Stitching News

Sporty Sue has been preparing these applique Dog blocks over the weeks with the intention of making a set of individual wall hangings... In a moment of inspiration last week... she decided to add Attic Window sashing to make one larger wall hanging... It's going to be called 'How much is that doggie in the window?'

Sally Snow has finished her Big Stitch hand quilting so it was time to trim those crusts off and make the binding... Sally is very pleased with her handy work, and rightly so... after that it was time for the Hand stitching of the binding... with jolly chatter... what a lovely way to spend a Friday afternoon...

Beryl finished her Quick Table Topper... the first one at least... It's been a bit of a learning curve for Beryl and she decided she would make another to check she has remembered it all... So toot toot toot for this fabulous finish.. and...

Here's Beryl's second Quick Table Topper, this one made with lovely Tilda fabrics. Beryl was making her quilt sandwich... and it was at that point she realised why we must not 'iron' and 'wiggle'... we must press!!! but it is amazing how a little careful pinning can help.

Sew Simple Saturday... many people ask me to schedule these days on Saturdays so they get to have a mini quilt retreat... Sewing all day and pleasing their very own selves. I will try to schedule at least one per month for a while, to see how they go. Susan arrived at 10am with this pre-cut pack of squares....

and went home at 4pm with... not only this finished quilt top... she had space to make a sandwich too so, for homework... the quilting will be done... by next weekend she declared!!! we will see.

Chocolate Sarah usually draws lines for her quarter inch seams and uses lots of pins... nothing wrong with that, nothing at all... but, During her Saturday... she braved using the quarter inch foot without drawing lines and found it ever so much faster.., she too went home with a quilt sandwich

The next Sew Simple Saturday falls on Saturday June 17th. A day to bring your own project to work on for a whole, luxurious, almost uninterrupted day... and help is on hand, should you need a little advice.

Stitching News

Annbacan started a new project after being inspired by a quilt hanging on my classroom wall. Of course Ann is changing it size wise to fit her very own needs... we continue to encourage PMS!! (Pleasing My Self) It's a pattern from an old magazine.

Naughty Norma is also making the wall hanging.. She loves bright colours!!
So, a little bit more PMS here,... and they are bright, aren't they!!
It looks really good with that lovely quilt in the background!!!

Thought you might like to see the inspirational wall hanging I mentioned.
I made this quilt in September 2009

Just Edna's lovely quilt sandwich... cute and ready to be quilted.
Edna likes to use 505 spray to baste her smaller projects.

And this is Edna's fabulous and finished quilt ...
All ready for a toot toot toot fanfare!!
Just lovely... Edna must be having an outbreak of babies!

Jean Bean spied the opportunity to make up a quick quilt sandwich...
What a fabulous idea to put floating blocks in the border like that!!!
I will definitely use that idea in the future...

Judy is making a tray quilt so we came up with a plan.
She had never made flying geese units.
This Sawtooth Star needed four of them in total...
Perfect for the No Waste Flying Geese method.

Hiddens Wells Progress

We had another wonderful Sunday Sew In... A Patchwork Party with Cake and Quilting. This time the secret location was Abbots Bromley Village Hall... lovely, large and very stable tables, great facilities and lighting with plentiful parking... best of all there was a person to put up, and put away, all the tables and chairs so we will most definitely be booking another day there.
I was so engrossed in my stitching that I forgot to take pictures but...

When I got home (well... after unloading the vehicle and feeding the hungry) I spent a further hour in Quilty Quarters just to finish the task I had set for my day. All of the units now have 4 squares joined with a big kiss/cross in the middle

I'm on the home straight from here as the blocks are already up to 12".
I pin very carefully as I want all the stripes meeting as perfectly as possible.
I am still extremely happy with my colour and fabric choices
Bright and happy!!

While you are here...
I will just let you know that we are opening as normal next week. We will be closed ONLY for Bank Holiday Monday but the rest of the week will be shop and classes as normal... there are too many Bank Holidays too close together this year.
And for the next Bank Holiday weekend we will be closed for extra days!!! Just slipping that in Boom... It will be our Annual Quilt Retreat weekend at Westhope!!!!!! wooooooooooooooohooooo

Sandwich Saturday, On A Thursday?

Yes... One of the great things about having my very own shop is that I can please my very own self what I do... As there wasn't a class on Thursday and PM Pam needed to make a quilt sandwich I decided to have a Sandwich Saturday to help Pam... she made two quilt sandwiches and eventually went home with plenty to be stitching... Do I offer wonderful customer service? Oh yes indeedy.
The trouble came when lots of other customers thought it was a Manic Monday (and my goodness do we have some Manic Mondays!) and they all came shopping on the very same day!... It's my very own fault for saying, out loud " Oh we won't be busy Pam... come on over and we'll make your sandwiches" ha!! but all was good in the end...
Here are the two quilt sandwiches Pam made... very different, in fact, from one extreme to the other in the colour department.

Quilty Quarters

So that was it... the 'long holiday weekend' is over and today my lovely, inspiring and very well stocked Patchwork And Quilting shop is open as normal... well... when I say normal... there are no classes, like a half term school break!
Oh yes, there have been complaints, folk don't like missing their weekly fix of fun... but I've grown a tough skin over the years of Bank Holidays.

I have rather indulged myself with a few uninterrupted, long days in Quilt Quarters... What really started off as a very small project to use up a few triangles, and I do mean small as I had ideas of a large floor cushion, has turned into this! 

The original blocks, all 12 of them 12" finished... already way beyond the possible cushion size, were making a rather small quilt, 36" x 48"... I might have mentioned the possibility of maybe sashing the blocks in an earlier post? 

I did sash them, with the remaining, left over Tri-Recs triangle units and more that I cut to finish the job... which, by the way, created even more scraps for that half full drawer! 

The sashing bits created a secondary pattern... I love a secondary pattern.. especially when it just 'happens', so...

I thought about it and decided I probably needed to choose a light-ish neutral for the background then there would be pale stars too... that would be great... Grey-ish neutrals or beige-y cream-y??? hmmmmm...

I rooted and rummaged (and unearthed a spider or two... agggggrrrr! They are in the garden now!) 

Hot pink and orange and bright yellow and blue? Boom!!!... All from my Alison Glass selection ... They are my neutrals ... HA HA HA Oh my goodness do I ever love this project now!!!

When it's finished and needing a label, I will have to call it something to do with My Molly, bless her... Molly's Magic maybe... I probably wouldn't have started this if she was still with us... I'll ponder that one.

Right... deliveries are coming today so I better crack on, take this holiday hat off and get back to work... That would be choosing fabrics and cutting them up for lovely projects... did I say work?

Quilty Quarters

Another productive day in Quilty Quarters yesterday, at least I thought it was until I went in there this morning to review it... I thought I had done so much more! But I did have a lovely day consumed in cutting up colour and fabric choosing... very good for ones peace of mind me thinks...

I was wanting to make a quick! Small! project just to use up project leftovers.
I have 12 x 12" blocks ready to sew and Still have these blooming triangles left... and more out of the picture.

I had culled the scrap bucket down to a minimum... I did that on day one... but now it is half full again... not half empty... HALF FULL! how can that be called progress? and most of all... do I care? No... there's a Crumbs and Mile-A-Minute workshop coming up in June at my lovely shop... I will take the scraps there to be used up... a fabulous and cunning plan. 

So, all the elements for 12 blocks are cut out and ready to be sewn into units then stitched together but... I might add some other elements in between the blocks as it will only measure 36 inches wide and 48 inches long if I don't... more planning, more thinking, more fun!!! More fabric choosing, more cutting... more scraps!!!

Quilty Quarters

I love a long Bank Holiday weekend, don't you?
My very own, very well stocked and quite inspiring, quilt shop is closed to give me chance to rest and do things... like sewing!!! ha ha ha
After a very early start to the first day, yesterday, I  cracked on and had a short burst of energy in the domestic 'must be done' department followed by... well, actually...
I went to get ready to go to my very own shop to do a bit more of the dreaded stock taking. but, a quite incidental, sideways glance into Quilty Quarters occurred and I suddenly thought... "Sod it I'm going in!", forgive the language, but honesty happens!
So... I did, I went in.
The magnetic power sucked my 'should be doing' and turned it into 'want to do!!'
Lots of things had been 'dumped' on the floor and on every surface for one reason and another... Most of all the Uttoxeter Quilt Show... There was all the frantic finishing of quilts, adding hanging sleeves and the sorting of labels... I didn't tidy as I worked... there was no time, or desire, to do that.
Then there was the Crumbs and Mile A Minute demo. booth stuff piled... and the SPQ stand stuff and quilts to give to the people from the stand display... anyway eventually I put all the 'stuff' in the right/a good/better place... and vacuumed!! and dusted!! It looked fabulous...
All that done I tackled the mending pile... some things had been on that pile for more than 3 years!!! I set to and mended everything, well almost... 2 jobs involved buttons so they are still there, ha! Next up was the quilt finishing pile...

This quilt just needed the binding sewing on so I did that, it needed Faux Piped Binding so it took a little while but I was watching/listening to The Quilt Show at the very same time, I love watching the older programmes... so much has changed in the quilting world! This little quilt is made mostly from left overs of other projects... made just to show that lot's of our left overs can make fun quilts. The frog fabric was trimmings from a quilt backing. The bright green is left from me making a Beatrice Pinafore. The borders are left over fabrics, carefully saved, as I do. The orange fabric is some faulty fabric that lots of us purchased ages ago. The fish fabric is also left over bits.. I had fussy cut the fabric for a quilt I made, which left the little bits.
Toot toot toot for a small but fabulous and finished quilt... 

I made this little quilt a while ago to show what you could do with an uneven striped fabric. Which turned into a workshop for the Hidden Wells projects that are ongoing in my shop... there's also one ongoing in quilty quarters. So, yesterday I finished sewing the binding on this quilt...not a big job, 20 minutes and it was done, so that's another... small but fabulous and finished quilt ... toot toot toot.

I made this rather dramatic quilt in June 2009, it has a label telling me so.
It was the very last quilt I made living in Portugal and I was extremely unhappy when I made it, I didn't want to leave Portugal. Anyway... enough of my whining, it's called "Sunshine On A Rainy Day, Time to leave Portugal" I've been in England for almost 8 years now, I am finally over that sadness, I lie to you.
Yesterday, I stitched on a hanging sleeve and hung it up!
Only 8 years after completion... ha ha ha

After all that quilt finishing, I remained in Quilty Quarters.
I sorted out the overflowing scrap bucket...basically just put it all back into the big bottom draw sticking out there. On the cutting table there was another basket with even more of the fabric strips left over from doing the Jan Hassard workshop. I have already made 4 further quilts using the strips by cutting them up with my 60 degree Triangle ruler... I had cut way too many... so, I laid out my Clover design floor! I no longer have our Molly to worry about so I can do that (sad, but true) and embarked on 60 degree triangle quilt number 5... I laid it all out and thought...
"Yes, that's OK... but I don't want to make another 60 degree quilt!"
What to do... I eventually found inspiration or something and got out my Tri Recs rulers... I trimmed all 60 degree triangles and the rest of the strip sets to the big Tri template and then some other scraps of possible background-ish fabric to the little Recs ruler... then, I decided that I liked doing that so I emptied out the scrap bucket/drawer again and started to cut other fabric scraps with the Tri Recs... Oh the creativity flowed... but then... where did all the time go? When I looked up it was dark, I was hungry and thirsty and it was Pajardie time...
This picture was taken this morning... this is how I left Quilty Quarters after my 'stocktaking, not! day' I'm going in there again now!!! woooohoooo

Stitching News

Princess Jackie made this adorable Easter Bunnies wall hanging ... Click here to get the free pattern It's perfect for the upcoming Bank Holiday long weekend. ... Toot toot toot Jackie, fabulous and finished with a lovely wire and dowel hanging doodad to finish it off perfectly. 

New Sue started another block on her latest applique project...
I forget which flowers these are but Sue had expert fabric and colour choosing help and advice from our resident (she comes a lot) botanist, Jean Bean.

Gail suggested that you might well be fed up of seeing her blocks... I assured her that showing a true timeline of progress will be comforting to many of you! This is a huge project with many blocks so it's bound to take a while... especially when you move home twice during the process!

Rose thought this picture would look messy and scrunched up... She was quite correct... it's a work of art in progress and this unstaged photograph will look very familiar to many of you... love it or loath it... the quilting has to be done.

And to finish for today, a toot toot toot fanfare is required for new Sue's fabulous and finished quilt... it's a large one so Sue decided to do simple quilting... especially as the recipient was waiting to be wrapped up in it!

It's been a very busy time in my world but now things might start to calm down a tad. The quilting and stitching show at Uttoxeter is all done and dusted until next year... though planning is already a fun subject in classes... so many promises of quilt entries for 2018.
It's very early on Good Friday as I write this and we are starting a long holiday weekend. Today is Friday Quilt Club, as usual and my shop is open as normal.
Tomorrow, Saturday 16th April, my shop is closed until Thursday 20th... but you can take a virtual tour of my wonderful little shop... I hope you noticed the new feature!! I would love to know what you think... I think it is such a clever thing... to walk around my shop and classroom from your very own home!
My plans for the Easter break? well, Once the dreaded stock taking has been done, I have a plan to stitch... If that happens I will probably post pictures for you... there's a lot of fabric and stuff to count though... 1 2 3 4 5 6 7... 1 2 3 4 5... 1 2 3 4 5 6 7...1 2 3... 1 2 3 4

Just To Say Thank You

I would very much like to thank PM Pam, Our Sheila, Christabelle and Fran Cupcake for all the help demonstrating how we make beautiful blocks from scraps...
Those little bits of fabric that a lot of us might have thrown away.
We met such a lot of lovely people and most said they would have a go at making their very own blocks too.Our mission accomplished.
I think PM Pam has a new Fan Club!!!
Thank You ladies xx

Between us all, we made enough blocks in the three days for Pam to produce another quilt... Just a private thought Pam... Might you enter it in the quilt competition next year? I bet your fans would love that!!

My 5 In Uttoxeter Quilt Show

Strippy Trippy Batik Beauty

I hope you look closely at this picture!!!!

Dazzling Diamonds 

Hexagon Strippy

Take Two Strips

Hexagons From A Jelly Roll

We're Ready...

Our Crumbs and Mile -A-Minute demonstration booth is ready for the three days at Uttoxeter Quilt Show. Do pop over and say hello to My very good self or PM Pam or any of the other wonderful volunteers who were talked into helping me!!

Sandwiches And Beginner Cushions

There's no time.... I am setting up at Uttoxeter Quilt Show... Here's a few Sandwich pictures... there is a story with them... I'll fill it in later

4 new quilters have been created too... hence the cushions....

Catch you later!!

I Finished!!!

Next weekend, in these here parts, we have the Traplet British Stitch Village event... the one we call Uttoxeter Quilt Show... because it used to be a Quilt Show. Any way, last year I was disappointed with the amount of quilts on display, my own personal opinion of course... The only way to keep a quilt show is to have quilts entered... you know the saying "Use It Or Lose It" so... I declared that I would enter 5 quilts, in hopes that other people might feel the urge or feel obliged... to enter at least one quilt or project! Talk about taking it to the wire!!! I just now, at almost 6pm on Sunday evening... finished quilting and binding the last of my 5 quilts, labels are stitched on, hanging sleeves made and stitched in place... I'm good to go!