My quilting thoughts and inspirations sprinkled with a glimpse of life down on the farm

Friday, March 31, 2017

I met my goal!!

All of a sudden this last week of March was here and all of a sudden I realised I had only a few days to work some little magic and get some goals completed - but - yaay - I did it!
My one monthly goal (OMG) for March was to transform a rather sad looking lump of fabric into a cushion...a ufo that had sat around for a couple of years when I got (very) behind in SewCalGals's FMQ cushion challenges. (I posted about this goal *here*).
Hunting through my shelves for inspiration, I came across the book Dream Feathers by Peggy Holt - I'd fallen in love with this book, and even ran a giveaway for a second copy, back in 2013.
Peggy has a slightly different way of making feathers, where you make feathers against a basic shape, when they get big, you use the last large (individual) feather as the spine of a new set of feathers, and so on; this methods creates lovely indulating sets of spineless feathers. If it helps the photo below shows what I'm trying to describe!
So I set about playing, had a ball, and finished my cushion centre!
A bit of simple ruler work and the border was done.
 A little more sewing and the cushion was together. In went the cushion inner I'd purchased back in 2013.
It's been a while since I've done any feather play so I really enjoyed finishing this up.
I didn't do one of the fun scrappy backs that I like to do as I actually had enough fabric this time! I did, however, use *this* tutorial to make a zipped closure rather than my usual buttoned one.
Remember the days when buttons, zips, fastenings were carefully unpicked before worn clothing was recycled and became new clothing or rags? This zip was in a pile Mum gave me and I suspect it was out of a dress!
You can find the end of month link up for OMG on Elm Street Quilts...thank you Patty for hosting us and giving me the little push I needed to complete this UFO.
I'm also linking up with Joy, of Days Filled with Joy, with Finishing Stitches, her monthly UFO Challenge. It sure is nice to have another one done!

I had a lovely few hours sewing with some friends yesterday. I hadn't yet had a chance to work on the Rainbow Scrap Challenge colour of red (for March) so I took along my bucket of red scraps. Using a couple of the blocks I was gifted by Sue (Mother Patchwork) as a starting point, I sewed two more scrappy sprout blocks.

(The photo of them all together is a little dull sorry - I took it first thing this morning well before the sun had risen!)
Red appears to be my favourite colour (as I'm not short of red scraps) so I would have expected to have made about 20 of these this month but it wasn't to be. I can always add to these later on :-)
Thank you to Angela for running the Rainbow Scrap Challenge - even though I didn't use many of my reds, it was still nice to rummage through them!

I'm not usually very big on advertising on blogs but you may have noticed that I have added some links to my sidebar. All three of our girls (our two daughters plus our daughter-in-law) are running their own businesses so I have added the links to their websites. I realise that most of you live nowhere near them, but it doesn't hurt to promote these small businesses does it? And you never know who might be reading and who knows who and so on! (And while a Chiropracter cant really help via the airwaves, maybe a Graphic Designer can?!) Thank you in advance for your interest and support :-)

Happy Stitches,

28 comments:

  1. Your cushion is wonderful! I went to Sue Nickels feathers workshop, but I don’t have any books by Peggy Holt. I’ll have to look for it. Thanks for sharing. :-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Your feathers are amazing! That cushion looks beautiful.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Your cushion is amazing Raewyn, such beautiful quilting. I remember taking out zips and buttons and unpicking jumpers to use the wool again for my Mum!! Love your scrap blocks too, I managed the first month and didn't get back there!!! Good on you for promoting your daughters, I hope their businesses do very well.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I love Dream Feathers but havent been quite as adventurous as you. I use her idea a lot in borders.
    Your scrap leaves are just the best... I love them...
    Good luck to all your daughters business..... it's mums role to support them however you can...
    Hugz

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hi Raewyn wow i love your feather work it looks fantastic,its great that you are promoting your family's business,hope the girls do well.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Congrats on a wonderful OMG finish and using some of your RED scraps for the RSC!!

    ReplyDelete
  7. I am so very impressed with your feathers! You created a lovely cushion.
    Oh, I remember saving zippers and buttons!! : )

    ReplyDelete
  8. Magic cushion! I thought your sprout blocks were pretty cool and the end result will be quite striking. I think a Mum can have a shout out for her kids.........good luck to both of them.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I am very impressed with your beautiful quilting on the cushion. It looks great.
    And well done for working on your colour challenge. The combination is looking good, too.
    Good to see you being very proud and promoting the girls.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Lovely quilting on your cushion Raewyn! Was it tricky?

    ReplyDelete
  11. such beautiful quilting on your cushion you are an expert at feathers. Liking the red flowers too, I struggled with red scraps but managed one crazy block, tomorrow we will know what the colour for april is.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Beautiful cushion Raewyn. xx

    ReplyDelete
  13. Raewyn, I'm in awe! What a truly beautiful cushion. Your quilting is stunning! I took a screenshot of the book and hope to find a copy before I cross the border next week. Do you have any objections to my pinning your cushion? I want to always remember it's there, for inspiration! XO

    ReplyDelete
  14. Beautiful FMQ work on that cushion! Thanks for linking up with Elm Street Quilts One Monthly Goal and congrats on your finish!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Oh my Raewyn, your quilting on the cushion is fantastic. I just started playing around with feathers which is more fun than I thought it would be.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Wow - the transformation from a simple pinned out layer to your final feather loveliness is amazing. Congratulations!!

    ReplyDelete
  17. The feathers on your pillow are beautiful! Sometime I want to make the sprouts block for the RSC but not this year. Have a pleasant week-end.

    ReplyDelete
  18. oh I do love your sprouts. The feathers are so gorgeous. wow

    ReplyDelete
  19. Love what you have done with the cushion Raewyn, very clever quilter!!! So glad you got to sew for yourself and liking the scrap blocks also. xxxx

    ReplyDelete
  20. Wonderful quilting Raewyn - a case of practice makes perfect!

    ReplyDelete
  21. Absolutely in awe of your beautiful cushion. Love your Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks. Good luck to your girls and their ventures xx

    ReplyDelete
  22. That is gorgeous work on your pillow. You truly are an inspiration to me to give machine quilting another try. I get so discouraged as I never can seem to get my tension right when doing free motion. So, I usually just do a straight line grid.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Your cushion is sooo pretty! You are doing great with feathers... I have trouble! Thanks for joining in again with Finishing Stitches! xx

    ReplyDelete
  24. Oh my your cushion is gorgeous! I hand quilt for the most part but should really try to machine stitch something small / this is inspiration! :)

    ReplyDelete
  25. Your pillow is incredible, oh to be able to do feathers like that , just amazing ! Your scrappy challenge looks rather neat also 😊

    ReplyDelete
  26. Oh, wow, Raewyn! That pillow turned out absolutely fabulous! What a great turn-around for that piece. I'm so excited you finished it!

    ReplyDelete
  27. In know it was said before in the comments below but...
    WOW! Your quilting ist stunnig Raewyn, such a beautiful cuschion!

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for visiting and taking the time to leave a comment. I read and appreciate them all and try my best to reply. Have a great day!!
(If you are a no-reply or anonymous blogger and would like a response, please leave an email address.)