June's FMQ Challenge

I managed to get this month's free motion quilting done before the end of the month!! The month went fast!

I filled in an 8" x 16" rectangle on my sample quilt. I thought this month's challenge was wonderful, and Cindy Needham's tutorial was fabulous.

I started by marking a few lines with a Hera marker,

and then filled it in with all kinds of quilting.

Thanks to Sew Cal Gal and Cindy Needham!!

This past week has been taken up with installing a new patio, but luckily for me today was 30C/86F and too hot to work outside in the afternoon (the patio faces west and gets all the afternoon sun), so I was able to do some quilting.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!❤

Winding Ways

This week has gone by fast. I have been doing a lot of yard work now that things are drying out. Plus my youngest son finished school for the summer! Whoo Hoo!

I have sewn more Winding Ways blocks (they were cut with the GO! cutter). I have now finished the length of the quilt and just have to add 4+1/2 more rows to make the quilt top square - it will be about 94" square when done. I am amazed at how well the pieces go together, and it has been lovely to sew.  Not much pre-planning has gone into the layout and I hope that the rest of the pieces work out into a nice pattern.

I have had a little house guest for the past two weeks and she has been a great companion while I sew. She is off home tomorrow, a week ahead of schedule (her "parents" miss their three dogs too much and are coming home early), I am sure she will be thrilled to go home to see her family again. She is a lovely Kerry Blue terrier.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by!❤

March's Small Quilt

 I finished another Small Quilt of the Month from the Yahoo Small Quilt Talk Group.

This is March's quilt (I joined the group in April and have one more quilt to catch up). It is Civil War Baskets from the book "Remembering Adelia" by Kathleen Tracy

I used reproduction fabric that my husband bought me when he was in California last year. I wanted to try a very monochromatic quilt with just a splash of colour (red - my favourite colour), and I am pleased with how it turned out. I have said it before - mini quilts are a great place to try something new.

I used a Hera marker to mark quilt lines. I thought the above picture shows how well the marker works - it just makes an indentation in the fabric and doesn't leave any thing that needs to be removed later (the fabric fibres will bounce back after a while if the marks aren't covered by stitching). The Hera marker is probably what I use the most to mark quilting designs, especially since it works on every colour of fabric.

After quilting the lines (the above 2 photos are closer to the actual colours of the fabrics of the quilt).

I added some micro stippling around the baskets, and like the contrast with the cross lines in the basket handle area (thanks for the tip Wendy!).
This quilt was all about Hooked Feathers  - they are in the basket and the border.
The sashing idea came from Janet (Cariboo Crossing Chronicles - such a lovely blog!) when she sent me a link to her Friendship Mini Sampler Quilt - thanks Janet!

A close up of the back of the quilt showing the hooked feathers border (more about hooked feathers on later post). I made the borders extra wide so that I would have lots of room for quilting.
The quilt is 19" square. I used wool batting, and 100 weight thread for the quilting.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!❤

Friday Night Sew In Results

I had a great Friday night!

Skypeing and sewing with friends - Joan (at Leschenault) and Raewyn (lovetostitch).

I had a little buddy to keep me company too (we are looking after a friends dog for three weeks).

My Friday night started with some chores - surprisingly my fancy iron does more than just quilting projects!

My main Friday night project was working on this mini quilt (it is the March small quilt for the Yahoo Small Quilt Talk Group). I added the borders last night and got started on the machine quilting. I stitched in the ditch with the walking foot first and then did some free motion quilting. I should get the quilt finished this weekend.

Thanks Heidi and Bobbi for another great night!

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!❤

Quilting

I machine quilted a quilt for a friend of my mother. It is the first time I quilted a big quilt for a non-family member (and it was a bit nerve racking).

It is her first quilt, and she did a wonderful job. It is about 86" x 100".

The majority of the fabric is from Africa, when they lived there in the late 70's. The pattern was perfect to show off the fabric.
It is a wedding present for her son.

I quilted an all over puzzle piece meander (she wanted the simplest quilting).

I quilted a row of stylized gazelle for the border (hard the see - the thread is variegated and blends well with the fabric).

I started the gazelle by tracing curves for the initial layout of the quilting (I made marks on the ice cream pail lid for reference and used a Hera marker).

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by!❤

June's Small Quilt

I belong to a Yahoo Small Quilt group, and this is June's small quilt of the month.

The pattern is Scrap Squares from "The Civil War Sewing Circle" by Kathleen Tracy.
It was such a fun quilt to make. 32 different fabrics, plus "the shirting".

I decided to quilt it in an "X" pattern using the walking foot on the machine to keep it simple. I used a variegated Valdani thread - a 35WT hand quilting thread that I had left over from another project, because I wanted the stitching to really show, using a #90 top stitching needle. I used cotton batting, and after washing it, dried it in the dryer so that it would shrink and have an older look.
After drying the quilt is 19" x 15" (which is smaller than the pattern because I cut the shirting to the wrong size and just went with it - not too good at following patterns lately!).

Today I made this Hop To It block. Our quilting group just has one block left for this BOM.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by!❤

Delectable Mountain Mini Quilt

I finished a mini quilt wall hanging.

The pattern is Delectable Mountains from the book "Fat Quarter Quilting" by Lori Smith (click on the link to see all the patterns in the book, it is one of my favourite books).

Once all the pieces were cut (and labeled), it was such an lovely quilt to put together.

The only problem that I had was there are mistakes in the book, and I should have checked the corrections  page before I started (it is the second quilt that I have made from the book with mistakes - so I should have known better).

I decided to use a leftover piece of silk batting. I joined two pieces with the three-step zig-zag stitch on my machine.

I wanted to see how silk batting washed (before I wash my string quilt). Before washing the quilt was 20.5" x 16.5",

after it was 20" x 16". It shrunk about 2.5% (the package states that silk batting shrinks about 5%). I hand washed it in cool water and after spinning in the washing machine, I hung it outside on the clothesline.

Silk batting is lovely to quilt, and I like how it looks after washing.
I did continuous line quilting, feathers, and some straight line quilting (with the walking foot) for contrast. I used 100 WT thread (silk and Invisafil), because the pieces are so small I didn't want a heavy thread.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by!❤

Quilt and a Magazine

I finished this quilt last week, but forgot to show it.

It is a string quilt that I made when I was stash busting at Christmas. The blocks are 7",  and I paper pieced them. The quilt is 70" x 84". It has all kinds of fabric in it.

I quilted a very simple design (on my DSM) - meander in the blocks and a swirl design for the trellis (a design from Carla Barrett).

I tried silk batting for the first time on this quilt. Here it is next to the wool batting I usually use. It seems a bit stiffer than the wool, more like cotton, but it puffs nicely when quilted, like wool.
My son is using it as his summer quilt.

Last month I won a year subscription to Quilter's Connection magazine (a Canadian magazine), and my first issue arrived today (there are 4 issues a year). I won the subscription from Monika Kinner-Whallen (My Sweet Prairie) when she was celebrating her birthday (the day after my oldest son's birthday as it happens) and her 2nd blogaversary.
Monika is a very talented Canadian fibre artist - if you have never seen her blog be sure to check it out to see her incredible artwork and amazing photos. Thanks Monika!!

Monika's art is even featured in this issue of the magazine!

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!❤