Another Raggedy Edge

I discovered a raggedy edge that I hadn't finished, so in between making sure my children weren't killing each other or themselves, I sat and snipped. To make the time go quicker, I put on that classic movie Footloose. Nothing like a dance movie while playing with really sharp scissors. Anyway, snipping done, I washed, dried and photographed. And the only mishap was while I was photographing, my son coming in screaming because "something" hit in the eye. No permanent damage. Now all I need to do is label it and I can gift it! Given the person who is to receive it does not check this blog, (they don't even know it exists!) I feel safe in revealing it!

Front

Back

While I was at the clothes line taking photos of the quilt, I also took pics of a peg bag my mother in law made me. I love it, simply the best peg bag I have ever had!

A New Year

Well the New Year is here and our move north grows ever closer. Just had removalists in giving quotes and hopefully we will be packed and away by the 16th! This does mean however, that a lot of the crafty stuff needs to packed up. Don't expect to get much done over the next month at least until we get settled. BUT, I did get a few crafty Christmas gifts and, despite putting a fabric ban on myself until we moved, I bought a few things while we were down the south coast at the in laws that I thought I would share with you.

First is my Christmas present from the in laws. A lovely bundle of magazines and 10 blue fat quarters. One of the magazines called Beautiful Pieced Quilts (No 1) in my pile has a quilt called "True Lover's Knot" which is what I think I will use the blue fat quarters for. It has 42 different blue fabrics in it, so will need to find another 32. Shame that!




Then the day after Boxing Day we braved the shopping centre in Batemans Bay. As we were walking down the street I spied a fabric shop down an alley and popped in for a quick look. I was in the shop no more than 10 minutes and left with these gorgeous lizards. I have a bunch of aboriginal prints (which I can't show you because they have already been packed!) and while I have no idea what I am going to do with them, I know these will go perfectly!

On the 28th, a childhood friend of my husband and his wife arrived. Kelly and I get on really well and often forget that it's our husbands who knew each other first, not us. Anyway, we left the 4 kids with my wonderful mother in law (the boys were out fishing, my father in law playing golf) and went to check out Steph's in Moruya. This is a lovely, well stocked shop. The rolled fat quarter was on sale for $3.00 and I picked up a few more blues to go with my Chrissie pressie. Another aboriginal print and the green and red at the front I just fell in love with and had to have! I also picked up a book on Machine Quilting to hopefully give me some more ideas and confidence.


While we were at Steph's we saw a thimble that Kelly thought would be perfect for her mum, so on New Year's Eve, we again abandoned the kids (boys were fishing again, but my father in law was home to help this time!) and went back. On reflection, Kelly didn't get the thimble, but we did park ourselves in front of a shelf that had huge amount of $3.00 fat quarters and went through them one by one. I chose 7, Kelly got 10. I also scored the two red tins at the back which have 4 Christmas fabrics in them. I plan to put them away for presents next year. I also spotted the sea themed fabric and as it was half price, I grabbed the metre that was left. Kel has suggested I make a bag for Kira using it, which I think is a great idea!

So I have all these lovely new goodies that I can't play with! Guess I will just have to satisfy myself with browsing the magazines and marking the projects I want to do. There are quite a few bag patterns in them that I would love to have a go at.

So until I make it back, possibly not until after the move I will wish everyone a happy new year. Hope your 2008 is filled with lots of sewing!

I'm not a big fan of green...

...so imagine my joy (not!) when both Luke's teacher and Kira's daycarer nominated green as their favourite colour. Earlier in the year I made a green disappearing nine patch for Luke's teacher when she got married and blogged it here. I was going to do a green log cabin for Kira's carer (who has also cared for Luke) but with time running short I decided on a raggedy edge instead.
Now let me explain about this woman. She is wonderful. Leaving my children in her care is the closest I could come to leaving them with family. I was very lucky in that she started in the preschool room just as Luke was going in there and moved to the babies room just as Luke finished daycare and Kira started. With our move to another state at the end of the year, I will miss her dreadfully.
So with great pleasure I present "Carer Extrodinaire"

I also used this stuff called EQ Printable Fabric for the first time to make a label. I'm so impressed with it! My blanket stitching (and my spelling if you look closely enough!) leaves a lot to be desired, but it was my first attempt and I would like to thank Janet McCaffrey of Primrose Design for the wonderful instructions that were so easy to follow. I apologise for the big green blobs in the photo, but I wanted to remove anything that identified the receiver or the centre they work at.I just know that come tomorrow I will be a blubbering mess as I give this to her!

I'm a bad blogger!

How embarrassing, I can't believe how long it's been since I last posted. In my defense, I am trying to sell a house, buy a house and move interstate! Yesterday was the first time in ages I have done anything so I thought I would share.
I picked up mums grandchildren sampler from the framers and I must say I am most happy with how it turned out. She is away until Tuesday so I will have to wait to give it to her. Anyway, here's a piccie.
I've decided to make a raggedy edge quilt for Kira's daycarer. She is a very special woman who looked after Luke before he went to school and I absolutely adore her. So yesterday, using a couple of charm packs and a few other bits and pieces, I got it all ready for sewing. The picture below is of all the blocks ready to be pinned and sewed. Hopefully there will be some time this weekend.

Practise, practise, practise.

This is what I now need to do after doing a machine quilting course on the weekend! I did the course at Addicted to Fabric with the fabulous Beth Reid. As you can see from the pictures below, I need lots of practise to perfect my technique, but at least I now have an idea of what I am doing!

OK, so this is the sampler I did. Hmmmmmmm, what did I say about practise. :blush:







Close up of the leaves and gumnuts. Most probably my best work and the one I really enjoyed doing. I can see me doing lots of these!





This is my stippling. Obviously a lot of work needed here too. I can see how this would be used a lot. Quick and effective once I master it!









Beth Reid uses these two techniques alot with her landscape quilting. I love it, but my circles need a lot of work. I've discovered they work better if you are going fast, but if you go too fast it makes it worse! Finding that fine line is my challenge!







This is the bit I did last, so was getting tired and therefore very lazy! The flowers are suppose to have four leaves, but I often only manage to fit three! The other two patterns rely on you being able to replicate what you have done once several times. Did I mention I need to practise?







Finally there is a picture of my new toy - a quilting table for my machine. Very extravagant but oh so nice!

Finished! - Grandchildren Sampler!

I said I would finish it tonight!! Finished about 20 minutes ago. Here is the sampler I've done for my mother.



For someone who doesn't enjoy backstitching, there was a lot on this! I backstitched as I went, I think I would have gone mad if I had left it until the end.

I also took a pic of the backing fabric I got from EQuilter. In the words of a friend of mine - Lush! So the big question now, is what cross stitch do I start next?

I'm still here...really!!

Life has been hectic, hence the lack of blogging. We are trying to get our house ready to go on the market, trying to organise a trip north so we can look for a house to buy up there, trying to maintain a semblance of sanity in a house we only seem to be fleetingly these days as we trip from one thing to another!! While there has been no quilting recently, hopefully tomorrow night will see the completion of my mother's Grandchildren sampler. Stay tuned, I've only got to add the names and it will be complete! I received the backing for my disappearing nine patch, the top of which looks like this:
I have also been doing some sewing of my frogs, but that was at least 10 days ago! Hopefully things will settle soon and more sewing will get done. I live in hope!