Thursday 25 April 2013

A Lovely Finish....








I have managed to finish my April challenge.... This was a small quilt that I had made when following the Zakka Style Sew a Long last year.. I had used a Charm Pack by Cabbages & Roses instead of yardage, together with Essex Linen to give a really soft 'shabby' look.
So a quilt style to match? I chose straight line quilting about 1/2" apart... this was the width of my walking foot.
You can't see it on these pictures but through the strips with floral blocks I quilted with a variegated cream King Tut thread and to ring the changes on the plain linen strips I used a variegated pink one...



I like this close straight quilting as I like to see a soft 'rumpled' finish - so after quilting the top I sewed a line of zig-zag close to the edge, trimmed  it up roughly and then put it through a wash and tumble dry. Then I squared it up and put the binding on.... followed by another wash and pinned out to dry on old towels to keep it square.



So here it is ... all soft & shabby -  with (hopefully) just a hint of chic?


Wednesday 24 April 2013

Baby Baby Baby...

Is there something in the water around here? or is it just that having been married for 33 years all my friends children are starting their own families.... as I just seem to be making an awful lot of baby quilts..

This is the 3rd quilt that I have made using the 'Little Man' pattern from Camille Roskelly's book Simplify. It is so simple and so effective... just 4 fat quarters (this is from Lily & Will by Bunny Hill Designs for Moda) and some plain yardage. However I did cheat on the yardage.... I have used a cream jelly roll as the pattern uses 2 1/2" strips and I have enough strips from one roll to make 5 of these quilts. Then just a bit for the top & bottom borders and its all done. It is about 40" wide so fits one width of fabric for the backing too (around 1.5m total) so altogether it is not an expensive quilt to make.


I have quilted most of the top but I am waiting for this baby boy to be born and then I can quilt his name on the bottom corner - so I am well on time with this one.


Saturday 6 April 2013

A Lovely year of Finishes


I'm back on track... Linking up for my April finish.. This is a quilt top that I started last year in the Zakka style sew a long... so it just needs to be quilted and bound.


Not a good picture sorry... but Linen & pastels are not high contrast....

Tuesday 2 April 2013

Spring Break?

This time last year I was up in Scotland basking in temperatures of 24 -26 degrees... and very nice it was too.
This year we went up again.... not quite the same!!
We left Suffolk after an overnight snowfall and headed up to Cumbria - I phoned the hotel to check that we could get to them as we were seeing pictures of stranded motorists in the new... They were fine... only 7 miles off the motorway so to them  access was good... not like some of the villages higher up that were cut off.  And they had log fires going...
The next morning we headed North again...  Tried to phone the hotel but couldn't get past the switchboard...!
I must explain that this trip was for my LSH... he had seen pictures of a golf course on the Kintyre peninsula that he so wanted to play... after letting me go to India for 3 weeks it was only fair that I said yes.. so to save you running to look out the Atlas..



Can you see Glasgow?... well we had to go up around and above that and come back south to Campbeltown....  See that island in the middle.. Thats Arran - and you saw what was happening there... why did we not take this as a clue?

The journey went well.. the roads were pretty good and the snow was spasmodic leading my LSH (not normally known for his optimism...) to remark he was hopeful of playing some golf...!! (I had a bit of a paddy when packing the car, that it was pointless putting all the kit in.... I was right..)
All went well until we were approaching Tarbert and heard the traffic news.. "the A83 is closed" - thats that red line on the map... one road in and out.... oops..
We risked it and were rewarded by getting through via a convoy system.... it was only one area that kept getting blocked by snowdrifts..
So we pulled into Campbeltown rather chuffed that we had fought our way through only find that the whole peninsula had been without electricity for 5 days.. the hotel had been taken over by power workers and they didn't have any proper food as it had all spoilt... They had one room left.. so we stayed one night and beat a hasty retreat up to stay with our friends near Glencoe... which was totally white, majestic and trouble free... they are used to snow there.. love it in fact, the ski season was in full flow..


We took a ride down the glen where Skyfall scenes were shot and saw loads of these.... 


They are pretty bold at the moment as the hunting season isn't until June..

So although the weather was totally different... we do still love Scotland..  We get 'Goosebumps' every time we drive through Glencoe especially... It's so different from the 'Big Sky's' we have here in Suffolk for one thing... and then there is all that history...

So not a lot of sewing has gone on for some time but I have been getting my Kinky Bee blocks back in the post... Here are the first 9.... they finish at 16" -  I don't know how big I need to go but I am loving this quilt already.....


Will be back soon with more pictures from India maybe....