Quilting swap - update

My quilt block swap is going really well, and I'm so excited about it. There are five of us at present...

Ellie will be doing houses
Lala will be doing shops
I'm doing churches :)
Gem is doing florists
Cartier is doing cottages

This is going to be lovely. There's lots of time, so please do consider signing up - you'll end up with such a lovely mini quilt/wall hanging, and I'm certainly not advanced, so would love to inspire someone fairly new. Scroll down for more details, but please do join. x

Quilt swap - progress on the block

 
There are now four five! of us who have agreed to my quilting swap, to make a wall hanging. Thank you so much! I'd love more people - it really doesn't take long to make a block, and I plan that it will be a 3 month deadline... so lots of time. I've only just begun quilting really, so I see this as a journey we can share. So please do consider signing up if you're wavering.:) I've put off quilting for a long time, thinking I just wasn't capable, but admiring since I was a teen. I now wish I'd got going sooner. I read Jane Brocket's The Gentle Art of Quilting, and that really helped. (Her inspirational blog is here) I so identified with what she was saying. She explains how she put it aside for years, until a friend said 'for goodness sakes, it's just cutting and stitching fabric together'. It really is - don't be put off by all the terms. I've a long way to go, but I'm so glad I've started. I certainly don't follow the rules - I muddle through. I've only just truly understood what 'stitch in the ditch' means!

I thought I ought to set out some guidelines. Just to run over what I outlined, I'd propose nine people, all making individual blocks, so ultimately we each have nine blocks from which we can make a wall hanging. I really want a house theme, but within that, it's flexible, though I think we need to have uniform sized blocks - so blocks to be 12 inches square.

I think it would be nice if we each chose something different. It could be a house or cottage block tutorial - there are so many available on the web - or something else that you'd find in a village. There are loads of stunning schoolhouse quilts in the States. I've decided I'd love to do churches. I'll make them all the same, and as it's a wallhanging will embellish with buttons and ribbons and applique. I don't expect everyone to do this.

Once you have made your blocks, I'd suggest you send them to me, and I'll divide them up, one from each person to another, and send them on. I'd appreciate that when you send, you include a stamped, self addressed packet, so I can return. It would be fabulous to have someone not from the UK... so if you're reading this in America or Australia, please do join in. I'd love to have some international flavour in there.

So...

Sign up: Now
Deadline for blocks to be with me: May 31st
Flickr group to be set up so we can post progress.
What to make - if you've signed up and chosen something, let me know, so I can let people know that 'subject's' gone.... So, I've taken churches! :)

As for my church... I couldn't find a church pattern, so have made my own. I think it's going to have 18 pieces when finished. I haven't finished yet - I want to add grass, and more sky, to 'set' it and make it up to a 12 inch block, but I'm happy. I've chosen text fabrics for the roof, following my love of text fabrics. It's not clear in the picture, but it has a little heart button door knocker, surrounded by a heart trim. I think it looks cute, and I'm having fun with the embellishing.

Do sign up - it really will be fun. x

A quilting bee ... sort of ... anyone interested?

As you know if you read my blog regularly, I've become more and more interested in taking the plunge and beginning to do my own quilting. There's been a long path to this. But I'd love to share it with others and I'd really love to organise a swap, which it seems is really popular in quilting circles. I'm not confident enough yet to approach real quilters (whatever they look like :) ), but I'd love to do something along the lines of an American quilting bee. I got this idea from a library book about just that - 12 women who produced 12 quilts together over the course of a year, despite living hundreds of miles apart.

The thought of a quilt is too frightening for me at the moment, I think. But I thought a nine-piece wall hanging may work. Especially if it's on the theme of what I've been making... houses.

These houses are wonky because I made them very quickly, and just freehand - without patterns, but it was while I was having fun with them that I thought a mini quilting swap may be nice. My idea is if I could get a group of nine of us, we'd each produce nine houses, or schoolhouses - each to the same end 12 inches square. Then, all would be mailed to me, I'd divide them into nine and mail them out again. I would ask that return postage is included when the nine are sent, maybe through a pre-stamped envelope.

I could take a look and decide on houses patterns - there's a lot of tutes and free patterns out there for houses. So each person would make the same pattern, and the end result would be a collection of nine different houses. I think it would be pretty special. I hope a few of you agree.

I'd set up a Flickr group so we could all keep in touch over progress. I think it would be a lot of fun. I'd set a 3 month time frame. I'd love to go on a journey, and develop my basic skills with others on the same journey, and I think we'd all learn a lot. So there's many reasons I want to do this, despite not really having the time. But honestly, the houses come together so quickly, and I'm happy to organise.

So... is anybody out there interested/willing to sign up?

A Monthly Make Pledge! - February

I'm so pleased to see that lots more have joined up The Felt Fairys Monthly Make challenge here. This is me for February:

This is one of my latest makes, which has been in the planning since November - it's taken that long to get the pattern sorted out, as it was fiddly... I wanted to base it on my lavender dogs.

I'm really pleased - from her tarten chin and belly to her cute front paws. Of course, I had to use my lovely Japanese fabric for these... and her ears!

She's a very effective draught excluder... and if you ever go looking for a draught excluder, there's a lot more work than you'd first think in these.

But it's lovely to create a little personality. I hope you like her. Do join in the Monthly Make pledge - see the link on my side bar. It's fun to see what everyone's creating, and it's not too late.

Progress on my happy houses blocks...

So now I've finished the 42 houses, I need to add the border to each. 42 houses each need 4 triangles cut, so that's 168 triangles to cut and pin and sew and iron. This is the first! Pinned below and ready to sew...

And the other sides added, now sewn and pressed:

And a second one done. That's two. 40 to go! I'll keep updating on my progress. :)

I'm going to square up the blocks when they are all finished, so they'll stay wonky for now.

Adventures in quilting - part 2!

  

Remember my post here (for those of you lovely readers who've stuck with me a long time!).Well, I've had a sudden burst of renewed enthusiasm to finish my long unfinished project. For those of you new to this, I've always loved house and schoolhouse quilt designs. There's a long history of them in the States, and I'm fascinated by them. I was so thrilled when I found this tuturial on the Quiltville blog (I love the woman and am so grateful to her for publishing it) and I determined one day I'd do it, when I got good at quilting. Then I thought, I might as well jump in with both feet and just get on with it - after my button quilt (which is very simple in comparison.

So I did 37 houses, and back when I did my original post and...  left it! Not good, but I'm told this happens a lot with large quilts.

Yesterday I picked it up and determined to finish the last five houses (you need 42), and above you can see three cut and ready to be stitched. Here's two laid out, so I know I haven't missed anything:

I love the flag stitching method... though I'm not a quilter yet, so not sure if that's the correct term, but it looks like mini flags!

And I did it. I achieved my five extra houses:

I'm determined to keep going and get my quilt top done (hark at me, I'll be a proper quilter one day!). I know each block isn't perfect, but it's not meant to be. These include lots of fabrics that have been given to me, or I've found in special places and they go back years, so it's just as it's meant to be - a real memory quilt, mistakes and all. And because it's just for me, that's just fine.

Letterbox Dolls House - a mini look!

I couldn't resist showing you this. Regular readers of my blog know I love Letterbox, a UK company, packed with fabulous toys for kids of all ages. I loved trying out their Ezyroller in my post here (before I go any further, I have to add that this time this is not a sponsored post... I spotted this and thought it was such a brilliant bargain, I had to share.)

When my kids were much younger, I spent many hours searching for the perfect dolls house. I then realized how expensive good wooden dolls houses were, and it took me a long time to find one I was happy with. This beauty is in the Letterbox sale, reduced from £130 to £65 - I thought this was such a brilliant bargain, I wanted to draw attention to it, in case anyone's looking for a dolls house and is despairing of finding one at a reasonable price. It's shown in the picture with an extra floor, but it's still a bargain. At least, I'd say so!

And I promise you, Letterbox did not contact me and ask me to write any of the above, but I'd have loved to have spotted something like this a few years ago!

Just to balance it up, I also love this... I'd better finish now - I could browse the Letterbox catalogue for a while quite happily. This is also a bargain, and has had loads of lovely things said about it. But I had to include it, as my three all enjoyed playing with their wooden set when they were younger. I love wooden toys!