More Black and White

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There are now a couple of these done and two more sets of four ready to put together. But I’m needing a colour fix so have gone back to working on the ’30s Inklingo pinwheels. I’m not sure why, but the white on white prints are photographing as very stark white. The WOW prints are not quite this stark!

These little star blocks go together really quickly. It’s really fun seeing a little rectangle finished but I definitely need colour to work with too. Good thing I’ve got a couple of projects on the go.

We had sun today. It was wonderful. Now they’re saying there’s another storm on the way that’s likely to hit us Tuesday. More snow!

Second Finish for 2008

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Finally got a partial shot of the shabby chic quilt on the bed. It has been super to have it on the bed the last few nights. Last night the wind chill value was -22 Celsius. That’s way too cold for me!

Yesterday I got the black print fabrics I’ve found so far for the black and white star quilt printed. This is definitely going to be a long-term project! The little stars in rectangles are so fast to put together that I can see having lots of the tiny ones made relatively quickly. Then it will be a matter of finding more black fabrics that are appropriate in scale and have light enough “wrong” sides on which to print.

A bright quilt of stars is also in the making — well, in the making at least in my mind so far. I’m going to slowly get together some real brights and start making stars — I have a great idea for a setting, I think. What is it with me and these stars? Just can’t stop! LOL

A Black and White Beginning

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This is the beginning of my black and white quilt. I’m quite pleased with the negative/positive effect it’s creating.

This will consist of star rectangle blocks made with .75″, 1″ and 1.5″ diamonds and the appropriate setting bits and some solid black sashing. It will be a very long-term hand piecing project, which is just what I love! Thanks to Inklingo, it’s so easy to make these little blocks — just print, cut and stitch!

I think I may be quite mad — working on a black and white blocks in Toronto in March?!? The city is grey and dismal enough! Ah, well — there are always the ’30s tessellating pinwheels when I crave colour!

I had only printed enough to test out the effect and make sure I liked it. I do — and today I will be printing lots more of the pieces for the tiny stars. I cut the fabric to the right sizes for printing last night, so it’s just a matter of cutting the freezer paper, ironing it to the fabric and feeding it through the printer today.

We were lucky on the weekend and had tons of rain, which got rid of a lot of the snow. There’s still quite a bit out there but the towering snowbanks at the side of roads are definitely much reduced. As I type this, there are snowflakes drifting by the window. I hope this doesn’t amount to much — as of right now, we can see the grass on the roof garden again.

A Finish and the search for a new quilt project

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The shabby chic strippy quilt is now complete — all the binding is on, as is the label. Before I wrote on and appliqued it, I took a picture of the label:


I feel almost lost without that huge quilt to work on! Does anyone else get that feeling when they’ve finished off a large project? I love the quilt, it’s absolutely beautiful (and pictures soon when we can get some good ones) but … well, I miss working on it!


Guess it’s time to come up with a new large hand piecing project. I have many small projects on the go, but none of them seem to be grabbing my attention for more than a few days at a time. Perhaps it’s time to go through quilt books and magazines and search for some new ideas.


The swap packages are starting to arrive in earnest. Next week should see a deluge of packages as the arrival date is supposed to be February 25. These Inklingo swaps are such fun — and I’m always amazed at the variety of fabrics. One of the swappers packaged her little groups of triangles in the most marvelous way:

More Circles — and more snow

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There are at least 70 or 80 of these circles done. I’m not sure at all what I’ll do with these ones — I keep thinking that some sort of table runner and matching placemats might be fun. And it would be a Christmas gift that I could get put together now and tuck away! One thing’s for sure — whatever I’m making to give away this Christmas is going to be done early.

It is snowing yet again — I cannot believe the amount of snow we’re getting this year.

I’ve been working on the tessellating pinwheels and the 2″ Drunkard’s Path tops — but as I’m hand piecing, they are taking a while and really don’t have too much to show — yet! I’ll be taking a few days off form any piecing as I tack down the binding on the king-sized shabby chic quilt seen here. Finally. I really don’t know why I’ve left it so long because I actually enjoy that part.

Yet Another Snowstorm!

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This has been a wild 24 hours. First we had freezing rain which occurred overnight and then snow. And more snow. And more snow. It’s still snowing. The trees look like they’ve been dipped in a rather heavy coating of icing sugar.






It’s very pretty — but rather treacherous underfoot and definitely more snow than we’re used to! Now they’re saying there may be yet more on the weekend.

I was glad we didn’t have to go anywhere today and am just as thankful we don’t have to go anywhere tomorrow! It’s supposed to continue snowing most of the night tonight.

Smudge and Lester sure know how to deal with a day like this:


I’m hostessing another swap on the Inklingo list — this time of 2.25″ equilateral triangles. The first of the swap packages arrived this week and I’ve had fun looking at the fabrics that swapper chose. It’s always fascinating to me that no matter what shape we’re swapping or how many participate, we rarely if ever get duplicates of any fabrics. Makes for some wonderful scrap quilts!

Snow and more snow

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It snowed a lot — as this evergreen clearly shows. This was taken around noon today — so a good 24/36 hours after the snow had stopped. I suppose it is pretty — but I’m just not a winter person by any stretch! Can’t wait for spring!

A few years ago, for whatever reason, we had moose statues all over the place in Toronto. There is one moose statue we still see outside a business that dresses it up for holidays, seasons, you name it. It’s rather hard to see what the moose has on as the snow is covering most of it, but here’s a picture of the moose. 🙂



And here’s yet another picture of the snow — it seems like there’s mountains of it, yet I think a great deal of it will be gone by Wednesday as we’re forecast to have a rather mild couple of days at the beginning of this week.


Last night I worked for a while with the setting for the 2″ Drunkard’s Path blocks I made a while ago in ’30s prints. I think I like the effect of this setting and am going to keep adding to it till I’ve used up the hundred or so blocks that I made. Then I think I may do a border with ’30s stars in it.

Another Winter Storm and Tessellating Pinwheels

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This was our view out the living room window around mid-afternoon. It began snowing around 5:00 a.m. on Friday morning and didn’t stop all day or evening. The picture seems a little blurry because it was still snowing. Thankfully we didn’t get the freezing rain or ice pellets that the forecast suggested we might — just snow and more snow. I think we have in excess of 10″ of it!

To add some colour to the day, I worked on this:

I’m not sure how large this will end up — but I’m having a lot of fun making these ’30s pinwheels and putting them together. They are composed of 1″ half hexagons from Inklingo collection 1. I have a little box full of the half hexagons already printed so there is no rhyme or reason to fabric placement on this at all — I just add another as it’s pieced. I love designs like this — so easy to work with and so amazingly simple.

Why did I start quilting?

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Over on Krisp-Quilt , the question is being asked. It really made me think.

From childhood, I was a knitter. I loved to knit and rarely was without a project on the go. I made lace tablecloths, lace scarves, big fishermen’s knit sweaters and everything in between. Then about 12 years ago, aggressive arthritis struck and I had to give it up. I was lost without a craft.

My cousin is a quilter and I had always been intrigued but figured there wasn’t a chance I could do that. After all, when I needed to sew on a button it became a very big deal! I had never used a sewing machine. It all seemed too foreign. The funny thing is I remember being in a big bookstore here, looking at one of the Elly Sienkiewicz Baltimore Album applique books and being absolutely enthralled. That was years before I even began to contemplate quilting. Little did I know!

However, desperation took hold and I took the plunge. One rainy Saturday afternoon DH and I were out doing errands on the same street as the LQS and we stopped there. I bought some supplies; a book, a rotary cutter, a mat, needles and thread and, of course, fabric. That evening I went through the exercise of washing and ironing my fabric, making templates, tracing them on to my fabric, cutting it out and started to stitch. My first block? Oh, it was dreadful. But I was hooked.

The following week saw me haunting bookstores and another LQS. I read and read and read some more. Then I started on a star quilt. It is truly dreadful — but I still love the fabrics I used in it. It never got quilted. Even as a total novice I could see it was dreadfully constructed! If nothing else, I’m sure the kitties will love it. LOL

I can’t even imagine what I was thinking now. When I look at this and see the great gaping holes in the middle of those stars, I shudder. I actually tried to fix a couple of them last night — unsuccessfully.

Since then? Well, since then I’ve learned tons and tons. I tend to learn best from books and at my own pace. I have some wonderful books in my quilt library but must say that my most treasured book and the one from which I think I learned the most is Linda Franz’ Quilted Diamonds 2. The DVD lesson that comes with that book is worth its weight in gold, in my opinion.

I have never been comfortable with machine piecing although I am fortunate enough to have two great sewing machines; my mother’s Featherweight and an older Pfaff Creative that is wonderful. Perhaps because I sit at a computer all day for work I find sitting at any type of machine for anything else seems altogether too much like work. But I found my niche! Hand piecing and, when I can, hand applique and hand quilting. And this past year I even started to do some hybrid blocks — utilizing both machine and hand piecing. I don’t know if I’ll ever be completely comfortable with machine stitching, but this is a step I never thought I’d take.

While my wrists are certainly not better, I count my blessings — I can hand piece even at the worst of times. During good times, I can applique and hand quilt (using the Thimblelady technique and thimble). I am very fortunate and know it. Tracing templates and rotary cutting were both things that I knew were going to be problems for me a few years ago. So when Inklingo came on the market, I was thrilled. Thanks to it, I can keep on quilting and have been able to make a wonderful king-sized quilt for us — I had seen the pattern for the quilt in an older issue of Australian Patchwork & Quilting and had always wanted to do it but knew there was no way I could trace the templates on to fabric or paper for English paper piecing. The day I got my copy of Inklingo Collection 1 I started printing the hexagons and elongated hexagons for that quilt. And that is the reason I talk about Inklingo so much — it has meant I didn’t have to give up quilting as it was becoming apparent, the summer before it came out, that my quilting days were numbered.

I am amazed at and thrilled by the creativity of quilters and their beautiful creations. Wandering about quilting blogs is almost sensory overload some days. There are so many gorgeous quilts being made with so many techniques and so many wonderful fabrics that I’m constantly wanting to try something else.