WIP Wednesday

Beanie

Having finished off Boyo's beanie (which has barely been off his head since I made it. As I write this he is wearing it) I started work on one for Beast. He wanted black. I found a tutorial on the net for one using a different stitch. 

However it didn't work out properly and was ugly so just before I finished off the ball of wool I decided to unravel it all and start again. I'm making up a pattern now and like it better. My attempt didn't look at all like this. Not sure what I did wrong but I'll have another go at it...perhaps using a thinner wool

Kombi Boy wants a beanie too. He's asked for dark grey which I don't have any of so his will have to wait till I get to a wool shop, hopefully tomorrow when we are in Rockhampton

POD Block Challenge

I am up to date with my blocks from this having made this week's one. There are only 4 blocks to go in this challenge. I have at least one I want to redo because when I wrote the name on the books I had the block upside down at the time. Doh. I regret writing the names on the books. It is so time consuming to stitch the names on and I have often been in a rush when writing the names on to embroider over and my printing isn't as good as I would like it. I am not going to do any more and hope that the ones that I have done won't make the rest look out of place

 New one released tomorrow which I won't be able to work on till after the weekend as we head out tomorrow lunchtime for a Chrysalis Flight.



I finished a banner for church this week... so its not a work in progress. I got it made between WIP reports. I wrote about it in my last blog (here) Today I took it up to the church and hung it. 

Unfortunately its hard to get a good photo of the banner in situ but the light streaming through the banner gives a rather special affect and I am starting to think about doing a sort of stained glass banner utilising this light... stay tuned.

Playing with Nine Patches quilt - a pattern by Charlotte from Scrapitude. I've got the top together. I put a golden yellow border on it and I think that will be all I will put on it. However I am still thinking about it. I might yet do something more spectacular with it.



 My friend Tina has finished her quilt She pieced the back completely from squares. Isn't this cool? She's upped the ante on this one. I am going to have to do something special for the back even if I don't do anything crazy special with the borders.

  

My friend Kym has finished quilting both the quilts I sent her last week - That's Scrap in a Box which I reckon looks like a lattice so am calling it Lovely Lattice and Crop Circles. She is posting them back to me tomorrow so should be here early next week.

Speaking of Crop Circles. It was a mystery quilt from the Patch n Peace weekend I went to at the beginning of June. Another lady, Vivienne, has finished hers and put photos on our Facebook page. Hasn't she done a lovely job. I love her border and have already warned her that I might be appropriating it for one of mine. Perhaps this is what I can do on Nine Patch

Black, White and Red Charity Quilt

My friend Lindy and I are working on putting together blocks made by our group in a block of the month challenge we had going earlier on in the year. As well as the 9 blocks that we put into the centre of the quilt in a basic 9 patch configuration, we had some 5" and 2.5" black and white half square triangle blocks and some 2.5" and 2" black and red hst that we are working into a lovely border. We haven't finished the border yet but made good progress on it today.

 This was the photo I took today to show Lindy (who was sick today) how far I had gotten with it. Also we were trying to decide whether to use red (as in the bottom left corner) or white (top right) to fill in the spaces. We've decided on the red. Might call this quilt Newspaper Mama (Its Black and White and Red (read) all over)

 

Growing in Christ - a banner is finished

I love to make banners for our church. It adds beauty to the worship space and can inspire the worshippers. It began a few years ago when our then minister admired one of my wall hangings and asked if we could hang it at church.

This led onto me making wall hangings or banners specifically for church. Suzy, our then minister was a bit of a stickler for following the colours of the church liturgical calendar and so she wanted me to make banners in the appropriate colours. 



Purple is for Easter and Advent, White for Christmas and Easter, Red for Pentecost. There are a few special Sundays scattered in there as well that are white or red but for the rest of the year - ordinary time the colour is green. Thats about 30+ Sundays that the colour is green. At the moment we have 3 green banners. (see here for a more detailed break up of the colours of the church year)

Now we have some other banners that we can use but they aren't specifically green. 

I know that after a few weeks people stop noticing things that are there all the time. Its not very  long and so I want to be able to change things around a bit to keep people aware.

So - I have been mulling over what banners I can make to add to the worship space.

I have a Pinterest board that I collect pictures of banners. They come up as suggestions in my feed. A little while ago the most beautiful banner came up. Its by an artist called James Spurgin and I just loved it.



I decided to make a new banner based upon his design. I altered it substantially but the idea of the gold cross with the vine growing over it was the heart of my design.

Being a patchworker instead of an appliqued cross I patched a cross. At first I wanted to do crazy patch but I didn't have enough gold fabric to do that.

 I was going to patch the background as well but I had a lovely green floaty fabric and I used it instead and pieced the cross to the this fabric. Another reason I didn't applique was that the fabric wouldn't take heat (I damaged it a little pressing seams so knew that it would take the heat of fusible applique and that's the only sort I do)

For the vine I thought about ribbon but didn't have enough. Then I remembered a batik skirt of my mum's that had already been cut into for another church banner. It was a circular skirt so already cut on the bias. I just followed the circular hem line and cut 2" strips. I folded both edges of the strips into the middle and shaped the vine over the cross and stitched it down along the side seams.

Originally when I had been going to piece the background I had cut a stack of 6.5" squares from a piece of fabric that was somewhat sun damaged. It had faded in various places. The gold cross didn't show up enough against the green and so I had gone instead to the forest green of the polyester fabric. I was worried that these squares would be wasted but then realised I could use them as the leaves.

I found a leaf shape on the net and printed it out and used it as a template to cut out the 72 leaves. The squares were folded in half and I was able to get at 1 or 2 leaves out of each square. I used some other green fabrics as well in order to get a bit of variety in the leaves. I cut leaf shapes from batting scraps too to give each leaf some body. 

I sewed the veins on the leaves and around the outside in straight stitch and then attached them to the vine in bunches of three. Where the fabric had puckered a bit when I had sewn the vine down I put some leaves to cover up the faults.

The banner itself didn't have any wadding - just a back lining. I did outline the cross but there was no quilting as such, just the stitching where the leaves were attached. (I put the vine on before the back lining which was a mistake on my part. I think there would have been less puckering if I had put the backing there) I bound the edges of the quilt in the same fabric as the background. I stitched it to the back, folded it over and then stitched it down on the front using a decorative, vine stitch.

I put rod pockets top and bottom. I find a bottom rod helps the larger quilts to hang straight,

The finished quilt, which I have called Growing in Christ is 194cm x 115 cms ( 76" x 45" approx). Whilst it was in the planning for a month or more I constructed it over just 2.5 days. You can see by the close ups that I haven't done beautiful stitches. Banners go on the wall and are viewed from a distance. They won't get washed so its not as carefully stitched as it might be if it were a quilt or even going on the wall of a home where people might examine it up close and personal. This certainly isn't show quality but I got it done and I am really really happy and excited by it

Stash report -

I've done a lot of sewing this week but have had no finishes.

I got the next POD block done.. yest the same week as it came out. How good am I... again. This week will be a struggle cause we are away all weekend and then we will have visitors so I'll probably be behind again by next week but you get that. At least I am up to date for now.

Sent 2 quilts off to be long armed... when they get them back and finished off there will be some big numbers to add which will be rewarding.. .but meanwhile I am pretty stagnant.


I've made great progress with Playing with Nine Patches, another quilt by Charlotte from Scrapitude. The centre part is together and I just have to do the borders. I was thinking about doing something special with them but am back to thinking that I'll just do some straight borders in a couple of different colours, the first one being bright yellow... but I've been known to change my mind so watch this space.

this quilt has 738 2.5" squares and I didn't have to cut any of them. They all came out of my scrap drawer of 2.5" squares and I still have some left.. half a box of them. That is really amazing

Currently on my design board is a banner for church. I only started making it this afternoon and I have made great progress on it. The basic banner is done... now for the embellishing which is going to take the time. 

The "vine" is only pinned in place while I work out exactly where I want it to go

I've started making the leaves to go on the vine. I want them to be 3 dimensional so won't applique them down but attach them so they hang off the banner. 15 made and probably 30 more to make

The other work I've done this week has been on shirts to go to the school in Zambia that the Charity Our Rainbow House runs. Our group, Handmade Love has already made dresses for all the girls and now we are working on shirts for the boys. I can't count any of them as finishes either as a) I didn't contribute any of the fabric for them and b) we haven't actually finished them (minor details I know... but rather telling) 

My friend Serana sent me this photo of me hard at work in Peggy's kitchen yesterday

And then there is the knitting loom. Boyo got his beanie (and proud of it he is too. He's hardly taken it off) I've started one for the Beast but I unpulled it cause it was ugly... I was trying a new pattern. Have restarted, another new pattern but one of my own making and so far so good

So... nothing to count as far as finishes go however I do have some fabric to count in the "discard" area. A couple of weeks ago I tried my hand at chenille work. I used 5 pieces of fabric together - mostly repurposed fabric for the inner linings but the top fabric was a panel of some daisies. I was thinking of making it into a cushion cover. When I did the sewing and cutting I did it on the straight of grain, and not on the diagonal. As a result it has just unravelled and unravelled... can't get it to stop... it will unravel to nothing if I keep brushing it and so I have decided to call it quits and throw it out and try again. - 5 pieces of fabric .45m x .5m total thrown out 1.05m

 
I haven't purchased any fabric - have resisted all the offers on Massdrop despite there being several gorgeous fabric bundles on offer. No little surprise packets from any of my family or friends either so nothing to put into the fabric in section so that is a plus

So my stats for  week Week 26

Fabric Used                                1.05

Fabric Added                              0     

Year to Date

Fabric Used                               70.32

Fabric Added                             35.35

Net Fabric used                        34.96m

I am so looking forward to getting those 2 quilts currently getting long armed finished. They will so change those figures about so that I will have used a heap more fabric, and especially bump that net fabric used up so that it is much more than fabric added. 

The scary thing is that despite having used almost 35m of fabric.. .my stash doesn't seem to have gone down all that much!

Linking up with Judy at Patchwork Times

WIP Wednesday

As usual it has been a busy and varied week of sewing.

My Sister in Law Christine (from the blog Bluebirds and Bumblebees) designed a block of the month set of embroideries several years ago. I have spoken about them before.  (She is now putting them one month at a time on Etsy).  My mother completed several sets of them including 2 for me. One I made into a quilt for my daughter Fangirl and one I made into a quilt for myself.

 My sister Joy also completed a set of the blocks but never did anything with them. Earlier this year she offered them to me  and of course I said "Yes please". I decided to make them into a quilt for my niece, Joy's daughter. I was sure she would really appreciate them and enjoy having something special with links not just to her mum but 2 of her aunties as well.

This week I got them out and trimmed them back. I meant to trim them to 8.5" so they would be 8" finished but somewhere along the line I had a brain explosion and trimmed them to 8" instead. Ho hum. I then calculated the size of the triangles I would need to make (I used this tutorial from Pieceful Living  to work out the size) I'd asked my niece what colours she liked and if she liked brights or pastels. She said blues and brights :) If I only used the 12 blocks themselves the quilt would have been rather small, unless I put a huge border on them so I decided instead to alternate other blocks with the embroidered blocks. I cut 8" squares from a variety of blue picture fabrics. The triangles for all the blocks I cut from a variety of mostly bright blues. All the triangles have now been attached. I am still tweaking the arrangement of these blcks but hope to settle on something suitable soon.

Next I have to trim the blocks to a uniform size before I stitch them together. Then I will work on the border. I could just do a simple border but knowing me I will probably end up making flying geese.... or checker board.... or piano key... cause I love scrappy borders so much. We will see.

I made another banner for church this week. Its another banner for lent so its lots of purples. It was inspired by a banner I saw on pinterest whilst looking for banner ideas. Its from PlayfulStitching

My banner was substantially different in the end but this was my initial inspiration.

I made it basically as big as I could with the fabric I had. I used scraps I had already cut in my scrap stash. Some I had to cut down to 2.5" as they were wider than that. I did cut a few strips from my yardage but only a very few... maybe 3.

For the backing I used some fairly thick fabric... not sure what it was exactly or where it came from. I suspect from fabric I inherited from my elderly aunt. She died a little over 2 years ago at 99yrs and 9 months. I didn't use any wadding in it but did quilt it.

 I echo quilted around the cross and then went out from it about 1" for 10 rows then went to 1.5" then 2" then 2.5" and finally 3". I have declared it finished although am thinking of doing a little trapunto type work on it and stuffing the cross to give it a 3 dimensional look. We shall see. If I do that I will have to go back and stitch another row on the cross as at the moment the first row of stitching is 1/4" outside the cross.

At Patchwork this week I continued to work on the blue block donation quilt that our group is putting together.  Its all random - asymmetrical and its challenging to me cause I keep wanting to make things all matchy matchy. I got 2 sides just about put together. I might have to take off the sashing from the previous border as its a bit wavy. I have been trying to ignore it but.... its annoying me so might as well give in and redo it.

I have completed the week 8 block for POD . I followed the lead of some of the other participants in this challenge and chose some more adventurous fabrics for the book's spines. A new one was released today so hope to make a move on it soon.

 I am one week behind with the Elephant Parade blocks but I have got eyes on the frog block

The fabric is all cut for the next two blocks I have to make - the turtle and the bird. Hopefully I will get them both done this weekend too.

Fixit Guy is going away this weekend so I will have a clear run at my sewing. Not that he ever stops me sewing but sometimes he does suggest alternate activities like going for walks or doing other jobs. In fact he is a great enabler getting me lunch and delivering it to the sewing room if I don't emerge and often cooking tea etc. I really need to get stuck into some small projects for the sewing stall Hand Made love is having at the Afternoon tea on the 28th March. I haven't made anything for a couple of weeks now. Better get some of those pouches sewn.

Linking up with WIP Wednesday, WIPs on Wednesday and Lets Bee Social.

Tuesday Musings

I've made some progress yesterday on my Riverwalk quilt.
I was concerned that the bottom of the quilt which consisted of 3 rows of dark greens was too harsh and too "solid" compared to the rest of the quilt which appeared very random in the colour placement

I considered putting some light browns and beiges there to reflect the dry grasses that are so prevalent down there at the moment.

I didn't like that look either.


I took the bottom 3 rows of dark green off my Riverwalk banner/wall hanging. The bottom 2 rows of these I left as they were but one row I pulled apart and using some mid greens I made 2 more rows which I then added to the bottom of the banner before reattaching the two dark green rows. I feel it has mixed things up a bit more and made the dark gren less harsh.

Now I am working on finishing it off. Usually I don't quilt my banners for church. I usually "pillow case" them. ie I cut a backing for the banner, put them right sides together and then sew around 3.5 sides, turn the quilts right sides out, Press, sew the opening shut. Sometimes I sew stay bars across, if the banner is a long one to keep them from curling in on themselves.

This one I am thinking of quilting. I have some old flannel sheets that I could use as wadding/batting as it doesn't need to be very heavy. Not sure what I have that will serve as backing but my main concern is how would I bind it? I am not sure that I want this to have the frame or border that most binding would give. Pillow casing it would give the neatest finish but I don't always get a very crisp edge when I do that so I am still thinking. I am not sure how I would quilt it either. It would give the potential for more texture and added design elements but I am not sure that I am up to that yet.

Thinking thinking thinking