French General Moonlight - sounds like the name of a race horse!

Ta da ... I am finished!

Made with French General fabrics (more then one line) and using the Moonlight pattern by Gerri Robinson, from her book A Cut Above.  Quilted by Vicki Jenkin.  (78" x 78") 

This is such a fun pattern, made with squares and stripes it was very easy to cut out and make.  All the time I was cutting through I was worried that with the beautiful patterned fabrics I wouldn't get a good contrast.  However I am delighted with the end result.  I love two coloured quilts and red with cream is a great combination.  

My favorite part of this quilt is the pieced border!  My friends know that I normally use a 2 + 6 " combination border...everytime!  I cannot think of another quilt where I actually pieced a border, so I am very pleased with myself.  Although it felt odd to not be putting the big stars into the centre of the quilt!  To ensure I didn't change the pattern I made the stars first!

The other reason to celebrate this quilt finish is the fact that it used lots of lovely gifts - my friend Ann gave me the book, Sharryn gave me a layer cake of French General and my mother gave me some FG yardage.  

Happy quilting Sue.

Progress finally

This quilt (Moonlight by Gerri Robinson in her book "A Cut Above") is made with French General fabric and has been back from the lovely long armer Vicki Jenkin for weeks!  Finally I found my box of left over FG to cut and sew the binding.

  

Its such a treat to have a lovely quilt to hand stitch binding down at night, when its still cool enough to want a quilt on your lap.  The weather has warmed up but a lack of rain has caused me to hold off planting much in the garden, and I have had to start hand watering it is so dry.

Having said that it was freezing cold over the weekend and I just hid in the house as much as I could.  I have been frustrated for months that I couldn't find anything in my sewing nook so I attempted a clean up.  I moved fabric from box to box, upended cupboards, whined about the lack of space and project boxes and made a big mess. I say attempt, because I am so easily distracted that when I found some projects I stopped cleaning up!  I did some unpicking and sewed borders on two projects then dumped them both in a box that I promised myself would be my go to UFO box.  LOL will see if that makes a difference in finishing UFO's!  

This mini cake stand quilt (12") was not a UFO, just a favorite orphan block.  I added two more rounds, quilted it minimally and put the binding on. While I think it deserves more quilting then it received, I am happily calling it a finish for now!

Happy quilting Sue.

Kids quilts progress

Opps sideways picture!

You get the idea!  I keep finding UFO's in the pile that is my sewing space which is jammed in the corner of my lounge room.  So I stuck a border on it and now its a flimsy finish - a lap or kids sized quilt top made from left over sashing strips (see below) and I spy fabrics.

A proper finish!  These are the I Spy  four patches that my friends help me make (and donated fabric for) back in March.  Finally its quilted and bound.  I literally picked out the dark blue and black bindings from my scrap binding collection and sewed them on.  While I was there I had a bit of a clean out ... no point holding onto 5" of scrap binding ... cut them into 2.5" squares instead!

I found this wonderfully loud lime green and blue spot in my stash and it worked perfectly as a border on this kids quilt.  I love the fact that happened...because the rest of the quilt is out of the stash as well!  I have purchased some backing and which just needs piecing and then this top goes in the pile for quilting.  While my shoulder is much improved, I am not game to do any quilting and upset it again after months of discomfort and physio.

And this is the view from the top of Mt Arapiles, where you can see the canola flowering in the paddocks below.  This was a short walk only...you can drive to almost the top of this mountain, which is perfect when the weather is threatening to rain!

Spring has arrived! Wattle flowering in the Mt Arapiles State Park.  

Happy quilting Sue