I fell in love.....

.....with this gorgeous quilt, from the current issue (107) of Quiltmania.....

It is called 'Brinton Hall', and the minute I saw it, it really was one of those 'I love that so much' breathtaking moments, and I do just adore it - but, sadly, let's be honest here LOL, at the rate I sew it would probably take me about 15 years to make it..... 

It is going to be published in 2 parts, so I am anxiously awaiting the next issue.

Nevertheless, as much as I love it, I decided I absolutely could not start it until I had finished a few other things first, and given my sewing stuff a good sort and tidy.....

.....only to find myself on Friday saying to my lovely friend Gabbie, hey, let's do THIS quilt together..... *insert rolling eyes*.....

Gabbie was at my house on Friday, and while we were looking at some things on pinterest, she saw this Kim Diehl quilt and loved it, and I remembered the pattern had come out in one of the American quilt magazines some time ago, which I just happened to have....  I dug it out to give to her, and of course, as all good friends do, I offered to join her!

As it happens, I have been looking at Kim Diehl quilts a lot just recently and had literally just the day before started a 'Kim Diehl' board on pinterest.  I love her designs, but I really love how she uses colour, and puts colours together.  

So it kind of felt a bit 'meant to be'..... particularly when Gabbie realised she had the same magazine
at home too! 

I think we will break it down into sections and do a bit each month, a bit like a block of the month, so hopefully there is a good chance it will get done.....

In the meantime, I have started playing with the layout of my hexie blocks, and I am having fun.....

xx

FNSI, a catch up, and sewing frustrations.....

I still don't seem to have been able to get into the practice of blogging regularly, as I had planned to do.....

Anyway, here is a sort of catch up, as most of the sewing that has been happening here has been 
Secret Sewing.  There has been this.....

my parcels sent off for Chez's Christmas in July swap.....

and this.....started on Friday night during one of my favourite nights of the month, FNSI, hosted by Wendy

...the beginnings of a gift I am making for a friend, from French General fabrics.  I had hoped to finish this and get it off in the mail this week, however......

VERY frustratingly, both my sewing machine and I have sustained Sewing Injuries..... (a half-hearted lol...)

I seem to have wrecked my thumb, possibly caused by too much hand sewing and hand quilting in too short a time, which is making hand sewing and generally just trying to grip things very difficult and painful.... 
and yesterday I managed to damage my sewing machine too.....

I was on the very last block of 16, the previous 15 having worked perfectly, doing some machine applique, and was having some difficulty in getting my bottom thread to come through to the top.  I think I must have been a bit over-zealous in pulling on the top thread to pop the bottom thread through..... I'm not really sure how it happened, but the needle, going down, hit the plate, bent and broke, and now the whole needle mechanism seems to have been thrown out of alignment, as when I now put the needle down it either hits the foot or the plate.  

With a new needle in, some gentle wiggling and nudging took place, and then a bit more forceful pushing and pulling... some swearing may have been involved....  but it seems we are both now pretty much out of action sewing-wise.

I am so frustrated, as I had a list of things I wanted to get finished this month, and was doing well with them.  So I guess I will resort to preparing projects as much as I am able, and a bit of tidying up and reorganising my sewing stuff will not go astray - and thank goodness I don't currently have any urgent deadlines to meet!

I am missing my sewing though.....

a bit of randomness.....

I need to delete some photos off my camera, so today as I was going through them, I found quite a few to share that had not been on my blog previously -

fun Halloween decorations last year, outside my favourite house in Gisborne (not mine, sadly!)

an amazing and beautiful sunset

 the beach at St Leonards - on holidays with Sue

 flower mini I made last year and sent to Maria, in Cheryll's swap

a get together of blogging and sewing friends in April - much hilarity was the order of the day

 taken on the same day with a few of us ladies from the Mill Rosies group

my gorgeous nephew playing basketball -

just about my most favourite activity for the week is to watch his basketball games

my gorgeous boy

you may not know that Ollie also comes to work with me... in his basket next to my desk at work and looking very handsome, having just been to the groomer

my sister's and niece's gorgeous dog Scout... she has the most beautiful and affectionate nature

a delicious lunch last weekend.... home made vegie soup and a cheesy toastie on a cold day

  

 ... and some delicious afternoon tea, a homemade banana cake just out of the oven...

being the nature geek I am, I loved this beautiful lichen on a tree at work

xx

YAY! Photos now included......

No, I didn't find my camera cord..... It did occur to me, when I couldn't find it, to see if my computer had a slot for a memory card, and it doesn't, but in being so focused on and frustrated about the missing cord, I had completely forgotten that my little tablet DOES.  It took a gentle suggestion from Peg - thank you, Peg! - about checking for a memory card slot to prompt me to remember the tablet!  I'm a goose!!

So, firstly, my Easter mini swaps...  I sent this little Easter mini to Simone ~

of course, a bunny needs a little, fluffy tail ~

and this is the cute little mini I received from Maria ~

isn't he a cute little bunny ~

and Maria even hunted out some gorgeously pretty Easter egg fabric for the border ~

I feel so much better now that I have been able to show my Easter minis, sent and received!  Thank you Maria, and thank you to our amazing Swap Mama Cheryll.

  

The evening of Good Friday was FNSI, and I did some sewing on my Underground Railroad quilt blocks.  Since I had changed my colours, I needed to remake the first block.  The second block had come out too small and needed to be fixed, and I finally I needed to make the fourth block.  Results are as under - block 4 is still a work in progress ~

I am really happy with how my blocks are turning out.

Thank you to Wendy for hosting another fun FNSI.

Finallly, I had a couple of lovely gatherings with friends over the last week - but I think I will now save that for a blog post tomorrow!

xx

Hello again!

Just a quick catch up on a few of the things that were made while I was not blogging.

The ones below were for swaps, gifts and raffle prizes ~

My quilt, made in a Round Robin with a few lovely quilty friends.

This quilt is HUGE ~

...and the two below were for a mini quilt challenge in our Wednesday night group (the little heart quilt is actually about a quarter of the size of the mini log cabin quilt ~ more of a mug rug really lol)~

Back soon!

Ollie & T xxx

m.i.a.

Yep, I seem to have been missing in action. Not really sure why, only that sometimes life kind of just.... happens. A few things have been worked on -

the cushion for my niece now finished (and she loved it) -

a few more of the windmill blocks -

a new scrap quilt in pinks and greens, just cut into simple squares -

the centre medallion block for the Round Robin challenge -

and some more of my crochet blanket -

I have also been working on an Irish Chain style of quilt, done in mostly William Morris fabrics.  Looking forward to posting piccies of that soon.

'working on' wednesday {4}.....aka 'sunday mini-challenge' {1}

On Sundays at the quilt shop, I work with the lovely Ms Kylie who (along with the lovely Miss Amanda on Saturdays), makes this job so much fun. While Kylie and I were chatting last weekend about sewing in general and fabric we liked for bags in particular, she mentioned a cute and easy bag pattern that she had, and asked if I would like to make one too. As I said I would love to, she came up with the idea of us both making one by the next Sunday; and thus, our 'Sunday Mini-Challenge' was created!

So, here is our bag pattern ::



In this instance we are both using the same fabric, as with the size of material we needed, it was more economical to buy one piece each of the outside and the lining, and cut them in half. We both love this material, so we don't mind it being the same. This is from the gorgeous 'Etchings' range by 3 Sisters for Moda, which we have all been in raptures about in the shop.



The blue print, which is a map of Paris, is for the outside, and the cream cursive script material is the lining.

As this week has all of a sudden become much busier than expected, I had better get my skates on and start making it - it would be rather embarassing to fail on our very first challenge!!

And now it is my turn to pick next week's challenge. Perhaps a cute little pincushion? Or a gorgeous little brooch? Maybe even a little Christmassy something?? We shall see next Sunday!

In the meantime, some progress has been made on my previous 'working on' Wednesday projects - a few more rows of my crocheted blankie done, and another block finished for my applique project.





My little knitted bag is now sewn up and ready to be lined. Kylie asked me what book this pattern came from, so I have included a photo, and the photos in the book of this little bag.



Hopefully there will be some more ta-dahs to show you next week - including my 'Sunday Mini-Challenge' bag!

'working on' wednesday {2}

Hello, and welcome to my second 'working on' wednesday post! Today, a little bit of applique.

I saw this pattern in the shop where I work and loved it.



As you can see below, I have been blanket stitching my applique. I would so love to be good at needleturn applique, and always say I will practice on the next block, but then I worry that if I try to needleturn it all, it will never get finished! So, blanket stitch it is, at least for this project.

I have had four blocks that have been finished for a little while now, and I am hoping to start a fifth one this week - maybe the one with the cute little house.


So, with any luck there will be another block to show you before too long!


These blocks are only 7" to start with, and so don't take too long to get through, although the one with all the leaves did take a little longer.


The great thing with small applique projects like this is that you can use up lots of little scraps that might otherwise get thrown away, and I HATE throwing fabric away unless it's so small it isn't useful for anything.


I do love a lot of the Lori Smith patterns. I have one pattern pack which is for nine small quilts all done in pink, cream and brown - 'Cherries, Chocolate and Cream' - and now that I have a nice little collection of pink and brown fabrics, some of these little quilts may be 'on the menu' before too long too.