Saturday, December 17, 2011

I hate "garment" sewing

This apron pattern was one of the projects from the Schoolhouse Retreat in the spring. I  just made one  for my son and everything that could go wrong did..... from cutting of the brown  the wrong way to the beige being cut  too small, ( I measured 2 or 3 times)  to sewing the borders on wrong as the stripes were to be vertical and putting one of the slits for the ties in the wrong spot. But it looks OK cause you can't see where the beige is pieced.

He wanted some felt lapel flowers he had seen on an Etsy store for $20.00 each. I could buy a meter of wool felt for less than that. So I whipped up a few. The centre is needle felted in. That's a cool technique.

Sunday, December 11, 2011

A few gifts....

for Gayle's birthday
for Sewcializers gift exchange
for my sister
I made a few runners for Christmas gifts. They have no batting or actual quilting holding the layers together which made them fast. Another circle one is underway as well as a wall banner for me. I think I will make myself a couple of new runners too as I'm tired of my old ones.

Thursday, December 8, 2011

Phew!

Log Cabin Variation
Double Slice
As my friend Joanne would say "A flurry of finishes." These are all Scrap Bag quilts, some for donation this year and some to start up the stash for next year's donations. I think the one called Bricks cause I don't remember the name was from last year. The Log Cabin variation is something I started  last year when I was finally able to get back to sewing after Pete died. Just sewed pieces together and it came out OK looking. It's funny how doing these quilts to help out other people actually make us feel better.
Stash Buster
4 Patch
Bricks

Friday, November 11, 2011

birthday

My friend gave me this giant cup and saucer for my birthday as well as some of those red tools and the bum shaped spoon rest.I should have turned it around for the picture. The cup and saucer fits nicely into that corner  adding a punch of colour. We had a nice outing as her birthday was the following day. We went to the guild meeting in Kincardine then to the shop in Exeter. What a wonderful shop - Quilts and Calicoes. One of us forgot her purse at the meeting and it wasn't until we got to the shop that she noticed. It was 20% off during your birthday week there and they believed the one who forgot her BIG RED PURSE!!! Fortunately it was found safe and sound in the church office. This is about the 4th year that we've gone on a birthday outing, lunch and maybe even dinner. And this year we had both.

Ella Bella

practice piece
Double Slice
Finally got a piece loaded onto Bella after a lot of fits and starts. Now to practice and they say practice makes perfect. Got a lot of projects underway and planned  but seem to find excuses to avoid them all.
The brown Double Slice is supposed to be made with a layer cake but since I didn't have one I used scraps. I could call it a Slice of Chocolate cause it's all browns and beiges. It will go to a Scrapbag donation to a male. Joanne had made one but modified to a mini as she is getting well known for.I still have the Oct. SB one to sew  the rows together.  It's the same pattern as the Retreat quilt.I'm hoping to machine quilt all my SB and Guild quilts.

Saturday, October 29, 2011

Retreat Quilt

Stash buster
This afternoon I finally finished sewing together the rows for this beige stash buster that was started at the Schoolhouse Retreat this past spring. I have a couple more items to finish up then I'm going to start on quilting them on Big Ella. I think I'll change her name to Ella Bella as Big Ella sounds derogatory.

Thursday, October 20, 2011

Pot Luck

What is this???
Cathy and her Bonnie Hunter's Trip Around the World
Joanne and the layer cake resized
Yesterday I hosted a pot luck for the Sewcializers to show off my new home and sewing loft. Everyone made all the appropriate remarks, a lot of OMG's, about the loft. I was so pleased that the whole group could make it. We had delicious food and 3 desserts. Joanne and Cathy even brought their items for show and tell. It was a really good time.  I'm going to retry to post some pictures. Last night when I did this, my computer crashed  so here we go.... Ah good success. In other news I joined the Sunset Quilter's Guild in Kincardine last week. They support Project Linus as one of their outreach programmes which is one of my favorites. This past Saturday I went for my big machine lesson in London with a stop at the Marsh Shop in Coldstream. Just doing my bit for the economy. So now I have to get busy working at it. I have 4 days off next week so I'll give it a good go.