Wool Applique Workshop with Jill Buckley

On Saturday, I attended a guild workshop put on by my friend Jill Buckley. She is an amazing artist and teacher. We all had a great time as you can see by the smiling faces!

2013 in Review

Hello 2014!

Well I tried to post more often and I think I did for the most part. I slacked off in the latter part of the year, but to be fair I was busy at work and I actually did not do a lot of sewing.

2013 in Review
I completed the Hawaiian Punch and City Harbour Quilts, large bed size quilts! and finished my t-shirt lap quilt in time to bring it to BIQR 2013. I collaborated with Christine and Gail to complete a lovely quilt for Gwen Marston. I participated in a block donation to Houston for astronaut Karen Nyberg's quilt....looking forward to seeing the results of that!

 I participated in a placemat challenge at guild this year. We were given a photo and using the colours from the photo we were to create a placemat. You can see the other entries here.

 I made 4 pillowcases as Christmas gifts and forgot to take photos :( as well as a couple for myself. :) again no photos.

Quilts started and progress report
North by Northwest, batted up but needs to be quilted
Oakshot reds (working title), top completed, needs to be batted up and quilted
9 Patch Mystery quilt, top completed, needs to be sent to machine quilter
Trendtex Challenge 2014, being quilted, cannot show photos as will be sent in to Quilt Canada 2014
Collaborative projects with my friend Jill, in progress, no photos
There goes the neighbourhood, batted up needs to be quilted

New Sewing Room
We turned my sewing room into the guest room and moved my sewing room to the room where we put all the junk! So I had a lot of downsizing and reorganizing to do. I made several trips to Goodwill to donate my extra stuff. I gave away and sold three dressers and replaced them with some new cupboards and shelves....still organizing but the new sewing room is becoming more comfortable.

2014 expectations and resolutions
Finish the above mentioned quilts, finish the sewing room, attend Quilt Canada 2014. I have been asked by my guild to do a trunk show in March. I am very nervous....lets hope it is not a complete disappointment for those attending!

Happy New Year to all and my your stashes be replenished and your projects completed!

Another handpiecing project!

Last year at BIQR someone made this lovely top out of antique blocks she had collected. She had hoped she would use them all up, but nope, she had some leftover, which she generously gave to me!

they languished in my drawer for a year and I brought them out to bring to the retreat. I sorted them and decided I was only going to use the 6 large blocks. I then passed on the rest to friends.

I went for a simple pattern and decided I was going to hand piece them since all these blocks were originally hand pieced. In between other projects I worked on it.

I trimmed the blocks so that they were all 12.5inches square and pre cut my sashing from fatquarters and shirts and scraps 3.5 inches.

here are some photos of the underside:

here you can see more clearly how she pieced the square, surprisngly, using triangles blocks in the corners.

in these 2 photos you can see how when she ran out of fabric she just pieced in some more!

BIQR 2013 week 4 - I am going to miss you!

I am going to miss.....White Birch Lodge,

Elk Lake,

the internet picnic table,

going out to Pearl's,

Gwen's trunk shows,

the room of inspiration, creativity, and sewing,

Gwen's demos,

Show and tell and the wonderful stories,

Pizza night in the wicker room,

Gwenisms,

New friends from across the continent,

but most of all, I am going to miss Gwen!

Thank you Gwen for 30 years of inspirational retreats!

Handsewing at the Cottage

This year I took some hand sewing to the cottage to work on....If I was out on the dock I would read, but if I was up on the porch I would hand sew....it is a peaceful (piecefull) thing to do. I made 11 blocks, each block is 5 inch square finished, and then started putting some sashing in... 4 blocks....then 6 blocks...

then 9 blocks...the others ask me what is it that you are working on...

I do not know, but I will let you know when it is done.....

Nine Patch Mystery Solved!

Do you think it needs borders? I am thinking in the black fabric, if I can find it again.

The card, the couple, the quilt...

Inside the card, I added a hard copy of the label, should the one on the quilt wear out after washing.

Amanda and Dan very happy with their new quilt!

I could not find the room at my own place for such a big quilt so took these photos on the bed at my parents' place. King size quilt on queen size bed. The intended bed has a foot board so I did not make this quilt hang a lot on the bottom.

Hawaiian Punch Label attached!

Yep! it is all bound and label attached, ready for presentation on Sunday! For the label I used Avery's Printable Fabric sheets, that I bought at Staples. They printed up real nice but they did not stick fully when I tried ironing it on....I must remember to make the label before quilting next time.! and it is pretty thick to hand stitch the sides on for extra protection....so I came up with the idea to frame it in fabric and iron it on in the middle and applique the "frame" on. I really like the results! I also created a QR code that will bring you back to all my posts on my blog about the quilt, a sort of unique copyright protection. I am going to design a card with a hardcopy of the QR code in case the label becomes worn after washings.

I would like to thank Cathy Shepherd from Eagles Wings Quilts for the lovely job of machine quilting! Click on the above link and you can read about the machine quilting on her blog.

4 more strips!