Hello and...Goodbye

My son's friend recently had a baby girl so I decided to quilt this lovely panel for her as a gift.  The panel is one of a range of designs called Bed Buds by the Devonstone collection.  Not only are they really cute but they're the perfect size.  All too often panels are thin and you have to add to them to make them decent sizes.

I have three panels and I was going to quilt them all at the same time.  I loaded a king sized sheet on the frame and started with the bunny.  I needed to get it finished quickly so once it was quilted I cut it off the frame hopefully leaving the sheet intact ready to do the others.

I used the sheet for binding too.

And messed up the end join in the binding!

And messed up the end join in the binding!  Oh did I already say that?  Ha ha!  

Third time was the charm.  I've only been sewing bindings for thirty odd years.  You'd think I'd know how to do it by now!

I embroidered the label and turned it into a heart shapes appliqué.

Ta da!  Expertly held by my husband, Jim.

I'm going to retreat this weekend and I'm hoping to finish the camera quilt at long last.  I was about to machine sew the binding onto it when I noticed a section of the quilt I'd missed quilting.  Oops!  So I quilted that on my domestic sewing machine which reminded me why I love my quilting frame!

I then stitched the binding on and prepped the label and I'm all set for retreat.  I'll be taking my new Christmas cross stitch and you never know, I might actually do some of it!

And finally, the goodbye.  

Rest in peace little Minnie.

You’d better watch out

You'd better not pout.  Santa Claus is coming to town!  

I was gifted this cross stitch and I decided to start sewing it whilst watching My Kitchen Rules through the PC because I forgot to record it on TV.

Because the Aida has been printed I don't have to think while sewing this.  I don't have to count stitches or anything so it's very easy and will be the ideal project to take to sit n sews or retreats because I'm less likely to go wrong while I'm drinking socialising!

There was a note on the packaging saying No hoop and I thought that meant that the package didn't include a hoop but after hooping it it left a very prominent hoop mark so that might be why there's No hoop!  I've now attached a border around it and it's in a frame so that should cause less damage.  

Although I am enjoying the ease of the printed fabric you can see the colour through the stitches so I'm a bit concerned about that particularly when I stitch the white beard on top of all that pink and red printing.  Ah well.  It'll either work or it won't. 

I rinsed off the blue markings off the camera quilt and had that sinking feeling when I noticed the water was turning black!  I quickly washed the quilt and then dried it and the colours didn't run.  Phew!  I quite like the way the quilting crinkled after the wash.  I'll be attaching the binding next week ready to finish at retreat.

I finished quilting the camera!

Now I have a gazillion threads to bury! I'm going to WASPS sit n sew on Saturday so that'll be a job for there.  I was wondering whether to put the binding on so I can start hand sewing that to the back while I'm at sit n sew but I suspect those threads will keep me busy all day!

My friend uses a canon camera so, of course, I had to personalise it.

I'm not sure what part of the camera this circle is.  The pattern makes it look like a flash but it isn't.  I wasn't sure what to do with it so I was going to do a spiral motif but I couldn't find one and I was too impatient to make one so I just used this motif.

I wanted the centre of the quilt to look like the aperture and I think this was pretty successful.

The coloured segments were a pain in the neck to quilt!  I traced around the shape so I had an idea on my screen of where I needed to position the motif and then I had to keep moving it a bit this way and a bit that way until I was happy with the fit.

I wasn't happy with the position of the green so I unpicked it.  I repositioned it and it looked correct and then when I quilted it again it was wrong so I unpicked it again!  Third time wasn't a charm but I'd had enough by then so I left it.  They're all a bit "wrong" but it was the best I could do.

The smallest parts of this quilt probably took the longest.  I just wanted straight lines to make the grey rectangles look like the ridges on the sides of dials.  It worked but look at all of those threads!  I probably could have designed something so the lines moved continuously from one to the other but I wanted the look of the single lines.

I have to bury all the threads, pull out any basting lines I've left in and wash out any markings before sewing on the binding and a label.  There's still plenty of work to do but the end is in sight and at this rate my friend will have her 50th birthday present by her 53rd birthday!  Better later than never!

Guess what's back on the frame?!

Woo!  Yeah!  I finished burying a trillion threads (the amount of threads grew with each telling) and I put the camera quilt back up on the frame.  I'm hoping I've done enough of the previous quilting to stabilise it enough for the next part which will be the custom quilting.

 

I was in such a rush to get it off the frame last time I left two small sections on either side of the quilt empty.  I thought it would be quick and easy to fill in once I got started.  Ha!  It was neither quick nor easy.  It took me several hours and a lot of swearing!

I'm now ready to finish the rest of it.  I suspect this will involve a lot more hours and a lot more swearing.  I'm scratching my head though because I've forgotten what I had planned to quilt.  I checked through this blog and I'm none the wiser.  Oh dear!

A bit of this...and a bit of that...

Once a week I go for a sit n sew session at the Global Learning Centre in town.  The ladies all do different things which makes the morning feel like a nice social catch up.  A couple of the ladies knit, there are ladies smocking, embroidering blankets and quilting.  I've been cross stitching.  I picked this little kit up from a donation pile at WASPS (the lifestyle village in Wollert) and decided it was a quick, easy project to take along for sit n sew sessions.  It is neither quick nor easy!  But it is pretty!

This is how much I've completed and I've been working on it for hours!  It's only 6 x 6 inches!

The pattern chart is so small I can't see the symbols so I've enlarged it.  It's a shame I didn't think to enlarge the aida while I was at it ha ha!  Anyway, I'll get it done.  I have another two of these charts I might tackle.  I don't know what I'll do with them once they're done yet.

I've been working on my shawl.  I'm about to start the last border round.  Saying that, I have a bit of yarn left over and it wasn't cheap so I might make the border bigger and use it up.

I had some of the value yarn left over and couldn't think what to do with it to use it all up.  I spent way too much time online looking at designs and found this bunny lovey.  After convincing myself that I HAD to make the bunny I printed off the pattern to find that my yarn isn't suitable.  So I bought more yarn!  Oops!

This is a free design by Alanna O'Dea featured on the Bella Coco blog.

I started making the head seven times.  This has been unpicked and redone so many times the cream yarn is turning grey.  Oh dear!  But I persevered.

And now I have half a head!  Woo!  Apparently, this pattern is beginner friendly.

I've been burying threads on my camera quilt.  I managed to snap the end of the needle and part of the needle got stuck inside.  Yikes!

It took me ages but I got it out!

And then I snapped another needle.  

So I have been busy.  Just not busy making quilts!

Toot toot

Judy, Kate, Kay and I had a lovely time at retreat.  We all met at Millrose quilt shop in Ballan and spent time sighing over the beautiful fabrics.  After that we had a hot drink before heading off to Ballarat.

First stop there was to Gail's Patchwork Emporium.  I could live at that shop!  It's full of wonders! Next stop was lunch and, because we had time, we popped into Spotlight before we grabbed snacks and wine before checking into our accommodation.

We stayed in a beautiful house in the centre of  Ballarat which was a short walk to some lovely cafés and restaurants so we took full advantage of this and ate out one night at a pizza place and had a Thai takeaway the following night.  As you can tell, there was a lot of eating during our stay!

Our house was next to the railway line and the trains toot tooted all the time.  It was quite cute in the day.  Not so much during the night!  Not that that would put me off staying at this house again, mind you.

On the Saturday we went to The Pickled Pig and I bought this metallics fabric to add to my Christmas fabric.  I'd like to make a Merry Christmas banner one day but who knows when that day will come!  I need to source some more metallics as I'm running short.

I took three projects to retreat.  I didn't take my greyhound cross stitch out of its bag.  Again.  But I did work on my camera quilt and managed to unpick all of the overlapping or excess quilting.

I used my favourite needle threader to bury the shortest threads.  But I have a billion threads to bury so I didn't finish this task.

I worked on this crochet shawl.  I unpicked probably more than I actually worked.  Apparently I can't count and chat at the same time.

There was cheese and wine.  Perfect.  This might also be why I unpicked a lot of my crochet...

Kate worked on these beauties.

Judy worked on a billion projects but didn't finish anything.  She went on to finish lots the moment she arrived home!

Kay used a bloc loc ruler to trim half square triangles and was so impressed with the easy and accuracy she immediately bought herself a set!  She sewed her half square triangles into this lovely quilt top.

When I came home I went to a new sewing group hoping to make new friends.  And I met old friends!  Here are Margaret, Annie and Rosie working away on their projects.  I've attended this sewing group a few times now and the ladies I didn't know are becoming more familiar and I'm sure one day I'll consider them friends.  I've been working on a small cross stitch at this sit n sew.  It's tiny and my eyes aren't as young as they used to be!

I haven't done a lot at home although my crochet shawl is growing.  It's amazing how much you can do without wine chatter.  I did hem a pair of pants for my son though.  That was fun sewing. YAWN.

Oh! And I've been tidying my studio!  It's amazing how much space there is now that I'm not storing all of my son's furniture and boxes for his house!

Gail is keeping me busy!

Gail started putting this disappearing nine patch quilt together while we were at our last retreat as a gift for her mum.  Gail was going to quilt it herself but life got in the way so she asked me to help.  Out of interest I recorded how long it took me to complete this project.

I reinforced the seams.

I pinned the backing to the frame and laid the wadding and quilt top on top.  I then had to decide what colour thread to use.  I thought grey would work but the best colour turned out to be a light brown.  So I filled a few bobbins, created the design in CAD and made sure the quilt was square before I started.

This all took me an hour.

This is the quilting pattern.  It's called Trillium and Judy chose it for me because I was having one of those days where I just couldn't decide what to use!

I enlarged it a fair bit because not only does it look great but it's quick to quilt.  And...ahem...it's also quick to unpick.  I played around too much with the automation and started quilting the last row on the first row.  I noticed fairly quickly but it still took me half an hour to unpick my silly error!

As you roll the quilt on to start the next row of quilting you then have to smooth out the wadding and quilt top and make sure everything is still square.  I added some basting lines as I went which helps keep everything straight and I'm always relieved when I get to the end of the quilting and the bottom edge is relatively nice and even.

And Ta Da! Here it is!

Look at the lovely texture of the quilting.  

My last job was removing the basting lines, which I did whilst watching TV and then I added up my timings and worked out that start to finish this little quilt took me five and a half hours to complete.  I had no idea it took that long!  Ha ha!

A few of us are going away for retreat at Ballarat soon.  I hear that Judy and Kate have been busy prepping so they can sew sew sew.  I'm still busy wondering what wine to take!  I'm thinking that I should crack on with burying threads in my camera quilt so I can get it back up on the frame to finish off.  I might even take my greyhound cross stitch.  Hopefully it makes it out of the bag this time!