Something old(ish) and something new !

Finished - tralala !!!

My 3D hexagon is all done.

Hand-quilted up to the borders and then I tried out my new machine to do some free-motion squiggling.

For anyone who doesn't know I started this quilt during the Olympic games 2008. It is a charm quilt - every piece is one from my stash and is different.

I have had the most fun ever doing this and am delighted with it. I would recommend making a charm quilt to everyone. So many memories tied up in this.

And because I am so chuffed with a finish I decided to do a "start" - lol !

I have limited space to store my stash and it is busting out all over. I need to get some used up. Now I have my new Janome I will be making backing for tops I have so that should make a dent. But I have been toying around with an idea for a while now. Want a look ?

2 strips joined along the length with a small stitch. These are width of fabric cut 2.5 inches ( good for jelly rolls )

Then I am trying something radical ( for me anyway - lol ) pressing the seams open. Do you do this ?

Using a 60 degree template cut like this.

And this

Join 3 together - pressing seams open again.

Here we have it

Need to make a good few more - so far I have cut enough strips for another 20 blocks. Keeping this bright and using spotty and stripey fabrics as much as I can

All good fun

have a good day xxx

Lucky me !!

Firstly here are a few things I made for our little quilt show.


It was a great day and we were kept busy all day with visitors. Looking at the quilts - buying from our sales table - cushion tombola - raffle and most importantly drinking tea and eating cake - lol ! I'm not sure how much we raised towards local charities as the money hadn't been counted up when we left. Quite successful though I think.

Earlier in the week I did a little knitting for my friends gorgeous little boy.



He will kill me for this when he's older :-) He's 7 months now and such a love...


And I had another birthday this week ( man - they come round quick ) and here's what I got.




I have been saving up for ages for this and had got about halfway there and so for my birthday DH said - just get it - so I did...Yippee.


Do you see the big space under the arm ? That is why I bought it. It just basically does a straight stitch and I will only use it for machine quilting. Apparently it is FAST - semi-industrial. It is a big machine - makes my others look tiny... I am hoping to be able to machine quilt on this with a bit more ease - ie - not nearly wrenching my shoulders out of their sockets - lol !


So far I have only threaded it and sewn a few lines but next week I plan to try and get a quilt done on it. I think I have a top or two ( cough ;-))) I can get backed ready to quilt. I bought the free-motion darning foot too and look forward to giving it a whirl.

I got a free gift with it



should keep me going for a while.


I am busy putting the finishing touches to my Stitchers Angel swap package and should get that in the post early next week.


So much to do - I love it xxx

Thanks for all the lovely comments on Dannys quilt - I always try to reply but somehow the time gets away from me..

By the skin of my teeth

Well you all know where I've been and what I've been doing - lol !!

Happy 21st birthday Danny !







All done just in the nick of time. Guess I will always be a last-minute sort of quilter.. Finished the binding just last night and gave him his quilt a little while ago. The smile on Danny's face made it all worthwhile - he wrapped himself in it and declared it the cuddliest thing ever.





For a bit of fun I quilted his and Jess's (DD) names in it and they both had a search for them. This is the Peaches and Dreams pattern kindly provided free from Judy Laquidara







The borders were just made from random sized leftovers from the blocks. Because I was running short of time I did them differently to how I normally attach borders. In golfing language I believe there is a term " hit and hope" - well that's how these borders went on - sewn a load of strips together and just whacked them on hoping they'd fit. Sort of "piece and pray" - lol ! Turned out fine.. So glad it's finished. The quilt is actually blue and green although my photos are showing it all blue. Feel quite a pang giving it away.

Our little quilt group has a small exhibition on Saturday and I am making a few things for the sales table. Only little items but I need to get moving.

Take care !

Feeling blue . .

Before I show my new quilt project here is a photo of Septembers quilt of the month. This is a UFO that I said I would work on through September whenever I could. I did get side-tracked once I started hand-quilting my hexie quilt but I have made some progress. Last month it looked like this.

And now it is at this stage.

I also have all the hexies prepared for the next row - I think I will continue to take this to my quilt group on Tuesday evenings where we all sit and do hand-work. I can't wait to get this done.

Because I have a deadline coming up I have decided not to work on a UFO this month. I am making Jess's boyfriend a quilt for his 21st birthday and what a performance this is turning out to be.

A while back I bought yardage of this fabric.

The width of the fabric is divided into 4 sections ranging from light to dark. I bought this in blue and green and this is what I decided to use for Danny's quilt. I love Judy's blog and she has some wonderful free patterns on there. One caught my eye a while back and I thought this would work well with these fabrics. Because the shaded fabrics are quite plain I thought I'd add a bit of something else to make sure the quilt wasn't boring. Like so . .

Then after a time I realised I was going to run out of the stripe. Tried everywhere to get hold of more to no avail. So I knew I would either have to scrap the stripe or add something else.. So a few different stripes came home with me

I went with the top one and duly made 12 small sections. These were quite different when next to each other but I thought I would alternate the 2 different striped blocks throughout the quilt although I wasn't convinced this would look very good.

I am bearing in mind here that Danny's birthday is getting ever nearer. This morning I realised I have 11 days to get this finished. I have had a cold-like bug for a week and have not really done any machine sewing in this time as everything seemed to make me tired.

Anyway I am feeling better now and if I get moving I will get it done.

I had a quick rummage through my scraps the other day for something else when just what did I find ? A whole big fat quarter of the first stripey fabric !!! I did not know I had this - I was amazed.

So now I have enough to just use the one stripe - which was my original plan all along.

This is one reason I make scrappy quilts - no running out of fabric and no headaches - lol !!

Here are 2 finished blocks - must get moving. If I had a brain I would be dangerous :-)

Oh and I managed to nip and see May - although I had to miss my quilt group because of my cold and she was delighted with the quilt top. She couldn't thank me enough. Big sigh of relief..

Just off to cut more strips. Meant to say it is the Peaches and Dreams pattern. I have 4 blocks made out of 24 - help !!!

Take care xx