Pieced ... and a party

Here, at last, is last week's pieced top.  The fabric is Moda's Girl's Best Friend - yummy batiks.  

I did the pinwheels blocks, and joined them in strips.  Then I joined the strips to the fleece in my Quilt As You Go method - the one that probably has traditional quilters shaking their head sadly, but works great for me [click here for instructions].  It took about 45 minutes to go from 4 strips to a pieced top!  I did then decided to echo quilt each pinwheel block - except I then did one quilt line down the middle of the block instead of at the side.  With normal fabric I might have unpicked, but batik isn't too forgiving, so I did the echo quilting on each horizontal and each vertical - that might teach me to concentrate!

I have ordered some more of one of the pinks for a border then this will be ready!

Although we had a no-work day today for the Royal Wedding, I didn't get any sewing done.  The family didn't show much interest in watching the wedding, so I thought we'd have it on in the background - in the end I had a husband, two daughters, two boyfriends, and nephew and his daughter all watching the wedding, and drinking my tea!!!

After lunch we then moved out into the lane for a great Street Party.  Appx 120 people in our little road, eating, drinking, chatting - having a great time!

Hope you had a good Friday :-)

A finish, and a floor

I managed to turn a flimsy into a finish this weekend.  I have seen bloggers write about their favourite quilt being the one they are working on now.  My favourite is usually about 4 quilts ago, and the one I am planning to start next.

This Moda Rural Jardin quilt got as far as a flimsy back in November, and has been hanging in the dining room ever since.  I have now fallen back in love with it, and really like the finished item. 

 I decided not to use wadding and backing fabric, but to attach it straight to a fleece blanket.  Luckily it went on really straight, so I didn't need to trim away any of the fleece, leaving a good size blanket.  I quilted it from the front echoing each side of the blocks

The borders are a one inch dark red, followed by a 2.5 inch lighter red (cut to 3.25, 1/4 lost in joining it to the flimsy, and .5 turned under to finish.).  The final seam is a machine blanket stitch - I finally read the instructions and worked out how to flip a stitch over into a mirror image!

AND A FLOOR...
We went to Ikea yesterday.  We had quite a few things on our list (Brian doesn't do inspiration shopping) but bathroom floor was not one of them.  However when we saw this flooring he was happy to get enough to do the bathroom floor ... AND come home and start laying it.  [Does anyone else see the rail fence block here? I love it!!!]

done some making ;-)

When Lisa transferred to senior school, age 11, she was the only one from her primary school to go to Herschel Grammer School, so she didn't know anyone.  She quickly made friends, and still sees a fair number of the girls.    Kelli was was of her first friends, and I've always had a soft spot for her, although we did years ago reckon she'd be the first of Lisa's friends to get pregnant....

Well the baby is due in June, and Lisa and I have both been invited to the baby shower in a few weeks time.  I'm really flattered to have been invited, and have dug out the Moda tea roses pinwheels and have made a little quilt for the baby (Kelli knows she's having a girl).  The pinwheels don't stand out from the paisley blocks much in the photo (which means you cant see how poor the seams are :-) but it's very soft and pretty, and I'm pleased with the echo quilting.

On the back I used a fat quarter of the larger roses, and added a strip of spare pinwheels to add some length to it, then a border of the pink gingham from the range to make it as big as the front, and finally the green gingham as a narrow binding.  I hope she likes it!

I just thought I'd also share .... we have become a family that drink tea from a teapot!  Get us!  Actually we'd run out of teabags and only had a packet of loose tea which had been bought by mistake ages ago.  Brian and Niki found this teapot in the back of a kitchen cupboard. 

This was a real blast from the past - my Great Aunt (Auntie Bet) had this as her every-day teapot before she moved into an old people's home, when she gave it to me.  By then there was only the teapot left from the set, but I have this painting that she painted for me in 1970 (!), that shows there must have been other items in the set.

Feeling better

Whoever invented Night Nurse and Day Nurse capsules deserves a knighthood.  I'm sure I remember, as a kid, Night Nurse having the colour and consistency of washing up liquid, but I got capsules and they have done the trick.  (mind you my grandfather used to say that a cold lasted 7 days without remedies, and just a week if you took something for it, he also reckoned that Whiskey was his favourite of all the cold cures that didn't work)

Possibly one of the I'm-feeling-better reasons was two packets of loveliness that arrived in the post:  I have taken part in the BQL skinny quilt swap, and the ladies sending quilts to me have been far more efficient than I have.

this lovely quilt came from Ann, the squares are just one inch each, and the quilting pattern is lovely

and this came from Marian - she dyed the fabric herself, and the simple quilting really brings out the design

So that's why I'm feeling better, but my memory - still rubbish ... where was I?  ... Oh yes, so I have cut up my lovely Moda batiks into 10 inch squares, stitched them together in pairs [see here for method] cut them into triangles

 and opened and ironed them into half square triangles (HSTs).

(I really aught to get a new ironing board cover, it's AWFUL!)

Now I'm pinning them together and should get twenty two 12" pinwheels.  While I'm doing that the embroidery machine is plodding through 20 fleeces for a local builder, and then 30 polo shirts for a transport company, so I'm earning the money to pay for the fabrics :-)

And now I've just seen the time ... nearly midnight, so Good Night!!!

Bleugh...

that's how I'm feeling, bleugh :-(

It meant I couldn't be bothered to post about a lovely silk workshop I went to at my friend Sarah's house (thank you Jacqui) where I made this

and this

this

and this,

with dying the silk "hankies" in the microwave and then stretching them and pinning them to a board and painting a watery gluey stuff.  I think this will look good on a white canvas board on Lisa's wall

I managed to order some fabrics, and while the thought of them arriving did nothing to cheer me up, the sight of the package in the postman's hands did help a bit.  They are going to be big pinwheels, and have no particular destination in mind, they are just because I LOVE the fabrics - Moda's "Girl's Best Friend".

I have however managed to make two blocks for the March Block Lotto, and a baby one for a postcard for Lisa.  These are disappearing 4 patches (or D4P)

Yet again I'm having to work 5 afternoons at the after school club, but roll on next week when I'll just do three, and car start late on Tuesday, so no alarm clock mornings for 11 days!

Rural Jardin Jelly Roll

Jackie and I both got a free Moda Rural Jardin jelly roll when we signed up for a year's subscription for Popular Patchwork at the festival of quilts in August.

Mine has been sat on a shelf while I drooled over it, and waited for inspiration. As I surfed around blogland I saw a number of designs that would work, but this morning, with some help from an inspirational email (thank you Victoria) decided on a sort of rail fence design.

I joined the strips into pairs: a light with darker, keeping reds with reds and blues with blues.



And then ironed them



I then cut the selvedge to selvedge units into 9 inch units















and started to play around with them

I tried using 'twins' in a mirror image,
















and tried dissimilar pairs so it looks woven, and finally decided this was the way I wanted to go.
















I am going to be brave, and have my first go at setting these blocks on point (diagonally).















I was just about to start cutting some squares into triangles for the corners, when I realised they weren't actually square - they had ended up 8.5 x 9 inches. (grrrrr)

So I have put them aside for today, and will get back to them tomorrow night.

By the way, I am L-O-V-I-N-G the Moda fabric - it's the first time I have used it, and it's lovely to work with and so soft.

END NOTES:
Mum, if you prefer the first layout, don't tell me, it's too late.
Jackie: Jardin is French for garden ... I reckon working with this fabric counts as horticultural homework?