Star Surround Finish

I did it! Yay! My Star Surround quilt top is quilted. And in time for the parade over at Happy Quilting!

This started out as a set of 13 strips of Heaven and Helsinki fabrics, 5" wide by WOF. I won them in a competition held over at Mad About Patchwork sometime last year. It was a bit tight cutting out the squares using these as they were 1/4" too narrow. But I made it work with some fudging clever stitching.

I did some simple straight line quilting on this one to highlight the points of the stars.

Star Surround Front

I tend to prefer a more heavily quilted look. And I have been debating whether I should add some more quilting, but am undecided! The back shows the quilting a bit more clearly. I had enough scraps to make the scrappy binding and used the remaining fabrics on the back.

Star Surround Back

This marks the end of another quilt-a-long run by Melissa at Happy Quilting. She is holding a grand parade of all the finished quilts on Monday 16th September so hop on over and check them out, there will be some amazing quilts!

Quilt Stats:
Fabric: Heaven and Helsinki, Kona Snow
Size: 35.5" x 51" (rather an odd finished size!)
Started: August 2013
Finished: September 2013

Linking up with 

More Letters

We are in month three of the Easy as ABC QAL over at Blossom Heart Quilts and the letters she published were KLMNO. I kind of wish I was making the quilt as it looks so great.

But no, I am making name banners for my 3 children. So I am picking and choosing the letters I make.

I started with the boy's name. I have just redecorated his room and made curtains and a headboard in a green, yellow and blue striped fabric. 

So I pulled out some fabrics that I though went with these and ended up with these four letters. Just need a couple of letters from further down the alphabet and he will be done.

The littlest one is very pink and very girlie so it was easy pulling fabrics for her letters. 

I never realised there were so many Ls in my children's names.

Linking up to

A Lovely Year of Finishes - Sept Goal

September! The start of a new school year and the littlest one has started Kindergarten! It's going to get very quiet around here! I haven't quite decided if that is a good thing or not. I do, however, have an ever increasing list of things that I should now be able to get done given there are no small people around!! But before that list can be tackled we have to get passed the 'gradual entry' phase, so far the school day has only been 2 hours long!


So, I have been busy finishing off my Star Surround quilt top. The deadline for this step is the middle of the month, so I have managed to meet that bit! Yay. 

I decided I had enough fabric to make another 2 blocks. It would have been nice to have had a little bit more fabric to make another column, but I was scrimping on the fabrics as it was! So I have the 16" blocks in a 2 x 3 layout.

The top has been on my design wall for a few days while I contemplated whether it should have a border or not. I didn't really want too much more white space but didn't have enough of the Kona tangerine (to match the outer triangles) to bind it with. So in the end I decided to add a small border so that I can do a scrappy binding.

I am currently piecing together all the leftovers to make the backing and then I can layer it and start quilting. Ha, and there is another decision to make!

Melissa is having a grand parade on September 16th for all those that get it quilted by then! There have been some great looking quilt tops! It should be a fun parade.


Whilst the quilt top sat on the design wall I managed to complete another Dr Who block. I am so far behind on these! Anyway, I give you the sonic screwdriver.

Sonic screwdriver

So, my primary goal for this month is to quilt and bind the Star Surround quilt top ready for the parade! 

If I meet this goal, I should then have the rest of the month to crack on with some Mario blocks (I have 3 left to do) and maybe another Doctor Who block, before the next 2 are revealed!

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 :)