End of August .....

this is the corner at our house....

we planted the tree you can see in the front corner and the wisteria behind it was our first planting....

this year (after 8 years) it is at it's finest we have seen it....

(brown grass = no rain)

smothered in glorious scented lilac....

.... and buzzing with lots of happy bees....

this week I finished off these two special quilts....

very open quilting

thick plush minky blanket on the back (no extra wadding)

two the same but different....

for two grandiegirls....

and made from their mum and dad's old shirts....

I found it impossible to get good quilting with the thick blanket, and the sides kept rolling, but they have worked out really soft and snuggly.... I'm still finding bits of fluff - it goes everywhere!!!! 

Some more Field Journal hexagons have been self bound....

... and I continue with the long top border of Civil War Bride..... slowly but surely....

Righto, time for coffee and off to help get the Embroidery Exhibition set up today....

Have a lovely weekend.....

Beginning of March

Another Field Journal block has been done ... I have been rather neglecting these, but they will happen

I worked on one of two quilts I am making from my farmers (son and DIL) shirts... they have two daughters and these quilts are specially being made for them.

this one is based on the Broken Dishes block.... I wanted fairly uncomplicated blocks as the fabric moves and it was hard to get good points.... they won't mind that some have been chopped off.

Part 2 of Gossip in the Garden has been completed....

Michelle has a different version

and I have done February's quilting session ....

On Williams Street gives instruction on quilting , which I am following as her style is quite different to my own and it's getting me to try different patterns....

I really like the block too and think it would be lovely in two colours only.... another on my want to do list!

I spotted this bag at The Quilters Angel.... and made it up in Easter fabrics.... its not very big but would certainly hold a few lovely easter eggs...

It was good to get this little bag finished, I feel I am jumping from one thing to the next at the moment.

Righto, Gotto Go..... I want to start preparing Part 3 of Gossip to work on this month....

Hugz

This week

The week has sped by - it's been a busy one with various things...

9 more 'pies' were appliqued onto backgrounds.... and a bunch more of EPP pieces glued on for stitching into pies...

This bright cheerful quilt is on the frame... made in December 2018 - All over flowery feathers you can see in the turquoise border...

At machine sewing day with friends I made a start on some of the old shirt quilts.... at this stage I am making the broken dishes blocks....

I had 6 coordinating fat quarters, I prewashed as it was loose weave and they did shrink a fair bit so I'm glad I had.... and I made them up into simple fat quarter draw string carry bags.... gone into the gift box

The binding has been added to the Charming Stars quilt.... free pattern from HERE .  The top was made in a Sewalong hosted by Terry in 2015... so it's been in hiding for a while.  I used a favourite line of mine called Papillon 

Custom quilted the stars, sashing and borders... fairly simple to keep it soft...

Found a very pretty backing.... the colours are dulled in the picture but there is more pink

I have a quilt too big for my frame so I have pinned it up and will do it on the sit down machine when I need some sit down time....  It's a kit I got years ago and made up the top in 2019 called Les Courtiers.  Lovely French General fabrics.

Looking forward to the weekend, a couple of quiet days at home for me.  There is sewing stuff everywhere in 'that room'....  I hope you have a lovely one whatever you are doing...

Righto, Gotto Go... coffee needs topping up....

Finishing Up The Year ....

Amongst my tidy up/sorting for the year I found I hadn't posted a few things this year.

This top is recently made and all out of the scrap bins.

I'm really happy with it and most likely will do something like this again.... great for using up lots of those smaller pieces... 

I didn't get as far as I had hoped with Civil War Bride this year - I had hoped to have all these blocks done and be starting on the borders....

I made Pop Star with friends this year using a Tilda fat quarter pack I had with some background and shadow fabric...

In fact there was enough fabric to make 2!  These two tops are waiting to be finished!

Sunday Stitchers kindly invited me to join them in a sweet little foundation pieced project.  People made a bunch of the same 'friend', wrote the name and then they got shared out.  I have put my circle together but still undecided as to what to make with them....

Over the last few weeks I have done a few more Field Journal blocks.....

I have a plan now for the shirt quilts (shirts given to me in UK pre-owned by son and daughter in law to make quilts for their 2 daughters)

I will make one in this broken dishes block...

and the other in square in a square block (maybe there is a formal name for it)  There is a mix of colours so each block will be different...

These are the decorations I made this year - I made 20 altogether ....

Today sewing with friends I hand sewed down the binding for this Granny Square quilt.  I used a French General range Jelly Roll and some plain solid....

The top was made in 2019 and so it's been waiting in the quilting queue for a while....

Close up of the quilting I did....

Grey Toile backing ..... just right...

I have updated my pages, and done some counting.  This last year I really wanted to make progress on my too long list of UFO's which included a number of quilt tops that needed quilting..... 

Pleased to say I got 21 quilts done... many of the tops had been done previously but there were a few new ones this year.    These are shown HERE on this page if you are interested.....

Righto, Gotto Go.... still sorting the UFO's to make  my list for next year..... I pretend it helps to keep me on track!

Wishing you all the best for 2023 .....