My Mum (Gwynneth) finished her quilt. When I was helping her choose the fabrics she wasn't too sure they would work, she liked all of them individually, but could not see them playing nicely together in a quilt... well, she quite likes it now and is going to call it " Who Would Have Thought", it's a pattern from a magazine... I'm sorry, I can't remember which one now If I find it I'll update the post.... click on the picture and you'll see she quilted with big circles... she says they're crop circles....
The back... fabulous! The pinwheels are made from the triangles that Mum cut off whilst mitre-ing the borders strips and left overs from the setting triangles. The background of the pinwheels is a left over piece, more fan fabric was purchased to make it up to a good size. Another double sided winner? I think so...
Next on the agenda is this, red and cream. This, in my block book, is called the Kayak block, Mum has had her eye on it for a while as she loves the secondary design that happens once the blocks are pieced together. The bigger triangles are cut using a template so that adds a little fiddly element, nothing too taxing though... lets see how she gets on with it.
Ruth finished her blocks, woooohoooo! She trimmed then all up, (I mean she trimmed them all down don't I?) to be 8" each, which took quite a while as there are 48 of them... then she started the process of adding the black, 1" sashing strips and joining the centre sections which need 4 blocks for each bit...
Here, Maid Marion is giving herself a few guide marks, she's doing the quilting free hand but it does help to have a few marks to aim for to help get the curves even... we were doing points and bellies... you'll see what they are next time Marion comes to play.
These are the back and front pieces for Arty Janet 's cushion... a clever idea really.. if your cushion has two wonderful designs on both sides, you'll never have to worry that your cushions are the wrong way round... I had never thought of it that way.... these will be made into sandwiches and quilted. There will be a zip needed..... oooooer...
Foxy Margaret added the final borders to her quilt top, with corner stones which looked great. She then had to piece her backing fabrics with 3 seams and she's ready to make a sandwich next week. She's going to make a scrappy quilt for her next project... a multi fabric quilt if you like, he he he
My Mum (Gwynneth) treated herself to a pack of these binding clips from the Table Top Shop,... used something VERY similar in my hair at school a loooooong time ago... These clips are extreeeemely useful.... when the binding is pinned in place ready for hand stitching, the whole thing has similarities to that of the very prickly Porcupine... and I have had some nasty scratches in some rather feminine places, (bet you know what I mean... he he he) from the pins in binding... They're great for holding sets of blocks together too, and strips and piles of triangles.. all kinds of little fabric piles... like I said..... they're very, very useful!
Irene has finished the main part of her quilt. She trimmed all the edges, just to tidy it up by taking off the dog ears and little pieces of excess thread really, then she added the blue floral fabric for the inner border and prepared for the large red floral 6" border that will follow... looking good eh!
Karen added her final borders and corner stones, prepared a backing fabric and was able to make her first ever sandwich... now she knows why a quilter will need painter's masking tape... twas a mystery you see... Karen and Arty Janet will be purchasing walking feet this weekend, ready for a little "Ditch Hoping".
Wendy spent the best part of the day doing wonderful free motion quilting on her Kaleidoscope quilt. She's made a lovely job of it and even tied off all the ends as she made them.. well... there aren't so many with an all over design really... she then trimmed it up and proudly announced that she would be finishing the quilt this very same day... she has such a list of 'Gotta make it' quilts.... do you?
Dotty Maureen, I know you're not going to believe me... has started, yet another, project. She got a little confused trying to work out the order of the strips, Gilly was summoned to help out and the two of them eventually had it sorted.
This is the pattern in one of Dotty's many books.... it looks very similar to the Convergence quilts in a book I have at home.... Dotty wasn't too inspired whilst making the strata... "just a lot of long, straight lines" she said... oh but it will all be worth it.... I think the book is called Quilts For Men?We meet again Friday 18th March, (that's tomorrow if you're reading this today! ha ha ha) 10 am t0 3pm, Kettle Corner will be happy to have you pop in for a cuppa... should you find time to come shopping in the Table Top Shop, wadding on the side.
We love our Quilt Cave! We have lots of big, sturdy tables to spread out on with our machines and cutting equipment, and, of course... all the other stuff we might possibly need. We can make all sizes of sandwiches without need to sprawl across the floor. We have great light, lovely loos, a fabulous kitchen too. All this, every Wednesday and Friday, mixed with lovely, fun ladies makes for a most wonderful atmosphere, and a great retreat day out... ahhhhh the little pleasures in life......
Show & Tell.... A short while ago, Arty Beryl made Log Cabin blocks... she was quite enthusiastic whilst making them... alas, something changed, she decided that she didn't like them and, eventually, started to unpick them all, "Wait a minute... what a waste of time and effort!" Beryl recalled that she had often heard Maid Marion talking about the quilts she makes and how she gave most of them away to one charity and another... "Right..." thought Arty Beryl, "I shall give these blocks to Maid Marion and she can put them to good use and I shall waste no more time unpicking them all... I shall move on to another wonderful creation... which will be much more fun.... " So, armed with lots of these lovely Log Cabin blocks, Maid Marion set about making them into a quilt.. with 4 cushion covers to match... all sandwiched, quilted and bound.. they look fabulous. Arty Beryl was so thrilled to see her hours of unpicking rescued and turned into such wonderful things... They will be donated and hopefully sold at an upcoming WI event and the money raised will go to support Air Ambulance... two very content ladies then spent the rest of their day in the Quilt Cave, stitching, laughing and chatting.... fabulous!
As promised, here's a closer picture of Gilly's "The Curtain Quilt" ... sometimes a name sticks with a project right through the making process, it was made from a pair of curtains.... "The Curtain Quilt" perfect... All the information is right there on the label (sorry about the little bit of blurring, but you can still read it) so I need add nothing... 
well, I would like to add a little bit... she hasn't mentioned that every single piece was 'fussy cut' to get exactly the right shade of the flowers.... if you click on it and zoom in you will be able to see that... In actual fact that is the main reason it took Gilly a longer time to make this lovely quilt than she actually wanted it to... that and her insisting on treating herself to a few hours of sleep! ha ha ha... I can tell you that she fell asleep many times in the madrugada (wee small hours) whilst stitching... like the babies who fall asleep eating their dinner... he he he
Barbie brings so many bags with her, it always looks like she's coming to stay for a week! She says she brings everything she needs or might need and she'd rather do that than be missing something... except this week she forgot the power cable... now I'll give you a top tip here... the machines work so much better with electricity! ha ha ha It wasn't a problem really as I had a spare Bernina on hand so she was able to crack on with her "ditch hopping" (that's PMS quilting 'In-The-Ditch')
Helen started another of her blocks, this one isn't quite as stitch intensive as the first. I'm trying to persuade Helen to go ahead making the quilt instead of the practice cushion covers... you know, her prototypes are so good they should be the real thing! come on Helen... a quilt? you don't need any more practice....
Joan The Shop spent the day making words for her borders, all to do with formula one of course, I think this is the final stage before making a sandwich and Joan is rather keen to get to the quilting, the label is planned too.
Margaret is making slow and steady progress with her small 3D butterflies, they look big in this photo but they are only 6" so all the bits are tiny... but this isn't a race, it doesn't matter how long it takes for each project, it's all about the pleasure of the making.
Lynda finished her piano key borders, added corner stones and was able to make a sandwich, as usual Dotty helped too... she didn't have quite enough pins so had to do a bit of tacking, which is OK but she'll have to watch carefully when she's quilting, not to catch a giant stitch with her walking foot.
Shirley Lerly has all of her main blocks done. What a palava we had getting the side triangles to work... if only we had read the instructions, he he he... actually it was me trying to do it the "easier way".. but we got there in the end, as you can see, we needed 18 1/4" squares cut twice diagonally....
Kate was hand sewing all day, this is a long term projects that she has decided to finish, there's a lot more hand stitching to do on each of the very pretty blocks, it's like a sampler, but she is determined. Hand stitching is so portable so I guess she can take it with her wherever she goes... 
Maid Marion pieced her backing and made a sandwich with the pink and green quilt top she completed last week, she pinned so fast, with the help of Dotty Maureen (who always jumps in to help when there's a sandwich in process), that it was all cleared away before I got my camera ready...
as was Dotty Maureen's project... the one I've had lots of emails about, green and yellow with the Prairie Pointy edge... she was free motion quilting, using a Bernina Aurora with BSR, which she loves... but I thought I would show you what they both made at home, aren't these machine tidies handy little things... I think Wendy has the pattern now, so she'll probably have on by next week... Dotty Maureen has started a craze, ha ha ha!Brenda Barbara had had a birthday this week so we were treated to a delicious home made Banoffee pie in Kettle Corner at lunch time... what a shame we only have one birthday per year... twas quite a treat!!We meet again on Wednesday 16th March 10am - 3pm
My Mum (Gwynneth) finished her quilt. When I was helping her choose the fabrics she wasn't too sure they would work, she liked all of them individually, but could not see them playing nicely together in a quilt... well, she quite likes it now and is going to call it " Who Would Have Thought", it's a pattern from a magazine... I'm sorry, I can't remember which one now If I find it I'll update the post.... click on the picture and you'll see she quilted with big circles... she says they're crop circles....
The back... fabulous! 
Next on the agenda is this, red and cream. This, in my block book, is called the Kayak block, Mum has had her eye on it for a while as she loves the secondary design that happens once the blocks are pieced together. The bigger triangles are cut using a template so that adds a little fiddly element, nothing too taxing though... lets see how she gets on with it.
