Craft actually

V&A quilt finished

I finished hand sewing the binding on this quilt while watching the final of the rugby tri nations played in my hometown of Brisbane. And Australia get narrowly beaten unfortunately.

 

The front is mostly Amy Butler fabrics and I bought some pink and yellow fabric of hers for the back too. I used the same double triangle quilting suggested by Kaffe in his pattern and it was quite easy.

Smithy's Mum sent us over a beautiful NZ sheepskin for the bebe and a very cute sheep softie was wrapped up with it. Thanks Grandma Lynn!

V&A quilt

I started making this quilt on the weekend for a commission for a friend who specified "anything except green". I'm sure you can understand how hard it was not to slip a bit more in there given my current bent but I think I was pretty restrained.

Its based on one of the patterns in Kaffe Fasset's V&A quilts book and the strips are 6" wide.

I popped into Liberty in the afternoon for a little more blue (the Amy Butler second from the right) and the backing - I'll show you that later. I'm planning to bind it in the Denyse Schmidt blue flowers (third from the left). Its for a girl due in about 5 weeks and I love this combo of pretty and girly with fresh and fun.

Smithy turned his hand to making Yorkshire puds to go with Sunday roast beef. Pretty impressive huh? He used this Mike Robinson recipe from the BBC website if you're interested.

Minnow supervised operations.

It was a lovely relaxing rainy Sunday afternoon.

PS I'm a bit paranoid that only one person (thanks P!) has commented on the week 3 giveaway. Is it because noone listens to podcasts? I thought I was the last person to get into them. It makes me realise how much I rely on feedback on the blog to make me feel like I'm not talking to myself like a crazy cat lady. Although I probably am heading that way but hopefully quite slowly.

Audition

I've started another Green & Blue quilt. I'm "auditioning" the fabrics here. I think they've got the part. Taking a photo and viewing the overall effect on screen is definitely easier than trying to see the whole in "real life". This one is a much simpler version that the BB quilt. I'm detail-ed out this week and feel like some instant results.

 

By the way if anyone knows of anywhere that still has the blue flowers Denise Schmidt Flea Market Fancy fabric please let me know....I'm all out and missing it! Maybe I need to move on...I've seen some likely new candidates to fill that little niche so we'll see when the one or two *ahem* yards of fabric I've ordered arrive.

Oh yeah and I found this on Etsy today - fabulous! I do love the "pounce" button to see what people are up to.

BB Quilt

I finished this project just before our visit to see brand new Bebe Baylay-Ray yesterday. This is definitely one of my favourite quilts I've made, although I have a soft spot of all of them of course.

This project has got me back into the sewing and quilting and I'm finding myself writing lists of all the quilts and projects I'd like to make. I'm quite tempted to do another one just like this but will probably do something different in between for a bit of variety!

  

 

Thanks to y'all for your input into this, I almost feel like its been a collaborative effort with the help with choosing colours and all the lovely comments I've had here and on flickr *hugs*.

better

About four times as many pins as I had in before is working much better. Laziness in sewing really does not pay. I've done about half the quilting now. This project is going really slowly. But its nice to work on. And I don't think BB has arrived yet so have a little time but as "Noodle" is now a week and a half late I better get moving.

rainy long weekend

Its been a lovely weekend despite the rubbish weather for most of it. We went up to Birko (Birkhamsted) on Saturday to visit Chris and Beth before the bebe is born. We pottered around drinking lots of tea, visited the allotment to see the spring seedlings (forgot camera damn as the light was gorgeous) and had a delicious bbq lamb with canellini bean mash in the garden by the canal.

Today K & C came over with Herbie and we met Eliza who is now four months old and a total cutie. We had one of my favourite meals of antipasto to graze. Its been a somewhat baby oriented weekend and I've been taking notes.

This afternoon I overcame my post-lunch laziness and finished the quilt top for BB and started the quilting. I'm loving the finished top but my quilting is a mess! I think I probably needed about double the pins (shortcuts never pay!) so will revisit later, most likely with a fair bit of unpicking involved. Ugh.

Back to knitting the last minute shrug now! Progress is pretty good, am on to the second sleeve.

Afternoon sewing

Inspired by all my lovely commenters and some almost spring-like sunshine I sat down to start work on the BB (Beth baby) quilt yesterday. Yes that is an outdoor bbq table currently doubling as a dining room table after our builders kindly left our dining table outside in the rain for about a month. Being an expensive IKEA number it basically disintegrated. Anyhoo.

Its much nicer thinking about fabric than builders so lets go to that happy place.

This is the first block I made up as a test and being quite happy with the result went on to make several more. I think I'll just keep going until I run out of the white fabric which will probably end up at a fairly small playmat/pram/purely decorative size.

Smithy meanwhile enjoyed the results of his hard labour in the garden the past few weekends. Look at that lovely lawn...a bit different from the construction zone of a few weeks ago. Yes that is the FT he is reading. Each to his own I guess!

Soon after this photo was taken a little bird (a robin perhaps? he had a red tummy) came and had a very energetic bath in the bird bath.

Now we just need the weather to warm up so BBQ season can get into full swing.

quilt brainstorming

White fabric and batting arrived today which wasn't a very exciting package from my team's point of view. So I have some materials and even have inspiration for a design. I'm thinking log cabin but with a few rounds of white around the edge so the over all effect will be a little like this one.

For unisex colour options I'm leaning towards green with a bit of blue.

(Denyse Schmidt fabrics - picture from Cia's Pallette)

I also like the bolder brighter organges and browns - perhaps inspired by Grandma and Pop's tablecloth?  But I don't have many of these in the stash...some shopping required??

(Denyse Schmidt fabrics - picture from Cia's Pallette)

Or maybe a zesty citrus combination of orange and lime green? Hmmm I will have to do some rummaging in the cupboards tonight.

bright white quilt inspiration

For my next sewing project I'm planning a bebe quilt for a friend expecting in spring. I'm thinking about bright colours (unisex) with lots of white space like these ones. I think its going to be a fun easter project to work on.

1. eleanor's quilt, finished and delivered, 2. bento box quilt, 3. Hop Skip & A Jump Baby Quilt, 4. quilt top for my boy, 5. orange flying geese quilt, 6. Oscar's baby clothes quilt, 7. doll quilt, 8. Denyse Schmidt Hop, Skip & a Jump Quilt, 9. cecelia's quilt, 10. Doll Quilt Options, 11. quilt update 3, 12. belle quilt - quilt top

And in kitten news, I called the breeder of the Burmese I looked at on the weekend and she said the ones I wanted were taken already. Wow. You have to be quick with these cuties eh?!

But then tonight I had a call from the Celia Hammond trust to arrange a home visit. I think things will work out the way they are meant to.

Japanese Pillow

What do you get when you cross a rainy weekend and a lot of rugby on TV? A Japanese pillow!

Don't worry there is absolutely no pun in there and it doens't make all that much sense. But we have new sofa adornment! I went for a wander down Lordship Lane on the weekend and reached the fabric shop. The owner was glued to the mini TV, vocally cheering on Liverpool. I capitalised on his moment of distraction and he sold me a couple of meters of the cream background fabric cheap(ish). So there may soon be a series of these. I was looking at some floral Cath Kidston scraps I have with a bit of a glint in my eye - maybe next weekend.

In the meantime the dreaded cardy is slowly growing some sleeves and I've even cut some "noodles" aka strips of fabric for Flibbertygibbet's swap. Different fabrics for my two swappers and both rather nice (I think).