Saturday, November 24, 2018

Frank

I spent a few hours in the car last Sunday and, of course, I worked on my Frank Lloyd Wright project as we travelled.  Today, we were in the car again for a couple of hours so FLW had more outlining stitches added.  The bottom rectangle in the picture below is the last section that needs to be outlined (besides the little squares in the next section up!).  Tonight, I watched a movie on TV and did some more stitching.  At this rate, FLW will be done in no time!


The Elgin Piecemakers Guild met this past Thursday.  As usual, there were several Comfort quilts in various stages of completion at show and tell time.  Our blocks this month were scrappy churn dashes, adapted from a tutorial by Crazy Mom Quilts.  Yvonne and I will be working together to put these blocks together in to a top.  We just need to make one more block...


Julie quilted this grey, yellow and white quilt and the binding will be added by the next meeting.


Two other finished quilts were ready to be delivered to the hospital.



I hope to have some slow stitching time tomorrow after doing a few jobs around the house.  I will be checking in at Kathy's blog to see what the other slow stitchers have been up to this week as well.  I have a quilt back from the long arm quilters so maybe I will get the binding machine sewn to it tomorrow as well...perhaps there will be a finish to share soon...

Saturday, November 17, 2018

Another Baby Quilt


At last weekend's sewing day, I started making plus sign blocks with 30's prints for a baby quilt.  The pattern for the blocks came from Cheryl Brickey and Paige Alexander's book, Modern Plus Sign Quilts. In the book, they made a table runner with their blocks but I decided to make a baby quilt. 


There are two blocks from each print--I thought it would be fun to play a matching game with the quilt when the baby gets a bit older.  (There is no baby in mind for this quilt--it is another one of those baby quilts in waiting.)  When I put the blocks up on the design wall, I was not entirely happy with the way they looked...so I decided to add some strips of white fabric between the rows...


Much better!


I may or may not add white strips to the sides of the quilt...What do you think?  If I add the strips to the side, the backing fabric I have may not be wide enough.  Maybe, I could add narrower strips to the side so the backing is still wide enough... the jury is still out on this decision. I will continue to ponder. 


Grand-dog Finn had his first encounter with snow this week.  He liked it!  My daughter said it was hard to get his picture as he was tearing around in the snow and did not want to stop to sit for her to snap a pic. 


I did some more outlining on FLW this week.  The outlining in this section makes all those blank spots look more intentional.


I will be linking up with Kathy and the other Slow Sunday Stitchers on Sunday morning.  I will be doing more outlining tomorrow...

Tuesday, November 13, 2018

Elgin Piecemakers Sewing Day


Twice a year, the Elgin Piecemaker's Guild has a sewing day at a local church.  This past Saturday, 13 quilters gathered and sewed all day long!  We had a couple of ironing stations and a place for cutting fabric in the kitchen as well as 13 tables for sewing around the room.  It was fun to see what everyone was working on as the day progressed.


Fran was working on a jelly roll rug to match her shirt!


Heather is attempting to use up her Christmas scraps for a paper pieced courthouse step quilt.


Farruk is a friend of Yvonne and is a new quilter.


Anne was using a collection of bicycle fabrics to make her blocks.


Yvonne finally finished a Christmas project that she started two years ago...Don't we all have this type of project aging in our sewing rooms???  LOL.


Christine made two acorn mug rugs.


Beth is making a winter quilt from flannel--so cozy for a cold winter day.


Chris's colourful leaf quilt is coming right along!


Pat made 8 blocks for her 365 challenge quilt. 


Jacqui managed to make three owls for her grand-daughter's Fancy Forest quilt. 


The other Yvonne quilted a lap quilt.


Jane is starting a new quilt --I can't remember the name of the pattern...

I started two new projects...A spinning four patch quilt with some Kaffe fabric purchased years ago...


I cut out all of the squares... and then assembled the blocks. 



Here are a few of my blocks:


I made 33 blocks and now I have to figure out how I am going to assemble them into a quilt.

In the afternoon, I started a baby quilt using 30's prints.  

I started assembling the blocks and then had to pack up before I got any done.  Stay tuned for another post later this week about this quilt.  


We had the room at the church booked until 4pm but I wanted to keep sewing!  Alas, I had to pack up and go home.  There may have been some more sewing time that evening...



Sunday, November 11, 2018

Half Way There


I managed to find a few minutes each day this week to add some more stitches to the outlining of my Frank Lloyd Wright Fountain Glass picture and I am pleased to announce that the top half of the picture is done!  The bottom half does not have as much detail so it should not take as long to complete the outlining there.  I have been doing most of my stitching in the mornings with a cup of tea before breakfast.  It's cozy to sit by the fireplace and add a few more stitches as I think about the day ahead.


I have a bit more outlining to add to the left of the brown and yellow chevrons...that will be done today.

I have had a very Quilty week...Monday night, Christine and I got together to sew for a couple of hours.  I made some blocks for comfort quilts for the London Friendship Guild...


and some pincushions (one one is complete because I ran out of the beads I use to stuff them):


I dug into my bins of solid scraps for these.

Wednesday night, my friend Pat and I attended the Oxford Quilt Guild's meeting in Ingersol.  The speaker for the evening was Sandra --her blog is "Quilting at the Cro's Nest" .  (The house quilt in the background is the raffle quilt for the Oxford quilt guild at their Spring quilt show.)


I met Sandra online through her blog when we both linked up to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching Group each Sunday.   We met in person back in May when my husband and I attended her Guild quilt show in Simcoe.  Sandra is a long arm quilter and also makes amazing, colourful appliqué quilts which she often quilts by hand. It was inspiring to see her quilts up close at the trunk show.


Thursday night was the monthly London Friendship Quilter's guild meeting where Cathy and Charlene did a trunk show about their amazing English Paper Piecing quilts.  Cathy blogs at Eagle's Wings Quilts and also has a business by the same name selling EPP supplies.  Here is a picture from her blog of her most recent finish--Friendship Chain which she showed at the meeting :


Yesterday, I spent the day with members of the Elgin Piecemaker's Guild for a sewing day.  The original plan was to work on some UFO's, but no, I started two new projects instead...Yikes!  I will do another blogpost about the sewing day later this week. 

I will be linking up with Kathy and the Slow Sunday Stitchers at her blog this morning.  Take a look at all of the beautiful hand stitching everyone is working on and leave an encouraging comment or two. Have a wonderful day!

Saturday, November 3, 2018

Slow Stitching Report


I managed to work on the outlining of my Frank Lloyd Wright Fountain Glass pictures every day this past week.  My goal was at least one length of thread per day and some days, I even did two or three! The outlining in this part of the picture really makes the details pop!


The picture above shows where I was last week...

Some days, I stitched before going off to work and other days, the evenings were spent stitching.

I also managed to get the backing of my Foothills Quilt pieced.  I forgot to take a picture before giving it to Cathy at Eagles Wings Quilts for longarm quilting today.  I will have to show the back of the quilt along with the front when the quilt is finished.  I hope to have this quilt done and on the bed by Christmas.

Tuesday morning, a friend and I went for a walk at a local park.  For a change, the sun was shining.


Our burning bush is burning brightly right now.


I will be linking up with Kathy and the other Slow Sunday Stitchers in the morning.  My husband and I will be putting the patio furniture away and cleaning up the gardens tomorrow afternoon, as long as it doesn't rain.  After that, I will put my feet up and stitch by the fireplace with a cup of tea nearby.