It's an Elephant Parade!

I attended a workshop taught by Lorna from Sew Fresh Quilts last week.  Lorna designs wonderful quilts, mostly with cute and whimsical animals on them.  She was the speaker at our London Friendship Quilter's guild meeting last week and brought along lots of quilts to show us.  She admitted to being a bit obsessed with quilting... (I don't know anyone else with this type of obsession...LOL!)

My favourite animal in this one is the squirrel! 

More squirrels...

How about some cute puppies?

This one is called Elephant parade and it is the pattern I chose to work on during the workshop.

I chose a yellow fabric with polka dots as my background.  These are my bluebirds of happiness...they were supposed to have tails that matched their bodies, but I used creative licence and left them as is.

The turtle was fun to make...I have used the dotty fabric in his shell in several quilts and still have some left for another quilt.  

I am using black and white prints for my elephants.  All of the fabrics were from my stash.  The bicycle elephant is my favourite.

This one is a cut-up....

Circles are fun! 

Here is one facing the other way.  I made 6 elephants, three facing right and three facing left.  I will use the extra one for a label on the back of the quilt. 

I managed to get quite a bit done during the workshop. 

Christine was there too and is also making the elephant quilt. She picked a turquoise background and gray prints for her elephants.  

Lorna spent time with everyone in the room and by the end of the day, it was a real zoo with all the different animals being made!  I went home and made three baby elephants and a frog.  I have put this project aside for now as I have another one with a deadline that needs to be met.  You will find me in my sewing room this week...

There is only one baby in this picture and my frog and turtle still need eyes.  

Back to the sewing room now...

Placemats and Some Squishy Mail

Each year at this time, the members of the London Friendship Quilters Guild make placemats for Meals  on Wheels clients.  The placemats are added to gift bags which are delivered on Christmas Day along with Christmas dinner.  I made three placemats this year using a charm pack and some co-ordinating fabric from my stash.  

Here are the backs...

I even found some striped fabrics to use for the binding.

I tried to make the placemats so that they could be used all year long rather than just at Christmas.

I got home today and found a parcel by my front door.  It was my swap blocks from the broken dishes swap that was co-ordinated by Fun with Barb. (There is a link to her blog in the sidebar.)

It will be fun to get these up on my design wall and figure out how to set them!  That will have to wait until after my Christmas sewing is done. Christine's civil war blocks arrived in the same package but you will have to check her blog later to see her blocks.  (Quilting at Balmoral)

Take care! 

Progress on some projects

What glorious fall weather we have been having!  I have been going for a walk for an hour most days and the colours are gorgeous!

I am soaking in as much of this as I can because we all know that cold weather and snow are coming!  

I love how the sun was shining on these trees as we walked through the woods. 

This one was taken on yesterday's walk. 

Meanwhile, in the sewing room, I have been working on some more snowman pillows...

I tried to make each one unique.

This one needed a bow tie, instead of a scarf.

Someone asked if I was using a pattern for my pillows.  I am making them up as I go along...I made a whole bunch of string snowball blocks in different sizes and I am building the snowmen and adding embellishments to personalize them.

These blocks are for comfort quilts.

I needed a hostess gift and found this 5 year old UFO in my sewing room, just waiting to be finished and gifted.  

Everything was cut out...

The background fabric is Essex linen.

I fused the pumpkins and leaves to the background...

And then used matching thread to button hole stitch them to the background fabric.  

I will be quilting this today and doing the binding. 

I am going out for lunch with a friend and then I will be delivering these to the venue for the London Friendship Quilters' Guild show in London.

Here are the details in case you want to come to the show!  I will be volunteering in the tea room at some point.

I hope to have a finished runner to show you soon!