Brit Bee October

I got to work on my super delayed blocks for Susan this week; I had my block all chosen about a month ago, but I have taken forever to get started on it. Susan asked for a star block, for her month in the Bee and I chose the Desperate Housewife's Star from Quilt Jane.

Once I started my foundation paper piecing, I remembered how much I love it (although, not so much picking all the paper out of the backs!) and as Susan had asked for many different sizes of block, I decided to do some extras for her. For my second block I decided to do another Rocky Road to Kansas from Fresh Lemons, at 50% of the normal template size, along the same lines as the one I did for Laura in Round 1.

And I couldn't stop there, my final block is another reduced size block; a corruption of Fresh Lemons' Evening Star, initially I intended to just replace the coloured corners with more background fabric, but part way through piecing and cutting I realised that I didn't have enough Kona Coal to finish, after much unpicking; I replaced the central background fabrics for some more star fabrics and had JUST enough Kona to finish it off!

These blocks are now winging their way back to Susan, not quite in time.

J x

Swooning Along Nicely

I have been working on my Swoon quilt this week and have made some gentle but steady progress on my block list (current count: 6/9!!!) and my latest Audible book; The Passage by Justin Cronin which makes for one happy girl.

In other sewing related news I am making progress on Bee blocks, but no pictures to show yet - Susan, I'm sorry; I promise it will be with you soon, October totally ran away with me :(

J x

Time to Swoon

So, I have had the fabric designated to be my Swoon quilt for months now and last week I finally decided that it was going to be my next quilt- I have been umm-ing and arr-ing for too long and decided that enough was enough and that it was time to just get on with it and make something; so Swoon it is!

This is probably the start of the girliest quilt I could have imagined and is definitely the girliest I have made, but Amy Butler was the first pattern writer/ fabric designer I heard of (back before I started quilting) and I love her, so it's time I used some of her fabric.

I have been cutting and piecing all weekend and I am very pleased to be able to show my first 2 Swoon blocks, the beginnings of my 3rd AND I have the rest all cut out and waiting (well not quite "all" as I ran out of patience cutting the white so I only have about half of that cut and ready, but at least that's enough to keep me going for a little while!)

I have been following the progress of the Swooning group on Flickr for a long time, but I haven't noticed anyone currently making a Swoon (I am a little slow, they have probably mostly moved on now) so imagine my surprise to read that 2 of my fellow Brit Bees are also in the midst of making some Swoons too. So, I am looking forward to following their progress to spur me on :)

I have been working from home this morning and there is no better place, for comfort, than the sofa with a cosy new quilt for doing some research.

It's also a great place for some paper piecing, and I now have a total of 2 blocks to show for it too!

Loving the progress, all around!

J x

Jennie's Crab Shack Charm

After designing the back of this quilt with Lucy's Crab Shack fat quarters in mind I had to give up on my design as I couldn't find the co-ordinating Kona solids on a single UK website, instead I took my finished quilt top to my LQS and dug out the best co-ordinating navy to finish the quilt top with a bold frame and I wanted a bright pattern for the back.

This is a simple and bold quilt that was really easy to put together; I especially enjoyed using whole charm squares as it helped me to make sure my seam allowance was accurate.

The finished quilt is around 60" square, perfect size for two to snuggle on the sofa!

J x

Fresh Sewing Day - October

Despite the fact that I feel that I haven't stopped sewing in the last few weeks, I don't seem to have much to shown for Fresh Sewing Day.

1. Porthole Windows - finished quilt
2. Jennie's Crab Shack Charm - finished quilt
3. EPP Rose Star block 1
4. Matching iPhone 5 cases

Linking to Lily's Quilts Fresh Sewing Day and Small Blog Meet











J x

Porthole Windows

Woohoo; 100% complete!

I finally finished this ginormous quilt last week and it is so big I can't hold it up alone; even Chris struggled to hold it up for the photograph.

I am so happy to have this quilt sitting on my bed, as my first full size quilt, it has been really exciting!

J x