Books in the mail

A day's leave and Bonnie Hunter's latest book, String Fling, collected from the Post Office (deemed too large for delivery, but at least no customs and vat to be paid), yippie!  Managed to write a blog post for Liberated Round Robin showing the flimsy (pictures in last blog-post).  Am looking forward to quilting this one.

And last week collected Leah Day's book, 365 Free Motion Quilting Designs (paid customs and vat this time).  Yes, I know you can see all the designs on her blog, but it is really nice to have them in one place to page through.  Go see what my Fish Hoek Friend has been doing!

T says "will it never stop raining", and my response is, welcome to Welsh summers!  I wish I was there instead of watching it rain here in Cape Town.

My plan is try and sew, if not every day, then every other day, even if only for 15 minutes.  So after looking at the six blocks from 15minutesplay that have been pinned up for the past year (there were more, and good intentions, etc), suddenly I knew what I wanted to do to put them together.  So I grabbed all the 2.5" red strips to make the blocks bigger.  Sewed for 30 minutes last night.  Pictures next time, when there is more to show.

I made a promise to myself when I turned 50, that in that year I would make 50 quilts for charity.  Four years on, I think I'm up to number five actually finished, with about 3 or 4 tops waiting to be completed.  But I now might have a secret helper, who has been raiding my crumbs and strings boxes and making the most beautiful "made fabric" - no pictures yet!  I think I have her hooked!

Love to you all!

Sorry!

I have been a bad blogger :(   I was embarrassed to find that I had 4 comments that I had to moderate to publish, oops.  Thank-you for commenting!

Some pictures, seems like I have also been bad at taking photos!  And taking bad photos, need to take them outside, but its been kind of wet.

Needle-cases for Cape Embroiderers Guild (to be stitched on by my good friend, F) for their annual event.  the one says "I never met a chocolate I didn't like"

 Liberated Round Robin progress and flimsy

Stirrings...

Am sitting at work, thinking of going home, the rain is beating against the window and it's getting chillier by the minute.  Thought if I at least write something here, it may prompt me to add some photos from home later, as I have actually been sewing again.  After a big tidy up in my sewing space, and realizing that the winter blues are not a figment of my imagination, after almost 6 weeks of no real sewing I just had to do nothing but sew, and so I did!  Yesterday, caught up on the Creative Blocks of the Month (all six done, including redo of my one from January) - I had a brainwave about a month ago that I should select a group of co-ordinating fabrics in which to do them all, so that there is some cohesiveness.  I'm using a fat quarter bundle bought (when?) from Fat Quarter Shop.  Put together all but the last block of the Just Take 2 (section one) - last block might take some time as it is an applique!  Can now start of the next section (which I think started in April!), but have already selected the fabrics. But next sewing MUST be the Liberated Round Robin, it is a flimsy, but it needs quilting. 

But also have a number of non-sewing admin chores to do - trying to allocate time to each of them as there are deadlines looming. 

Love to you all!

Blogger issues

What's up with Blogger - suddenly this blog and another one I am part of were deleted...   maybe it's time to think of an alternative!

This one was restored after jumping through some hoops, but the other one will take up to 2 days to restore.  Oh dear!

Quilt things next time - am too mad now to show anything.

Long weekend

I really enjoy having a four-day weekend, lots of sewing done!  First some pictures of Fish Hoek beach just after sunset Sunday last week, was there with family, and had dinner at restaurant just behind me, right next to beach (view brilliant, food not so!).

 

Just Takes 2:

Liberated Round Robin:  Sewed like crazy for two evenings creating green fabric - all to show is 7 x 4.5" squares and smaller pieces of made fabric, interest waning a bit... because I can't think what I will do with them, and surely will need lots more....

My mother has shown an interest in making a quilt.  After taking her to our regional guild meeting in February where she bought half metres of six fabrics from the same range, I promised to help/show her... Friday we started, and with me cutting and pressing and she selecting and sewing we made some almost log cabin blocks... then continued on Sunday.  These are just badly pinned to one of the four polystyrene sheets that serves to hold my work/s in progress (to say a design wall sounds a bit pretentious).  She's aiming for a random type of look, rather than regimented rows.   Watch this space!

Saturday, thought to relook at LRR, maybe I should not make fabric from such small pieces, start with longer strips, pull all the lilac strings and ...  yay! in 15 minutes flat had stitched and cut these 3.5" pieces.  A border later?

Monday morning, so enthused with that turn around, I wanted to do something with red, and found in the red box all the left over string pieces from Orca Bay (mostly the triangles I cut the wrong way, because not paying attention!), Ok... seeing I'd added the turquoise slash, picked some 4.5" squares with turquoise and made these half-square triangles (hmm... more scraps for later!)  Various sizes... but at this point no idea how they'll get used!

Maybe should try again with the greens, using strings, and ended up making this, thanks to Anna's blog.  Again perhaps should have had wider pieces, as it took all evening.  It's about 14" x 16".  It looks better in the photo than in real.  But I could cut it up later!

So tonight, what to do, what to do... then saw what Margaret had said about containing her orange... think I know what, add a border...

... and I think (see, not stitched yet..) this might work... 

Go and see what other Liberated Rounders are doing.

Birthdays

Today is T's birthday.  Is it possible that I have a 30-year old daughter?!  Just wish we weren't half a world apart today.  Happy Birthday T.

Some progress on the Just Takes 2 blocks, and an update on my hesitant contribution to Liberated Round Robin - although having done it, am looking forward to the second part.

Just Takes 2:  3 more blocks, trying hard to do them in order (at least the machine-piecing ones and omitting embroidery for now), but am now 14 blocks behind!!!   - Easter weekend coming up, should be able to catch up. 

This was block 1! - circle in centre is hand-stitched.

House block - this was second attempt!

 With some help:

Liberated Round Robin:

This was the original block, not quite sitting flat.

Then sliced the corners off

Inserted mauve strips, and squared up, but something missing.....

... a thin slice of turquoise!

Liberated Quilters

Deep breath... I have taken the plunge to join the Liberated Round Robin.  After originally thinking I don't have time (and yeah, probably don't! lol), and, after reading and seeing what is being done, and yes, I do have an odd block that could be liberated, here goes.

This year in my quilt group we are doing a block of the month, contributions from randomly selected members... I was nominated for the first month.  My first quilt block ever made was a Log Cabin block (circa 1975), and my first four quilts were log cabin blocks.  Last year my daughter was teaching herself by following Leila's blog and she was turning out amazing blocks, the first ones being Log Cabins.  So thought it would be a breeze, hmmm. This was my 12.5" BOM but it's not flat!  It definitely needs liberating.

Just Take 2

 Today is Human Rights Day, and it's really great to have a public holiday in the middle of the week.

Finally have photos of the finished Orca Bay top.  Taken on the front garden path, but quickly as the wind was ruffling up the edges...

Took a nap yesterday after work and then was itching to sew, knowing no work next day!  Completed five, bring the total done to seven, of the Just Takes 2 blocks. Think that I will have to resew one or two as they are little bigger than they should be.  I've now realized that the foot on Pfaff Grand quilter is a bit narrower than a quarter inch. Blocks are between 6.5" and 12.5" square.   Pictures...

Starting to Sew Again

Short update of quilty things.  The Orca Bay piecing is finished (was done a month ago) - now have to choose a backing and get it ready for quilting at our retreat in April or May.  Tonight I prepared the back for one bandana quilt and finished second bandana top (I think the quilting of these will also go to the retreat!).  Just Take 2 - I am way behind... have printed each installment, and have cut most of them at my Thursday evenings group (making a change from taming scraps), but needed to work on those bandana quilts before sewing these blocks.

Daughter C is travelling in Queensland and plans to be home sooner than she expected.  Daughter T says she has had some work and enjoying Wales.  We had a great party on Saturday evening - sister and bil both reaching a half century; it really made up for having to go to work in the morning and missing a French class.

Where we've been...

We're back!  Have been skiing in France, practiced a little of my French.  For the 12 days we were there it was at least a little warmer (-7 to 0 C) than the week before (-18 to -5 C).  Who am I kidding, it was the coldest skiing holiday we've had!  Reminder to self: "don't visit Paris in winter".  Either walking or waiting for buses in -5 C when you've just left 35 C in Cape Town dampens the fun of being there.  Not having been to Paris before, did the Eiffel Tower:  up, walk once around observation deck, and straight back down, just too cold, and nothing much open.  The highlight was, after visiting the Science Museum (preferable to the shops, even if they were in the throes of winter sales!), we were walking back to a different Metro, and hmm,  what is THAT building, and those crowds of ladies leaving look suspiciously like ladies who sew, hmm.  Closer look, and it's "L'aiguille en fete" at the Grande Halle de La Villette.  DH says not keen to go in, so persuaded him to go and look a shops for "One Hour"!   I was in heaven!  It was bigger than anything similar in South Africa.  Flew around, and managed to find a stand with French fabrics (lots of american and japanese fabrics which I can get anyway) and in halting French, bought some.  (This was our third trip to France, and because we were in the mountains with limited transport before, hadn't actually found fabrics.)  Lots of embroidery, threads, fabrics, wools, and similar - most of the "quilts" on display were in fact crocheted, but really beautiful.

Skiing in Valmorel was more for intermediates, not for beginners!  But the village is just like the pictures!  L'appartement was a good 600m from the centre.  Although the slopes really high up were great, one has to ski back down, and the last 100-200 m of pistes were steep!   Managed 5 days before falling and pulling calf muscle, not long after getting off the chair-lift.  Felt like an hour (but was probably only 20 mins) to get skis back on, and then it took me all afternoon to slip-slide back down from 1900m to 1400m, and then walk back to l'appartement.  Still ouch! but at least no broken bones.

Took some hexagons to tack, but did them all on the train trip going!  Ah well, never mind, was able to read four books!

And some photos of my helper, I had just pressed this fabric!

Lots of sewing

Orca Bay - not quite a finish, but I have stitched the centre blocks together, stitched the outer borders together, and stitched the inner border into one long piece.  Four evenings straight!  I found myself itching to leave work so I could go home and sew!  And I like being at work, most of the time.  Need to press all the sections before the finale.   But "have" to go out for dinner tomorrow, it's my weekly quilt group's annual "end-of-year" party... but Cape Town being so hectic during December because of summer and Christmas we have it in January!  Actually, I am really looking forward to a fun evening.

Very glad that the heat wave that we had for five days has abated,  the summer's howling south-easter is back, cooling things down a bit. 

Generation Q

Go and look and Megan's humour - just what is needed to lighten the seriousness of life.

Welcome to the New Year!

Happy New Year, ok, ok, so its two days late, but have been very busy.   Have managed to finish sewing all the pieces of Orca Bay (pressing, well that's still ahead) .... and yet there are others out there who have put the whole thing together!   (Busy, as in busman's holiday, finishing off accounts for my daughter's ill-fated coffee-shop, and my sister's gem of a Montessori school.)

As I snapped this picture, Eep (yes, that's the sound she makes, so name has stuck) jumped up.. so one more...

Please go and look at the linky-thing  at Quiltville, to catch up with the other Orcadians

After much mind-changing, have settled on purples and off-whites for the Just Takes 2 mystery (and if they go together nicely and reasonably quickly, will do some in red and green (go Wales!):

The first blocks have been released, but I need to wait a week or so before starting that!

Mystery Quilts

I guess the Mystery Quilt bug has bitten, as I have signed up to do another one at Just Takes 2!  I can't remember how I found it, presumably just jumping from blog to blog.  As one Orca Bay participant wrote, it's NOT knowing the final quilt that keeps the interest.

I do remember telling all my local quilting friends to look on-line at the amazing display of red and white quilts at the Armory last March, and really wished I could have seen it first-hand.  I'm so pleased with scrap look of my Orca Bay Mystery, that I think that will be how I will do this new mystery.  More detailed work, but over a year.  No, I'm not whining about Bonnie's weekly installments, especially as this is summer and Christmas time, meaning some time off work, and some time on sewing.... but I know I have a busy (work) year ahead.

Click on the red and white button on the left and consider joining in.

Have made 6 Ohio Star blocks, yay!  Only 52 to go!  The rest are in strips of three, so not too much to finish.  And I took to heart Bonnie's reluctance to pin when, if you are careful, you can butt up the seams and mostly they finish nicely.   And I am really pleased how flat these 6" blocks sit.  Please go and see what fun other quilters are having with this mystery at Bonnie's link-up.

Catching up

After busy three weeks of housing my eldest child and her partner, they left at midnight on Sunday for his family home in The Netherlands.  This is going to be the quietest Christmas ever.  Without my Dad, my Mum in Brisbane visiting my sister and her family, one daughter in Sydney and one in Heemstede, this is the first time we are apart.  Thank goodness for Skype and cell (mobile) phones, just knowing one can contact them, without the expensive long-distance call charges of many years ago.

Orca Bay - parts 1 to 4 complete

I'm now on leave now for two weeks and having spent the last three evenings tidying up sewing room and catching up with Orca Bay (at least to part 4), I'm looking forward to doing part 5 tomorrow, especially as I now have the right ruler!

Please go and look at the progress being made by other quilters on this exciting mystery quilt on Quiltville's link up thingy.