Tag Archives: quilts

Spools

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After reading about Klosjes day, I decided to devote stitching time on Saturdays to these little blocks!  Each finishes at 2 3/8″.  They’re tiny.  But addictive.  Seriously addictive.  Perfect use for a charm pack or two.

While there are other methods of making them I’m hand piecing them, as I love to hand piece and love Y-seams for the continuous stitching that they make possible.  I’m using 1″ squares and half hexagons  from the 90-degree 1-inch hexagons in the Patchwork of the Crosses Inklingo collection.  I was able to print three of  the half  hexagons on each charm and have a plan for the border for this quilt, however large it ends up, using that third half-hexagon from each charm.

I have no idea how many of these little beauties I’m going to make, but as Mr. Q.O. is quite taken by them, I have a feeling it may be as many as is needed to make a lap quilt for him.

An alternative plan is to make a doll’s quilt using these tiny blocks and then start another set using the shapes using the long half hexagon from the 1.5″ 90-degree hexagon collection and the 3″ squares from the Drunkard’s Path collection to make somewhat larger blocks.

The other night Lester decided to “help” when I was working on the Quaker Patchwork cross-stitch.  Great huge kitty paws on the chart make it rather difficult to keep one’s place!

Smudge was, as usual, perfecting his lounging.

Hexagon Blossoms

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I haven’t worked on this little top for ages so decided to add another blossom to it with the surrounding green path last night.  That’s a dime on top of one of the little hexagons to give an idea of size.  Each side of the hexagons finishes at half an inch.

I initially printed a few thousand of these small hexagons, almost all on 5″ charms, thinking I’d make the Insanity quilt seen here.  I quickly decided I didn’t want to make that quilt and now have all these tiny hexagons.  While I’ve started the little top shown above, I know that is going to end up as a small doll’s quilt.  I’ll use half and quarter hexagons around the outer edges so that I have straight outer edges to the little quilt.

As long as I finger press these as I go, it’s very simple to press the top.  I do press after I add each blossom.

More of the blossoms are ready and I have enough of the green surrounding hexagons printed to surround these plus a few more.  Once that’s done I’ll assess if I want to make the little top any larger.

Our forecast for the weekend is fabulous — sunny and highs of 7 Celsius both days.  The whole week has been wonderful with sunny days that have been relatively mild, considering it’s early March.

Lester looks like he’s thinking about spring and watching the birds and squirrels from the window.

Smudge, on the other hand, is showing off his sprawling capabilities.

Getting Ready to Print on Fabric

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I want to make the Drunkard’s Path quilt a good-sized lap quilt, so I need to prep some more of the Rouenneries charms for printing.  I already know that I can print both pieces of a Drunkard’s Path unit on a 5″ charm, so it’s a matter of ironing them on to the freezer paper that I have already cut to size and then feeding them through my printer.  Here you can see that I’ve separated them by colour as I will use different ink colours for printing, depending on the fabric colour.  Some of those pieces of freezer paper have been used 10 or 15 times already and are still fine for another few uses.

One thing I have learned is that even 5″ charms shrink when washed and not evenly.  There’s almost a full quarter inch shrinkage in width or length, depending on how you look at it, when these little charms are washed and pressed.

I received the Clothworks e-mail yesterday with news of their upcoming collections and immediately fell in love with the Hungarian Blues collection that you can see here.  Blue and white quilts are among my absolute favourites and these fabrics are  stunning.  I know I’m going to want yardage of every one of those when the fabric is available.  I’m already dreaming of a blue and white Winding Ways quilt or perhaps a Dresden Plate in blue and white.

Smudge has the funniest look on his face in this photo.

Lester, on the other hand, is looking somewhat majestic.

Tuesday Tidbits

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What have I been working on lately? A small quilt made with these fabrics — but I can’t show it yet. I think I’ve been inspired by Wanda at Exuberant Color to work with brighter colours than is my norm and have really enjoyed it! The little top is basted and the quilting of it is about to begin.


On Friday, I had to go in to one of the court reporters’ offices with which I work. They were touching up some of the boardroom tables with some stain or something and the smell was awful. I was only in there for about 5 minutes, if that, to pick up proofreading and that was it for me — a headache that just wouldn’t quit and a sore throat. I know I’m sensitive to paint and things like that but that reaction was incredible after only a few minutes. How the people who work there all day stood it is beyond me!

I just realized, when I looked at these pictures, that there is a resemblance between the two boys — they are half brothers, after all.

Lester:

Smudge:


I Got Mail!

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… from Stina in Sweden! The gift bag is so pretty and was just full of wonderful surprises.

For the past couple of weeks, there has been a lot of talk in blogland about pincushions. I haven’t said a word about mine as it’s just a plain old tomato pincushion. I was thrilled to receive this pincushion made by Stina — it’s absolutely wonderful! So now I can display a pretty pincushion too. 😉


Do you see the feathers in the package in the top photo? Well, the package contains feathers and these little wooden figures — bunnies and chicks. They’re absolutely adorable and are now decorating our wall unit. These will be brought out every year for Easter!


And this egg — which is, so far, chock full of candies and chocolate. We’re being very good and saving it for Easter, but I’m not sure how much we’ll be able to resist as the week goes on! LOL

And just because it’s such a good photo, here’s another shot of Lester.

Yesterday we made a trip to the LQS where they had bundles of the most glorious Japanese taupes. I was oh, so tempted but resisted. Instead, I picked up some more of the black and white prints and a pattern for my Four Seasons Quilt Swap. I’m going to amend the pattern a bit to incorporate an element that really means spring to me — flying geese. When I see a V of Canada Geese flying north it’s a sure sign that spring is here. Haven’t seen that yet!

If the forecast is accurate, we’re in for a snowy Easter. Thankfully it was mild yesterday and a lot of the snow is starting to melt but we still have enormous snowbanks!

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 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:

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.

Shabby Chic Circles and Yogurt Kitties

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What else did I find this weekend? More circles. Lots and lots more shabby chic circles appliqued on to shabby chic backgrounds. You know those wonderful 5″ charm square packs? Well, this is what I did with quite a few of them. I have a bunch of them left so I’m going to make a quilt of the blocks with the appliqued circles and alternate them with the plain shabby chic squares. These are definitely my colours!

I have six of them still left to applique that are already backbasted and waiting. Tried to do one last night, but right now my hands and wrists just do not want anything to do with applique. So those 6 blocks will just have to wait till the warmer weather.

Both our boys are mad about yogurt. Whenever either of us has yogurt, we have an incredibly attentive audience of two. We call it show time. 😉 Here’s a picture of the two of them sharing some of DH’s yogurt.

Seven Sisters Almost Done

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It’s pressed and ready to baste and quilt, which will be done in the next few days. I was going to add two more blocks to it but it would have ended up way too long. So now I have two Seven Sisters blocks made and ready for something else. 🙂 I used 1.5″ diamonds and equilateral triangles for this one from Inklingo Collection 3 and it really was fast to put together. Each block took about two nights to piece, so this whole thing was only about 6 nights of hand stitching. Printing the shapes took next to no time, maybe half an hour.

One of these days, I’ve got to figure out how to master free motion quilting on my sewing machine. Doing straight lines is getting a bit … well, old!

There’s a significant storm coming tomorrow, they say, and we may get a lot of snow. Today will be the day to run around and do errands so we can stay off the roads tomorrow. In Toronto, just about any amount of snow seems to paralyze the city so a “significant” amount could be catastrophic. LOL