A bit of a Catchup

 A few things I have made since I last posted. I had a 50th birthday gift to make. 

My quilting is improving slowly, and I love doing it on my machine. I have come to realise that it doesn't have to be perfect, to look OK!

This is the back of the quilt, which was lap size.

I have also taken up knitting again.  In March & April, two of my grand-daughters

Had baby girls 3 weeks apart.

 

 I hope some of you see this and thanks for dropping by.

http://susannasquilts.blogspot.com

 

 

Baby, Baby...

About a month ago, a young couple we know had their first baby, and I thought I'd better get my act together and make a quilt. Mind you I started it when the Mum was in her 6 month of pregnacy. As they chose to Not find out the gender of the baby, I decided to go with bright childrens fabrics.

I tend to make baby/childrens quilts, so they may be used in the cot, then on their first little bed.
They can also use it to lay baby on the floor.
I free motion machine quilted it. 

I followed an idea from Susan Clair of  www.gourmetquilter.com

How to have Fun with Novelty 5" squares - Quilting Tips & Techniques 062.

This is the you tube site

Its a fun way to use up all those childrens style fabrics. This is the back of the quilt so its actually double sided.

 Thanks for dropping by

 

http://www.susannasquilts.blogspot.com

I have been trying to send this post for over a week, but now have my photos in Google Drive and I can't seem to pick them up onto Windows Live where I normally write my posts. This time I am writing directly to blogger, so we'll see how it goes. Ah! today after wasting yet another 3 / 4 hours trying to blog from Windows Live Writer I find its a problem with Google. Hundreds of other people are having the same issues. Whew! at least it wasn't just me!!

I have been in a Doll Quilt swap run by Lori from Humble Quilts.
This was a lot of fun, although for me a little difficult, as I normally make large quilts
.
This is my first attempt, but I was worried that the blocks at 4" were too large, although looking at other small quilts since then, I think it would have been OK.

 Sorry can't crop these today! 
 
Actually top right was my 2nd attempt, as the first time I made the pinwheels with no sashing, which I thought didn’t look as good.
3rd attempt …….

finally the finished quilt.
I unintentionally  cut the pinwheels alot smaller than I meant to, and they finished at 2”. I hand quilted in the ditch although you can’t see that from the photo.

I am in the final stages of added the borders to my Nearly Insane Quilt. I have pieced 112 of these time consuming squares. 

 


Now to try and figure out how wide to make the outside cream borders with the limited piece of fabric I have left over. I would like to make them 6” finished in keeping with the 3” borders shown here, but I wont have enough fabric as I also need fabric for the bindings. I think the bindings would look better in the cream also, but I’ll have to see.
I also made a pincushion for our office girl, who isn’t a sewer, but was telling me about something she was making and was having to put the pins on a table and try and scoop them up. Great little birthday gift!
 

 I used wool felt on the bottom of pincushion.

Thanks for dropping by
Sue
http://www.susannasquilts.blogspot.com

My…how they grow!

This is a photo of my Grandchildren in Australia, all dressed up for a  Graduation Ball. Only two of them are going, the older two (who had theirs last year) just making up for a lovely family photo.



Matt, Alex, Malitta and Troy. You are all beautiful kids!

On the quilting front, I have just finished a couple Christmas gifts for friends. I can’t get over the fact that I’m a little ahead of the game at this early stage. I think it must be çause I’m not on any committees at the moment. :-)


 

  This is a rather large square bottom bag, which is perfect for putting your knitting in beside the armchair!




A table runner made from a tutorial by Tara of Tazzie Quilts. Thanks Tara it was so easy to make.

I also made a skirt for my 9 year old grand-daughter Jenna. The photo isn’t the best but I’ll show another one when I get it.


I made her one last year, and her Mum tells me its the only skirt she will wear! Makes me very happy çause you never know with kids, whether they’ll like something or not. If not  it stays in the wardrobe!
Thanks for dropping by

So Much has Happened…..

Since I last posted. I was going to post a photo of what I had done at our retreat, but never got back to doing it. Then DH and I drove to my Son & DIL and grand children’s place for my GD’s 8th birthday. Whilst there my DH had a heart attack. Fortunately for him it was not a massive pain and drop down on the floor kind of HA but when he was finally admitted to the hospital, they told us it was a big one. It seemed to happen slowly over Friday night and then after we arrived home, on the Saturday night. By then I made the decision to call the Ambulance. I had to run down the drive ( 100 metres) in the dark waving a big torch. We live in Rural Auckland, and in the dark the paramedic couldn’t read the number on our gate. He was admitted at midnight on Saturday, and had the most wonderful care and attention, from all the staff in the North Shore Hospital. He had a stent inserted into one side of his heart on the following Tuesday. Home on Thursday, but will have to go back in a fortnight to have another stent put in the other side of his heart.
Looking back he had been feeling a little breathless over the week or two prior to this, and just told himself to ‘toughen up!’  This has been such a shock to every-one, as my DH is quite fit – walks four hours around the golf course ( no cart for him ) and he is not over weight. Even his GP was surprised!  The hardest part for him he said, was feeling scared.
 
I have a couple of photos of the birthday presents I made at our retreat for Jenna.  Tada! ....Presenting
'Lemonita'
  …..aka. lemon eater! ‘cause that’s what these furry creatures do!
She is a puppet, with a tail filled with rice.
My Australian friends love them, but us Kiwi’s really can’t stand them as they endanger our wildlife! but…. in saying that she’s pretty cute! The children loved her.

I also made this skirt which funnily enough was called Jenna’s skirt on the pattern. 

Birthday party in action!

Next day, brother and sister out on the water

A week or so ago I made a little bag for putting threads in when sewing.

Well, I'm on the count down now, until Christmas. The month of November seems to fly for me, and before you know it, it's the 25th December. :-)
 
Thanks all for dropping by

Hi Every-one

just had a week with the MIL staying, so was a bit curtailed with the quilting. When our little quilting group was allocated a grant from the Auckland Patchworkers & Quilters Guild to help finance our show, we were asked if we could perhaps donate a quilt to go in the collection of Community Quilts from our Guild. The Auckland Patchworkers & Quilters Guild organises the making and distribution of quilts to worthy organisations in the community.
A few of the women in our group managed to make a quilt each. I made up this quilt from a pattern I saw on Jeni’s site http://www.incolororder.com/2010/09/plus-quilt-tutorial.html. Thank you Jeni, as this is just what I needed to use some of my scraps. It measures 64” x 76” so will be a good single bed quilt for some-one.

  

Last week 3 friends and I went to the Craft Show in Hamilton. The quilts on display there were absolutely fabulous, and I have some photos to share. The problem is I don’t have permission from the owners of the quilts, and I have been told that maybe I should have, before I show them. It’s all getting a bit PC isn’t it, but I guess one needs to do the right thing.  Sorry this is short and sweet, but I have to get back to stitching the binding down of my quilt that I am entering in the Auckland Festival of Quilts which is on in November.                                          
Thanks for dropping by

In My Spare Time…..

I have been crocheting hexagons. I have checked out so many online patterns, and almost forgot where I got the original pattern from, but I remembered when it came time to put them together. There are so many different ideas out there, and although I should have been hand appliqueing or stitching my tiny hexagons at night, I found so much pleasure in sitting and crocheting, that I kept doing it. Its also a great project to take away, as it doesn’t matter if the lights not so good, whereas I tend to sit under my floor lamp when doing my stitching. This is the pattern I used http://heidibearscreative.blogspot.co.nz/2010/05/african-flower-hexagon-crochet-tutorial.html but I added an extra row to mine. I wanted the hexagons to be bigger so the afghan would get bigger quicker.
I wanted to crochet join them together, and spent a couple of hours trying different methods, but ended up with a ridge which I didn’t want. I pretty much joined them Heidi’s way http://heidibearscreative.blogspot.co.nz/2011/02/african-flower-hexagon-join-as-you-go.html but joined them every second stitch instead of every 3rd. I am quite happy with how they are turning out, just have to keep at it and stop getting distracted with other beautiful crocheted rugs. I also made this little carry bag for a lady who, without even being a member of our club, spent hours helping us set up the show. The other night I started my 2nd Flower Garden applique block. I wish there were at least 2 more hours in the day.
Thanks for dropping by