Moore Patchwork & Quilting

Maple Leaf Dolly Quilt

Managed to get some sewing done on my Maple Leaf Dolly Quilt on the weekend - in fact it's almost finished!. That's one of the things that I like about making dolly quilts, they are really achievable and provide a break if I'm bogged down on a bigger project.

On Friday afternoon, I laid the finished blocks out on my work table in what I hoped was a nice arrangement, and left them over night so I could see them fresh first thing in the morning. I find this a good strategy when I'm putting together quilt blocks; it means that you get to look at it with 'fresh eyes' and any glaring mismatches seem to be more obvious. Besides that, when I'm trying to arrange quilt blocks I get to the point where I just seem to be moving blocks around over and over again. It's good to call a halt and start again the next day.

With the arrangement settled, I then looked through my stash for suitable sashing and border fabrics.

For the sashings, after auditioning lots of lighter fabrics I settled on a biege background with a small red print.

For the outside borders, I'm following Kathleen Tracey's lead in her pattern and just adding borders to the ends.  After tossing up between two black prints I settled on the one with the large pink flowers and cut these at 3.5".

The little tablerunner then seemed to come together really quickly. 

I found suitable backing fabric in my stash and then layered it for quilting.

I have a self-imposed 'rule' that for all my dolly quilts I have to do at least some hand quilting but with this one I'm planning to do only hand quilting - and of course it will be with my favourite Perle 8 thread.

I'm pleased with how it's looking so far.

 

Peace on Earth...

Another Christmas pattern that is now available in both printed and pdf formats on my website and as a pdf pattern in my Etsy store.

It's a small scrappy quilt (18.5" x 18.5") with Christmas stitcheries.

Until next time

Lyn

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Maple Leaf Dolly Quilt

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Maple Leaf Dolly Quilt

I haven't made a dolly quilt for a while and the other day I was feeling a bit distracted and needed a break from my stitching on The Word bom so I looked up Kathleen Tracey's blog to see what the small quilt of the month is.

This month it is Maple Leaf block and Kathleen gives suggestions for different layouts.

It seems funny working on an Autumn project when we are heading into Summer but I gathered together some browns, greens, and blacks and started planning what I would do.

I liked the idea of having different coloured 'leaves' rather than all the same and I also thought a small table runner would be better than a quilt. Kathleen has a sample of a tablerunner with eight blocks but I decided that I would make mine with six blocks and add 1" sashings between them.

I made one block to see how it would turn out and found it was very easy to make.  That gave me confidence and I made the others fairly quickly.

Now I just have to work out a layout and choose sashings and borders.

That's my plan for the weekend anyway.

Until next time

Lyn

 

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Another Noteworthy Floor mat

After the success of my first Noteworthy floor mat I was encouraged to start another one.

I wanted this one to be different and rather than do another applique design, I've chosen to make this one a quilt-as-you-go mat. I have to admit that my inspiration is from the book Quilting in No Time by Emma Hardy, which includes a pieced floor mat. In fact, my inspiration for making floor mats at all came from this book.

I've started cutting up the strips and to make it a bit more interesting, I'm cutting them different widths. This time I'm not using any of the pink/red fabric - simply because I don't have enough left - but am sticking to the yellow, orange, blue and green.

I'm making this one the same size as the other - 20" x 28" - and have cut the batting at this measurement.

I've also joined together some of the left over fat-eighths to make the backing.

Almost ready to start sewing.

Craft Fair...

Yesterday I went to the Quilt and Craft Fair. It's the first time I've been for at least 3 years and was really surprised how busy it was. It was actually quite difficult to walk around but I enjoyed seeing what was on offer. I especially enjoyed the quilts - there were some spectacular ones there including a handpieced dresden plate quilt which won the Best in the Show. It certainly deserved it.

I was pleased to see Natalie Bird's new book In My Garden and the quilt from the book is really lovely. It's not as 'blue' as the photo on the cover of the book but a much more subtle colour. I've always loved her designs and this book doesn't disappoint. I also bought a charm pack of the new range from Sweetwater called Wishes. Not sure what I will make with it but loved the colours and prints.  I found out that an online yarn store called Glorious Yarn is about to open a shop front in a suburb close to me. Very happy to hear that.

I wasn't sure if I would go to the fair but at the end of the day I was really glad I made the effort.

Until next time

Lyn

 

 

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Noteworthy Floormats

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Noteworthy Floormats

Now that my Makeshift Garden quilt is nestled nicely on my sofa, I've turned my attention to my next project - floormats from Sweetwater's Noteworthy fabric. As you can see from my basket - I have quite a lot!

I plan to make at least two mats but am hoping that I will have enough fabric to make three.

I'm going to make them all the same size - 20" x 28". That's the size of the floormats I made previously and have found it to be just right for my purposes.

If you are planning to make a floor mat and are not sure what size to make it, do what I did - put a teatowel on the floor and decide if it was too big or too small. In my case, it turned out to be just right.

The first mat I'm making is applique.  For the background, I joined together 4 different grey fabrics and for the applique shapes, I used the designs from my Afternoon Tea pattern which I enlarged slightly. I fused the shapes onto the background with Vliesofix.

I'm now going to layer the mat in the same way I would a quilt with a backing pieced from left over fabric, and cotton batting. I'm then going to machine stitch around each of the applique shapes through all layers. This stitching doubles as the quilting.

I will then bind it - I'll show you that next time.

So far I really like the way it looks. Should really brighten up the floor!

Until next time

Lyn

 

 

 

 

 

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Makeshift Garden and W for Wasted

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Makeshift Garden

I'm pleased to say that I managed to find some time to do some sewing this week after all and quilted the Makeshift Garden quilt. I quilted in the ditch of the seams around each block and had originally thought of adding some buttons as well but because this quilt will end up on our sofa, I decided against it. Nothing worse than having a button in the middle of your back!

My attention then turned to the binding. When I added the borders, I really liked the way the darker fabric framed the coloured blocks. I wanted to carry this onto the binding but unfortunately I didn't have enough of the brown stripe to bind the whole quilt. In fact I didn't have a lot of any of the fabric left but I did have enough bits and pieces which could be sewn together for a scrappy binding. I only used the darker of the fabrics including the blacks and browns, the darker green and the purple. I cut the binding at 2 1/4" and doubled it over.  Sewing it down will be my long weekend project.

I forgot to mention the other day that for the backing, I pieced together a couple of fat quarters from my stash. I chose fabrics that I know I won't be using anywhere else and that fit in with the colours in the quilt top.

Now that this project is under control, I'm starting to think about the next one. I'm thinking I need some more floor mats. Will let the idea rattle around in my head while I'm watching the NRL Grand Final. Can't believe that footy season is almost over.

Until next time

Lyn

 

 

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Makeshift Garden and Fabric Club

Makeshift Garden

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Makeshift Garden and Fabric Club

My Makeshift Garden quilt is now all pieced and backed ready for quilting.

I actually had it all put together on Friday but have left it sitting near my machine all weekend as I tried to work out the best way to quilt it. My choices were to do my usual all over stipple or quilt in the seams of the blocks.

Every time I walked past it I tried to imagine which would look better when yesterday afternoon I decided that quilting in the seams between the blocks would be better. I'm also planning to quilt around each of the floral designs just to make them stand out a bit more.

I will quilt it entirely by machine with a grey thread. Hopefully I will get time later in the week to start on it. I'm quite keen now that it's almost finished.

Threadbear Quilters....

I received another instalment from my fabric club with Threadbear Quilters.

There's quite a mix this time. I especially like the purple print in front adn the shirting fabrics (the light prints) - all very useful.

I'm starting to accummulate quite a pile again so will have to start a project to use them up. It's a nice place to be.

Until next time

Lyn

 

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Makeshift Garden

Makeshift Garden

I managed to join all of the blocks of my Makeshift Garden quilt together and I'm pleased with how it seems to be coming together.

I wasn't sure if I would have enough fabric for the border but was pleasantly surprised to find a fat quarter of a brown stripe fabric which was perfect for a 1" inside border. I think the brown will frame the blocks perfectly.

The outside border proved to be a bit more difficult  because I only had smallish pieces of the other fabrics left over.  Because there are so many 2.5" squares in the blocks, I wasn't  keen to use them for the border as well.  I thought it might look a bit 'busy'. But after much thought, I was able to cut  3" wide pieces in varying lengths and even though they look really scrappy they don't take away from the blocks in the centre. I'm also adding corner blocks in the border from the brown floral fabric (on the left). Fingers crossed it will 'good'.

New Crewel....

Before we went away I saw this book New Crewel Motif Collection by Katherine Shaughnessy reviewed in a magazine. I've never tried crewel embroidery and I thought this book might be a good place to start.

The book includes general instructions like needle selection and the type of wool used and more detailed instructions on stitches used. The motifs are beautiful and their are suggestions on how to use them. The book comes with a CD of the motifs so you can upload them onto your computer and change the sizes of the motifs, print them out and then transfer them onto your fabric.

I'm looking forward to giving it a go!

Until next time

Lyn

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Makeshift Garden

Makeshift Garden

I still have quite a bit of Anni Downs' Love to Garden fabric left after making my Flyaway project and I wasn't sure what to do with it.  I had originally thought that I would make a new design with it but my mind was blank so I then thought a quilt would be nice.

Over the weekend I took it all out of its hiding place to see exactly how much is left. Among the pieces is a fat quarter of a panel that has a variety of garden images on it. The images are in 3 different sizes and not wanting to waste them I decided to cut around each one and fuse it to a background square.  I will then blanket stitch applique around each shape.

After that I'm not sure what I will do with them - but it's a good starting point.

Because it's a garden theme and I'm making it up as I go along; I'm going to call it 'My Makeshift Garden'.

Ready to applique...

The weekend was spent busily cutting out and fusing the shapes and now they are ready to blanket stitch applique (by hand). 

I'm planning to use Perle 8 thread in blue, green and purple.

Fingers crossed it will turn out a winner.

Until next time

Lyn

 

 

S is for Sewing

I have finished yet another of my little Alphabet Girls. This time it's S for Sewing.

This little girl has been stitched on blue Aida - although it looks a bit grey on my computer!

I'm making slow but steady progress and trying not to think about how many more there are to do but just enjoy stitching each one.

I'm again jumping around the alphabet for the next one and stitching G for Geese on pink Aida.

We've been watching the Ashes Test (cricket) and last night when Australia was batting I gave up and went to bed and left Robin watching alone.  It seemed like we were heading for a wipe out but then the new guy - Ashton Agar - really dug in and produced 98 batting at number 11 which means that we finished the first innings in the lead!  Oh me of little faith!

Until next time

Lyn

 

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Family Blessings - Home

Another block from my newsletter quilt Family Blessings (see the right hand side bar for details) is Home.

What do you think of when you see the word 'home'? To me 'home' is a place that is warm and welcoming; where I don't have to pretend to be anyone other than myself; where I am loved uncondtionally; and where I feel safe.

That's what Jesus was referring to in Matthew 11:28 when he said "Come to me, all who are weary and heavy burdened and I will give you rest."

Life can be tiring - lots of things that we carry around in our hearts and minds really weigh us down. Things like guilt, rejection and all sorts of hurts.

When we put our faith in Jesus he takes these things away and we enter into his rest where we receive unconditional love, acceptance, forgiveness... sounds like home!

Except the home that Jesus has for us is for eternity.

Until next time

Lyn

 

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