2018 Wk 43 - Quilt show and making

Today we helped run the Bric-a-Brac stall and the R&K quilt show and then came home to sew sew and sew!

We made these Melinda handbags from sotakhandmade (just waiting for lobster clasps to attach the cross body straps)

and we experimented with some 1.5" squares we bought -  we are going to make make these together - Jackie in her sewing room across the Irish sea and me here

And we have worked out the placement of my not-La-Plassacaglia blocks!

More tomorrow xxx

2018 Wk 43 - in my happy place

Yay - Jackie is here for 4 days!!!!

Today we have been helping set up for the Richmond and Kew Quilt exhibition

Lots of fab quilts, crafted items to win or to buy, and a *huge* amount of bric-a-brac for sale with all the proceeds going to charity, all held in a beautiful old church.

2017 Wk 25 - Corking good fun

Yippee!!!  Jackie is here for a weekend of fun!  We went to the National Quilt Championships at Sandown Park yesterday -which may have involved some shopping!

One of our goodies was a sheet of cork 'fabric' - which resulted in these two using Noodlehead's design.

 We've made these before so felt confident in adding slip pockets and zip pockets too

We also had a go at scissor pouches

And then we wrapped some cotton and leaves up together and boiled them in water with rusty nails for . . . well, the bucket didn't reach boiling point after being on the stove for an hour

This was as a result of having met Caroline Bell at Richmond and Kew - she creates amazing fabrics this way - I'm not so sure ours will be as successful - we'll find out tomorrow!

Whilst in the kitchen on a hot sweaty day watching a bucket full of water, nails and fabric - as if that wasn't hot enough, we decided to do some baking!

This means Jackie baking and me fetching and washing up!!!

Lemon drizzle cake . . . 

and the world's strangest shapes muffins (so it turns out you really do need a muffin tin - who knew!)

And finally: my favourites from Sandown Park yesterday

Journeys with Jackie

Jackie has been over for the weekend, and while we've managed some fabric related stuff there has been a lots of travelling too!

First let me show you the great scissors pouch she made me, and these gorgeous knitted fingerless gloves.

She also brought me some more EPP templates for La Pass, and acrylic templates for cutting the fabric: thank you Jackie

On Friday we drove to Portsmouth (to collect mum) and then on to Eternal Maker - a fabulous fabric shop in Chichester. There was SO much lovely stuff, I struggled to make choices! Mum got herself a coffee while Jackie and I tried to make decisions!
In the end I bought this gorgeous grey-on-grey and these rainbow solids

And we got some pretty zips, then came home to play. Eternal Maker had instructions on their blog on how to use the zips, but it appears you need to *follow* the instructions - we go one successful boxy pouch, but it's partner declined to be photographed!

Unfortunately I'm a bit of a no-raw-edges snob, and this ended up with raw edges, so I'm done with these pretty zips

On Saturday we were going to Teddington to volunteer at a stall at the Richmond and Kew Quilt Exhibition. Teddington is near Twickenham, but also near Twickenham is the home of the 2015 Rugby World Cup - and on Saturday New Zealand was playing South  Africa in the first semi final, so we decided train was a safer choice than car.

The exhibition was great, and the quilts looked great in the fab setting. 

After we'd done our shift  we went on a few more stops to Kingston to visit Fabricland. I know at least one person (hello, A) who checks fabrics there with a lighter to make sure she really is buying 100% cotton but I just bought some home dec weight fabric for bags and done interfacing: no lighter necessary!

As we had the bag fabric, it made sense to make a bag. This one from Love P & Q looked fairly simple,

but it posed a few problems - maybe our fabric was too thick, or maybe we are!!!

We finally decided to adapt the pattern, and today we made a variation from our knowledge rather than the instructions!  I'll show you the result tomorrow!

Posted with Blogsy

Sunday and Stars

I had a lovely day on Sunday: No pics but I went to Sandown Racecourse - to the National Quilt Championships.  Lots of inspiration,  lots of vendors and lots of fun.

I managed to meet a fellow blogger  - Kate North from Kate's Quilting.  We have followed each other for many years, and my children are only a few years older than hers.  She kindly sent me some unwanted wool a year or so ago - it was great to meet up over a coffee.

I managed to do my bit for the quilting economy and bought a few bits and pieces:

All *Mostly* for projects already on the go, or at least at planning stage!

The white is for the top I've recently been working on

 

It needed a border of white, so as soon as I got home I set to chopping up the fabric and adding squares around the outside.

Next it needs to be chopped up again.  I'm making a Whirly Gig / Lil Twister quilt,  I first knew this as a Square Dance design.  I've made a few in the past

 

I love the end result, but haven't made one for quite a while.

I wrote a tutorial at my last attempt, and approached that from the "I have a template, what size blocks do I need to cut", angle - whereas this quilt is approached from the "I have charm squares, what size template do I need?" angle.

So, I started with charm squares (5") and joined them with 1/4" seams, leaving me with, give or take a smidgen, 4.5" finished blocks.

A bit of trial and error showed me I needed 3.75" templates, with the diagonal starting 3/4" from the corner.  You can see I made paper templates to start with to ensure they almost met but didn't overlap. 

When I was sure I had the right size I made myself a plastic one

And started drawing on my quilt

Some lines are separated by a small amount

Others are on top of each other - luckily none actually overlapped so my template is the right size, its just some of my piecing that's a bit off

Once I'd drawn all over my top, I started to cut out the new squares

Each of these new squares just then needs to be twisted slightly anti-clockwise and pinned to its neighbour.  Its easiest (well I think it is) to start by cutting  and pinning one square at a time

But after a while I started cutting a whole strip's worth.

The white in the second and third columns don't look like stars, but are actually two stars wide.  My plan is to quilt just inside each star with a suitable thread so the white stars stand out

I'm now about half way through the cutting and pinning stage.  There is a far bit of waste, as there is an unused square between each pair of star blocks, but I plan to use them in the border, like in this one

Back to cutting and pinning :-)