The Letter M...all quilted

Well I am feeling good, I began this project on Friday night and finished it Saturday morning, and it has already been gifted to it's new owner...11 year old Mikela, who proudly showed me her two other purple cushions her Grandma had made her and her purple quilt! Nice to know the pillow is going to a quilt luvin' home!

Do you like the wonky checkerboard border? I started the cushion thinking I would put a string pieced border around the "M" but then realised I had cut all my pieces to big, and there would be too much waste.

So I decided to do a checkerboard with a "no maths" twist. First, I cut a whole bunch of rectangles 3x6" (I used scraps from my scrap box), then I pieced them together with the edges being mismatched. 

Sew together as many as you need for your borders. Be careful to alternate your fat and thin ends otherwise you could end up with a big snake shaped strip! (TIP: If you end up with a big snake you will need to unpick a seam or two and flip pieces around, otherwise you will lose too much of your border when you trim up).

When your strip is the right length, trim it up to be 5.5".

 Trim back your mismatched seams to a regular 1/4".Then slice the strip in half length ways.

And then mix up the halved strips so you have mix and match borders...no need to worry about matching the seams, in fact the more unmatched they are, the easier they are to sew together.

Sew the strips together and attach to your block, and trim to the right size.

That's all there is too it! If you found these instructions useful, or even confusing, please let me know...it's the first time I have written up a "how to" blog. 

The Letter M...

Time for some fun...my 10 year old daughter is off to a birthday party tomorrow for her best friend...so I volunteered to make a pillow for her bed. So of course you need to start with the letter "M", because that is the first letter of the birthday girls name!

Can you guess what Mikela's favourite colour is? Yes it's purple, and apparently her second favourite colour is blue!

So it's looking like it fits the purple/blue specification! I am off too quilt it now. I am going to use an Essex linen for the back of the pillow...does anyone know if it shrinks...just wondering if I should wash it?

Scandinavian Hearts

At last its started! My Scandinavian Christmas...since finishing my Sue Ross blocks, I have been busting to do something new. Seeing as I was spending so much time trapped on a plane I thought these little love hearts would be the perfect small project to take with me! There are 23 of these little blocks to do...and I got 9 done...I think I might have been distracted by the in flight movie!

I have previous blogged about this project here. I am still scared of all the stitchery! But I am liking how my needle turn straight stitch has turned out.

Happy stitching this week!

Fun with Becky

The books authored by Piece o' Cake quilters Becky Goldsmith and Linda Jenkins have always been a great source of inspiration for me, probably sewing the seeds to encourage me to take on the Sue Ross BOM.

Last year when I found out that Becky Goldsmith was coming to Australia I knew I had to go, along with Mum who needed no encouragement at all!

What a great two days we had in Sydney, hosted by Kathy from Material Obsession, the first day was all about needle turn appliqué and second was about piecing those great backgrounds that appear in the Piece o' Cake quilts.

My efforts from the needle turn appliqué day are very modest, but I enjoyed the variety of techniques I learnt.

The middle point is a bit wobbly... but I particularly liked the needle turn method using the running stitch...mainly because I am quicker at this then the traditional needle turn method with the "invisible" stitch! Any ideas what I should do with this little block? Bag? Mug rug?

What was great was, I was able to use these new skills on my Pot of Flowers block.

Doing this class was just the incentive I needed to start and finish this block...so motivated I even appliquéd both sides of the ric rac.

Crazy I know....in short if you ever get the opportunity to take a class with Becky, grab it with both hands. She is very professional and is generous at sharing her techniques and her creative approach to her projects.

Failing doing a class with Becky, pop over to the Piece o' Cake web site and check out these two videos: Applique with Attitude, and Points with Attitude, and when you are finished add Becky's blog to your favourites!

What sewing have you got happening this weekend? Me...I get to spend 8 hours on an airplane, to Melbourne on Saturday, back home on Sunday...so I guess I will get a lot of hand sewing done...maybe some needle turn applique!

12 x 12 Something from Nothing Mini Swap received

I am excited. I have received my 12x12 mini swap quilt...straight from the U.S.A . My swap partner is a "farm/country gal"...her words... the country charm comes through in the mini quilt she has sent me. I am luvin' the plaids!

Saska's blog is www.oklacookiemaker.blogspot.com

Sue Ross Block of the Month - Blocks done!

The last block is done! This is the block that was lost but now is found! I turned the house upside for six months looking for this...and I found it in a drawer in my daughter's room when I was doing a clean up at Easter...I suspect a male might be involved, because I wouldn't have put it there! But I have no proof so I will only voice my suspicious here!!

I had said in an earlier post that I had started this BOM at the start of 2010, and I have realised that is WRONG, it was actually the beginning of 2009 that I enrolled myself into the BOM program with Material Obession. Where has the time gone!

My aim with taking on this BOM was to get better at hand piecing and applique. The earlier blocks are a bit rough so I think I have improved. The other stretch with taking on this project was to use a different palette of colours.

This BOM lets you choose between a Pretty or Contemporary colour range, I decided to go with the more challenging (for me) colour palette of Contemporary. I have mosiac'd all of the blocks (using BigHugeLabs) to show off all of the blocks, and the different fabrics that were used.

1. Whirly Gig, 2. Radiating Star, 3. Blazing Sun, 4. Arrowhead, 5. Pot of Flowers, 6. Prickly Pear, 7. Queen of the May, 8. Carpenters Wheel, 9. Wheel

I have also added the photos into Flickr if you wanted to have a closer look. So what's next for this BOM. Each of the blocks has a strippy setting. I am not sure when I will get to do that as I have two quilts that need quilting for a local quilt exhibition at the beginning of August, but I am feeling very motivated at the moment to get this quilt top finished...so we will have to see.

Have a great weekend.

Home Sweet Home

I hope you all had a lovely Mother's Day...I spent the day fiddling around with scraps, piecing up some letters for the back of my sister house warming present.

It was quite fun to do, but very time consuming. I thought I would get the whole back pieced, but I only got this done!

Last week I also finished this block from my Sue Ross block of the month quilt, it has 60 pieces in it, and I hand stitched them all...yes this is my "stretch" project. Can't say another one of these blocks will be made by this quilter, but it has turned out to be very eye catching.

and I am half through my last block...I am pretty excited. Check here for a look at a finished version of the quilt.

Its a Wrap!

It's a wrap... for my self imposed UFO month. I am quite pleased with what I have completed. A king size quilt top done, two single bed quilts backs pieced and off to the quilters, binding done....and gifted!

Here's my jelly roll quilt from the Botanic range...

Mum did a good job on the binding...thanks Mum!

And she remembered to take photos for me before the quilt went my niece...that's hotel carpet you can see in the shot....never a moment wasted when you are a quilter....take quilts on holiday so you can finish the binding, taking hand stitching to hockey training or on an airplane...is this compulsive behaviour? I prefer to think of it as productive use of time...you know idle minds etc etc