A Lovely Year of Finishes - August goal Met!

Well, for the first time in a few months I actually completed my goal this month! That's not to say in the last couple of months I haven't completed anything, just not the one thing I set out to do! 

So my charm pack challenge mentioned here and here, has been on going for a while now. The top was finished quite quickly but then my chosen quilting pattern caused me to avoid it for a while.  It wasn't a particularly tricky pattern, I just got fed up turning the quilt every 10" when doing the straight lines. Plus my lines were not always very straight, despite using my walking foot guide, or equally spaced, especially after stopping for a coloured block.

Anyway, it's done! The kids were out today so I got to finish hand sewing the binding this afternoon sitting in the garden in the sunshine, which has returned after an amazing storm a couple of nights ago. A very pleasant way to spend a couple of hours!

So here is the finished quilt. Although the quilting was not the most enjoyable I have ever done, I really like how it has turned out. 

Sticky Notes - Front

I have also thought of a name for it! My husband seems to have lots of those sticky note pads and he stacks them up in piles on his desk, and several other places around the house! 

Some are square and some are rectangular, and so many colours. Looking at these one day I thought my pattern reminded my of sticky notes stacked in piles. And given that the fabric range is noteworthy, I am calling it Sticky Notes. Also quite apt since I did get a bit stuck on the quilting of it! 

So here are some more pictures of Sticky Notes.

Sticky Notes - Back

Quilt Stats:
Fabric : Noteworthy charm pack, Know Snow, Kona Ash (I think)
Size: 43" x 48"
Started: May 2013
Finished: August 2013


Linking up with 

Paper Piecing

I have been admiring lots of paper piecing lately! There really are some very talented people out there. I particularly like stars but have yet to actually make one myself.

I am a follower of Crafty Shenanigans and she is making a wonky village. One night last week, I fancied a quick project so found a wonky house and a wonky tree pattern. I was quite pleased with how they turned out. I perhaps should have picked a brighter fabric for the door and window to make them stand out a bit more.

They will soon be flying their way over to Amy to join her village. I hope she likes them.

This next one took me a bit longer than one evening to do! The Tardis! Part of the Doctor.Who.Along. It was actually block number one, but I started late and am playing catch up in my own order! I have another 5 to do to catch up!! 

I had a few issues with this one. I realized, after I had made 2 doors, that I had transposed the light and dark blue fabrics. I can live with that. The background seems a bit bright but perhaps in a daylight setting it won't seem so bad. The seams got a bit thick in places.

The Tardis

I like the challenge of these but I do get frustrated at times! I think I'll attempt the sonic screwdriver next.

Off to do some regular straight line quilting for a break. 

Happy quilting.


Linking up with 

3-ring zipper pouch

Whilst shopping for school supplies recently my daughter showed me a pencil case that attaches to a ring binder saying how her friend found these soooo useful. Translated into "Can I have one please!". 
Having just seen this tutorial here I refused to buy the plain black and red one she was holding, thinking I would make her one instead. Well that was a couple of weeks ago! How time flies!

So last night I pulled out some fabrics I received in a competition a while ago and set to making it. They are such fun colours. It went together quite easily, but I really should learn to read the instructions rather than guess what comes next, especially late in the evening and I am thinking I am nearly done!! I had to rip out some seams and do it again, which at gone 11pm was not a good thing to be doing! 

It had zippers, which I normally avoid! Not sure why as it wasn't as bad as I had expected!

Applique!

And I added grommets to the side rather than the ties in the tutorial.

Anyway, all finished. And it was well received this morning. Now, how many days until school starts!?! 

Happy quilting.

Link up with The Needle and Thread Network.

Taking shape - stars

I wasn't sure I would get these done this week since we spent the week in the mountains doing lots of swimming, biking and playing by the lake. But here they are the centre stars are complete.

I am loving these bright colours, rather bold but so fun. Can't wait to get this quilt top all together.

Linking up with Melissa here

Quilt-along madness

I seem to be in a space at the moment where I have this compulsion to keep joining quilt-alongs. I think it might be the variety that is appealing as they are all very different!

Firstly there is the Star Surround with Melissa at Happy Quilting. Week three saw us making the flying geese.

Then I found a paper pieced quilt along for Doctor Who fans! This is being run by Soma (Whims and Fancies) and Caroline (Trillium Design). Their paper piecing patterns are just amazing. I am still playing catch up with this one as I didn't find it at the start. So far I have managed two blocks.

Timelord

K-9

Then the other day I came across the Easy as ABC quilt along with Blossom Heart Quilts. She is blogging 5 letters a month that are very simply pieced together to make a quilt, see details here. 

I don't want to make the who quilt, despite how appealing it is, primarily because I have too many of those on the go already (oops!). So I am selecting letters from her patterns to make my kiddies names into banners for their rooms. 

These last few weeks we have had some bedroom swapping going on in our house so I have been painting their bedrooms. Thank goodness I have nearly finished the third one as I am now tired of painting!! The walls look crisp and clean again and I thought a name banner hanging above their closets would look good.

So August saw the letters F, G, H, I and J. I have started with the eldest child and she only has 2 of these letters in her name.

For her birthday last year I made her a cushion for her bed so I am using the same fabrics to make the banner.

The colours are a lot darker in this photo than they really are. I have quilted these very simply by stitching around the letter and will bind with a kona marine blue. So onto the next child. 

It's all good fun :)

A Lovely Year of Finishes - August Goal

Well, I didn't do too well last month with my July goal! I had wanted to finish quilting my charm pack challenge quilt but it didn't quite happen!

Charm Pack Challenge

I have got a bit bored of the quilting I am doing. I thought straight line quilting was a good idea, which it would have been if I had gone right across the pattern and not decided stop and turn when hitting a colour block! Too much turning is making it tedious.

Charm Pack Challenge

I am probably 2/3 of the way through. So I will finish it this month!!! 

Star Surround Quilt-A-Long

Well this wasn't on my list of 10 things to do this summer, although I have done some of them! But I just had to join in another of Melissa's quilt-a-longs - the Star Surround. 

I was really pleased with how the last QAL turned out (the Starburst Quilt) and her instructions are always really good. 

Quite a while ago I won some Heaven and Helsinki fabrics from Mad About Patchwork. I really couldn't decide what to do with them. Well now I have a project!

Last week we had to cut the fabrics and here they are looking fab. That's some Kona snow as the background.

This weeks task was to make some HSTs. 

I like doing projects like this where only little bits have to be completed in a week! Makes me smile when I feel I achieve something!

Now back to finishing my July goal that I seems to have slipped by the way a little...