Doll Quilt Swap Revealed

I received my fabulous Doll Quilt from Sharon Tucker. Thank you so much Sharon. I love it, together with the YLI thread, pkt needles and a swatch of repro fabric with grasshoppers playing pool.
Its beautifully quilted – some hand and some machine.

I am also working on finishing a few UFO’s. This is a quilt I started about 6 years ago. The block measures 8”finished.

I am piecing them into 16”squares as I find it a little less daunting to have to make 36 of these rather than 144 x 8”blocks. 

Dumb I know but thats how my brain works.
It will be a very random scrappy quilt, but I am only using blues and browns/tans, plus whatever creamy/white backgrounds I have. I am NOT buying any fabric for this. I have laid out 2 of the 16 “ blocks. (unpressed)

I'm still having problems writing in Windows Live Writer. Something has happened to Google ( to me and alot of other people) so I am writing this directly to blogger. 
Thanks for dropping by

Sue

http://www.susannasquilts.blogspot.com

Hoorah!

My Nearly Insane Quilt top is finished and ready to take to the Machine Quilter. I am so relieved to have finished it, and have made given myself a deadline to finish as many UFO’s or WIP’s whatever you call them in the year of 2015. This measures about 96” square.  

The quilt is so large I couldn’t get a photo at home, so got a friend to take a photo at Quilt meeting last week.

It took me almost 5 years to make, from the date I made the 1st block to when I stitched the last border on, with lots of down time in between!

 
I have another quilt basted for an Australian Grand-daughter ready to do some of my hopefully reasonable machine quilting on. I am a real beginner at this, but they say practise makes perfect! This quilt measures 80”.

I am in the process of making more blocks for a blue, cream and brown/tan quilt that I started in 2011. I needed to make 144 x 8” blocks for this quilt as I wanted it for our main bed. I like the quilts to finish about 96” square. I still have about 40 blocks to make, and am joining them into blocks 4 x 4 which seems to make them easier to cope with.
Thanks for dropping by
Sue

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

A great weekend …

was spent with a dozen or so like minded quilting friends at our Retreat at Vaughan Park, Longbay  The weather was typical Auckland weather - grey and cold and thundery looking, then  brilliant sunshine.
Lots of talking and computer advise from each other, lots of laughing and of course lots of food and sewing.
Here is a show and tell of each persons effort for the weekend.
The view from our sewing room window.
 



In keeping with Anzac week this is Carole’s quilt.

The start of Carole’s Knights of the Round Table quilt. 



Beth’s Quilt is seeing the light of day again!

 Another of Beths quilts - a Sarah Fielke pattern.




Christina’s Blocks for her Quilt.
Sorry photos are a bit blurry.



Lorraine toiled away on her rail fence blocks until her eyes were blurry!


   
Diana was very prolific with her 2 wall hangings and 2 table runners.


Sue (another one) was sewing like fury and also having Crochet lessons from Rosalie. 


She was also trying to finish this table runner which is a kit from Rosalie Maskell of Auckland.



Rosalie who spent alot of her time helping the others with their patterns and cutting made up some more of her table mats as well as finishing her crochet blanket.

Another Beth was totally committed to making 4 quilts from flannel using a quilt as you go method. Stitching the 3 layers together on the right side and clipping the edges so they ripple. 
 


I think this is the back of the top photo.

Stephanie’s beautiful bargello quilt. This photo does not do it justice as the colours are more vibrant than it looks here.


The same goes for this top which was made from new pillowcase fabric.


Jeanette made some blocks for her quilt then decided she might do something else with them, so she put them away and made up some of these small blocks with her scraps.

On the right a WIP of Jeanette's which is also a pattern from Rosalie Maskell.



 A gorgeous work in progress from Ailsa. Hand appliqued and machine pieced.




And, this was my effort for the weekend. I managed to make 26 more blocks ( I had 38) and am at the point of sewing them altogether.




I hope you enjoyed looking at my not very good photography, but we all had a great time, and thats what matters!
Thanks for dropping by

Border for N.I.

I am piecing the border for my Nearly Insane Quilt and have taken a photo of what I have done so far. Not sure whether to have a cream border in as well, but I think looking at the photo I like that version best, even though my zigzag border almost finishes the correct size to the rest of the quilt - give or take 1/2". If I add the cream I will have to work out the maths for it!  The original quilt doesn't have the extra border, only a wider border after the zigzag.

Sorry my photos are a bit on the dark side, but its a funny Autumn day here - raining and then sunshine, and we have veranda's around our house, which darkens inside.
 
I've also gotten onto the  'Stars in a time Warp' quiltalong on the Civil War Blog

Because I jumped in well after it started, I am making my stars in what ever color I find at the time, but trying to keep in with what they are doing on the blog, so my colors are a bit out of order!

Yesterday I was thrilled to receive this trophy for 'Viewers Choice' for 
'Mrs Billings Returns' from The Western Quilters Show that I entered last month. 
Unfortunately I don't have a photo of the quilt with the trophy as yet, but I'll work on that and see if I can hang my quilt some-where and get a photo taken.

 

Thanks for dropping by