Some more Christmas...

This year I took part in just one bloggy Christmas swap - I love Chooky Blue's swap where we have no idea who is sending to us, and we send to someone totally different....
We're allowed to open the small parcel, a tree decoration, now. Here is the gorgeous little hanging sent to me.... don't you just love it?? I do ...thank you, mystery giver :-)

There's another interesting feeling pressie tucked away in a safe place - I'm sure I can I think I can wait till the big day to open it...!
Also made in felt is the one I sent to Sue....she's figured out that it's from me so I can share about it. The hanging rod is made up of cinnamon sticks... I'm so pleased the rod arrived intact as I had to hot glue 2 together to make it long enough!

This pattern is from an old Australian Homespun magazine
#38 Vol 7/6. The designer is Marg Low

Now Sue is pretty lucky as I got my swap details muddled and sent her 5 gifts not the 2 we were supposed to!!! Silly of me to do things from memory and not read the paperwork properly. Never mind, I had fun putting it all together!!

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I've had some more happy mail recently with a parcel arriving from SewCalGal... I took part in The Year of Red and White challenges she ran.... SewCalGal arranged sponsors for the challenges and did a big drawing recently.... and I was the lucky recipient of some Aurifil thread and this gorgeous Martingale book - thank you to the sponsors and of course a special thankyou to SewCalGal for the year of challenges and also everything else she does to enhance the quilting world. I'll be looking to see if she comes up with anything special next year...

Lovely prizes, thank you Aurifil and Martingale :-)

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Also finished and off in the post is this hanging. You may remember that Wendy of Sugarlane Quilts had a little stitchalong recently. As I progressed through the blocks I realised it would be perfect for a special friend so I was doubly motivated to finish it....

It did take me a while to put together as I went through two other border fabrics before I was finally happy with it... yes, they got to the sewn on stage too!!!

Haven't done feathers for a while, seemed like a good excuse to play!

One of the dangers of an open toed foot!!

Wendy's blocks are available through her Craftsy store here.

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And one last little cutie; I sewed up this Libby Richardson design as a shop sample recently....such a sweetie; I can also imagine him on an actual stocking...but not this year...!!

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It seems that Blogger has been playing up again... apologies if anyone has been annoyed with word/number verification on my blog recently...a friend let me know it was on but I checked all the settings and all seemed correct... thanks to Terry's post this morning which led me to Kathy's post *here*. Hopefully I have fixed the problem...please let me know if I still have it on!
Have a lovely day everyone, thank you for sparing a moment to read along... it is a busy time of the year, isn't it?
Hope a bit of creativity sneaks into your day,

Where to start?

You know that feeling that you have when deadlines are met, the climax has happened and you are left hanging - what to do next? Well, that's been me this week! (You can read my last post here if you have no idea what I am talking about!)
The need to sew is so ingrained in me that it didn't take long for my itchy fingers to start wriggling again.
But what to do?
I decided a good start would be to have a good look at the leader and ender project I've had in the background for the last few weeks. I always like to have a leader and ender project (ideally a scrap project so I don't have to think too hard) on the go. 'Goodnight Irene' is a good gobbler of 2.5" squares, of which I have plenty! Terry from Terry's Treasures has inspired many with this project, and it goes together very quickly and well.

Goodnight Irene so far. After looking at others in Terry's linkups,
I think I am going to slow down on my use of the creams, and try to
make those 16 patch blocks a little more colourful.

And as is the way, scrap sewing does not always use scraps - it generates them too.......!!

I've been sewing 2 seams on the X-block instead of one so that when I trim it off,
I have a half square triangle - something else to find a project for!!

Now that my head is a little more sorted and I have some direction for Irene, I will send her back to leader and ender status and poke around for my next main project - I have plenty to choose from!!

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In the evenings I have pulled out my applique again, starting on Block 3 of the 2103 Quiltmania mystery. Here's the first little person from this block —

Can you guess what they are doing this time?!

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 I said in my last post that I have a couple more projects (yaay, finishes) to share; ones that I've been sewing at home for the New Year's Launch my favourite quilt shop held last week. This first one is a 'Seasons' project we are doing, with the first season being Autumn (naturally, for those of us in this hemisphere!). As the year progresses we will work our way through the other seasons.

The stand for them is really lovely and I look forward to making more of these little hangings :-)

 And on the wall in this corner of the shop you can see another wall hanging I have made; the long, skinny-ish one —

When I remember the name and designer I will edit this post!
The single ladies are also very lovely and are by the same designer.

Quite clever how she has done the perspective, from left to right rather than
front to back.

 

Isn't she sweet?!

It's been nice to have these finishes, but now it's time for me to rummage through my sewing cupboard :-)
Happy stitching, have a great day - and thank you for visiting

Finally....!

This year I signed up to complete "1 Xmas item a month' with Narelle (Pins and Whiskers blog). I've been a bit hit and miss and my item hasn't always been finished by the 25th of the month.

Like this month.

BUT, we do have a finish!

You've seen a few shots of this lately in various stages of 'nearly doneness'; it is "Stockings Were Hung" by Nikki Tervo of Brandy Gully Designs.

You may be able to see that I did a simple cross hatch in the  border after all those busy curves.

I love these Cottage Garden Threads - and love the naming of the colours too......listen to the ones I used...Hugs and Kisses (red), Latte (brown), Sweet Gum (green) and Pumpkin Seed (gold).

I've recently discovered and used a new (to me) battting...80% wool and 20% polyester (not sure of the brand) ---oh my goodness--- I LOVE it! The photo below may show the puff achieved with this batt. Yum.

I haven't tried it in a big quilt yet nor given it the wash test but I am keen to.

Still plenty of activity happening on the farm......

"Spot the twins"!
Yes, our calves come in all shapes and sizes.

"Have you seen my mummy?"

Brilliant Green Moth. 

I think this may be a Puriri Moth (but stand to be corrected). If so, it would have emerged after 7 years as a grub in a tree, then died after 2 days. If so, wasn't I lucky to see it?!

Ok, back to work :-)
Thank you for visiting. Apologies to those of you I haven't replied to after my last post. I am endeavouring to catch up :-)
Have a great week everyone, and happy stitching,

Some things Christmas

I think I've made the deadline for Narelle's 'One Christmas Item per Month' round up for March. Narelle has the lovely Pins and Whiskers blog and I appreciate the extra motivation to help me to finish some items.
This month's item is this cute wall hanging designed by Michelle at The Raspberry Rabbits.

A bit much glare this morning. It's making the colours a bit weird!

The felt shapes are fusible webbed and then hand stitched on.

I love how it's ok to merge very basic handsewing stitches with whizzy-around
free motion quilting.
Ooops. I've just realised too that I need to sew a star button/sequin on the star.

And talking of things Christmas, I was very fortunate recently to receive a gorgeous parcel from The Australian Homespun Magazine. In it were these gorgeous fabrics from Anni Down's Christmastime range.

Aren't they scrummy?!

Lucky me, I was Reader of the Month, with some photos from this project here. I've been a long time reader of this magazine so I am especially delighted.

Thank you very much Homespun Magazine - I am looking forward to using these!!

Thank you to Shirley for sending me this photo from her copy
of the magazine. She's received hers in the UK but us here in NZ are
still waiting for ours!!
Go figure!!

And it feels like all my Christmases have been coming at once, as last week I discovered I had won a $25 voucher from "I have a Notion". This was through a competition on SewCalGal's blogsite. Kelly at "I have a Notion' has been wonderful to deal with and it was fun shopping her site for goodies. I eventually decided on some Wonderfil threads to use for my invisible machine appliqué.... cant wait till those arrive too :-)
Whew two posts in two days, what is the world coming to?
Have fun everyone,

Conquering Pieces of Time...

Photo from Lori Smith's website.

....block by block.

Pieces of Time by Lori Smith (From my heart to your hands) is the quilt my online group and I are making as a BOM. Last time I reported on it, I had done my first appliqué block using the invisible machine appliqué method. I was taking deep breaths as the next scheduled appliqué block was a Nasty one.

I can now report that I have completed it!!

I was very concerned about all those tight deep curves and wiggly bits but in the end patience paid off and I am able to tick it off the list. I did the previous appliqué block with freezer paper which I removed through the back. For this one though Joan sent me some washaway solvy 'stuff' to try. (I used it with glue rather than the iron I used for the freezer paper technique). It means I can just rinse the block and the inner will be gone, without having to pick freezer paper out of all the nooks and crannies. Interesting stuff - I would be interested to know other people's experiences with this product....

And my recent conquest in this project is this one -

Bird's Nest

It is 7 1/2 inches finished so the smaller squares and setting triangles are quite tiny. It was a challenge at times making sure bits matched up but it did finish at the right size and it's not too messy so I am quite pleased!!

It's always fun to see a pile of these turn into a block!

I've realised too that I haven't shown this picture of a cushion I finished recently.
It's a Gail Pan design (I just love her work!) and it was a joy to make.

Cosy Home Cushion by Gail Pan Designs.

I used a Cottage Garden thread for the stitchery. I love these threads,
they have a beautiful effect.

And following on from my last post - I hope you all managed to get some extra quilty-things done over last weekend for International Quilting Day. I enjoyed some of the free shows offered by The Quilt Show... always hard to decide which one to watch first though! And fun to join in with SewCalGals' virtual sew-cial to see what others got up to.  Lesley on sewhappy.me shared a sweet doorhanger pattern - here is my version.

It was a door hanger but as our doors have big knobbly knobs, I decided it would look cute on this little hanger.

Oh so true!

Now, this quilter is going to get back to some quilting - have a happy week everyone, and thank you, as always, for visiting, Happy creating to you all,

The last of the Christmas sewing...

I am about at the end of showing you my Christmas sewing - I realised I had to squeeze these posts into this week so that I could list them all as my finishes for OPAM this month. After struggling to sometimes have a finish each month, this time I am able to list the grand total of drum roll.... 15!!!

Speaking of OPAM, I have found it to be a great motivator for getting projects completed - that end-of-month deadline looming helps me to find that extra hour or so needed to put the finishing touches on a project. So I'll be signing up for it again for 2012... of course I may be a little biased as last month I was one of the lucky winners for the monthly draw. 

Look what I received in the post - 

Cant wait to have a play :-)

Thank you Peg and Kris for keeping us on track and supporting us in our finishes!

Below is a small wall-hanging I finished in time for Christmas.

The pattern is by Wildcraft Farm and I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it. It had a nice mixture of appliqué, piecing and stitchery. I used the Scandinavian Christmas range as used in the pattern but would love to try it in a different Christmas range another time.

I have got keen on book covers too and created this one using a recent photo of the child to whom it was intended. I was pleased with how it turned out and am pleased to say she loved it.

I sewed a piece of clear plastic on and inserted the photo
behind it.

And for her sister I put together a soft cover book from a bought panel.

And this is a sneak peak of something I cant show yet....

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE—

MAY 2012 BRING YOU HAPPINESS 

AND GOOD HEALTH

(and a fair bit of sewing in between!)

A small finish and some pets.

After some lovely weather (fairly) recently when we were able to prune and plant trees and dig gardens, it's now definitely turned cooler and inside is the place to be.

Oh to be a small furry creature with not a care in the world!

One of my inside 'jobs' was to have a good sort-out of my 'cave'. This seems to be a fairly regular occurance for me, but this time I really dug deep. I cleaned out all sorts of things - including getting rid of paperwork leftover from when I gave up work nearly 4 years ago - I figured if no-one had chased me for it already, it was pretty irrelevant (hopefully no-one from the MOE is reading this!), so that felt good, and created more room for quilting projects!!

And I found this project. I did the stitchery a few years ago, bought the Moda pre-cuts (2 1/2" squares) then stowed it all away.

Now it has seen the light of day and I'm pleased to say I have completed it!!

 I'm never quite sure what quilting to do on a stitchery - how to enhance it without detracting it by putting stitching all over it - especially this one which is relatively big. I settled on using invisible thread and stitching along the running stitch lines, around some of the objects (house, birdhouses and hearts), and along the bottom of the garden. The a-b-c section is mostly untouched because I didn't really know what to do with it!

 I also experimented with the fancy stitches on my machine by using a faux hand-quilting stitch... there is invisible thread in the top and normal thread in the bobbin. By loosening the top tension, the bobbin thread comes through to the top. The photo doesn't show the effect very well but I think it is quite a nice finish.

Arty shot in the sunshine.

[The design is by Gail Pan and was in Australian Homespun magazine number 58.]

Lately at nights I have been sewing my hexie-flowers together. It's been rather delicate as I had to make skeleton joins (that is, just enough seams sewn to keep the flowers in position). This was because I needed to clear it off the bed it was arranged on when ED came up to visit (but I'll forgive her). Imagine my horror when I came home one day to find Katie had taken it's protecting cloth off it and nudged it off the box it was on - then settled down for a good sleep!! I had visions of seams pulled apart and bits of hexagons everywhere- luckily she hadn't wriggled too much and it was still intact!

Katie-cat in the Flowerbed.

Later I have a very exciting thing to do---load EQ7 onto my computer. It arrived yesterday and I am looking forward to having a good play :-)
Happy sewing everyone - hope your day is going well!!