Bloggers quilt festival entry no. 1

Hi all,

I have been admiring all the quilts that are already participating in the bloggers quilt festival and felt inspired to enter a couple of my latest finishes. If you are a follower of my blog you have probably already seen these quilts so I hope you don't mind seeing them again :-)

I am entering my American Beauty in the large quilts category. She is a huge king size quilt and was quite hard to photograph. As you can see my clothes line would not go high enough!

I made this as a Marti Michell block of the month in a monthly class at my local patchwork shop. It was a slow burn project for me, never rushed, not in a hurry to finish. I just enjoyed the ride that lasted about 2 years!

She now lives on my bed and hangs over the sides a lot which eliminates any quilt tug of wars during the night! ;-)

Thanks for visiting me!

Bye for now, Jess

 

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American Beauty

Hi all,

I want to share my 2nd finished quilt for the year....yay! And this one has just been waiting on binding for the last couple of months.

This was a block of the month quilt that I did through my local patchwork shop, Sew This and That. It is a Marti Michell design which uses her awesome templates. We started in February of 2012. It took about 18 months to make the finished top and then I was waiting for some fabric for the backing for a while. Then I had Jane (quilt jane) quilt it for me on her longarm.

This is a monster of a quilt, I think it is the biggest I have ever made. It is approx 110" x 95". Huge!

I used mostly Sandi Henderson's Secret Garden fabric with coordinating solids and prints.

Bye for now, Jess :)

 

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One night a month

hiya,

One night a month I get an evening off to go sewing! I go the the local PWS Sew This and That and I work on my Double Wedding Ring quilt.

I have been going since February and have only missed one night because of sickness, so that is 5 nights so far. It has taken this long to get the cutting finished. 1154 pieces for the insides of the arc and 580 ends for the arcs. I only work on this quilt on my one night off and for about 2.5 – 3 hours.

This time I took my sewing machine along so I could start sewing! There are 254 or 288 arcs, it depends what size I end up doing but so far I am aiming for the biggest size. I am using the Marti Michell templates and so far it has been a breeze!

This is my “no pressure” project! I am not in a hurry to have it finished so I am enjoying taking my time and not feeling any pressure!

Bye for now, Jess

My plans for Quarter 3 of the Finish Along

Hiya,

I have decided to add some older projects to the list this quarter. To try and tick off some of those projects that would other wise just keep hanging around.

First up though is the Marti Michell BOM.

I found this half finished apron, how hard is it to make an apron? well this is no ordinary apron.

I haven’t touched this since before we moved to this house, which was before kids….so probably 9 years! Time to finish it!

This skirt was supposed to be made for last summer. Well that season came and went, maybe I’ll finish it for this summer.

I have had trouble deciding how to quilt this gorgeous stitchery….I think I have a plan now, so hopefully I can finish this.

     
This small convergence quilt is half quilted but my thread kept breaking so I gave up for a little bit….I will try using my new setup and see if that works better.

This is a small Schnibbles quilt that I made a couple of years ago, I just need to quilt it.

 
Christine has organised a scrap quilt challenge and the quilts are due to be finished in September so I need to get moving on this.

And finally a cover for our Ipad mini. I also plan on making a matching pouch to carry extra things. 

This seems like a lot, 8 projects and I may not get it all done but I will try to stay focused (LOL who am I kidding?!). I am also working on long term projects too – a double wedding ring quilt and the Afternoon Delight quilt.

Linking to -

Bye for now, Jess

Little helpers!

Hi all,

A little story.

My 4 year old is sitting on the lounge watching the Lorax, I notice it only has 10 minutes or so left so I think I will let him finish the movie before bed. What should I do, Oh I know, I will do some more work on the next block for the Afternoon delight quilt, I might get the block finished tonight I think hopefully….where is it, oh it as fallen on the floor…I pick it up and gasp in horror.

Hmmm, I show it to the child, “who did this?” I say with dismay and anger in my voice.
”I did it” he sheepishly admits. I turn off the movie and do the bedtime routine early as punishment.

It is hard to stay angry when he admitted guilt straight away and has said sorry repeatedly while brushing his teeth and going to the toilet. And this is not the first time this has happened, No 1 son did the same thing at the same age to the appliquéd border of my Baltimore quilt – it now has a pieced border.

Moral of the story – don’t leave your sewing in the lounge room were little hands can try to help!

On a brighter note, I finished putting together the top of the American Beauty quilt.

It is huge - 90” x 110”. I have to admit I forced myself to finish it today…I wanted to start other things but this was in the way. I am glad I finished it because it feels like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders and I have that “what will I start now?!” excited feeling!

WIP Wednesday!

Hi all,

On Saturday I went to my first sewing day for this year, it was great to sit and sew with friends, new and old. We met at Christine’s, some of us are working on the same pattern but we could also bring whatever hand sewing we wanted to work on.

I picked up my new pattern pack for the Afternoon Delight quilt and quickly got to work!

This is my first block for the quilt and I am half way through my second block. I am using needle turn appliqué, mostly Kaffe fabrics and ‘Breeze’ Bella Solids for my background.

Unfortunately though I haven’t even turned my sewing machine on for nearly a week…really! So my American Beauty top hasn’t gone anywhere yet. I seriously need a motivational kick!

I am linking up to

Traffic Light…stop…go…

Hi all,

I wanted to squeeze in a last finish for January…this was actually finished a couple of weeks ago but I was waiting for it to be put up!

It still needs some finishing – the rail needs to be trimmed. But that is a minor detail, the main thing is that it is up on the wall!

This is from the book Stop.Go.Quilt.Sew! by Angela Yosten and you can actually get this book for 40% off this week – you do not want to miss this if you have boys in your life!

As always I changed it a bit – Just the background fabric…I used one big piece of fabric, it is a tone on tone cream with darker spots from my stash. The pattern calls for a jelly roll of white but I didn’t want to buy anything, cheap I know but really who wants to wait – it would have taken me at least a week longer to make just waiting for the JR to arrive and I was ready to sew now!

I straight line quilted it which was a nightmare…straight lines and I are not friends!

All the fabric came from my stash so I am happy and No.1 son picked this pattern and loves it in his room so everyone is happy!

Next on the list for his room is the No Parking quilt from the same book, but as it is summer so I am not in a hurry to get this done yet!

Here is a quick peek at what I am working on at the moment -

I am putting the top together for the Marti Michell American Beauty BOM. Hope to have a finished top to share soon!

Plans for 2013

Hiya!

I thought I would share a few of my plans for the next 12 months…well, maybe I should say the next few months because my creative goals/focus change quite a lot, with the wind really LOL

First up for this year I am participating in the “In your words” blog hop.

My day is the 10th so stay tuned to see what I have made! And I will also share links for the other blogs that are joining in!

There are a couple of quilts that I want to get finished fairly soon -

This is a peek at a wall hanging I am making for No.1 sons room, it is a lot further along than this picture now…just a little bit more quilting and then binding.

I also want to finish the Marti Michell American Beauty BOM quilt. I thought I had some pictures of some of the blocks but I can’t find them, anyway hopefully I will have the top finished in the next month and then I am going to give it to Jane for quilting. It is a huge quilt so I will send this one away. Then I am going to start a Double Wedding Ring quilt in my ‘night off’ class. I have always wanted to do a DWR so I am very excited about this one!

And there is also Hooterville, which I have started to work on again. The Jamestown Landing quilt which I really should dig out (both mentioned here)….If I go any further into my UFO’s I might have a fit so I think I will stop there LOL

There are also lots of new things I would love to start – I have the pattern for Aunt Millie’s Garden calling my name and I am getting the pattern for Afternoon Delight which looks beautiful!

All of the things I have mentioned are very time intensive quilts, so I hope I don’t get too boring for you!

Although I am sure I will be making small things too, already I have planned to make No.1 son a pencil case for school…and no doubt the list will grow. Not to mention the dress and top’s I want to make…okay now I am scaring myself!

Better stop now before I dig myself into a hole! I hope you have lots of fun creative projects planned for 2013!

Let’s see where the wind blows us!

A little block love!

Hi all,

Well a lot has been happening here – we all ended up sick with colds, the car is not going anywhere for at least another week and to top it all off the washing machine died….It must be so expensive for people who don’t have “Mr Fixit” hubbies, we were able to get the part half the price off ebay and hubby fixed it himself. I am glad I married Mr Fixit – maybe that is what I will call him from now on LOL

Anyway there has been some sewing happening…I have nearly finished my Name Game Swap quilt but I won’t show you yet because I think my partner is on to me!

But I will show you the blocks I have done so far for the Marti Michel BOM I am doing at the local PWS.

I am seriously loving my fabric choices – a bit if Sandi Henderson Secret Garden and a bit of Joel Dewberry’s Aviary 2 and some solids to calm it all down…and some random fabrics from my stash too.

This is block 1 which is actually last months block.

And block 2 which we did last night. I am really enjoying my night out once a month…gives me a break from the bedtime routine which has really turned into a nightmare I don’t know how to fix.

Also there is one other thing that is super exciting happening but I can’t tell you yet….you will be the first to know!