Finished Retro Flowers quilt!

It seems to have taken me an eternity to complete this quilt for one reason or another, but now that it is done it makes me smile it looks so summery and cheerful. I finished hand stitching the binding last night and the weather cheered up so I got some photos in natural light. I can't take any credit for the quilting (sadly I haven't become a pro at FMQ overnight). I got this quilt done by a longarm quilter - worth every cent :-)

 

A few of my favourite things!

If you are a kiwi you might already know about The Little Craft Store, but if you don't you should check it out! A little while ago Helen closed her brick and tile store and is now an online shop with lots of my favourite things - stripes, pin dots and an ever increasing range of solids. I love getting little bundles of fabric goodness in the mail! Look at these gorgeous buttons which I bought with the green pin dot. I have arranged them with the yellow pin dot and blue sketch fabric which also come from the Little Craft Store.

Helen also has lots of great ideas for all kinds of crafty projects. I'm very taken with this little quilt top she made and if it wasn't for the eleventy million other projects I have on the go at the moment, I would be whipping one up immediately! She has made it available as a free download - thanks Helen!

Amy Butler's Cameo sew-along

Waverlee over at Little Guinea Pigs alerted me to a sew-along organised by Amy Butler (Waverlee's project is looking really good - check it out!). I'm pretty certain that my hexies won't be in an anywhere near complete state by December, but I'm going to add my photos to the flickr pool nonetheless!

I have tried a few different fabrics for the background and have finally settled on this rather unusual yellow/green pin dot from Riley Blake.I stitched one together to get a better idea of whether I liked it or not:



These two photos below were taken as the clouds were scudding across the sky and despite major wind gusts. I'm nothing if not persistent! I laid the centres that I have already made on top of the blue one so I could see how it looked and get a photo. You can see the change in light - even though I was only outside for about 5mins in total!

Slice and Dice quilt blocks

Somehow we got our wires crossed at our last Monday Modern quilt group, so this month we are working on two bee blocks - one of them mine. I have dithered around for the longest time trying to choose something. In the end I decided to ask the group to make blocks inspired by this quilt of Rita's over at Red Pepper Quilts.

I played around and made one of my own first so that I could work out what size pieces of fabric to give everyone. I'm really looking forward to seeing what other people come up with!

Say Cheese! Polaroid Block Swap

Kristy over at Quiet Play is hosting a polaroid block swap for all us quilty folk who live down under. I really have no idea at present what I will make with the blocks, but I'm sure that inspiration will strike!

These were really quick to make, but I was very restrained and limited myself to making just 20. I am very excited to see what blocks I get in return. The post is so much more interesting now that I have become a fabric addict quilter.



It is school holidays and I could be sewing up a storm. Alas, I have felt too tired to do much except lay about reading and although I occasionally think about practising my FMQ - haven't got to the doing part yet.