Some progress with my WIP's

I got the quilting done on the Milky Way quilt two weekends ago. But unfortunately I had a few puckers on the back.  So I eventually got time to unpicked and resewed. I am now just hand stitching the binding down.

I went to the shops to get a backing for the pink and white chevron quilt (found and purchased) but also came home with a neutral jelly roll and a pattern!

I finally piece the backings I had picked for the two cowboy quilts.

Last weekend I made two more houses, there is a third one still in pieces, ready to go in the bottom right corner of this picture.  The blocks are 6" square and I  want to leave it at nine blocks, lost the enthusiasm for making more.

The houses are definitely going to be a wall hanging sized project.  But I cannot decide if I should be  a) making a different block to go along side them OR b) sewing them together and adding an interesting pieced border.   What do you think?

Happy quilting, Sue SA

All Day Quilting

My quilting group has All Day Sewing sessions about four times a year.  We start at 10 am and finish at 10 pm.  Well that's the idea.  I ran out of steam before then,when my back decided it didn't like standing (cutting or ironing) nor was it happy to sit and sew.  However this is what everyone else was up to before I piked it after dinner.

 Kylie was making heart blocks.

 Jill was making her self this great summer quilt.  Curves are a fear of mine, but Erolyn told Jill to keep her "smile on top" and voile one curved seam without 20,000 pins.  

 Sam and Vicki like to sew together and were making this sewing bag pattern by Rosalie Quinlan.  I have this pattern, it is one of many I have never ever made up.  I am very keen to see the end result!

 Sam was wearing this cute hippo brooch - with a nearly patchwork pattern on him!

 Elaine was trimming scrap wadding and joining them up into a usable size.

 Erolyn did finish this top (in a day) and it looked like licorice all sorts!  This pattern was off the Internet and designed to give lots of  space to practise free motion quilting.  I might need to make one of these!

Shez was making a jelly roll quilt out of one the fabulous books by mother and daughter team, Pam and Nicky Lintott.  

 Julie made two table runners in this fabric and then pieced all the squares for a raggy quilt in flannel.  

Sorry my camera ran out of battery before I got around everyone in the room : (

Happy quilting, Sue SA.

Hot pink for St Valentines day!

I did drop a hint, but DH completely forgot it was St Valentines day.  In his defence he normally remembers and I forget until he presents me with flowers.  Instead of romance I worked on finishing the pink chevron quilt, by adding a hot pink border.

Hot pink is not my colour, but its for a primary school aged girl, so figure that this was a no brainer when it came to borders.  The finished quilt measures 151 cm x 223 cm (or 59"x88") and I have recently found out that she has a king single bed.  Does anyone know what the measurements are for king singles?  It fits nicely on my son's single bed, but I am now worried it wont be wide enough.

You may have heard Adelaide has gone from being the hottest city in the world, to having a big wind storm and now flooding rains.  Oh and bush fires, except the big bushfire was a few hours north of Adelaide.  My boys like to watch the weather each night.  I think the animals are now taking shelter from the rain (and hoarding food on the roof?) ...that could be the flood coming in the background!  We are all safe n dry and luckily my husband cleaned out the gutters before the 90 mm of rain arrived...that's 3 1/2 inches in the old scale!

Sugar Block BOM January's block - already made, just for comparison with ...

February's block.  I tried to get the lovely waratah print in the centre block, but the print was a bit large.

 I finished off my St Valentine days sewing with some new star blocks.  Yes, this is a new WIP!  Because I had a gazillion blue 5" squares left over I cut some 3" white squares for flippy corners.  I am not not sure what I ever had against solids!  Two down, ??? to go!

Note to self, do not try and make dessert that involve melting chocolate when humidity is 200% and definitely never try and put Brownies back in the oven AFTER you have cooled them and discovered they are uncooked in the centre.  Further note to self; throw out Brownies recipe, go on a diet. 

Happy quilting, Sue SA.

Friday night sewing, I wish!

Again I am late for linking up to Friday Night With Friends  run by Cheryll.  

 I achieved this on Sunday.  One table, without umbrella - had to find a shifter to achieve that!

Covered in one old double bed fitted sheet...to protect it!

One batting smoothed out, trying to ensure one end doesn't drag in the dirt.

 One backing, smoothed out, the corner aligned with the batting.

 Flip the corner over and spray baste the batting.  

 Worked my around to the last corner, spray and smooth, all while making sure excess batting stays off the ground.

Trim excess batting.  Concede defeat.  Can of spray is empty and shops are shut.  

I intended to sew Saturday and I kind of did in between;, hosting my sewing mother (visiting from Victoria), caring for my two boys (DH is away for work), making lunch for a non sewing girlfriend...who I then convinced to stay and learn to make a Union Jack pillowcase. I did help her to make half of a Union Jack, use a rotary cutter and sew a quarter inch seam.  All the while hosting another non sewing girlfriend and her daughter - who were voluntarily evacuated from their house due to the catastrophic fire rating for the hills and the fact here were two fires burning in the hills.  And hosting another quilting friend, who pretty much luckily entertained herself!  And then after the two non sewers left late in the day, my quilting buddies hubby and daughter turned up and I cooked BBQ tea.  Phew!  

Tomorrow I am going to buy basting spray.  Perhaps I might get to sew next Friday? Sorry for the boring photos, but whats a post without pictures?

Happy quilting, Sue SA.

PS we still have our Southern Boobook owl in residence, despite the 40C temps on Saturday and a steady stream of visitors looking at him.  I am very pleased to have a residential mouse eater, lets hope s/he stays!

Unexpected presents!

A few weeks ago a good friend dropped in and gave me this lovely bag.  It has a special pocket inside which includes a pen and notepad.  I had forgot to show it off, because I am too busy using it!  I think this lovely print (purchased in Africa)  helped the revived interest in Zebras at my house!  Although I don't think any more poor zebra have been sacrificed to feed the lions...I found the lions drinking milk...from the "milk tanker" out of the Thomas train set!

On Sunday I enjoyed a lovely afternoon sewing with a few friends, one who had recently cleaned out her stash.  I have plenty of novelty prints in my stash, but happy to take a few more on board, just to help out a friend of course!

Then on Monday a parcel arrived unexpectedly, with presents for me - a cute key chain purse,

 followed by some magazines and lots of matching fat quarters!  These cute kids prints are going to make a great quilt!  Can you see the great butterfly pattern I have already ear marked, I don't do enough cute girls cot quilts and I had seen a picture somewhere in blog land of this butterfly and now I have the pattern!

 And there were presents for my two boys, two super cute pillow cases each - all from my friend Karen.  The boys loved their new pillow cases and we had to immediately put them to use ; )

Then tonight DS2 told me he needed a library bag...apparently library day is tomorrow! He requested lion and zebra fabric, and surprisingly I had some that fitted the bill!  

So this is my first finish for February.  But I have been enjoying everyone else's hard work and generosity!

Happy quilting, Sue SA.

We have a feathered visitor

Our yard had lots of tall, establish trees when we brought the house and a host of bird life.  This is the first owl we have seen, but I suspect he is a little bit lost and we only saw him because my husband was washing the car under this tree.  This is a juvenile Southern Boobook owl, which according to the Birds in Backyards website, is the most common owl in Australia, for more information go here.  I hope he hasn't lost his Mummy and I hope he is going to be OK in the 40C+ heat we are suffering!

 Meanwhile we were avoiding the heat and staying inside, happily playing - me on the sewing machine and my darling boys were playing African safaris again,  plotting escape routes for the zebras!  Its hard to keep a straight face when they are discussing in earnest how to outsmart the lions, those smart zebras split into two groups and crossed the river - outwitting the poor hungry lions!

 I found more pre cut squares in my stash, these are all cowboy themed.  I cut some red horse shoe print to try and pull the different colours together...I not sure I achieved my aim?  Either way a single bed size top is finished and when this is quilted it will keep a little cowboy warm.

This square quilt was made with the rest of the cowboy left over fabrics.  Karen sent me most of these fabrics a few years ago and I have been struggling to know how to put the left overs together.  In the end I made several types of blocks, which looked awful together, but somehow look better with sashing.  At 54" square I am happy with the size of this quilt and there are very few scraps remaining.  The light blue and red border fabrics I had brought myself, so there is a bit of yardage to use up in backings and that potentially will be the last of the cowboy themed fabric!

Happy quilting, Sue SA.