Stellar Fun

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Just before Christmas I signed up for the Simply Solids Sew Solids Crew Stash Club and thus became a Sew Solids Crew member. There are different options on how much fabric you want to add to your stash and I went for six fat quarters. Duly, six lovely purple fat quarters arrived on my doorstep in December, which I cut into straightaway to use as binding for my Mindless Flannel quilt.

Purple Stack

This month six yummy green fat quarters arrived. My favourite colour is green but, to be honest, I wouldn’t have ordered most of the greens that arrived. Now that I have them, however, I’m in love with them all. The colours are from top to bottom: Peridot, Holly, Candy Green, Avocado, Olive and Ice Frappe.

Green Stack

Justine from Simply Solids is a very clever (and lovely) girl and initiated a fun quilt-along. Stellar is a free downloadable pattern by (the equally lovely) Laura Jane Taylor from Needles, Pins and Baking Tins and was especially designed for the Sew Solids Crew Stash Club (quite a mouth full, I have to say, maybe I should call it the SSCSC?). The pattern consists of wonky stars, something I’ve always wanted to try.

Green Wonky Stars

Wonky sewing is not in my nature and I seem to have to work really hard on breathing and relaxing. The first star was the most difficult and I realised once I’d finished it that I was going to cut off three of the points when I sewed the sashing on. I was awake half the night wondering if I should start again but in the end decided not to. Wonky stars with missing points? Hurrah, for giving up control!

I’ve now gone back to the purples for December and they’re all cut and ready to be sewn when I can sneak in a little sewing. First, however, I have to clean the fish tank.

Categories: Fabrics, Quilting, Sew Solids Crew Stash Club, Sew Solids Quilt-Along3 Comments

Treasure Thursday

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Every Thursday I pick one of my personal treasures, i.e. things that are very close to my heart, and tell you a little bit about them.

This week I would like to show you a another secondhand shop find. When I was a student, I had a small room in Bern which I tried to furnish on a very tight budget with things from home and cheap finds at the secondhand shop. I was very lucky as one of the nicer shops was around the corner from where I lived. One day I found this little beauty in a corner:

Enamel Plate

I fell in love with the colours but felt that it was too expensive at £4. After all I didn’t need it and for just a couple more pounds I could get a bedside table which I was in need of. I’m sure you can guess what happened, right? Yes, I left the bedside table and went home with my little enamel plate. It’s in constant use and has been since the day I bought it. It’s the perfect size at about 4.5″ for a couple of biscuits or a small slice of cake and holds my tea bag whenever I make a cup of herbal tea.

It’s signed on the back but I can’t read the signature.

Enamel Plate, Signature

I just love the colours and wish I could make a quilt that looked like that.

Enamel Plate, Detail

By the way, I went back for the bedside table the following month and bought it. It was a yucky dark brown colour and I quickly turned it into a lovely orange little number. It has since changed colour a few times and has been painted blue, green, white and pink. Little Miss Bossy-Boots and I painted it pink last summer and it now resides in her room. It was well worth the £6 I paid for it.

Categories: Treasure Thursday1 Comment

Plodding On

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Well, I’ve been plodding on with my EPP for the Doll Quilt Swap and I love it more and more. I’ve appliquéd the flower onto the linen background and I think it really makes the colours pop. I had thought about adding a border but have decided not to as I really love the simplicity of it now. It’s going to be so hard to send it off at the end of the month.

EPP Flower

The colours are a lot brighter than those I usually have in my house but, oh my word, I love them.

 

PS I’ve already started another one…

Edited to add: The pattern can be found here.

Categories: Doll Quilt Swap 133 Comments

Treasure Thursday

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This week’s treasure is a cat.

Tania's Cat

My aunt Tania, who gave me my sewing machine, was a cat lover. She had real cats which she spoilt rotten and she had a cat collection. It was easy to get her birthday or Christmas gifts, all you had to do is get an unusual little cat. When she died I asked if I could pick out one cat from her collection to keep as a memento and the cat above was the one that spoke to me the most.

Tania's Cat

Just look at that little face. Who could resist? I have no idea where it’s from of who gave it to her which is a shame but with more than 1000 cats in all sorts of materials it would have been impossible to remember every one of them.

This little cat is about three inches high and lives on our bookshelf behind glass doors and I make sure that Little Miss Bossy-Boots doesn’t play with it. Today, however, I took it outside to take pictures and she (the cat, not the Miss) thoroughly enjoyed herself, even trying to hide behind some frozen moss.

Tania's Cat

You can see she’s not really used to playing hide and seek; I found her within seconds.

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Bright Piecing

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I have been busy cutting out shapes and choosing fabrics for the Doll Quilt Swap 13 which I’m part of. After seeing all the talent on flickr I went back to the drawing board. The sketches I had made didn’t really sing to me so I tried again and again to come up with something original that would make an impact. I failed. In the end I went on the internet and found this design:

EPP Flower for DQS13

It really spoke to me and after printing it out I went to the post office to get it enlarged to A3. They couldn’t do it quite as large as I wanted it so I went home and drew the design on some paper. This might be an easy job for most people but not for me. I drew, discarded and used many a swear word before I finally finished a drawing in the right size. I’m incredibly proud of this achievement and have decided that I’m going to make at least one other mini for myself, probably in slightly more subdued colours.

EPP Progress

Anyway, here’s how far I’ve come. I’ve used some fabrics that I bought on Instagram before Christmas and some Kona solids, Lakehouse Dry Goods black labels and linen from Simply Solids. My partner likes bright colours, text prints and linen and I’ve tried to accommodate all of those. The flower / star is going to be appliquéd onto a linen background. What do you think?

PS I’m having some real problems with my photos at the moment. They look in focus with nice bright colours in iPhoto but as soon as I upload them to the blog they become fuzzy and bland. Master won’t be home till the weekend but I hope he will be able to help me then. I do apologise for the bad quality of my pictures.

Edited to add: Although I searched for the origin of this picture at the time I couldn’t find who had designed it and where I could find the templates (hence the drawing and swearing). I have since found and purchased the pattern on Craftsy. If you would like to make this beautiful design you can buy it here.

Categories: Doll Quilt Swap 13, English Paper Piecing2 Comments

Treasure Thursday

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Today I would like to share another sewing treasure with you: My beautiful Bernina KL117.

Bernina KL117This model was built between 1938 and 1941. She’s built into a sewing table which is quite plain except for the intarsia measuring tape.

Intarsia Measuring TapeThe table isn’t in very good condition and the machine has had a few knocks but I don’t mind. After all she’s over 70 years old and being an industrial machine she’s been used a lot.  Sadly she doesn’t work but I’m hoping that I will be able to get her repaired one day.

I love the label.

Bernina KL 117

The reason she is such a treasure to me is because I bought her when I was at a real low point of my life. I was having chemo therapy which meant that I was incredibly tired all the time. Most days I didn’t go very far; a quick little walk with Aron was all I could muster. One day, however, my friend Anita called and asked if I wanted to go to the secondhand shop. Of course, I did. Everything was better than sitting around reading books I couldn’t remember a week later (A nice little side effect of the chemo. Makes buying books really cheap as you only need two which you can rotate). Anyway, I went and found the Bernina hidden away in a corner. Looking at her made me happy, getting her home made me even happier and now every time I look at her I can still feel the happiness bubbling up in me. She’s usually hidden away as her sewing table is the perfect height for sewing at and that’s where my other Bernina sits.

Sometimes, though, I get her out and just look at her…  and enjoy the happiness that fills my insides.

Categories: Treasure Thursday7 Comments

Lets Finish This

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I have numerous WIPs (works in progress) I would like to finish before I start on something new. So what better way to get me to actually deal with them than the Finish-A-Long organised by Leanne from “She Can Quilt“? Most of them were on my list of UFOs and WIPs last year and although I finished a couple the others are still there in bits and pieces.

So what am I going to put in this first Quarter’s Finish-A-Long?

she can quilt

 

1. My Flying Geese Cushion. This was started at the Fat Quarterly Retreat 2012. I finished one quarter of it but the rest is still in pieces. I enjoyed the paper piecing although I at times felt like my head was going to explode from all the concentrating. I love the colours, the geese are all from Kate Spain’s line Good Fortune, the green is a solid I got from a friend.

Double Flying Geese

2. Little Miss Bossy-Boots’ Log Cabin Quilt. She loves the flannel quilt I gave her for Christmas and it’s in use every day but she really wants a pink one and the log cabins have quite a bit of pink in them. They are quite fun to make although I do feel at times that they were a bit too busy. I might combine them with some big solid squares to calm the whole quilt down.

Pink Log Cabins

3. The Heart Hexagon Cushion. This was started as a fundraiser for our local cancer treatment centre and I feel really bad that I haven’t finished it. They don’t know I’m making it so it’s not like I have any pressure from them but I still would like to get it done so that I can start selling raffle tickets. Due to my guilty conscience I think I might make something else in addition but that won’t be on this list as I haven’t started it yet!

Heart Hexagon

You might have noticed that I started quilting around the heart. Sadly, I didn’t like it and unpicked it again. I’m still wondering how to quilt it which is a real shame as I know that I could finish this cushion very quickly if only I got a move on.

4. A Sewing Kit for my sister. I can’t show you any pictures as she reads this blog and I want it to be a surprise. It’s been sitting on my sewing table for a while now. I’ve cut out the pieces but just need some uninterrupted sewing time to finish it. Now that school has started again I’m hoping to get exactly that.

5. Turn this trial block into something. Another cushion? How many cushions do I need? Any suggestions? Or even any takers?

Spin me round

There we go. That’s quite a lot to get on with and I’m not sure if I can do it but I’ll try my hardest to get all of the above projects finished before the end of Q1.

Categories: Finish-A-Long5 Comments

Busy Bee

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I’m really pleased as I’ve finished two more Bee blocks. This time the ones for January’s queen, Nicole aka Follow the White Bunny. If you haven’t checked out her blog yet, please do. I’ll wait for you here while you have a little look at all her fabulous embroideries.

Back already? Ok. Nicole asked for the wonderful x & + block for which there’s a tutorial here. I love this block, especially in a scrappy style, and it was as much fun to make as I imagined. The block in the tutorial is 8″ unfinished but Nicole asked us to make the blocks slightly bigger, namely 11,75″ unfinished. I’m just glad she did all the maths as we all know what happens when I do it….

x & + blocks

I am totally in love with the cat fabric and I meant to have it in the plus of the pink block but had a slight brain fart (excuse my language please) while cutting and ended up with a completely different looking block. Hopefully Nicole will like it anyway.

When I was trimming the triangles for the crosses I just couldn’t get myself to throw away the little triangles but instead turned them into 2″ HSTs (that is half square triangles). These HSTs were then turned into pinwheels and a little mug rug.

Pinwheel mug rugThe binding is Kona pepper, my favourite black (I don’t really like black much but I love Kona pepper).

 

 

Categories: Quilting, Sew Euro-Bee-An2 Comments

Treasure Thursday

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Hello, I thought I’d try something new this year and will post a picture of one or two of my “treasures” every Thursday. I suppose it’s one way of telling you a little bit more about me.

This week I’m starting with a sewing related treasure: my thimbles.

Thimbles

The one on the right was given to me by a very dear friend and used to belong to her mother. The one on the left was bought at an antiques fair in Switzerland by Master. Neither thimble is valuable but they are both precious to me.

For years I couldn’t find a thimble that was comfortable. When I was 18 I went to England as an au pair. One of the first questions I was asked by Matty, the mum, was whether I could sew and, if yes, could I please teach her. So I did and she was soon better at making button holes than I was. One of my favourite things in her sewing basket was a thimble which had belonged to her mother. It fit my finger perfectly and I used it a lot. After a fabulous year I went home but came back a few times on holiday where once more I had the pleasure of sewing with the thimble. I must have gone on and on about its perfect fit because Matty very kindly gave it to me.

The other thimble I got because I was so worried that I might lose the one I already had. Again, I probably went on and on about how devastated I would be if I lost my wonderful thimble with the gold rim. Master listened and when we saw a thimble that fit my finger at an antiques fair he bought it for me.

Now, one is always in the drawer in my sewing table, the other one in my EPP box even though I don’t use it much for EPPing. I find that my middle finger is quite calloused and it isn’t necessary to use a thimble for my Spring Carnival.

I have looked at other, lighter thimbles but just can’t get myself to buy them as I love the memories associated with the two I have. How many thimbles does a girl need? Two in my books.

Categories: Treasure Thursday3 Comments

Happy New Year!

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Happy New Year! May 2013 be a good year for you. To be honest, I’m rather glad 2012 is over as it hasn’t been a great year for me, not catastrophic but just not great.

Not everything has been ‘blah’, though, there have been some highlights too. Our holiday in Ireland in April, the Fat Quarterly Retreat in June, our holiday in Denmark and, of course, my trips home to Switzerland. I also have to add to this list my first bee, Sew-Euro-Bee-An, and my first quilt, Mindless Flannel, which has now been washed and dried and is lovely and soft to snuggle with.

This year I’m looking forward to the Fat Quarterly Retreat, making more quilts and moving back home to Switzerland. I would like to finish as many of my WIPs as possible and I’m already on a roll as I finished my November Bee blocks yesterday (the fabric was late arriving and Linda said not to worry about finishing before Christmas).

Linda's Bee Blocks

I loved playing with all the Denyse Schmidt scraps Linda sent us. She asked us for simple patchwork blocks with a little extra. In one block I made a snowball and the other a simple wonky cross. Hopefully she’ll like them.

Today I finished my shark bath mat. It’s not very big but it’s alright for me and Little Miss Bossy-Boots as our feet aren’t very big. However, I’m not sure how Master is going to cope.

Shark Bath Mat

Our other bath mats are white so it’s nice to have a little bit of colour in this completely white bathroom. I think I can see a couple more bath mats in my future.

As for New Year’s resolutions, I only have one: I’m only going to buy fabric I need to finish projects as I’m trying to save up to buy an overlocker. This year I would like to sew some clothes for the Little Miss and myself. I know I can do that with my sewing machine but I would really like to make it an easy process with nice looking insides.

I’m off to look for my Spring Carnival templates. Oh yes, I tidied my sewing room and now I can’t find half of my things. Wish me luck.

Categories: Musings1 Comment