A Lovely Year of Finishes - APRIL

This is not my Blogging A to Z posting. That will be the one before or one after it

At the beginning of this month I knew I had a really busy time coming up so I chose a very simple project, a small one that I knew I had to complete, for my project for A Lovely Year of Finishes.

I chose the mug rug that I had to make for a swap as my project. I chose to cut into my very special Australian Wildflower fabrics for this since it was going overseas to a lovely Twilter. I fussy cut the cream background fabric to showcase 5 different Australian wildflowers.

The backing fabric featured gum leaves. I loved the fabric and so did the recipient (I can't find the photos I took so these are ones that Gretchen took and put on Twitter)

Now I have to decide what I am going to do for my ALYOF project for May

Busy Month Ahead

 To those of you who have come here with the A-Z blogging challenge. This is not my post for that... go one blog post forward... or back and you will find it but feel free to read on anyway

I joined A Lovely Year of Finishes last month. I completed my project. I wrote a blog post about finishing... and then forgot to link it to the linky party. Oops. I did finish it... honest guys.  I had nominated my Tea Shop Quilt and I got it done with a few days to spare and wrote about it here I just forgot to link up.



So this month I will try to do better.

I am taking part in a swap this month organised by Sandi from Quilt Cabana Corner. We are swapping Mug Rugs. My swap partner is in the USA and I am going to make her a mug rug using some Australian print fabric. Better not say too much about it cause I know she reads my blog sometimes it would be nice if it turns out to be a bit of a surprise. Its only a small project but really ... it might be as much as I can manage.

April is going to be hugely busy for me. It already is proving to be




I'm taking part in the Blogging A-Z challenge and it is taking up heaps of time. I am searching for photos to go with my posts. Many of our older photos are on an external hard drive that has been playing up and getting the photos off there became a major concern. I also realised that there are several years worth of photos on my old lap top that has stopped working too. I had never gotten around to putting them onto the hard drive ... because it was playing up but never put them onto anything else either. Now a friend is going to try to rescue them for me. At least a lot of them are on facebook now :)

Anyway - whilst searching for relevant photos I have been going through the rescued folders and sorting them out - rearranging, labelling, editing. This is all enormously time consuming (I  now have to remember to copy them all to a new external hard drive AND to disk as well and maybe some online storage too.....) That has been an enormous time sink.

I have been trying to write my blogs ahead of time because in one week Fangirl, Fixit Guy and I are heading overseas to Malaysia for 6 nights. Actually we leave home on Thursday and don't get back till the following Saturday night because we are driving to and from Brisbane,  so that means I need to get all those blog posts written ahead of time. That's H to P! Being a tiny bit OCD I am having to work through them in alphabetical order so getting the ones before hand done first. I'm up to O now so nearly done. But its taking all my time and thoughts and the projects I had planned to do this week have been put off. Hopefully once I get to P I can relax a bit... hopefully.

When I get back I am going to be working full time for a week. I know lots of my dear readers do that all the time but I don't. I'm almost retired... I thought I had retired till I went back one day a week for this term, but that was it... only now its that first week of the next term.

One way and another it is NOT leaving me much time to complete any major quilting projects this month. You will note (those of you who have followed me for a little while) that my goals for this month are far more modest.

I do have to complete a pattern test for someone but obviously I can't blog about that or show you pictures... so that can't be my project for this month.

So - this mug rug is going to be it.

I might surprise myself and get it and lots else done too... but don't hold your breath.

Linking up with A Lovely Year of Finishes at Fiber of All Sorts

Teashop open for Business

Well not really but my applique quilt that I called Teashop Quilt is finished.

The journey for this quilt started in the UK in 2013 when I was visiting my daughter, known as Fangirl who was living there at the time. I had 4 weeks overseas, 3 weeks in the UK with her and one week in Berlin visiting our German exchange student Lena.

FG and I had 3 glorious weeks driving around England and Scotland. A feature of most days was us finding a teashop and enjoying a Devonshire Tea, or cream tea as they are called over there.

Our first outing was a high tea (well they called it Afternoon Tea) at the Chesterfield Hotel. It was Fangirl's Mother's Day present to me. It had a Willy Wonka Theme which was appropriate as afterwards we went to see Charlie and The Chocolate Factory at the theatre. (which was her birthday present to me)

We both also love English bone china and we had great fun visiting the charity shops - selling second hand clothes, bric a brac and china. Despite the fact that I was going to have to fly home with this china I didn't resist and bought a number of pieces. The only reason I had room for any china is that I had taken a large suitcase with me in order to be able to bring back some stuff for FG. She was moving back to Australia at the end of the year and I had offered to help her shift some of her goods in my luggage. Usually when I travel I go with just one cabin sized bag.

We tried to visit fabric and craft shops but had the most amazing run of bad luck First of all they were hard to find... well at least where we visited. And then everyone we did find was shut. We would get there in the afternoon of their half day and they had closed at lunch time... or at 2 or 3 and we would be there after that. Or it was the day they didn't open at all. One we came across had closed completely. NOT good.

On my last weekend in the UK we visited the area of Kent where FG had lived when she first went to the UK. She knew where there was a patchwork shop in the district and as a surprise she took me there. It was called Puddleducks and was located in Sevenoaks in Kent

 I wasn't interested in buying fabric. The range was basically the same as we have in Australia and the same price or more expensive. However I did want something special as a keepsake ... and after all the effort Fangirl had gone to take me there I had to buy something. When I saw this pattern by Gail Penberthy, featuring a tea shop I knew that it was what I needed to buy. The perfect souveneir from my holiday.

I flew back to Australia, into Sydney where I was met by my husband. We had a wedding to attend in Sydney and then had a 3 week driving holiday planned, around NSW (it had been originally planned as being 8 weeks but husband's job situation changed) During our holiday I visited a number of quilt shop and I collected fabric for the quilt. I was looking for tea shop related fabrics - cups, plates, cakes, mugs etc, as well as some fabric to complete the design I had bought.

Back home again I got busy and when I decided to start work on the quilt I couldn't find the pattern. I had the fabric I had purchased, and even some buttons but could NOT find the pattern. I was VERY frustrated to say the least. Eventually I found the website for the shop where I had purchased it and found the name of the designer and the pattern. When I ordered the pattern they got back to me to say they no longer carried it. I searched the net and found it elsewhere. Whilst on the website I found a couple of other patterns by the same designer and ordered them too. Of course when they arrived I found the original pattern! (isn't that always the way).

 

I didn't plan to make the individual projects but to combine them into a larger wall quilt.

We were planning another 9 week camping trip Oct-Dec in 2014 and I decided that this project combining these three patterns and other appliques featuring the fabrics I had purchased the year before would be the perfect hand project to take with me. I set about prepping the blocks to take with me. I worked out a design and planned my blocks accordingly

I stitched the appliques as we travelled the coast of Australia from Sunshine Coast around to Great Ocean Road, across to Adelaide, up to the Flinders Ranges and then home the inland route. I got most of the appliques completed in this time. Once I got home I put the squares up on my design wall. Had a few goes at rearranging the squares, stitched a few more squares and finally put it together,

   

Took me a little while once I got the quilt pinned to get it quilted but last week I managed to get it done and ... well now its done. Yay.


I thought this was my done photo... but then I realised I hadn't added the embellishments. I had collected a variety of buttons as well on my travels. Things which I thought would add to the quilt. Here they are. I love them. I have more I could add... will see how I go

I had hoped to hang it at a garden party I went to on Saturday but I didn't get around to asking the organisers if they would like it so I didn't take it with me. Its not a cuddle quilt. Its a quilt to be hung. Not sure where I will hang it but I will find a space I'm sure.

So its done! 18 months after I bought the pattern I have it all finished. I'm very proud of it

This was my March project for A Lovely Year of Finishes and I am pleased that I have managed it in time

Thursday Thoughts - a lovely year of finishes.

At last I have remembered in time to link up to A Lovely Year of Finishes. To qualify you have to link to them in the first week of each month. I manage to remember into the 2nd week but not this time. I was awake enough to do it this time. Well to try



To qualify you have to select a project to finish that month - one and only one. I could have just linked to my monthly goals but since that details a number of projects that I want to complete this month I figured I had better write a new post.

This month I want to get Tea Shop Quilt finished. I started this quilt back in .. well 2013 I think it was. That is when I bought the pattern and started collecting the fabrics. Then... I lost the pattern. It was by Gail Penberry design. 

 It was so frustrating. I found it on line and was able to order it, eventually from the UK (along with several others at the same time as I recall) Then of course - just after it arrived I found the original pattern I had bought. Grrr so frustrating. 

Never mind.

I traced off the applique blocks and got them all prepped to take with us on our trip at the end of last year. We travelled for 9 weeks, camping in lots of interesting places in our camper trailer. We travelled down the East Coast of Australia from Maroochydore on the Sunshine Coast around to Adelaide and then inland to the Flinders Ranges and then home to Central Queensland via the inland route. We did venture off the coast a number of times en route to Adelaide but its simpler to say it that way! I completed all the appliques whilst we travelled and even made myself a few more. I worked out a design for my blocks although to be honest when I put it together I changed it all completely.
   


I got the top completed last month and have made the backing for it and cut the batting as well. Now I have to pin baste it, quilt it and bind it. I want to have it finished (with a hanging sleeve as well) to hang at an afternoon tea to raise funds for a school in Zambia called Our Rainbow House. 

Wish me luck!!

Monday Musings A Linky Party and a Free Embroidery

My Sister in Law Christine who blogs at Bluebirds and Bumblebees designed a lovely set of embroidery patterns a few years ago, one for each month of the year. They were released through a local quilt shop exclusively however she has now started to release them through Craftsy. Her first pattern is free.



To check it out this is the link The patterns will be released monthly and the subsequent ones will be $2. I have made 2 quilts from these embroideries already after my mother did the embroideries. I made one for my daughter Fangirl and another for our bed.

Whilst I was catching up on reading Christine's blog I found a link to a year long linky party for Finishes. I was too late to sign up for January but am hoping to link up in future months. It is A Lovely Year of Finishes and is hosted jointly by Shanna of Fibre of All Sorts and  Melissa of Bittersweet



I need to make myself up a list of all my projects and try to work my way through them this year. I just have to make sure I remember to link up in time next month. You have sign up in the first week of each month.