Sunday sewing at the Chookshed

Sunday wasn't such a productive day for me at Chooky's Chookshed party. I'd like to say, too much chatting, but when you're at a virtual party, that can be a pretty poor excuse :-)
The day started off quite cool so I got busy with wheelbarrows of wood and fire lighting paraphernalia to get our winter warmth going. The day quickly changed and it wasn't very long before I was turning the firebox down, opening the windows and taking off my sweatshirt!
(I may have even pulled out the vacuum cleaner which, I know, is not appropriate behaviour for a party!)

I did still have my winter warmer soup for lunch though. The sunny deck called so I ate outside. I'd just picked some scrumptious 'spring flowers' and took them out with me to enjoy their company while I slurped. (And for a pretty photo too, of course!)
After lunch I pulled out my Whimsical Woodland blocks - actually they were already out - carefully arranged on the floor of the spare room.

This has been my play, close the door and walk away project!

I bordered four more of the stitched blocks with 2" squares. Just have a few more to go and then I'll nearly be at the assembly stage :-)

I made one of the churn dash blocks for the Omigosh quilt - it's been good to spend some time remembering what sized scraps I need for this project and doing a little planning. Light coloured squares that aren't quite 2" are perfect as the setting triangles for the 4-patches. More great scrap sorting.
(I forgot to add yesterday that these blocks are 5" unfinished size!)

While I was playing with this block I could vaguely remember having small bins of this project prepped and ready to sew. A quick look and I found these stacked behind some books - I'm too organised for my own good sometimes - but I'm pleased to have them now. The other scraps in bins under the ironing board can wait while I sew these all up into blocks.

Such a bonus finding these, all prepped, ready to sew :-)

After dinner I finished the stitching on the last Woodland block for my quilt. It's an extra one as I'm making the quilt bigger. I've put together elements from a few of the other blocks to make a new one!

All in all it was a productive weekend. I think Chooky has sent her guests home but as it's a long weekend here in New Zealand celebrating the Queen's Birthday,  I may continue partying today!

'til next time,

Happy stitches,

Scrappy sewing Saturday at the Chookshed

Every year about this time Chooky celebrates her Chookshed's birthday by spending the weekend sewing with real and virtual friends.
They say every cloud has a silver lining - my niece and her family were coming to visit this weekend but a bad case of the flu has kept them at home. We were disappointed that they couldn't come and stay but it did mean I could sew along with Chooky and friends.
I had been going to make the 3 year old visitor a pillowcase to use while he was here (after deciding all the snuggly pillowcases in my cupboard were rather girly) so while the fabric I'd pulled was out, I decided to carry on with the plan.
I found some brushed cotton pieces leftover from a quilt backing and some Happy Pants for a son-in-law. Of course none of the pieces were the right shape, and I had to do some joins - the back is two coloured and the contrasting flap is made out of several pieces.

The front

The back, it's supposed to be all the feature print but you can see I didn't have enough!

I've seen these burrito style pillowcases called 15 minute ones (or similar). Because I was sewing with scraps and figuring it out with extra piecing to make it work, it took me a bit longer than that!
But it's done :-) It will go into the post this week sometime.

Last week I tested another pattern for Juliet of Tartankiwi.
Here is the gorgeous hedgehog I made. Isn't he cute?!

This was another gloriously scrappy affair —

All lined up ready to sew

Juliet's pattern was for a 16" square cushion. Here it is made up to that size —

I decided I really need to carry on with my hedgehog so he doesn't end up in my Pile Of Ufos - he's too cute for that.
I also decided he will join a couple of other cushions on the couch which are both a bit larger, so I've altered the outer borders to enlarge him a little.
I spent some fun time scrappy sewing; finding big enough pieces to make the back, fusing together bits of batting. I do enjoy the challenge of scrappy sewing but it does mean the job always takes longer while I fuss and trial and join and measure and trim!

Joins here there and everywhere!

This leaves me with a wee pile of quilting to do today :-)

Juliet has now released the pattern for the hedgehog cushion. Details of where to buy it are in her profile on her instagram page.

And in between it all, I've been leader and ending with some of my smaller scraps. I've been making more 9-patches for my Omigosh quilt using 1" scraps. Once again, quite messy and time consuming in a way as I try to use every last inch!! Usually I just sew the strips together until I get sick of the piles of them taking over and then I focus on pressing, trimming and joining.

One of the many of these I've assembled lately.

I haven't made any of the blocks below for a while so think I might start on some of these next. The HSTs take slightly bigger scraps!

Last night before I went to bed I put some soup in the crockpot - I woke this morning to the delicious smell of bacon and vegetable soup wafting through the house. The weather has suddenly changed and we are finally going to give in and light the fire this morning.
It feels like another perfect day for spending celebrating Chooky's Chookshed Birthday!

'til next time,

Happy stitches,

Weekend bits and pieces

I've been doing quite a lot of knitting lately but for Friday Night Sew In I decided to pull out my current Foxley Village block... I say current because it's the one I'm working on, but it hasn't been worked on at all for well over a month, I think!
I was getting hassled by all the small satin stitched leaves which seemed to be taking me forever. I was tempted to change the stitch for the second tree, but in the end carried on with the satin stitch.
After a false start —

Hehe cuteness galore
We're looking after this grand-baby this weekend.

— and a bit more stitching on Saturday night, I've got this far —

There are also some berries to be stitched amongst the leaves! Sigh!

I finished off these wee slippers during the week. They have sheepskin soles so I'm hoping they will be 'just right' for the three walking babies in our lives at the moment.

I've cast on for another pair which I hope to make some progress on this afternoon in the car. The big grandie-girls came back here after netball yesterday and we'll be taking them home later.

As always, they've had a nice visit, and there's a batch of muffins being made, as I write :-)

They might even be ready now, so I'd best get upstairs and see how they are....
Thank you Wendy for hosting Friday Night Sew In. Head over to her blog if you want to check out what others got up to.

'til next time,

Happy stitches,