Tree Bird Hop

Oophs sorry  for some reason the scheduling didn't work.

Today is my day on the Tree Bird hop. I love the fabric line but I haven't been able to get any here in London. Instead I used fabric from my stash. Thanks to Samm from Sew We Stitch for organising the hop and Lana from It seams to be sew.  keeping us on track.

I started two projects for this hop but only got one finished (the second is still in lots of little bits). Last year I took part in the 'For the birds' and for this I made a quilt for when John goes bird watching. It lives in his car and I have found it really useful when we have been bird watching in the cold weather.

For the Tree bird hop I have one project that will also live in John's car and will be used when bird watching. John has had a pillow in his car for several year. One of the children would often use it for a nap on the way home from school or it was used at picnics or bird watching. It did originally have a beautiful bright orange cover but now it is rather sad with stains that just don't come out in the wash.

and worse still on the other side .....

I'd been planning to make a new pillow for some time but just hadn't got round to it so here was my chance.

I had a fat quarter of fabric with a lovely bird on it so this was my starting point. The background had to be blue to match with the quilt. 

I just love this little bird. I quilted around the outline of the bird and some of the leaves and stems. I missed that one thread when I took this photo. So my finished bird pillow.

The back of the pillow has a fold over opening. I couldn't get a good photo to show how 'puffy' the little bird is. I realised when I was quilting round the bird and the leaves that my skills of free motion quilting have improved a lot. I could actually follow the line of the pattern without too many problems.

Following the bird theme John, Richard and I spent a fun evening last week making up bird models with Lego. Richard has always loved Lego since he was tiny and now he occasionally treats himself to one of the Lego ideas sets.

This ideas set makes three birds.

Each bird comes with its own packets of pieces and instructions

Picasso does like to help and there was a risk that he would knock all the pieces on the floor

My job was to make the humming bird and flower.

Whilst Richard made the Robin and John put the Blue Jay together

It was a fun evening and reminded me of building Lego models with the children when they were small.

I hope you liked my bird pillow . Here's the list of the rest of the blogs you need to visit today.

Thursday, March 19

The Raspberry Rabbits

More Stars In Comanche

Sew Many Yarns

Super Mom - No Cape!

Stitchin By The Lake

Jane's Quilting

Quilting Through Rose Colored-Trifocals

Quiltscapes

Enjoy the hop and have a great day

Lyndsey

See you in September

The summer break is over and the new season kicks off with one of Mdm Samm's blog hops. This one involved making three items and one had to include Riley Blake Design gingham. Mdm Samm does love her gingham and so do I and the RBD gingham is rather special. Our cheerleader for the hop is Shari from Living with Purpose

My first project is a quilt. Hannah who is a Young Leader with our Guide unit is leaving to go to university. She joined Rainbows when she was 5 and has gone through Brownies and Guides as well. She loved our unit project to make prem baby quilts so it seemed appropriate to make her a quilt as her leaving present. 

The next problem was what pattern to use. Hannah's name at Guides is Sparkie because she is such a lively, happy young woman. When I saw that Amy from Sew Incredibly Crazy was looking for pattern testers for a couple of her designs I jumped at the chance. The patchwork star was the perfect pattern and I was able to make the star from scraps of fabric left over from the baby quilts.

I'm sorry that the photos are a little dark but I had to take them in doors as it was raining and went very dark. The blue backing fabric is actually much brighter.  I chose fabric with musical instruments for the backing. Hannah loves her music. I pieced the backing using a strip of the blue from the front on either side.

I love the patchwork star.

The star and the border are quilted with a large meander and the rest of the quilting echos the star shape.

Amy's pattern was very well written and easy to follow so the quilt just flew together. I am so pleased with the result and I think Hannah will love it. Thanks Amy for letting me test your pattern, I love it

My second project was a cushion cover and this is where I used the RBD gingham. I love gingham as it always looks so fresh. In addition it always reminds me of my childhood as my school uniform summer dresses where always gingham. I used a pattern by Sarah Soward which appeared in British Patchwork and Quilting in August 2013. I chose the medium red gingham for the flowers.

Again I'm very happy with the result. I had a FQ of the gingham and have enough to make a second cushion cover. This will be made over the next few days. My son suggested I make two more but with the gingham as the background and use white for the flowers. I machine appliqued the flowers and found it a little tricky going round all those curves.

My final project was a summer dress. I've had this fabric for a while but hadn't got round to making it up. I chose a simple shift dress style by McCall. Their patterns are easy to follow and go together well. I didn't need to alter the pattern to get a good fit. My only problem was that no one was around to take a photo of me wearing it. I'll see what I can do over the next few days.

So there are the projects I've been working on over the holiday. I have also managed to finish another dress that I started last year and put away for some reason and I'm currently making a pinafore dress. As the weather here in London turned wet and cooler in August I picked up my knitting again and I've been busy trying to finish John's jumper. It's nice to have a break from work and be able to catch up with some projects.

Now you need to visit the rest of the hop. Here's the list of today's participants.

Thursday, September 4Jane's Quilting
Life in the Scrapatch
Sew Many Yarns - you are here
Gracie Oliver Arts
Everyone Deserves a Quilt

I hope you've enjoyed visiting today, it was lovely to see you. I hope you'll come and visit again soon.

Lyndsey

Dare to Dresden and give away.

Welcome to day 2 of the Dare to Dresden blog hop. Thanks to Madame Samm for organising the event and to Christine from Quilt Monster in my Closet for being our excellent cheerleader.

I think the Dresden plate block is such a pretty block and it all starts from a simple blade template. Here are two of the templates I've used. The small white template is the one I've used for my Dresden Plate quilt which followers of my blog have already heard all about. The green template is fatter and I've used it to create a tumbler quilt. To create the typical point of the blade the fabric is folded in half, right sides together along the long side like the template on the right. You stitch the longer end together with the usual 1/4inch seam and then turn right side out making sure you have as sharp a point as possible.

My tumbler template is 3.75 inches long and the wider end is 4 inches and shorter end is 2 inches. From my template I cut 25 tumblers which I pieced together to create a prem baby quilt

The colours on the photo are not very true as the border is less red and the print going across the diagonal does have a pink background. I'm not sure why but I do have rather a lot of pink prints in my scraps and I decided to put them to good use. The quilt is backed with fleece but no batting and no quilting. The hospital this is going to like the quilts made this way to keep them as soft as possible for the baby. 

As my followers know I have been working on my Dresden plate quilt and I am hoping to finish it this month. I was hoping to have it done for today but there is still a way to go. For those of you who haven't seen it here is a photo.

Did I mention a give away?  Having finished all the piecing on my quilt I had some fabric over so I am in the process of making a pillow cover. I had hoped to have it finished for today but work got in the way. However here is a picture of the front.

Give away now closed

The pillow cover when complete will take a 16 inch pillow and will have a white back and a zip opening.

If you would like to have a chance of winning the pillow cover please leave me a comment about whether you have dared to Dresden. If you are a follower you may have a second chance by leaving another comment. The give away is open until Midnight (EST) on the 31st January.

Now you need to go and visit the other folks daring to Dresden today. Have fun.

Gingersnap Quilts

Busy Bee Quilts

She Sews the Blues

Traveling Quilter

Grand Mama's Stories

Cherry Blossoms Quilting Studio

Sew at Home Mummy

The Slow Quilter

Pig Tales and Quilts

Annie Oak Design

Jane's Fabrics & Quilts

Tea Time Creations

Mo Broker My Creative Side

Just Let Me Quilt

Words and Stitches

Just Keep Swimming

Sew Many Yarns (You are here)

Sowing Stitches

Jane's Quilting
My Patchwork Life
2muchfun

Pumpkin Patch Quilter
Quilt Monster in my Closet

Time free to sew.

I hope you all had a very happy Christmas. We had a great time with a quiet leisurely Christmas day and our older daughter and her boyfriend visiting on boxing day (26th). We have also managed to take Scamp (our Yorkshire Terrier) out for a good walk each day without getting wet. Quite a feat since we are having a monsoon season here in London.

Today I had some errands to run including posting the FQ's she won to Connie at Freemotion by the river. I also had a delivery from Green Fairy. I had ordered 3 charm packs ready for planned projects.

The Nancy Drew charm pack is ready for the blog hop in March. I've a couple of ideas of what I want to make, I just need to make a final decision of which one.

The Sakura Park is for a project with my Brownies.  The final one La Belle Fleur by French General is for me just because I really love the designs.

With errands done and only a small amount of cleaning and tidying needed I finally had time to do some sewing. We are a family of tea drinkers ( well all the females are) and my older daughter had complained that the tea got cold in the pot before she had finished it all. So my job for the day was to make a tea cosy. The Rusty Bobbin has a great tutorial for making a cosy including how to measure your teapot so that you make the right size. I love it when all the guess work is taken out of a project. Kathryn has always liked cows especially black and white ones so I chose this fabric for her. As a toddler she called the black and white cows moo moo cows which is the name of this design. Every so often on the fabric there is a black cow and I cut the shape so there was a black cow on one side

I chose red for the lining.

I used Hobb's heirloom for the batting. I quilted around the outline of each cow and I added piping. I think this is the first time I have done piping (I think ... must be getting old because I can't remember for certain.)

I am quite pleased with the finished result. I hope Kathryn will like it. Now I have two more tea cosys to make, one for my teapot and one for Lucy's. The quilting doesn't show up in the photo but gives a lovely puffy effect. 

So a gentle ease back into sewing. Hopefully I will have some more free time tomorrow. For now I have a TV programme I want to watch and I can't make up my mind whether to do some embroidery or knitting while I watch it. I hope you have had some sewing time today.

I am linking this post up with Richard quilts - link a finish Friday. Why not pop over and see what other people have been up to.

NewFO November

Barbara at Cat Patches runs a monthly challenge called NewFO or new fabric objects. The challenge is to start at least one new project every month. The size of the project doesn't matter, the important thing is to enjoy the pleasure of starting something new and  oh joy of joys there is no need to finish the project in the month . . . . or ever!

So what have I started new in November? Well first I had signed up for the Holiday Lane blog hop at Sew we Quilt. This was a fun project and went together easily. The pillow will look great when I decorate the house for Christmas - a little job for later today and I'm already getting excited. I made the pillow as a slip so that once Christmas is over I can use the inner pillow with a different slip .......I'm thinking possibly something to celebrate valentine's day but there are lots of options.

The pillow was also an opportunity to use some star buttons I had bought years ago because I knew they would come in useful one day and a time to play with sequins and the glitter embroidery thread. This project was also a finish in November.

Another November start was the advent calendar for my daughter. We bought this in October and I meant to get started immediately but got interested in other things. It was easy to put together but not as interesting as creating my own item. I think half the fun of making things is choosing the fabrics and deciding on the design you want to do. I finally finished this today and it is now full of sweets and on its way to Bath with my daughter. I forgot to take a photo of it once finished. 

I decided to make a Christmas present for Picasso, our cat. Our pets always get presents but usually they are in the form of food treats. Picasso likes something soft to cuddle up in, it doesn't matter what it is. Getting my work outfit out for an early start the next day has sometimes proved disastrous as Picasso has curled up on part of it and left cat hair everywhere. So the plan was a soft cuddly quilt we could put in his favourite spot.

I love the cat print and Picasso loves the quilt which he likes put in the dog basket. He now sleeps there all night and doesn't disturb even if anyone comes in late. If you are worried about where the dog sleeps don't as he has always slept on the foot of our bed - he is a Yorkshire Terrier and so doesn't take up much room. Scamp uses his basket during the day. Whilst I remember I am having a give away of a quarter of a yard width of fabric piece of the cat print on my post tomorrow to help celebrate my birthday which is next weekend. Come back tomorrow to find out more.

I bought some Clarice Cliff print fabric and I have started creating some table mats. I don't have a photo of how far I have progressed but here is a photo of the fabric.

There are 5 different panels  across the width and I managed to get 2 sets. I decided to keep the finished mats square rather than add width to make them into rectangles. The backing fabric is a gorgeous orange and I am using heat resistant batting.

I started making 6 mini Christmas tote bags to put the leaders presents in at Guides. The party isn't until the 19th December so this project will easily be completed very soon. On Wednesday these bags were looking like this - 6 little piles of strips cut out.

Five of them now look like this. I run out of batting so I need to go to my favourite quilt shop very soon. Another of lifes' little hardships.

I had a play at FMQ doing holly leaves. You can just see one if you look carefully at the photo below. I know I need lots more practice at this game. I have to concentrate so hard it gives me a headache. Still it's fun to have a go. 

If you want to know how to make a mini tote bag go to friendship bag tutorial at Rachel's blog ps i quilt. I used this pattern to make these two bags earlier this year.

I started a Christmas quilt using the Cherry Christmas jelly roll I won from Melissa at Happy Quilting. I have cut some of the fabric out ..... ahhh pre cuts make this job so much quicker. That's as far as I have got and I'm not expecting to finish it for this Christmas.  December is a busy enough month without adding that kind of pressure.

I think that is all my November NewFO's. Why not pop over to Cat Patches to see what everyone else has been up to.

Holiday Lane

Today is the first day of the Holiday Lane blog hop. Thanks to Madame Samm for organising the hop and to Pauline for being our cheerleader. Thanks also to Jill Finley from Jillily Studio Designs for designing the pattern.

I found this pattern really fun to make and it went together really easily. I decided to use blue fabric for the sky rather than the suggested black. I also decided on a lighter colour for the pillow surround and backing fabric. I made the pillow as a pillow slip closing with buttons. This way I can change the pillow slip with the changing seasons and holidays and only have to store the slips. This is important as we have a limited amount of storage space.

The trees gave me the chance to do a little embroidery and embellishment using sequins and buttons.

I also machine embroidered 56 on the door (the number of our house) and a Christmas wreath. I love the pictures on the Christmas fabric  I used for this house.

The panel is quilted in the ditch around all the shapes. Wherever I put the pillow to photograph it Scamp kept following determined to be in the picture.

I really must take him to be clipped, the poor dog can't see where he is going. In the end I resorted to the floor to get the full picture.

Not a great angle or photo but you can see why I'm so pleased with the finished result. Roll on the Christmas season so I can put it in pride of place.

This has got me all excited for Christmas. Whilst visiting my favourite quilting shop in Bath I bought a panel to make Lucy an advent calendar.

I shall be starting work on this tomorrow which should leave me time to make one for my older daughter before the beginning of December. I expect I shall have to fill the pockets with sweets as well. I will then be using the Cherry Christmas jelly roll I won from Melissa at Happy Quilting to make a Christmas table runner. I also want to make some mini tote bags from Christmas fabric to put presents in.

You need to go and enjoy the rest of today's blog hop. Here are the other places to visit.

Just Let Me Quilt

Simple Sew

sew.darn.quilt

 Color My World

Sew Maybe I Can

Handmade by Mary E

Sew Many Yarns

Pig Tales and Quilts

Tea Time Creations

Jane's Quilting

Have fun and enjoy the great work on view. I am also linking this post to Connie's Tuesday link party at Freemotion by the River. So once you have visited everyone on the blog hop pop over to Connie's for even more quilting eye candy.