Tag: Aurifil

Modern Churn Dash Ta dah!

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This quilt has been in use for a while already, half quilted and unbound. I put it on the bed, just to see how it would look after I stitched in the ditch. There were still safety pins in it but that didn’t disturb Charlie in the least and he had his nap on it.

It stayed on the following day too and the day after that. Then I took it off and started quilting the pebbles. I can’t really call them circles as most of them are anything but round. Because they’re quite big I kept hitting my hand on the machine resulting in very wonky pebbles. Now, if this quilt had been for anyone else I would have ripped out all the stitches and done some straight line quilting but as it was always meant for me (it was made with the first fat quarter bundle I bought: Echo by Lotta Jansdotter) I thought it would be fun to continue and see if the quilting would improve. It did, a little.

Charlie asleep

I started hand quilting the churn dashes but then didn’t really like the look and instead quilted them half an inch from the edge with my walking foot. As I was showing my mum the quilt I realised that I’d forgotten to sew around one of the insides. I may go back and do it one day but maybe not. It’s quite fun to have a quilt that isn’t perfect. Apart from the fabric and thread, that is.

Charlie

Charlie was on my case while I was quilting and when I was sitting in the evening hand sewing the binding to the back, which by the way is Pearl Bracelets. Wherever the quilt was, Charlie was. It now resides on my bed again and Charlie is happily sleeping on it!

Modern Churn Dash

The quilt finished at 53″ x 68″ after washing and is perfect for snuggling and sleeping under. I pieced it with Aurifil  50wt (2600) and quilted it with a gorgeous variegated Aurifil 40wt (4669) in various shades of cream and blue.

This is another finish on my Finish-A-Long list, number four to be exact. I feel the need to take another picture of this quilt, maybe down by the lake, as this one was taken in the evening in lousy light.

Categories: Quilting13 Comments

Plus, Plus, Equal

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My nephew turned eighteen at the beginning of February and a few days earlier I decided that I was going to make him a quilt. A bit last minute, I know. It had to be a quick make and I thought a wonky plus quilt would be fun.

My stash has a lot of girly fabric in it so finding proper ‘man fabrics’ was a little difficult. I managed, however, to find some Architextures by Carolyn Friedlander and Curious Nature by Parson Gray. Some Kona solids in blues, greens, greys and off white, Sketch in two different greys and two fat quarters from my LQS meant that I had enough for a biggish quilt.

Plus, plus, equal quiltI really enjoyed making the plusses, eighteen in total, and the one equal sign. At first I was going to make all wonky plusses but after making nine or ten and laying them out, they were too busy for my liking. I decided to make eighteen plusses and leave the rest of the squares plain. In the end I added the equal sign; just because I can.

Equal Sign

The quilting is straight lines 0.5″ on either side of the seam and then another two lines 1″ apart throughout the middle of the squares. I wanted to keep the quilt modern and, by not quilting too many lines, keep it nice and soft. The quilt was quilted with Aurifil 50wt in 5004, a dark grey, on the top and 2600 in the bobbin.

Plus, plus, equal

The backing is the oh so popular Britten numbers by Ikea. I thought it would fit this quilt perfectly. The binding is Pearl Bracelets by Lizzie House in Hi Ho Silver which I bought at Simply Solids.

Plus, Plus, EqualI love this quilt and I really hope that Leon will too. He’s a great lad who asked me to teach him to sew before I moved to Switzerland. We managed to make a pin cushion and cushion cover which he literally finished minutes before the removal company arrived to collect all my boxes.

Plus, Plus, Equal

The quilt is a little smaller than I would have liked (Leon is tall) but I ran out of fabrics. In the end it finished at 57″ x 66″.

Categories: Quilting1 Comment

Fly, Butterfly, Fly!

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This little butterfly was designed with one specific task in mind: to use up even my smallest scraps of Liberty Tana lawn.

ButterflyThe butterfly finishes at about 9″ x 12″ when printed out at 100%. For my purpose, however, I printed it out at 75% as I wanted to make sure I could use up even the tiniest of those blue and green scraps. The antennae are free motion quilted in a variegated Aurifil 40wt (no 4669) which I bought to quilt my Churn Dash quilt. The butterfly itself was pieced with Aurifil 50wt (no 2000) which is a perfect match to many of the Liberty lawns. I appliquéd it onto a red cotton/linen fabric that I’ve had in my stash for a few years. I auditioned different colours for the background but found it nicest on the red. Funnily enough, when I popped it onto some white, the butterfly looked really washed out.

All of the Liberty lawns came from Ali’s shop Very Berry Fabrics on Folksy and I already have plans to buy more (don’t tell my bank account, I can already hear it groan) as Ali sent me some scraps with my last order and I’ve completely fallen in love with one of them. Sadly she doesn’t seem to have any in her shop at the moment but you can be sure that I will be stalking her in the next few weeks.

This is my third finish for Q1 of the FAL and I’m very happy about that. I really would like to make one of these butterflies in solids as I think it would look stunning in a rainbow of colours too but I’m going to be good and continue with my list before starting something new.

So far, I’ve made my EPP patterns available for free and I want to do this with my last two, Butterfly and Liberty Bloom, too. They just need a little more work before I can upload them to the blog. Hopefully, they should be done by the end of this week. Afterwards, however, I’m thinking of opening a shop on Craftsy or Etsy and asking for a small contribution for my patterns. What do you think? Would you pay a couple of pounds for my EPP patterns?

 

Categories: English Paper Piecing4 Comments

A Triceratops with Cellulite

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When Juliet from a Tartankiwi asked for testers for some of her new foundation paper piecing patterns I jumped at the chance. I love the robin I did before Christmas even though he’s still not been turned into something useful. This time I got to try sewing a triceratops, one of my favourite dinosaurs.

Triceratops Head

Being a mostly female household (Charlie the cat doesn’t really count, does he?) I pulled out some fabric in pinks and oranges but changed my mind at the last minute and went for purple Liberty Tana lawn instead. Purple is Little Miss Bossy-Boots favourite colour at the moment and I thought it would be fun with a purple triceratops.

Half a Triceratops

This pattern contains a gazillion minute little pieces and the lawn fabric really helped with reducing the bulk. Once I’d finished the head I admit that I did breathe a sigh of relief. I don’t know about you but I stop breathing when I concentrate really hard. The detail is fabulous, though, and I was happy to continue with the legs, giving my triceratops red toe nails (don’t look too closely, though, as I managed to forget one).

Triceratops

Wondering about the cellulite? Wonder no more. I was a bit tired at the end and didn’t line up the bottom quite as well as I could have. As this one is for us I didn’t worry too much and left it the way it was. I’m sure she isn’t too bothered about her lumpy bottom.

Triceratops Cushion

I didn’t want this lovely dinosaur to end up as a WIP (especially as it is on my FAL list) and started quilting it straightaway. The bulk of all the seams in the head made it too difficult to quilt so I just did two clouds in the sky and a few plants in the grass. Quilting and piecing was, as always, done with Aurifil 50wt. A bit of dotty fabric and, hey presto, we have another cushion for the sofa.

This pattern hasn’t been released yet but I’ll let you now as soon as it’s in Juliet’s shop.

Edited to add: Get the pattern here.

Categories: Home Projects, Quilting3 Comments

Liberty Bloom

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I’ve finished my Doll Quilt Swap 14 mini quilt and I’m really very happy with it.

The only thing I’m a little disappointed with is that I couldn’t do more quilting on it. Once I’d finished stitching in the ditch around the ‘bloom’ and the linen pieces my back gave out to me. I realised that I wouldn’t be able to sit at the machine much longer and therefore simply echo quilted around the bloom a few times. I quite like the simplicity of it, it really lets the fabrics do the talking.

Liberty Bloom

The mini’s progress was stalled when I ran out of Liberty scraps that were big enough to finish the last few pieces. I ordered a mini bundle from Ali’s shop Very Berry Fabrics on Folksy and it arrived promptly a couple of days later. Thank you so much, Ali, for such quick service!

The Liberty Bloom is pieced and quilted with Aurifil 50wt, my favourite thread of all times.  It finishes at 19″ x 19″ and has a scrappy Liberty binding which I am very partial to. I just hope my partner loves Liberty Bloom as much as I do.

Scrappy Liberty Binding

The pattern for this mini will be added to my tutorials once my partner has received it as I’ve named it after her. I don’t think she reads my blog but it’s better to be safe than sorry and I don’t want to spoil the surprise for her. One of the fun things about theses swaps is that you don’t know what you’re going to get until you hold the package in your hands.

This was another projects on my FAL list and I’m so happy to be able to cross it off.

Categories: Doll Quilt Swap 14, English Paper Piecing, Quilting5 Comments

Doll Quilt Swap 14

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I enjoy a good swap and one of my favourites so far was the Doll Quilt Swap Round 13. The mini quilt I got was absolutely stunning and was one of the first things I hung up in my sewing room. When I saw that registration for round 14 opened I jumped at the chance to get another little beauty as those ladies are a talented bunch.

The mini quilt I did was an English Paper Piecing project that I found on the internet. As I couldn’t find the pattern I copied the design and drew the templates myself. I have since found and purchased it on Craftsy as I truly didn’t want to rip off the talented designer, Endulzar.

Anyway, I decided to go for another EPP project as I knew I was going to spend Christmas in Ireland and it would be great to sew a bit between eating turkey and Christmas pudding.   I designed my own pattern on TouchDraw for iPad and will be adding the templates to this blog once I’ve finished the mini and am sure that everything fits and looks the way I want it.

EPP for DQS 14

This year I went for the classic combination of linen and Liberty Tana lawn. As I only had scraps, I went for a scrappy but ordered approach and got to the last two pieces before I realised that I didn’t have enough scraps to finish it.I have now ordered more from Ali‘s gorgeous shop on Folksy where all my other scraps have come from too. I can’t wait to get them and finish this mini.

DQS 14 Mini

 

Pieced, as always, with my favourite thread: Aurifil 50wt (colour no 2000).

Categories: Doll Quilt Swap 14, Quilting, Uncategorized2 Comments

Can’t Get You Out Of My Head

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Quite a while ago I ordered a jelly roll of Kona brights by Robert Kaufman; not because I needed it but because I love solids and it called out to me. Once it arrived I put it on my shelf and admired the vibrancy of the colours and how well the colours looked together.

Last year I opened it and grabbed the purples to use as binding for the Mindless Flannel quilt. Then I rolled it back together again, stood back and admired it some more.

On Monday the admiring stopped and the cutting started. After sorting out the yellows and greys I turned to one of my favourite fabrics ever and chopped that up too. ‘Heron’ is from the line Across the Pond by Cloud 9 Fabrics . The design of this quilt had been in my head for quite some time. I could picture it and I really wanted to do it but there was always something else I needed to finished first. The list of things I need to finish is still as long as my arm but the quilt top has finally been made and it’s just the way I imagined it would be.

Heron Log Cabin

Excuse the poor quality picture. We have been swallowed up by the fog and despite having all the lights on it’s still really dark. However, I love the bright colours in real life. It has, of course, been pieced with my favourite Aurifil thread 50wt colour 2000 which is a lovely neutral colour that seems to go with all the colours in this quilt.

It finishes at 48″ x 60″ and is going to go and live on our sofa once I’ve quilted it. Little Miss Bossy-Boots tried to get this one too (she already has two quilts) but I thought it would be nice to have one we can share.

My dilemma now is how to quilt it. Once upon a time I would have just echoed the log cabin but after taking three (!) fmq classes on Craftsy I really want to do something else. Should I go for feathers (very ambitious), dot to dot quilting à la Angela Walters or use some of the designs I’ve learned from Leah Day? Answers on a postcard, please!

PS I will post better pictures the minute we have a sunny day.

Categories: Quilting, QuiltsLeave a comment

Fly, Robin, Fly!

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Yeah, my internet, phone and tv have finally been sorted and I’m hoping that this means I can get back to blogging on a more regular basis. Somehow, it’s not much fun to write blog posts without being able to publish them.

Juliet, who blogs at Tartan Kiwi, is a very talented pattern designer who concentrates on foundation paper pieced blocks. I haven’t seen one yet that hasn’t impressed me so, please, go and have a quick look at her Craftsy store. It’s alright, I’ll wait for you here.

Ok, what did you think? Isn’t she wonderful? Well, she was looking for pattern testers a while ago and I put my name forward. However, with the move to Switzerland being more time consuming and stressful than I had anticipated I haven’t really had the time to test any of those gorgeous patterns…until now, that is. Check out this little cutie:

Paper Pieced RobinThe pattern comes together really easily despite some teeny tiny pieces. In fact I had the most problems with those long thin pieces around the legs and for the twig. Slippery little so-and-sos.

Close up RobinIf you like to FPP (foundation paper piece) and you love Christmas this little Robin is almost a must. The block finishes at 10″ so I’m now going to go and have a little rummage through my Christmas fabric to add a couple of borders before I turn him into a cushion cover.

By the way, go check out Amy of Amy’sCrafty Shenanigans‘ version out as well. It’s in the bottom row of her October mosaic. I wish I had some of that snowflake fabric so that I could make another one.

I used some Kona solids, a couple of prints from Carolyn Friedlander’s line Architextures and a little bit of Denyse Schmidt for my Robin. The fabric I used for the eye was a small scrap I had lying around. Pieced, as always, with my beloved Aurifil 50 wt.

I love him and I will be sad when he flies away to his new home as I’ve decided he would be a perfect gift for…whoops, I almost told you there, didn’t I? I’ll tell you some other time, don’t want to spoil the surprise, do we now?

 

 

Categories: Quilting, Quilts1 Comment

Log Cabins: A Finish-A-Long

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These last few days have been a race to the finish line as I really, really wanted a second finish for Q3 of the Finish-A-Long.

My first finish was the Siblings Together quilt which I handed over at the Fat Quarterly Retreat.Siblings Together Quilt

This is only a picture of the top as I haven’t got any pictures of the finished quilt! You can find a picture of the finished quilt here.

The list had a few smaller projects on it but I was determined to finally finish Little Miss Bossy-Boots- log cabin quilt. To be honest, I found it a little difficult to muster the enthusiasm for finishing it as I don’t like it. Or rather, I didn’t like it. I found the log cabins too busy and bright. However, toning them down with some white squares helped tremendously. As I didn’t have enough white for more than four squares so added some polka dots which I had bought for the backing.

Log Cabin QuiltThe quilt has grown on me and I rather like its cheerfulness. I decided to have fun with the quilting. First, I quilted some square spirals on the log cabins simply following the lines with my walking foot. Then I decided to quilt a big flower in the white squares, again with my walking foot. This was a lot of fun and I enjoyed the process, although turning the quilt so many times was a bit of a pain.

Quilted FlowersFar from perfect but I don’t think my five year old is going to notice.

Next I thought about the polka dots and decided to practice my fmq with some stippled hearts.

FMQ HeartsAgain, this is far from perfect but I’m proud I did it and had fun in the process. When I told Little Miss Bossy-Boots I was going to add her name as well she asked if I could also add Charlie’s name as he likes her quilts too. So I did.Charlie

And then I was asked to quilt some cats too. Cats? That’s pushing me to the limit. In the end I managed to hide a few cats amongst the hearts.

Cat

The quilt finishes at 45″ x 45″, just the right size to snuggle under while watching a movie, and is entirely pieced and quilted with Aurifil in white (2024, 50wt). I’m so pleased with how it came out in the end and can’t wait to stick this quilt in the washing machine and tumble dryer. I think it should crinkle up beautifully.

Little Miss Bossy-Boots loves her new quilt and I love that I’ve been able to make my bestest girl happy.

 

 

 

 

Categories: Quilting2 Comments

A Dashing Echo

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Two years ago I fell in love with Lotta Jansdotter’s first collection, Echo. I bought a fat quarter bundle with nine different fat quarters in the blue, teal, brown and grey colour way. They were earmarked for a quilt and hoarded together with a pink fat quarter that I received in a swap. Last month both queen bees of the two bees I’m in asked for churn dash blocks. I hadn’t made any before but always liked the look of the humble churn dash. Making these blocks  was so much fun and it made me want to make more. I got my greens and yellows out but they were really all bought for a specific quilt and I just couldn’t get myself to cut into them. That’s when I remembered Echo. I wanted to see lots of the gorgeous fabrics so decided to design a big churn dash that would use up the whole fat quarter. In the process I also linked the churn dashes which again triggered a different design in my head (but more on that later). A Dashing EchoYep, photo bombed again. Charlie does get around…

It was, of course, pieced with my beloved Aurifil 50wt, this time in white (2024).

The blue sketch in denim was the only yardage in my stash that was big enough for this project. It was one of these situations where the sewing had to be done there and then. No way was I going to wait for fabric to arrive. I’m still not convinced by it but am hoping that I will like it better once it’s quilted, bound and lying on my bed. The quilt finishes at 56″ x 72″ and is my biggest so far. I’m hoping to do some free motion quilting on it but am a little worried because of its size. As I have to order wadding and piece the back before I can start basting and quilting anyway I’ll just put this in the wip (work in progress) pile and forget about it for a little while.

Next up: basting and quilting Little Miss Bossy-Boots log cabin quilt. If I’m really quick I might be able to finish before Q3 of the Finish-A-Long ends. Wish me luck!

Categories: Quilting, Work in Progress2 Comments