The Little Blog Quilting Bee

So! It looks like I have signed up for my first quilting bee! All the hard work is being one by Lou at http://imstudiolou.wordpress.com/.

The blog is for UK quilters who have never done a quilting bee before and who have blogs with less than 50 followers........which is me!

We have a lovely logo

 

which we need to make into a blog button too (hint hint). We are all hoping to share our tale via our little blogs, instagram and twitter.

 

We are each going to chose a block each month for the twelve of us to make.

So who are my fellow partners in crime? Well there's me and Lou for starters. Then we have (in no particular order):

Claire at www.corblimeyclaireepoppins.blogspot.co.uk

Rosanne at www.notafloralgirl.blogspot.co.uk
 

Alison at  http://patchworkalley.Blogspot.co.uk

 

Jenny at http://notetofollowsew.blogspot.com

 

Sheila at www.mindfulquilter.blogspot.co.uk

 

Nessa at http://nessahux.blogspot.co.uk

 

Celine at http://espritpatch.blogspot.com

 

Heidee at http://handmadesomethings.wordpress.com

 

Gina at http://www.occasionalquilter.blogspot.co.uk

 

and finally

 

Natalie at http://lovenatalieuk.blogspot.co.uk

Looks like we have an exciting year ahead!

 

Joanna

Yea Gads!

I have become a really crap blogger!

 

August?

 

I haven't blogged since August?!

 

In my defence I have been blogging, just not on this blog. There's the blog for my business, the occasional post on the magazine's blog and then the parallel blog I started to chart the journey of TK and me as we took on an allotment.

I think it might be best to merge the allotment with this one........as then at least I might say something every now and then!

 

So new year and all that, let's have a bit of veg growing as well as quilting on this blog.

 

First off, here's what the plot looked like when we took it over in May last year.

 

 

A tinsy bit overgrown!

The plot extends as far as the metal frame at the far end. Its quite a big plot. I love working on the allotment; it gives me the chance to get a bit of fresh air, a bit of a workout as well as a bit of time to think.

 

And here's what it looked like at the end of December

 

 

It actually looks like an allotment again!

 

We had a small harvest last year and are just gearing up for a new season.

 

In the meantime TK and I did a little bit of sewing today when we visited a quilt group. Block D1 of our Sylvia's Bridal Sampler quilt.

 

 

 

So this could work right? A bit of quilting with a bit of vegetable growing?

 

 

Where have you been?

Months have gone by again without me managing to write a post. I'm actually getting quite good at not writing them now!

I seem to be consumed by work these days and all work and no play has made me a dull girl. The editing work, ie the work that pays the bills, has been so manic the last few months as we have had to fit putting together an annual special magazine on top of the regular monthly issues.

And then there is my quilting and a lot of my recent quilting is so tied up with my fabric business (the work that doesn't pay the bills), that I don't like to post pictures of them here first.

 

But hey ho

 

I have been quite productive over the last few months and have finished quite a few of the quilts I've made from Hoffman pre-cuts; I really love working with them now!

Here's a few pics of them........

 

 

This was made from a Cherry Bali Pop

 

A Tiramisu Bali Pop and Snap

 

This quick quilt was made using a Tonga Treat Mini pack from Timeless Treasures

 

And this final quilt was my first attempt at free motion quilting, which was a little silly as its straight lines and would have been better quilted with my walking foot!

 

So a lot of quilting has been going on but very little quilting for me.......



 

Blog Silence

I've had trouble finding the time to do a blog post recently, mainly because I have been busy with work; both the editing kind and also the quilt shop owner kind with two quilt shows since mid May.

 

It's not like I haven't been working on quilts in that time, far from it!

 

Hopefully I can remedy the situation shortly!

Jigsaw Stars - the whole story

I decided last night that if this blog is going to be an online record of my quilts and my quilting, I really ought to do a blog post for each quilt when its finished recording everything that went into making it.

 

So this is the whole story post for Jigsaw Stars, the quilt I finished last week.

 

 

A lot of my quilting is of course tied up with my business; to some extent the two are inseparable. Jigsaw Stars was made with one of the new Hoffman Bali Crackers; a 10" square charm pack. These are Hoffman's version of a layer cake which I have just started stocking. Quite often with new products you need to make something up to inspire people. This particular colour pack, Parfait, was actually my favourite in their 5th collection of pre-cuts but it wasn't very popular among my customers. And so it fell victim to being used by me.........

I spent quite a while playing around with designs, working out how much could be cut from a 10" square. I finally settled on the design and added a dull pink Hoffman batik as a background fabric which went well with all the colours in the pack.

 

The piecing went together quite quickly. I cut the squares up in a methodical manner as I worked as it was important to keep the squares in the right order. I think it was about then I decided the design was good enough to be made into a pattern that I could sell.

I always take work in progress shots of my quilts. Often they are just to post on twitter etc but they are then useful for adding to pattern instructions.

 

 

I used a new wadding for this quilt, a bolt of polyester wadding from Legacy by Pellon. I've wondered about using this for some time. Just thought it was cool to have it on the shelf!

However......

I was disappointed with it. It did say to pre-test with dark fabrics but this quilt has a variety of tones in it. It didn't beard where I was quilting but I just had a layer of fluff on the surface of the quilt which then collected in little balls of fibre like this.

 

 

 However, I have to say now that the quilt is finished and bound, it is behaving better!

 

This quilt was a first for me...........the first quilt I have free motion quilted. The stars in the centre were echo quilted using my walking foot but the pink background was stipple quilted. I'm quite pleased with my first effort!

 

 

I used King Tut 925 - Caravan in the top and a blue Masterpiece 138 in the bobbin as the quilt has blue backing.

The binding was put together with leftover bits from the Cracker pack...........and another first........I double bound the edges and used Wonder Clips for the first time!

 

Quilt summary - Jigsaw Stars

Top - Parfait Bali Cracker + Hoffman 1895 Orchid

Wadding - Legacy by Pellon Polyester

Thread - King Tut 925 + Masterpiece

Backing - Hoffman 1895 Swordfish

 

And that is the story of Jigsaw Stars

 

I Made a Quilt!

When I say I made a quilt, I mean I have actually finished one; quilting, binding, hanging sleeve. The lot. Well apart from a label, which I will add shortly.

This is a rare occurrence for me.

I do actually make a lot of quilts.........well quilt tops. I'm designing and creating all the time, especially now that I have developed this addiction for pre-cuts. I have a further three pre-cut quilt tops to quilt and started another one over the weekend using the new Hoffman Bali collection pre-cuts.

And not meaning to boast, but I finished quilting quilt #2 on Saturday so that just needs the binding and hanging sleeve added and then that is done too!

 

So where is this new found explosion of getting things done come from? It's because I am combining my learning to machine quilt with making all these quilt tops. It's just so quick to whizz around with the machine. It doesn't need to be perfect, its not for a competition. It just needs to be good enough to make the quilt look good and I think so far I have achieved this.

 

Everything has just come together nicely as this first completed quilt is going to be a pattern that I will be launching it Quilts UK this coming week. Wanting to make it into a pattern made me realise that I really needed to learn machine quilting for me to do this. I love hand quilting but its just not practical if I want to make something as a display model.

 

So this is the start of something new!

 

And as for the quilt itself............here it is! It's made from a Bali Cracker plus background fabric so its layer cake friendly.

 

 

Quilt #2 is possibly more suitable to teach in a class as its simpler........this is something else I think I need to start doing! 

A Good Day's Quilting

Spring has finally sprung here and we have some beautiful weather this weekend. This always gives me a real dilemma. As it's the weekend I can finally get down to some serious guilt-free sewing as I don't *have* to work but on the other hand when the sun is shining I feel that I should get out in the garden, especially as I am a bit of a fair weather kind of gardener!

 

I've been designing and making quite a few quilt tops recently using Hoffman pre-cuts, with a view to making them up as patterns but of course they need quilting. And they need quilting before I can have the pattern for sale! I hoping to release the first one at Quilts UK in a couple of weeks so I can show you a sneak peak but not the whole quilt just yet. It's made using a Bali Cracker ie layer cake. It was the first time I had stippled quilted ANYTHING and not quilting in straight lines was totally out of my comfort zone!

 

 

 

I'm quite pleased with my effort. Just need to add a bit more stippling to some bits of background in the centre and add the binding...........and its done!

 

I have had real problems with the wadding though. Its a polyester batting, one of the ones on the bolt from Legacy by Pellon. So much fluff and fibre has come through the fabric, not as I'm stitching just generally.

 

 

I was really disappointed although it seems to have settled down a bit now.

What I was amazed at was how quickly I was able to quilt. I know stippling isn't the most exciting of machine quilting techniques but hey it's a start!

 

So its onwards and upwards!