My quilts are back!

Last week I picked up my quilts I had sent to the Philippines (through a local quilt shop)  to be hand quilted.  

Both quilts are heavily quilted and I'm pleased how they turned out. I would never have the patience not the stamina for something like this. Because both quilts were hand or English paper pieced I felt they deserved to be hand quilted. 

I'm happy to have two tops done but there are still about eight more waiting in line! Oh well, a quilters work is never done!
Cheers
Vreni xx

My crafty week in pictures

I have enjoyed a lot of sewing and crafting time this week. On Monday I finished the "Peak Hour" top. When I say finished, I mean I cut out all the vehicles and ironed them onto the background. Not one stitch has been made at this point.  The next step is to sandwich the quilt and then I will sew through all the layers around each shape a couple of times with a  free motion straight stitch to secure them.

On Tuesday and Thursday I worked on my Camelot blocks. Here are block 12 and 13, only three more to go.

On Wednesday I finished another baby quilt top. I will probably quilt this one first, as the baby has already been born and I'm eager to send it off to the proud new parents. 

And on Friday I got together with my good friend Heather - as we often do on  Fridays - to do a bit of box making. She wanted to show me her way of making a sewing box, something she's been experimenting with lately. You can read about it here. I used my  "Keep Calm" fabric and I'm really pleased how the box came together. 

To close the box tightly, I used a piece of elastic cord and two buttons, so nothing will fall out while transporting it to and from the quilt group/class.

There's a little cutting mat hidden in the lid as well as a piece of sand paper (which is very useful when drawing on fabric around templates). Then there are different compartments, one with a lid,  for all the sewing utensils. Clever, n'est-ce pas?

Of course the fabric lends itself perfectly for a small pin cushion and I also made a teeny tiny "flannel design board".

After all this crafting, the sewing room needed a good clean up, which I did yesterday.

And today I woke to this: rain, glorious rain. It has been so very dry here the last few month that one could almost hear nature sigh with relieve. 

By all accounts, an excellent week. I hope yours was equally great, whatever you did. 

Cheers

Vreni x

I'm still here!

Amidst a constant stream of visitors and guests I have found little time for sewing. But I have finish three more Camelot blocks:

Block 9

Block 10

 Block 11

I also started a baby quilt for a soon to be born little boy. He will be the first baby of the next generation on my husband's side of the family and we are all very exited. I'm using the pattern "Rush Hour" by the very talented Kellie from Don't look now. 

I really need to get going with this as afterwards I will have to make another baby quilt for another new baby boy born just last week in Australia. And if that isn't enough, I also need to make a wedding quilt for a friend of my daughter. Luckily the wedding isn't until May. I'm happy to have a "free" weekend coming without any guests, visitors or invitations so I'm planning to spend a large junk of it in my sewing room. I hope you have an equally lovely weekend ahead! 

Cheers

Vreni x

Finally, some Christmas crafting!

In case you've been wondering what I've been up to these last couple of weeks, I will tell you. I've made some Christmas ornaments, stitched in felt and then put into small (3 or 4 inch) embroidery hoops.

This one is for mum as I tried to copy her childhood home. 

I hope she can see what it's meant to be. My husband and my son recognised it instantly, so that was a relief ;)!

I wanted to make some more, but unfortunately the shop I got the little hoops from had run out of stock and if I order them over the Internet, the chances are that it's too late by the time they arrive. Oh well, something to plan for next year. 

As I had the felt out, I've made this miniature pin cushion, which has been on my to do list ever I've seen it here, 

 Isn't it cute? I'm going to make a whole lot more of them. 

A small selection of the Christmas cards I've made so far.

I love making the "10-minutes table runners" although they take me a fair bit longer than 10 minutes. 

 Christmas box to give away Christmas cookies. 

A tea box for a friend,

I still need to buy the tea bags to go inside

and last but not least, my seventh Camelot block. Silly my, I've put the middle part together the wrong way, but at the moment, I can't be bothered to take it apart. 

Wishing you all a wonderful weekend.
Cheers
Vreni x

Lacking inspiration

Usually, at this time of the year I'm already "knee deep" in Christmas crafting and sewing. This year it seem inspiration is eluding me, although I've been looking through books, magazines and trawling the Internet and in particular Pinterest. Nothing really takes my fancy.

So instead I've been rearranging my fabric stash. And not just rearranging, no I've folded each piece of fabric (only those bigger than 1/2 yard/meter) over Comic Backing boards as they are just the perfect size. Now they look like mini bolts and are so much easier to see and take out. I've bought 1'000 pieces of boards and so far I've used up 500. I can't believe how much fabric I've got. It really was a bit of a wake up call to STOP buying fabric!!!

This is how far I got when I ran out of steam. I still have to do the lowest shelf (mostly Japanese fabrics), not to mention all the fabrics I've stowed away in various other places. I will leave my fat quarters for the moment as they are more or less organized in my sock drawers. Here's just a small selection. Doesn't it look nice? Sometimes I catch myself not wanting to use these fabrics, as then it wouldn't looks so nice anymore. Go figure!!!

My big pieces of fabric (more than 3 yards/meters) for borders and backings I will probably fold over some longer card board pieces which I will cut myself, like I did for my linens (see middle shelf).

I also did a little bit of sewing. Here's my sixth Camelot block.

And here they are all together. I haven't decided on a background yet, but somehow I quite like the Aubergine which is actually my foot stool on the balcony. Well, I have time to decide on that as I have 10 more blocks to make first.

As always, thanks for stopping by!
Cheers
Vreni xx

Camelot blocks 3, 4 & 5

I can't believe how much I'm enjoying piecing these blocks. I always thought I couldn't hand piece, but I think I was wrong. I just needed to learn how to do it the right way. Now on to the next block.

Have a lovely week ahead.

Vreni xx

Regrouping

With all the comings and going recently of various visitors, I haven't spent much time in my sewing room and I feel I need to make a new start (another one). I've set myself a few goals for the rest of this year! Yikes! And maybe if I list them here I will get them done.  I'm keeping the list fairly short so it should be doable.

1. Finish hand quilting "big bloom" quilt
2. Make more blocks, put together and quilt winter quilt
3. Make at least 6 more blocks for Camelot quilt (that way I am at the half way mark)
4. Make a few Christmas presents
5. Machine quilt one quilt top (which one to be decided later)

Now it's written in stone, or as good as!!!

I did manage to make my second Camelot block:

and a few more "measly" filler blocks for my winter quilt.

Maybe you've noticed that I've installed a new Pinterest feature on my blog. I followed a terrific tutorial here. Whenever your hover over a photo with your mouse a small "pin it" button pops up and by clicking it, you are taken automatically to the Pinterest window where you can then choose to pin it to one of your boards. Makes the whole process so much easier.

And last but not lease; look what I found in the latest edition of  "Down Under Quilts" magazine:

I had absolutely no idea and wouldn't have known as I can't often find that particular magazine here in Singapore. Luckily a friend of a friend spotted it and alerted me.


Till later
Vreni x