Laurie's Quilt Nov-Dec 2015

Laurie's Quilt was done in a series of coordinating batik prints which I bought in the U.S. The main block had 17 pieces in it which extended the time for making it. The supporting block was an hourglass block, one of my fav blocks.

                                                           Above: Laurie's Quilt front

                                            Laurie's Quilt: Front Detail

                                         Above is the main block measuring 9.5 inches with 17 pieces.

                                          Above : Hourglass supporting block.

                                             Above: back of Laurie's Quilt

                                        Above: Laurie's Quilt Back Detail

                                          Above: Laurie's Quilt: Label

New Mugbag for me December 2015

We all know that bags have a limited life. They get worn and stained and just plain dirty and have to be thrown out. Here is a picture of my new bag made for my favourite black and white mug. I thought the outside fabric was pretty conservative for me so I did the lining in a loud zebra print just to provide a surprise when the bag is opened.

New Work Sept - Nov 2015

Its been a while since I posted. That's because I have had knee replacement surgery in October with major physio following. For my hospital stay I took lots of handsewing sewing to do and managed to complete some applique that has been hanging around for a couple of years.

I finished four of these blocks begun for a reproduction quilt begun several years ago. Now I have no excuse not to complete the whole quilt as the other blocks have already been pieced. The pink check on the background fabric was tea-dyed to damp down the colour a bit so that it toned in with the  civil war reproduction prints in the rest of the quilt.

One of the members of my craft group (Yarnspinners) kindly gave me a beautiful scrap of vintage Japanese silk.I decided it couldn't be cut up or it would be ruined so I quilted the beautiful flower print in large stitches (a pretty inept sort of sashiko) using two strands of embroidery thread. I'm pleased with the result but undecided about quilting all the pale green background. I completed the binding by hand in hospital. It's a table topper I think. I was concerned to highlight the beautiful flower print which looked like a watercolour.

I have joined an international online group called "Global Piecers" and am having a lot of enjoyment being involved in swaps etc. The group comes from countries all over the world.It's a great deal of fun hearing from everyone and preparing small pieces to send to swap partners. The prayer flag above was supposed to be a Christmas one but with all that going on as I was making it, I couldn't conceive of doing anything as jolly as Christmas. I hope my swap partner likes it! It's made of silk, cotton and linen, uses doilies and embroidery in a collage. I haven't done a prayer flag before and really enjoyed doing this one.

More small things; August 2015

Last weekend I made a pincushion from a couple of leftover friendship star blocks, a needlebook from some Laurel Burch cat fabric and a mug bag from a pretty lavender print. Time to get back to the bigger projects soon though. Ive had a good bit of fun putting these small things together.

Needlebooks using Vintage Doileys; August 2015

I've had a lot of fun making these sweet little needlebooks as gifts for my lovely friends. I used old and stained doileys and cut out clean embroidered bits, using them on the front of the needlebook. The hand-crocheted edgings were too beautiful to waste so I stitched them across the front of the embroidery. I chose a tiny taupe print for Loretta's (at the top), knowing she likes those little flower prints. As the white background did not really go with the taupe, I tea-dyed the  embroidery and I think it worked well. I enjoyed doing these so much I'm going to do some more.

More Mugbags: August 2015

Recently The Yarnspinners asked me to workshop the little mugbags that I use so frequently as gifts. To do this I prepared each step in progression to demonstrate how to proceed. This involved cutting out 4 mugbags which would later need sewing up. So...........last week after the workshop I sewed all the mugbags up! We can't have them hanging about unfinished can we? And a pretty little bunch they turned out to be. I love doing them because they are very quick and easy and you can use those pretty little pieces you have left over from other projects. It's fun making the lining coordinate and more fun choosing fabric to match the mugs you have. Here is the latest batch.

That red one has no mug or drawstring yet but the fabric was a beautiful oriental that I had left over from some other project.

Len's Birthday Present: June 2015

Everyone seems to like my needlebooks so I've done another for a much-loved member of our craft group, The  Yarnspinners. Len is turning 85 next week and he can outsew all of us, making masses of lovely quilts and giving them away for charity. He has a great sense of humour and, because he likes my needlebooks, he has been turning up at Yarnspinners with a raggedy piece of felt covered in needles. This he shows to me and says, "Don't you think I need a new needlebook?" Needless to say I had to take the hint. I chose a folksy picture, embroidered it in stemstitch and put his initials on it. I'm not an expert embroiderer and essentially stick to stemstitch and chainstitch with the odd foray into more complicated stitches. Basically I embroider so that my quilt labels look good.

Being a Pinterest addict I also thought I'd try one of those pincushions on top of a jar that I'd been pinning on my pincushion board. This did not go so well as I'm not the best at using glue guns. It was worth a try but I'd need to get much better at it to feel comfortable. I cut out a circle and embroidered "Have a nice lamington" on it.This is an in-joke in the Yarnspinners. Len recently was ill and had to go on anti-biotics. He ended pronouncing to us all that he thought lamingtons made much better anti-biotics than tablets and proceeded to hand them around for afternoon tea. To those of you who don't know what a lamington is, it's a 3" cube of spongecake covered in chocolate icing and then covered again in desiccated coconut. A great Australian staple for afternoon tea.