Since my last post ...

Life seems to be whizzing by - not much sewing time and even less blogging time!!
I have finished the binding on this wonky stars quilt

I have finished this birthday reminder (although I wish I'd bought "family" or even "birthdays") but it is changeable

I've started embroidering this 36 times for a customer

And I've requilted the house group quilt - previously the lines were just under 1.5" apart, I've now quilted between each of them, so between about 1/2" and 3/4". Very, um, free range!

And I've added the binding. It's a wide one as I want all the ladies to write their names on the back of the binding

That's it for the weekend - hope you had a good one!

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Saturday Stars

Lisa has now left for New York: I consoled myself by moving lots of stuff back into her bedroom!!!!

I celebrated access to my sewing machine by pulling the Jenny Bayer charm pack and a Moda solid charm pack in cream.  This bundle has *nearly* been stitched into a variety of designs, but I finally split it into lights and darks rather than trying to use all. Working with the darks, I added wonky star sections to a quarter or so of the squares 

then started joining in strips of three to make parts of wonky stars:

All stitched, now waiting for the pressing and speed dating stage

At Crafty Church today we made stars for a Christmas tree we are entering into a Christmas Tree Festival in a few weeks time:

Lots of methods, including our craft of the month - felting 

Perfect Post 4 & 5

Yes, today I actually have TWO packages to show you, one more liberated star from my lovely friends at the Star of Africa Bee, and a goodie bag of I-Spy quilts from the just as lovely Avril at Stitchin Science

The Bee Star star block has a flag in the middle - do you recognise it?  (I didn't!)  It is the Latvian Flag, and the block comes from Fiona who sent it from Riga in Latvia,

Fiona also snuck in a fridge magnet and a bar of chocolate - I even managed to photograph it before it, um, evaporated.  Thank you Fiona, all very much appreciated :-)

And these I-Spy goodies will be put to very good use, thank you Avril

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A third squishy arrived earlier this week, but I haven't had the opportunity to get to the PC and load the photos


This came from Irene in Guatemala, her needlework, as well as her imagination, is amazing.

The flower is the Mohja Blanca (white nun) and is the national flower of Guatemala, you can click on this picture of her letter to read more about it.

She also mentions in her letter these additional fabrics she very kindly sent me, as well as  a very useful sized purse

Thank you Irene, thank You!!!!!!

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And today postie brought me *another* super squishie -  this African Bee is such fun!!!

This block was from Patti who blogs at Retired to Quilt (doesn't that blog name alone make you jealous!)

Patti sent me a fab star block staring Anne of Green Gables

And she added some goodies too, including scrummy honey, and a beautiful card, thank you thank you thank you Patti x x x

This month we are all making blocks for Nicky.  She has asked for  blocks inspired by literature from our neighbourhood.  Does anyone know of any literature based around the Thames, or Windsor, Slough, or Staines?  I've got as far as John Betjamin's poem about bombs falling on Slough or Ali G from Staines - there *must* be something better!

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Last week I received a Bee Block from Nicky, Mrs Sew and Sow, she's based in the UK.  Today my first international star block arrived, from Cindy who blogs at Tops to Treasures 
 

Not only a fab star, but a lovely collection of goodies fell out of the envelope too, thank you thank you thank you Cindy!!!!

This month's Fun with Fabric at Chertsey Museum saw Jacqui teaching us how to make Padded and Raised Work - this was our inspiration piece. 

If you want to see the Chertsey ladies' Show and Tell work - their creations in the last month - click over to FunWithFabric

Is it A Bee? Is It A Dog?

The first Bee block has arrived today from Nicky in West Sussex: isn't he lovely!

Just to show how the stars will fit together (tesselate), here is mine and Nicky's together

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Papers, and Pay it Forward, and a Pillow

The Papers have been out in strength to visit and photograph the A to Z Wall hanging:

This is from the Windsor and Eton Express

Pupils' iconic Windsor images to be displayed at castle

Schoolchildren and their families racked their brains to come up with iconic images of Windsor.

The children from Trinity St Stephen School in Vansittart Road teamed with their families in special 'after school' sessions to create the images in felt on a fabric background.

Luckily, 26 families came forward - one icon for each letter of the alphabet.

The resulting 6ft by 5ft creation is topped off by the school logo, knitted by headteacher Dalwyn Attwell.

You can see it at nearby St Stephen's Church until Monday.

Over the next month it will also be displayed at the Firestation in St Leonard's Road, Holy Trinity Church in Claremont Road, Windsor Library on Bachelors Acre, the museum at the Guildhall, and - to pupils' delight - the Education Centre at Windsor Castle from August 27 to September 2.

It returns to the school next term.

The Pay It Forward is this star:

A lovely lady, Marguerite, was part of a quilting bee: she had managed to keep up with all the blocks she was to send to the other members, but didn't have time to plan or cut the fabric for her own blocks.  The Bee Mama arranged to have others send her star blocks, but not enough for a quilt top.  I read about Marguerire on Hadley's blog, and having been recently the recipient of quilter's generosity, felt I should do something to Pay It Forward

 And the Pillow: this embroidery for a customer

Just checking in

Just checking in to say that I have been sewing today - I've done round 5 on the Stay At Home Robins, and I've done some stitching on the denim weave blanket. I HAVE taken photos - but the card reader has died, so no photos to post!

Sorry, I'll get them loaded as soon as poss

Edited 11 Nov

NOW I have photos ...

These are the three Stay At Home Robins I am doing with Kate at Stay At Home Robin, I had so many orphan blocks with plenty of extra fabric that I couldn't choose, so went for three!

Click on the link to see the lovely blocks that others have come up with

This, black and white, (with red for a robin) was the first one I started, and I have added some stripes, and some folded flying geese: I enjoyed making these more than I expected (but I did get muddled up with remembering to iron away from the folds, not into them!)
















For the baby blue one I added some stripes again, and some slashed stripes
















For the pink one I added some stripes (*) and had a go at some of the liberated stars I've been seeing in blogland. I obviously have a problem with spacial awareness as the number of time I had to re-do the 4 pointy blocks is nobody's business! however I like the result, so i might be trying these again.

















Next month I am going to force myself to do some half square triangles - either I'll get over my dislike of them, or I'll enforce it, either way, I'll know!