing.  Dressmaking, embroidery, tapestry, cross stitch... dabbled in a little business making bridesmaid dresses for a while. I love to try any type of creative activity out there - Scrapbooking, Cardmaking, this list could go on and on.   But I could never really settle on one thing til.....

January this year there were terrible floods in QLD and whilst surfing the net reading blog after blog then looking at this link.... going to that link.  I stumbled accross a blog belonging to Natalie Lymer of  Cinderberry Stitches . I was in love with her designs and whats that......patchwork & stitching together mmmmmm I want to do that !!

The quilting online community had started a QLD flood relief auctions, where by bloggers would donate things which would be auctioned to the highest bidder and that bidder would donate the winning amount to the QLD flood relief.  

So this was for me and I bid and bid until it was mine... A full set of fabric and patterns for Natalie's Tail Feather's quilt design.  Wow what a beaut package that was when it arrived.

Now what do I do??? OK so I looked at the instructions and started on my way... Ummm excuse me I need help... So I set out about finding a class or someone to help me make this beautiful quilt.  I stumbled into a shop called "The Patchwork Heart" and into the wonderful hands of Michelle Marvig. 

The adventure continued every Thursday for 3 hours and after a few months I finally had the whole lot of the lovely stitcheries done and all the blocks sewn together... Here are a few piccys of the progress..

The quilt is all together and I have started to quilt in on my domestic machine it's coming along nicely... even though it is now OCTOBER and it is not fully completed. So yes my first project is I must admit officially a U F O !!

Please people this craft should come with a warning !  You can't stop at one quilt, You can't stop with a few pieces of fabric.  Every bit of yummy pattern, fabric, magazine, goodness, toy, or new fandangled tool must be bought !!!! AHHH I need it all.

Well by the end of sewing the tail feathers quilt I had enough fabric and patterns to last me OOOHHH I don't know 2 years.

So began the journey...  stay tuned for the next installment

XX Caz