Sunday Stash #73

A big thank you to Kristy from Quiet Play for hosting a Sketchy Sunday Stash last week. Next week Sunday Stash will be hosted by Amanda of What the Bobbin?

The most popular Stash visited last week was Gina from Party of Eight: Our Story who profiled the latest Heather Ross' gorgeous Briar Rose collection.

Last Monday night I had dinner with my lovely friend Marieka from Bespoke Bites. She was up in Lismore for a 2 day conference and so we felt very special having a night off, sans children, to catch up. Marieka and I have been friends since 2008 when we both moved to Tumut. We live about 200Km (130 miles) away from each other now. We both know the lifestyle of being married to Civil Engineers and having to move towns often for new projects.

She had a little fabric offering for me  - extra wide Essex linen/cotton blend in Natural. This is beautiful to work with on Zakka projects.

And another linen fabric which actually feels like linen. I wonder if it will sew and crush like linen. 

Recently I bought a couple of Denyse Schmidt prints that were in the $4 per/m discount section at Spotlight .

This for backing. I love orange.

This for binding.

Now it's your turn to "flash your stash". (Borrowed that hilarious phrase from Kristy's post last week!)

You can share

• newly purchased fabric
• precious fabric that has been in your stash for a while
• op-shop (thrifted) fabric finds
• swap triumphs
• give-away wins
• books, magazines
• patterns
• rulers
• threads and other sewing notions.
• fabric stamps.

Please also feel free to link up the place of purchase and even a price. I am all for supporting small businesses on Etsy and Facebook as well as Local Quilt Stores - no reason why the big retailers should pocket all our cash. 

You can also share a post about some fabric that has been in your stash, what you have made with it or plan to make with it, if you wish.

Sunday Stash #31

This week's Sunday Stash is brought to you by two of the generous ladies in my Wombat Stew bee. Both were unexpected gifts of fabric in the mail. 

The first from Jane. A gorgeous ticket print in bright colours by American Jane. She had put a piece of this into one of the Travelling Stashes but alas it was snapped up before it got to me. She must have made a metal note back then because this little sweetie turned up in my mailbox this week. Thank you Jane - you gave me a thrill of glee.

The second from Marieka. Sometimes the Coffs Fresh Quilters  order fabric for each other to make the most of postage costs from the US. So Marieka was sweet enough to send me a few of the fabric that she and Jane ordered. Three of these prints are from designer Lizzy House.

Jane and Marieka call the green and yellow prints 'Pearl Bracelets' and they are such a great blender fabric for any projects. In fact these prints, plus the ticket print above would have been great in my Katie Jump Kites quilt back that I finished yesterday. However I wanted to stick to Denyse Schmidt prints only.

That pinky/red print is called 'Fiona's Fancy' - and it is written on the selvedge - so it may feature in a future project for me. And Marieka threw in that tea bag holder probably knowing that I am usually too lazy to take my tea bag out of my cup. Thoughtful of her.

Kate Spain 'Serenade' Winner

Last week I really wanted to reward the folks that linked up to Sunday Stash #30. Some of you are so faithful to it and I really appreciate it. I also thank you for spreading the word about linking up each week. We had 13 entries and it was nice to pop over and visit them all. 

So the winner of the charm pack is....

#4 Marieka! And it's Mr Random, and not I, that picked her. Honest.

Kaffe Fasset Give-Away Winner

Well it took a year and three months for Grandma Macs Quilts to reach 500 'likers' (apologies to those who made comment way back in June 2011) but I finally can give away the charm pack that has been in my fabric drawer waiting patiently. There were 45 comments but three of them were my replies so I discounted them.

The winner is....

#39 (that's 39 - 3 = 36) Norma Bradley from Norma's Craft. Congratulations.


So what's new in your stash this week? Feel free to link up below

Katie Jump Back

The back of my Katie Jump Kites quilt is finished!

I switched around a couple of the bricks and added 2 new rows with some other Denyse Schmidt prints. There not many yellow prints in her collections but there are plenty of greens, blues and oranges.

I am very happy with this quilt back. I have been following the FREE Craftsy 'Creative Quilt Backs' with Elizabeth Hartman (who is not only talented but good looking too!). 
I highly recommend this course to give you some very helpful hints about calculations, sewing practice and piecing a quilt back. Elizabeth makes very modern and unique quilt backs that tie in with her clever tops - so there is plenty of quilt candy for the eye.

There is a lot of maths involved with calculating a pieced quilt back and unfortunately I cut about 1.5" too short on the left hand side of my quilt back's light grey top section. Golden rule : round up not down. Be more generous than miserly. I may end up adding a strip but the quilt back is a good 4" bigger on EACH SIDE than my quilt top.

Now my problem will be to baste this quilt with only a week to go before the 2 week school holidays begin. It is going to be the largest quilt I have attempted on my Janome DC2101. Thankfully I am going to do some kind of straight line quilting.

So here is the top and the back.

Top - width 65" x height 74"
Back - width 74 x height 84"
(in the photo above, some of the light grey is folded over the clothes line as it is quite tall)

Belatedly linking up to...

and Link a Finish Friday #32 (LAFF) with Richard and Tanya Quilts

Sunday Stash #25

Scrap Savers


Are you a scrap saver? 
I mean, how small does a piece of fabric have to be before you relegate it to the Preschool donation bag? 

My current 3 boxes of scraps

If you are into Paper Piecing, then no scrap is too small to save. Since starting this method I have been saving the MOST ridiculous sized pieces. 

By the way this is my Preschool scrap basket!

Have you been following the Practically Paper Piecing Blog Hop these past 5 days? If you saw Kate's post you will see her miniscule PP blocks measuring 2" square! What! Really? Oh yes - she's making a sweet mini quilt for the mice of Brambly Hedge.


This week I was the beneficiary of two generous scrap savers. The first was Jane, from Where Jane Creates, who sent me some scraps (see my previous reference to her scrap bin) for my PPP 'Summersville Neighbourhood' project. She sent me these delicious snippets in yellow, red, green, blue, orange and black. Thank you Jane.

The second was an amazing windfall of scraps from Kelly of Kelby Sews. I won these by linking up with her 'My Precious' post in June. Kelly has great taste in fabric and I was not disappointed to get some choice pickings from her floor. And many of them were decent sized.

Ok I will need some help with naming most of these prints so feel free to make a comment if you know one or two or ten. I only really recognise the Denyse Schmidt, Aneela Hooey and Heather Ross prints.


Reds

Oranges

Pinks

Greens

Blues

Purples (not a lot of this colour in my stash)

Wouldn't it be nice if more of us packaged up our scraps and sent them off in the mail to make another person's day? Or even manage a scrap swap?


Tips - Now scraps that are very small can also come in handy for making:


fabric covered buttons

cute gift tags (I used to bother sewing these on but now I just use a bit of stick glue for these)

Don't forget to link up with your stash additions below.

Sunday Stash #17

The last half of my week has seen me lose my voice and take to my bed with sinus pain...so all my sewing projects are untouched. 

But this week's Sunday Stash is brought to you today by some recent clearance purchases from Kerry at Sew Dearly Loved on Etsy. 

These are from a Denyse Schmidt range called 'Greenfield Hill' that I have NOT seen in Australia. They are from the cranberry and blueberry colourways.

L-R Library Stripe, Mill Plain and Ladies League in cranberry - mirrored in blueberry

I also bought this cute little Japanese fabric called 'All through the Town' by Fumika Oishi.

So what's new in your stash this week?

Feel free to add your blog link below and pay a little visit to the ones in the collection. Thank you to those who are starting to link up regularly. It's nice to have your support.

Fresh Air

We've had some glorious dry autumn days this week. Crisp morning starts but lots of sun and a little breeze during the day - perfect for drying the washing on the clothesline. Yesterday I had a 2 hour job of sorting out 8 baskets of dry washing, folding and then putting away. I was successful in the latter stage by only 50%. I still have my basket, the towels, the sheets and the kitchen stuff to put away. 


And then there is the other aspect of domestic chore - shopping! I had to head into town this morning to purchase some long school pants, jumpers and groceries. Another hour of packing away groceries and it was lunchtime. Settle down for a tasty fresh ham, tomato and lettuce roll and reward myself with a 'James Taylor (whenever I see his smiling face...I have to smile myself) Live in Concert' dvd.


However washing and grocery shopping weather is not conducive to sewing. 


Fussy Fairytales Update

I have nearly finished hand quilting Fussy Fairytales. I am still concerned that the larger panels have too much unbasted fabric to contend with.  As quilt designer Kate Conklin hand quilted her original version, I wanted her opinion on what to do. So I sent her a message, to which she relied that some of the panels might be too big.

The largest section is 6"x7" and so I may have to add some more stitch-work to tie the quilt sandwich together. I can't decide whether to baste these sections with some kind of invisible thread, a short little basting knot or to highlight a feature within the panel. So more hand-quilting is in store for me. I don't really mind putting in the effort to get a more satisfactory finish. Plus starting next week, there is a new linky party each Friday for hand-stitchwork.


You can find all the details at...
                                                        
Katie Jump Kites

That is what I have named this quilt, a combination of the fabric line 'Katie Jump Rope' by Denyse Schmidt and the pattern 'Kaleidoscopic Kites' by Faith @ Fresh Lemons Quilts. I finished the cutting on Monday and I got just an hour and a half of sewing time today to start the patchwork.

The blocks are all made up the same way however, different in the fabric choice so I had to keep referring to the grid reference. They came together quite quickly and to have a new project to sew is a breath of fresh air. 

This week's stats:
Completed projects - ZSSA - Rain Cloud Mug Rug

  

Currently in progress   - 'HR Far Far Away 2&3 Fussy Fairytales'  hand quilting the windows and peekaboo                                           squares.

                                               - Katie Jump Kites - on cutting table
                                               

On Hold projects   - Mystery Quilt - top pieced

How are your WiPs going? 


I am linking up with....

Rain Cloud Mug Rug

Zakka Style Sew-Along - Week 7


I was actually going to skip this Zakka Style project because I have 2 mug rugs already and the design did not really interest me. However after spending hours cutting up fabrics, I needed to do some sewing.


This project was made with all scrap fabrics, mostly leftover from what Denyse Schmidt and Kona fabrics I had been cutting earlier that day.


It is a simple pattern and design and really you can pour as much creativity into this project as your imagination and time allows. Perhaps the original's simplicity of design and material best highlights the Zakka style.


Some Tips 


Hold your book up to a window to trace the applique design to your 'cloud' fabric. 

You don't need to do hand stitched 'needle turn' applique to attach the rain cloud. A close stitch width and length zig zag will do the job just as nicely. 

It may be a good idea to use fusible interfacing to keep it in place.

I used a blanket stitch for mine.

If you are going to machine quilt the 'wind' lines, I suggest you clearly mark them on your work with a water soluble marker. I drew mine by hand.

 If you have a darning foot, attach this and drop the feed-dogs.

Then warm up your free-motion skills by doing a few practice swirls. I made the mistake of doing this cold and so it looks very tentative.

 This 5" charm was a scrap sent with an Etsy order so I used some leftover scraps of Kona Ash from cutting the Katie Jump Kites solid that morning. This bumped it out to about 6" square. 

I have added quite a few colours to my stash since hand quilting the Fussy Fairytales quilt and thought that I might put them to some use. I tossed up using only reds and pinks but decided upon the 7 colours of the rainbow instead.

My front was slightly larger than the back but I spray basted them together and cut the front down to match.


Binding the Mug Rugs

Now here's where the pattern becomes too vague for non-quilters. It tells you to bind the quilt with a 1/4" seam allowance and using the single fold binding directions on page 25. However, these directions are for a straight piece and DO NOT explain what to do at each corner. Here's where quilters would do what's known as a Mitred corner. There is a tutorial here to help those who do not. 

Sew the binding down on 3 sides and leave the ends unsewn with a 3" gap.

Fold one of the strips back on itself and lay the opposing strip over the top and stitch over the top with a back stitch.

Trim the excess 'tails' of binding off and then fold the binding over to the back and pin.

Turn the binding up under itself at the back and pin down with pins. I use bobby pins.

Flip the mug rug back to the front and then stitch in the ditch between the fabric and the binding being sure to catch the binding at the back. A normal foot is fine for single-fold binding rather than the usual 'walking foot' used in double-fold binding. You may want to read up on binding techniques at Red Pepper Quilts, Crazy Mom Quilts or Cass the Coolest.

Set the kettle boiling and pour yourself a cup of tea, throw in a treat and enjoy your mug rug.

How are you going on the Zakka Style Sew-Along? Such lovely ladies on the Flickr page and I have one Quilt Club Australia friend join this week. Nice!


Linking up with...