Round robin {Karyn}

We swapped round robin blocks at our Monday Modern meeting last week. I received the cuckoo clock that Karyn started. Cuckoo clocks are kind of quirky to my way of thinking, and I really liked what Carolyn had done before me with the sort of deconstructed circles. I started by raiding my stash for anything that looked like it might fit. I particularly wanted to use some quirky Dr Suess type (?) fabric that I had.

I forgot to photograph my out takes and revisions. Anyway...this is what it became.

I'm no designer, but if anyone wants to know what I was thinking, read on...

Firstly - that brown fabric (is it actually Dr Suess? I don't know) reminded me of clock pendulums and the colour seemed to work really well, as did the little circles which kind of play on Carolyn's circles. I didn't want to do flying geese as they featured in a number of blocks this month, but something about the shape of the top of the clock made it a bit irresistible. And finally, I wanted to add some hour glass blocks. You know, in keeping with the whole time theme... I'm not completely happy with the bottom left block, so it might get a makeover before next month's meeting.

Friday morning was spent setting up at Alberton. I managed to get one picture before I had to leave for work.

Pop along if you're local - its worth it for the beautiful old home alone.

Hamilton Craft and Quilt Fair

I made a flying visit down to Hamilton yesterday for the Craft and Quilt Fair. Here are a few of the quilts that caught my eye:

City Shadows by Hellen Borrington

Sea Blue by Dianne Firth

Sea Blue (close up)

Gathered Consciousness by Cindy Watkins

And a very rare shot of me (mostly for mum) in front of my Anna Maria Horner quilt which was part of the Road to Colour exhibition.

Folk song {a finished quilt}

Not too many words needed today...

And finally, a cosy pile of quilts ready for  New Quilts for Alberton Beds. Just need to keep the cat off them until hand in day :-)

Moda Building Blocks {finished at last}

I finished hand stitching the binding onto my Moda Building Blocks quilt this week. I think that might be my favourite part of quilt making, it is contemplative and satisfying.

I learnt in the process of making this quilt that I don't actually like the look of sampler quilts much, although they are interesting to sew. However, I have grown quite fond of this one.

I have two more quilts to bind. After spending much of the year feeling like I just had endless WIPs, there are finally a few in the finishing queue.

Round robin #1

We swapped the centre blocks for our round robin at last week's Monday Modern meeting. I have to say, I was initially a bit stumped with the block I received, so it sat pinned on the wall for days while I thought about it.

I didn't think it lent itself to anything medallion-ish, so I googled some images for seminole piecing and decided to go with something along those lines. It is probably not exactly the thing to do to start with a bit of de-construction but that is exactly what I did. I just couldn't figure out a way to integrate it with anything else without taking the border off, especially as the fabric is different to anything I have in my stash. 

This was such a great exercise in thinking. I'm pleased with what it became especially as I just made it up as I went along.

After round one, my block which went to Robyn, looks like this:

I think it looks great - I can't wait to see what happens next month!

St Louis Star 2

A winter cold and some less-than-exciting sewing (backings zzzzz) have conspired to rob me of my sewing mojo. In an attempt to get it back, I decided to do some purpose-less sewing yesterday. You know, just for fun.

I went hunting in Quilters Cache and looking for something to take my fancy. The  St Louis Star 2 block caught my eye. I'm not hugely keen on paper piecing but I'm really pleased with how this turned out. It might even be promoted to 'starter block' for our Monday Modern round robin.

Today I got back to work on my Treasure Map blocks after a bit of a revelation. It is soooooo much easier cutting on the bench (I'm sure most of you know this).

See that pen? It's a Frixon pen. This is my latest favourite-handy-thing. It makes nice dark lines for marking and then they just iron away. I found it at Ribbon Rose.

I have two quilts about to be dispatched to Carol Longarm. (That's not actually her name, but its the name she goes by in my head). I'll be so pleased to get these back and bound and finished.

Round robin with Monday Modern

Our Monday Modern group has decided to do a round robin starting next month. It's not going to be a secret round robin, instead we will share progress with each other each month. Not having done a round robin before I wasn't sure what to do for my starter block. A couple of the others have done paper pieced blocks, but my first attempt focused on colour and shape.

After seeing Karyn's block I visited Bubblestitch just in case I want version two to be a paper pieced block . I'm very taken with the wolf block pictured below. I suspect this is because my poem-of-the-moment is called "Little Red Cap" by Carol Ann Duffy. It's in a collection of poems called "The World's Wife", if there is even the tiniest smidgen of the feminist in you, you ought to check it out.

...As soon as he slept, I crept to the back

of the lair, where a whole wall was crimson, gold, aglow with 

books.

Words, words were truly alive on the tongue, in the head,

warm, beating, frantic, winged; music and blood.

from Little Red Cap by Carol Ann Duffy