Abigail the ballet dancer

Granddaughter Abigail's first Ballet award ceremony. She gained a distinction for her ballet exam, and was awarded a beautiful trophy for the most improved student in her year. It was definitely a night to celebrate.

During the Christmas holiday Abigail [age 6] managed to make a Christmas hanging for her mantlepiece, using my featherweight to sew some of the points and sewing on the bells by hand.

All aboard for a Cruise

Anyone that knows me, will know this is the nearest I will ever get to cruising.. I cannot stand anything on water, but the SS Gt Britain is a restored ship in dry docked at Bristol. Chris seems to think he's a First class passenger, and I'm ready for lunch!

Stash Busting 2010

Stash busting in 2009 seemed to go to pot half way through the year, I was doing well until a local trader decided to sell up her fabric and I bought far too much!

I will again join Judy Laquidara's stash busting group in 2010 and have to try and use only fabrics I already have. Two reasons, One is my cupboards are full to bursting, Secondly I need to save hard for an exciting trip to Wyoming, the Tetons and Yellowstone later in the year.

Does buying fabric in a different country count !! Like eating chocolate when away from home does not have any calories!!

2010 quilt meeting dates and events

Listed here are details of quilting events I have found for 2010

(picture of a quilt-as-you-go quilt made for grandaughter Eleanor)

Busy Quilters and Stitchers 10.00 to 3.30pm
Goldington Middle School, Haylands Way, Bedford MK41 9BX
13 March, 5 June, 4 September, 6 November

Hamtune Quilters 7.30 - 9.30pm
Parklands Community Centre, Devon Way, Northampton NN3 6DX
First and third Tuesday of every month

Patchwork People 9.45 to 3.30pm
Lovat Hall, Silver Street, Newport Pagnell
6 March, 12 June, 11 September, 13 November

Spring quilt festival Chilford 12- 14 March
Quilts UK Malvern 13 - 16 May
National Quilt Championships Sandown 18 - 20 June
Festival of Quilts NEC Birmingham 19 - 22 August

Christmas Count down

This has been a fun project for a Christmas Count down...

Pattern taken from 12 Days of Christmas by Art to Heart.

Night of horror!

7pm Sunday evening an almighty BANG and all our Electricity went out, a car had run up the path at the end of our drive and demolished the Electricity Cabinet and lamp standard, smoke poured out and then it caught fire! The female driver was out of the car. Police and firebrigade arrived and questions were asked!! The electricity finally came back on at 3.30am the next morning as engineers worked through the night to clear up the mess and dig up the pavement.

It is now Thursday and we have huge holes in the pavement around our house but the power is back on. I think the police took the woman away probably to breathalize and question her! Next doors car was hit in the accident and looks like a right-off! A tree is now half burnt away and 3 or 4 dustbins melted into blobs of plastic.

Abigail's Christmas quilt

As it is half term, my granddaughter Abigail came to stay for two days. Age 6 she loves to do craft work with me, so we organized a Christmas quilt. She traced the pictures onto Heat n Bond Heavy then cut them out and ironed them onto fabrics herself under Grandma's watchful eye!
I think it may have been the first time she had used an iron by herself.

Having arranged the snowmen and trees and ironed them to the background fabric I machined around the edge with batting in the middle.. we didn't have time for her to use the sewing machine.

Busy busy busy

Busy busy busy, I seem to be always on the go. BUT I have found time to make this fun Santa, with all his bells. I thought my Mum would like it as she has little sight and the tinkling sound would be nice on her front door at Christmas.
This has been the month of birthdays, Granddaughters 6 and 2 years, son Richard, husband Chris, sister Debbie and my Mum will be 95 in 2 days time!

Final 10 fish for the fish swap

The final 10 fish blocks ready for the swap. There will be 25 fish in the post 15th September.

Green Lane Day in the sun shine

Friday 11th September as members of GLASS the Green Lane club, we went off the beaten track through glorious countryside in beautiful sunny weather. I must have opened dozens of farm gates, and while I lept out to take photo's Chris enjoyed splashing through the streams.

Fish swap

I've been fishing all morning!!!

15 fish ready for the no-sew fish swap, 5 more are waiting to be cut out and five more are still in the "thinking about it" mode.

Here we go again............

Here I go again....

Really decided I was going to finish all those UFO's that are still waiting from January BUT Sindy who runs www.fatcatpatterns.com/fatcat_swaps.htm

has just started a fuse only FISH block swap through her yahoo scratchingpost group, and I just love these fancy fishes, so I have signed up for "between 5 and 25" just to cover myself, but hope to get all 25 sent in. I will start by spending tomorrow drawing the patterns [all free to download] and then look through my stash for fabric.. at least that way I will still be stash busting! Why don't YOU join me and give Sindy a bumper bundle of fishes to swap for us.

Little bags for bag swap

A few little bags quickly made. The first was for a bag swap, but then I got carried away and could not stop making them... I have 7 more cut out ready to make, I thought they would make great little gift bags filled with goodies.

Thank you Rachel for sharing the pattern on your Blog.

rachel-griffith.blogspot.com/2009/08/friendship-bag-tutorial.html

Paper pieced Teddy Bear quilt

Paper pieced, using a very cheapo block of paper which was very easy to see through and easy to remove.

This pattern was offered on Carol Doak's yahoo site as a mystery, but I did not get around to making it until after the mystery had finished.

My colour choice was based on a teddy bear fabric and plain colours I had in my stash... didn't have to buy a thing! It measures 40 x 40 inches.

Pfaff-ing about

This is a sample of stitches used on my Pfaff sewing machine some years ago.. I decided to make it into a wall hanging to remind me of what I could do!!

Mid-Life Crisis !!

Where did July go ? I guess two weeks in Scotland, followed by a week in Cornwall and then a five day trip with our Granddaughter has left little time for updating my BLOG.

First let me introduce you to Lucy.. my "new" car, well actually she is a 19 years old Mazda MX5, and I plan a lot of fun driving her around. I have always wanted a red sports car and had to wait until I am 64 to get one, she is automatic, which is taking a bit of getting use to. The only time I have driven automatics is while on holiday in the USA, so I feel I should be on the other side of the road!

To complete my "mid-life crisis" I have started a diet, let my hair grow long for the first time in years, and moved the walking machine into the house so that I can get fit.

24th June 2009

Wow. what an exciting start to the day. Postman called at 7.15 am with a USA parcel from my Spring Mini quilt swap. Not only is the quilt wonderful and the machine quilting brilliant, there was also chocolate and FQ's enclosed. Thank you so much Maya.. I love it.

On the left are the 9 completed Baltimore blocks [ from Fatcat patterns]. It has been a struggle to get the machine applique done, but at last they are ready for the next step.. not sure what that is going to be yet!

Holiday in Scotland

Just back from two weeks holiday in Scotland where I tried to find time to make a USA paper pieced star each day. I actually managed to make 11 stars [see photo] of the 30 I eventually want to make. They are from Carol Doak's book 50 Fabulous Paper-Pieced Stars.

Most of my time was taken up watching dolphins from the lounge window, I had never seen them in the wild around the coast of Great Britain and three days I managed to watch them. Plus grey seals were lolling about on the beach near our hired cottage. An added treat was seeing an Osprey flying over the Spey River estuary.

A visit to two patchwork shops meant my stash busting is not doing too well this month!

Back home I have 1078 emails in my in box! so a lot have been deleted or I will never catch up!

Four projects worked on in May / June

Playing catch up with my blog.

I am working on my Baltimore blocks, machine quilting them, 5 completed and 4 partially done.. really want to get them ready to join together.

The chicken pincushion was my swap and went with a length of liberty fabric to Polly auntpollysporch.blogspot.com.

The snails trail quilt was finally backed, quilted and the binding sewn on.. another UFO bites the dust!

Final photo is of the June lottery block sent to Carol Doak's yahoo group..
Talking of Carol Doak, I have started to plan making a 30 star paper pieced quilt from her book. At the moment I have the patterns printed and some of the fabric cut out.. watch this space.

Carol Doak 9 Patch

Carol Doak via her yahoo group has offered two great prizes of SIXTY fat quarters. The competition is to make a 9 patch block from one of her patterns.. so this is my entry.. I would just love to win.

Decided to use Christmas fabrics and have now made it into a cushion, probably for the church quilt show in September.

I think I am in a foundation paper piece mood, as I have printed off 30 stars from Carol Doak's 50 USA State Stars book, now to decide on the fabrics I will use.

Two Swaps finished

I have joined yet ANOTHER group.. Carol Doak's yahoo group and find they are running a block lottery. The foundation block on the right will go off to the swap lottery, and when 20 are received the names go in a hat and one person wins all 20.. so I'll be keeping my fingers crossed.
One reason for joining this group is that many years ago I started using one of Carol Doak's books to make a star quilt of all the USA States I had visited. 26 at the last count! I need to re-start this quilt !!

The table mat on the left is for the Spring swap and features a blue cow, called Daisy, I have used a heat resistant batting and backed it in Christmas fabric to make it reversible.
Blue Cow is from a children's TV show a favorite of my granddaughter, and I thought it would be fun. The pattern is one of Mary Mayne's.

Swapping Mad!

I have just joined two swaps, one with the Quilting Gallery http://quiltinggallery.com/ for a Spring Blooms Mini-Quilt, which I have been working on all day and now just have the binding to hand sew down, then I will post a picture.

The second swap is for a pincushion with www.quiltathome.blogspot.com/ of Switzerland. Have to think of something to make for that.

It is such fun swapping with people around the world.. give it a go!

Chicken Oven Glove

A pair of chicken oven gloves.. trouble is they look to cute to use.

Pattern designed by Ann Harris.

Bears in the Farmhouse

Yee Haa at last the Judy Laquidara Bears in the Farmhouse top is finished. [See previous blog posts about the making of this quilt].

It will have to join the UFO pile for a while as I need to make a quilt for my neice's new baby, she or he, is expected soon.

Chicken time with the IAM group

IAM group meeting at my house on Thursday 2nd April.

Ann Harris came to teach us how to make chicken pot holders, we all had great fun and a lot of laughs!

Coloured Trapunto Workshop

Hamtune Quilters Northampton


On Tuesday 3rd evening I taught 33 ladies how to do Annie London's coloured trapunto. It was a fun evening and I will be repeating the workshop for the BQS group on Saturday 14th. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves and quite a few managed to complete the whole thing in the 2 hours.

Bears in the Farmhouse

RIGHT
Step 3 of Bears in the Farmhouse, 12 blocks to this stage just completed in time. Now to work on Step 4 and add borders and join the squares together.
LEFT
Worked hard today and have Step 4 completed.. have to wait until 25th for the next step.