I’ve been sewing!

My sewing room is no longer empty.  Or tidy woo!  I started by pulling out the star blocks I’d worked on at my last retreat.

It’s amazing how quickly you can forget what you’re doing when you’ve put your project away for a bit!  On the plus side though, it does feel like you’re starting a new project!

I’d also forgotten how to make HSTs!!  I marked my little squares and realised that if I sewed them it would be wrong but I couldn’t work out how to make them right!  

But I did work it out and felt a bit sheepish once I had.  Not as sheepish as I felt later though when I found all the squares already marked in a different box! 

Here I am trying to sew with my hand jewellery.  I’m finding it impossible to use pins so this quilt is definitely not going to have perfect points!

I’ve now made five and I have my next two blocks arranged and sat next to my machine ready to go.

This is one of my bonus pinwheel blocks.  This is probably the best example of the worst sewing.  Before hurting my hand I would have unpicked it but I’ve decided to let it go.  It’s the best I can do now and that’s got to be good enough.  

I’m off to retreat again next week.  I’m so excited!  Hopefully I’ll get some sewing done this time!  Still, sometimes it’s just great to hang out with lovely friends even if you don’t get a lot done.

A dream? Or a nightmare?

 I’m wearing this mighty fine hand jewellery now.  It’s definitely less torturous than the previous device to try to fix my hand but I still can’t sew.  It’s very bad timing to start writing a quilting blog when I can’t do any quilting!

After my son’s 21 birthday party where he’d taken over my sewing room I had the carpets cleaned and I repainted the walls to freshen them up.  I’ve just put my machine and cutting table back in.  The room either looks very depressing and empty or fantastic and ready to fill depending on how you want to look at it!  Look at that clean and empty cutting board!  And my design wall is naked!!

I know some people would look at that picture and think it looks wonderful but it just looks so wrong to me ha ha!

My shirt challenge quilts

 I haven't done a single stitch of sewing!  So I'm posting about some quilts I've previously made.  These are my shirt quilts.  

A couple of years ago the quilting group I used to be a member of did a shirt challenge.  You purchase an amount of cotton shirts each and then they get chopped up, mixed and redistributed and you have to make something out of the fabrics you're given. I'd participated in one of these shirt challenges several years ago and learned a lot about getting out of my comfort zone as I mostly liked to use plain fabric with perhaps one or two patterns.  Having to use colours I didn't like and checks and prints was really quite terrifying for me but I did it.  And I love my quilt!

Here it is hanging from a fence at the club when we did our big reveal. Now that I'm looking at it again I think I should make another with this design!

Moving on to the next challenge.  I didn't join in with this one because I have so many shirts already but I wanted to play alongside the other ladies. My husband loves shirts but he has a "rule" if he buys a shirt he has to give up an old one.  Who am I to say no to all that delicious fabric?  So I didn't join in with the club challenge because I had my own fabrics I wanted to use. Not all the shirts were 100% cotton yikes!

I wanted to make a half square triangle values quilt so I cut out squares for that and then as a bonus I cut the useable scraps into smaller rectangles.  I used the rectangles as leader/enders and it's amazing how quickly both quilts came together.

I sorted my fabrics into lights and darks for my values quilt and when I took a picture and edited it so that it was black and white I was surprised to see there were very few lights, lots of mediums and some darks.

I sewed together what seemed like a billion half square triangles and then I started placing the fabrics on my design wall.  For my focus part I started with darks, then medium and then darks again because I liked the look of it.  After that the rounds were lights, medium and then dark.  The blocks kept falling off the wall so I decided to sew them as I went.  I figured that I had enough fabric to get away with doing this but I was careful to stand back and check there weren't too many of the same print close together.

I soon ran out of design wall and started taping the blocks to the actual wall!

We were in lockdown when I finished both quilts and I struggled to find backing for them online.  I ended up purchasing cotton/poly blend sheets from Spotlight.  I must admit I was a little worried about the blend and whether the colour would work but I was pleasantly surprised by how well it quilted and the drape on it on the bed is amazing!

This is the quilting design on the values quilt. It's a free design called Fall Foliage from Urban Elementz

I had excess backing and wadding so I also quilted a few memory quilts while it was on the frame.  Here they are laid out on my living room floor before trimming and binding.  We have used these quilts on the beds for months and every time I see them I ooooohhhh and think I should take a decent picture but I haven't managed to do it yet! So living room floor pics is all I have for now.

I stitched the rectangles shirt quilt together as I went along too.  Luckily I ended up with a fairly balanced top at the end.  Here is my design floor. Or is it Minnie's bed?!

Finished and on the frame.

I also used a free quilting design on this quilt from Urban Elementz.  This one is called Lisa's raindrops.

Living room floor shot before trimming and binding.

My husband ran out of cupboard space for his shirts so we bought a hanger from Target.  Here are a few of his shirts hanging on it. Are these my next shirt challenge fabrics??

Quilt shop bus trip!

This is a picture heavy post but I couldn’t leave anything off!  If you want to see the pictures better click on them and they'll appear in a new window.

Last Saturday most of the sit n sew ladies from the Wollert lifestyle village and friends (I think we need a name!) went on a bus trip to four quilt shops.  A big thank you goes to Kay for not only arranging the whole wonderful day out for us but also for driving the bus!  

Our first shop was The Quilt Shop in Eltham.  This was a new to me shop and what a treat it was!  The shop owner not only offered us tea and coffee and yummy biscuits but lucky prizes and a discount too!  

This is the front room of the shop and you can see a few of the ladies studying all the fabrics and haberdashery on offer.

A Christmas display behind the counter.

More fabric and there’s Kate searching for the perfect fabric…

Ta da!  Is this is?!

Beautiful fabric on display.

And plenty of inspiration hung on the walls.

The back room had large tables for sit n sewers and I had a lovely chat with the HAGS (Hexy appreciation group or gals) who were there working on their hand projects.

Next stop was to Patchwork with Gail B in Bayswater North.  I've been here on numerous occasions as it has a huge display of just about everything you can think of.  The shop is bursting at the seams so can be overwhelming so I'd suggest this is the perfect quilt shop to go to if you have a list. We were gifted a lucky prize here.

The fabrics are arranged in ranges, by designer and aisles of colours and there are hundreds of projects made up to inspire you.

This is the Tilda corner.  Isn't it pretty?!

And the Blues and Yellows aisle.  

A couple of bus trippers eyeing up the fat quarters.

After an excellent parking job in an extremely busy carpark (don't tell Kay I covered my eyes!), our next stop was to Craftpaks in Heathmont. This shop specialises in all things embroidery and has a huge range of quality flannels.

You really have to enlarge this picture.  It's embroidered with ribbon and stitches with the occasional trimming!  It's stunning!

These fantasy houses are amazing!

Then it was time for lunch!  We'd all worked up an appetite by this time.  We went to The Boronia Hotel which is a popular place with decent food, friendly service and a huge play area for kids.

Our last stop was to Lilly Patches in Boronia.  This is a fairly small shop but there was plenty of fabric and the owner was very friendly and knowledgeable. We were offered a lovely discount at this shop!

These are mostly batiks and wide backs.  Ah I see the Dalmation fabric on the back wall I was going to buy and forgot all about!  

More beautiful quilts on display.

A lovely choice of fabrics.

We all had a lovely day out and came home tired, poorer but very pleased with ourselves!