Monday, December 8, 2014

Summer School/s

After the Xmas rush is over and all's back to normal how about some sewing at a Summer School?
I'm doing two different ones in January and this is the first one.
It's my Strippy Sampler quilt, made using a variety of different techniques.
There's "made fabric", curved piecing, foundation piecing, wonky flying geese, a traditional circle block and a wonky zig zag block with a touch of applique.
It's a fun project and held over two days at Hobbysew Kings Park (Blacktown) on 13 and 14th January.
You'll have a go at the techniques in all the strips so give the shop a ring if you're interested.
 
The next Summer School class is at Quiltsmith in Annandale.
On Friday 16th January you can come along and tackle this block from my Scrappy Windmills quilt.

You can make it by hand - English or American piecing - or by machine and it looks great in all sorts of fabrics.
You'll receive the pattern for the whole quilt on the day so contact the shop to book in.

 
After that very busy week I'll be getting ready to head to TOKYO!! for the Tokyo Quilt Show.
Can't really believe its happening.
Happy Xmas to all who read this blog - not many people comment so I really don't know who I'm talking to! How about you leave me a comment THIS time and that will tell me I'm not talking to the wild blue yonder.
 

Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Silly season!

Saturday saw our Xmas lunch with a group here at home. There was lots of show and tell for the last class of the year with Pam's finish of her Lots of Dots masterpiece. She will be persuaded to put it in next year's Sydney Quilt Show - can't wait for her response!
 
 
 The block below is a ring-in from the original - I love it!
 The full picture - just needs quilting.

Newcomer Karen has been working on Reproduction Beauties and what a burst of colour.

She was wearing orange on the day and blended perfectly.
 Yas drew this on A4 paper and blew it up at the copy shop which became her foundation pattern. It was stunning and all drawn freehand. Can't wait to see what happens next.
After all that excitement and swapping of presents we hoed into a lovely lunch with fruit, White Xmas and Alice's triple-decker pav for dessert. Oh and some bubbles to go with it all. What a day!

 Margaret from Hobbysew designed this quilt for her granddaughter for Xmas. Lots of maths and measuring involved to make the pictures fit but it looks great. She will be pleased I'm sure.
And Jenny is getting ready to quilt her Sunflower top - lots and lots of beautiful reproduction fabrics. This is a new pattern in my etsy shop. Hop on over and have a look.


Lastly, it's lovely to see the team from Quiltmania magazine liked our Springwood quilt show raffle quilt enough to include it in the latest issue. What great publicity - thanks guys!
Classes are winding down for the year and I'm planning some holiday projects of my own. Can't wait to get to that machine!

Saturday, November 8, 2014

New pattern and Give away winner

Square Dance quilt
Over two years ago I designed a BOM quilt for the Australian quilt shop Material Obsession.
After a successful run as a BOM the pattern is now mine to market separately and is available in my etsy shop here.
 
The quilt is 76" square and is made up of 4 x 16" centre blocks featuring foundation piecing.The sashing is foundation pieced flying geese.

The circle blocks are appliqued onto a background square using ric rac

There are 4 x 12" blocks in the corners of the large diamond borders.


The whole quilt is a fun project, especially if you use lots of bright "modern" fabrics.

The 35 page pattern comes in a folder with a quilt photo, detailed instructions for each block and borders and original foundations for you to copy and keep.
Nice Xmas present to yourself!
 
Now for the winner of the table centre - sorry it's taken so long.
Ann-Marie from Sydney is the winner and she had this to say...
 
"French General is my favourite fabric of all time!! Your designs are stunning. Friends recently did a class with you and are still raving! "
 
Thanks to those who left a comment and I'm glad it's gone to a good home.

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Bloggers Festival #2

 


This is my second entry in Amy's Bloggers Festival - my Cut Loose Sampler - no pattern available.



It's in the Original Design category and is a sampler of different blocks and techniques.

There's an eight-point star and free-form flying geese...






there's curved piecing and appliqued hexagons, plus a couple of log cabin blocks...



there's a basket block and half a feathered star plus some square-in-a-square blocks...





"made fabric" hexagons and lots more.








It was machine quilted by me and the quilting is a sampler too with lots of different designs in all the different blocks. Click on the pics for a closer look.



Thanks again Amy for a great Festival!


Monday, October 27, 2014

Bloggers Quilt Festival #1

For my first entry in Amy's Bloggers Quilt Festival I'd like to show you Scrappy Windmills.

Nine big 20" blocks hand pieced over papers then machine quilted by my friend Julie Clarke.

As you can see it's a riot of fabrics featuring lights, mediums and darker ones for maximum impact.
There are 72 blades in all these blocks and a massive 168 x 1" hexagons!

It was a lot of fun to make, mostly at night in front of the TV. It's amazing what you can do in a couple of hours each night.

No block used a great amount of any fabric but it was a delight to go thru the scraps and find the perfect piece!
Thanks Amy for running this again. Hop on over and check out all the categories and find some new blogs to look at.
I'll be posting my second entry tomorrow.

Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Snake Gully and a give away

Snake Gully Quilters are a group of girls in and around Muswellbrook in the Hunter Valley.
From memory this is my third year of travelling there for a weekend of fun and laughter with some sewing thrown in.
My gracious host Liz feeds and waters (read wine) me and I always come home with vegies or plants from her garden. A really lovely lady!
 
Rolling star blocks and Matiah with her Art Deco Lamp - she's 13 and a great little sewer!

Over the two days we were tackling my Rolling Star quilt and a circular table centre.
Table centres coming together

 
Show-and-tell from previous visits

 They are a very productive group with a fantastic sewing room and a great bunch a gals.
I'm booked in again for next year too.
 
Now for the give away as it's my 251st post. Who would have thought I'd get this far. I'm finding it hard to make the time lately to post here when Facebook is so quick and instant.
I'm giving away my original circular table centre taught at Snake Gully.
It measures 30" across and was foundation pieced and machine quilted.
It has giant ric rac around the outside edge and is made from a French General range of fabric.

To enter please leave me a comment - Australia only for postage reasons - and I'll select a winner next Monday.
Wish me luck for Saturday. My darling son is getting married and I'm to walk the 2 1/2 year old flower girl (my granddaughter) down the aisle before the bridesmaids. I'm pretty sure I'll be carrying her!

Sunday, October 12, 2014

Need a gift?

This post is not sewing related at all but I just had to show you this...
 
My granddaughter's name is Harper and a good friend's daughter Sarah has made this for her.
It's all stickers carefully chosen for a little girl.

It even has her name on it!

And how did Sarah know her favourite toy is a giraffe! We have three of them all the same colour to cover any contingency.
It's on a canvas 10" x 12" and is absolutely beautiful.
If you need a gift for a child - or even an adult - Sarah will make to order.
Contact her here if you're interested.

Monday, September 29, 2014

Misty Mountains Getaway

I've just returned from four days teaching at the Misty Mountains Getaway in Dorrigo, just inland from Coffs harbour. I had a total of 26 students doing five different projects and had a wow of a time.
 
One group was working on the Noodle Box quilt-as-you-go



The one below had the most beautiful machine embroidery in the centre of each block and yes those are my toes.
 Another group was working on Winbourne

 While there were lots doing the Emperors Wheel quilt - more flying geese!


Here are the Emperors girls proudly showing their achievements.
The Getaway this year attracted 143 students over six days with six or seven tutors teaching all sorts of one and two day classes.
If you get the chance to go you should - quilters pretty much take over the town. I know the locals really appreciate it and the girls have a ball.
Show-and-tell and dinner out every night - it's great fun.
My next post will be number 250! so I'm thinking I'll have a giveaway to celebrate.
Stay tuned.

Monday, September 15, 2014

Camping again

Our annual Quilt Camp has just been and gone with two workshops happening over the weekend.
My project was this Southern Wheel block and there were some beauties in the room.
Tracey's beautiful "scalloped" edge using giant ric rac.

Yum!

30 girls joined Ann Murray and me for a fun weekend. Great venue, great food and great friends! What more could you ask for.

WIP
 


Nearly there.
Auditioning ric rac,


The signs of a good weekend!

 Ann demonstrating her workshop on FMQ.
Ann's sample

 

WOW!

Looking good

Sue's amazing soon-to-be cushion


Another Sue's fine effort
 
I think they all had a good time - I know Ann and I did!
Back to the real world today.