Storm at Sea & Secret Sewing!

My daughter was over last night so we worked on the Storm at Sea quilt.  It is now one piece!  We tried it out on our queen size bed and have decided we will add one more row of pattern around all four edges (the diamonds and small squares) before adding a strip of the background print around all four sides as well.  Then we will have to decide if the binding will be just one of the prints used in the quilt or if we will use multiple prints.  We were also looking at pantographs to decide which one to use but didn't choose one yet.

And in case you were thinking that the blog has been really quiet and I haven't been sewing, it is just that what I am working on is going to be a present for a family member who looks at my blog so I don't want to spoil the surprise.  I started on Sunday from scratch and as of yesterday early afternoon, I have a completed quilt top, approximately 53" x 70", a pieced backing and prepared binding, so all that is left is the quilting and binding!  The pantograph has also already been chosen and I can't even tell you what that is or it would give away the surprise!  Maybe a sneak peak at the binding would be ok though....

Linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish it up Friday.

Batik Bird Beach Bag - Say that nine times fast!

I am very excited about this finish!  It started with a batik fabric challenge at the Mayflower Quilters' Guild and then I was inspired by a quilt made of birds on Sew Preeti Quilts' blog:  http://sewpreetiquilts.blogspot.ca/2017/02/he-tweeted-she-tweeted.html

First a view of the inside.  The challenge was to use the batiks received in a game plus any other fabrics you wished.  I must admit that I wasn't very fond of one of the fabrics but since I had to use it, I put it in the bottom of the bag....

Here is a picture of how thick the layers were that I had to sew through when I attached the bottom.  My machine went through it with no problems whatsoever.  I used the foam that has knit fabric on both sides to give the bag body and stability.  This is the first time I used it and I really liked it.  The bag will stand up on it's own, but is still nice and soft.

Here's a picture of the outside of the bag.  The bag is 18" wide, 6" thick and 16.5" tall and is made of 18 bird blocks.

And, just for fun, here's a picture with it packed for the beach with room to spare for other items.

My daughter was over yesterday working on the Storm at Sea quilt in the background so here's a picture of it.  There is only one long seam left to sew and it will be entirely together.  Sorry the picture is sideways here, not sure why, when I open it on my computer it is right side up....

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish it up Friday!

Fat Quarter Shop 2017 Patchwork Quilt Along - Third Month

Here are the Box-in-a-box blocks I have made for the third month.

And here are all the blocks I've made so far.

These were very easy, taking less than an hour from start to finish.

Linking to Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish it up Friday.

Batik Birds

At one of the Mayflower Quilters' Guild meetings this year, we were invited to bring a metre of batik fabric and participate in a little game.  We got together in groups of five and stood in a circle.  Everyone tore their piece of fabric in half, kept half and passed the other half to the right.  We then tore that piece of fabric in half, kept half and passed half until everyone had a piece of each fabric, but in different proportions to everyone else.  We were then challenged to make something which included those fabrics but could have others added as well.  I had no idea what I was going to make until I saw this post on Sew Preeti Quilts:

http://sewpreetiquilts.blogspot.ca/2017/02/he-tweeted-she-tweeted.html.

As soon as I made the first pair of birds, I knew this was what I wanted to make.  Here are eight pair.

I don't have a lot of the sky fabric so am planning to use the sand coloured fabric when I piece their legs together so it will look like they are walking on the beach.  I am also not planning on making a quilt with them but maybe a large beach bag would be a good project.

Here are a few with their legs attached.

If I get carried away making birds, who knows, a matching beach blanket would be kind of fun!

Odds and Ends Sewing

I have been sewing, but just not the sewing that you want to photograph and post.  On Sunday, instead of skype sewing with my friend M, she came over and we sewed in person which was great fun!  My new setup has room to have two sewing machines going at the same time!  I worked on adding two inch background borders to the Cardinal Red Star Quilt and also piecing a backing and making the binding.  M pieced a little charity quilt from wof strips.  We'll quilt it the next time she comes over.

On Monday, I did some more sorting out of bits and pieces from my old sewing room into my new sewing room and emptied out a big plastic tub of fabric.  I also added corner hanging triangles to the wall hanging I gave my daughter for Christmas and added a label at her request.  Just because the picture is so cute, here are the cats having a look at the wall hanging of themselves again!

Hopefully my next post will have some new material.

Cardinal Red Star Quilt - A finished flimsy!

I started this quilt last fall but put it aside in order to work on Christmas sewing.  Today I attached the final borders of half-size stars.  The large stars finish at 12" and the small stars finish at 6".  I will probably add another narrow border of the plain background fabric before quilting it so the binding doesn't cover up any star points.

The lighting is not good, so here is a close up of one star so you can see the Cardinal fabric and the red snowflake fabric.

At the January Mayflower Quilters' Guild meeting our President announced a challenge for our June year end meeting.  She wants everyone to bring in Star Quilts, so my goal is to have this quilt finished for that meeting.  I'm linking to Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish it up Friday!

Shamrock Table Topper Finish

Well it took me more than half an hour to rip out the mess I made on my Shamrock Table Topper yesterday.  I then quilted some diagonal lines and bound it with one of the fabrics already used in the block.  I'll do some playing with the ruler foot and templates on some scrap fabric another day.

To continue my theme of Table Toppers/Table Runners being double sided to get more use out of them, I made a Swoon block for the back using the same fabric as the binding and one additional complimentary fabric.

I picked my daughter up from work and brought her home and we did some sewing and discussing of whether we want borders on the Storm at Sea Quilt or whether we want to add more Storm at Sea blocks to make it Queen size.  We will decide once we have the blocks made so far all sewn together in one piece.

Updated 2017-03-10 - Linked to Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish It Up Friday.

Storm at Sea Update and Shamrock Table Topper

Here is the Storm at Sea sewn together in vertical rows.  I do not use pins if I can avoid them, but I pin matched all the centre points on these rows and it worked very nicely.

Here is a close up to show that no points have been cut off.

This afternoon, my daughter tactfully pointed out that this quilt is a project we are supposed to be doing together and I admitted I have gotten excited about it and barged ahead and done most of it. She is coming over tomorrow evening and we will work on it together.

I then decided to work on my Shamrock Table Topper.  I have a new ruler foot and set of rulers so decided to use some of them on my DSM (domestic sewing machine) and play at quilting the Shamrock.  I did not expect to be perfect.....  However, I also did not expect to be SO BAD!!!!!  Here is a picture of the mess I made and the tools I used to accomplish it!

This shall be ripped out immediately!  Some of the stitches are very large, but others are very tiny.....  OUCH!  It even hurts my eyes!

Storm at Sea - All Blocks Made!

Just added three more colours and diagonal rows 14 to 19 plus finished the last two corner blocks with the same fabric as rows 18 & 19. I really love it!

Next step is to sew all the blocks together!  Linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts for Finish it up Friday!

Storm at Sea Update

Another day, another colour, another two diagonal rows added to Storm at Sea for a total of 15 rows now.

And a close up of the fabrics to do them justice.

I'm really liking it!

Storm at Sea Update

Two more diagonal rows added in another colour for a total of 13 rows now.  I am loving it!

And a close up so you can see the fabrics better.

I still have to sew the individual corner square units, centre square units and side diamonds to each other, but this quilt is coming together quicker and easier than I thought it would!

Storm at Sea Update and a start on a Shamrock Table Topper

Another colour was added to the Storm at Sea Quilt which means 11 diagonal rows have been completed.  I really like the fabric in these two new rows!

Because it's March 1st, I thought I would work on something for Saint Patrick's Day.  I string pieced a block which was 18" by 12". I used cheap Christmas wrapping paper which is like news print as my base.

I then cut out three 6" by 12" strips which were each then sub-cut into a 3" strip and a 8.5" strip.

I then added 2" snowball corners to the adjacent wide ends of the 6" by 3" strip and two adjacent narrow ends of the 6 x 8.5" strips.  I also cut out 3" by 3" squares to complete the corners.

I then cut out a 6" square of background fabric and a 1.5 strip of one of the green fabrics and cut the square diagonally and inserted the strip and trimmed it back to 6".  I then cut out a 6" x 3" and a 8.5" x 3" strip of background to make an 8.5" square to attach to the three 8.5" shamrock leaf squares.

And voila, a shamrock block.

Not bad for using some green scraps and a bit of background fabric. The block is currently 16" square but I will likely put a border of background fabric around it before I quilt it.