First of the Red Borders

Using up a piece of red border fabric - It's like a Hawaiian shirt print, with surfboards and palm trees and whatnot. I had enough to border three small quilt tops, so here's the first of the lot, I didn't manage to make it to the Farnham Maltings Quilt Show and Fabric Sale this year, which is where I usually buy a lot of sale priced fabric to use as quilt borders for charity quilts (and backings for my own quilts), so 2015 will be a very good exercise in using up what I've bought previously!

A little taupe top

A good use for this border fabric - I used it in a piece I made for my mother quite a few years ago now, and it's actually kind of hard to use. The neutral blocks within the centre of the quilt were some fabric donated to me by someone who knows I quilt (as so often happens) - not stuff I'd probably use myself, so they seemed a good addition to the charity top stash...

Floral border

Not quite sure about this one, as it's a little wonky (intentionally and unintentionally). But perhaps someone will love it for its very wonkiness!

Black and white block lotto

Only one block made for the blocklotto this month - I had considered doing more, but actually, almost all the black and white prints I have are unsuitable - they either contain a little of some other colour or they are so evenly split between black and white that they don't really look black or white, which makes them hard to use in this situation. And as I am trying to buy very little new fabric in general, I decided that one was actually enough!

ATC Friday

Some more cards which I was given the task of finishing off. True to form, I looked to words to do this - at least partly. For these cards with stamps of explorers (which are great, aren't they?) I added a small piece of map, and the word "explore" - I am running out of small letters though - I had to use three different fonts - really must get some more.

For these cards of a little girl, which were fairly busy already, I added a small colourful cat and added a nice sentiment.

And for these celebratory cards, I just added a word and some more, different silver stars. I think all three came out pretty well.

Black & Neutral Rail Fence

Another small top - not yet bordered - using up some of the blocks I have stashed away. Not sure how many of these black and neutral blocks are left, but I think there's at least one quilt's worth.

Cross Stitch Update

Here's the final picture of the angels before I put it away for the year. I did do a little more on it, though not a huge amount. I finished the feet of the green angel, which is nice - it was a little weird that she didn't have any feet. And I carried the border on around the outside to meet up with the other side. Next year, I will have the right colour red for the inside of the border so hopefully I can make really good headway with that.

I did also spent a little time stitching this small piece - it's nearly done (the picture) - just some detail on the angels - and then there are the words, which say "Angels we have heard on high" - it will be a sweet addition to the Christmas Cross Stitches. But I'm tired of Christmas now, and am going to put these (and the other one with the elves) away until next year.  I think I have a non-seasonal piece half finished, so it will be back to that, and something else - perhaps another little Sheep.

Scrappy with coffee, part 3

...and here are the blocks joined together into a small top. The border still needs to be attached, but that's a job for another day!

Scrappy with Coffee, Part 2

The next step was to use the two coordinating fabrics as borders for the remaining scrappy blocks - easily accomplished.  Now it's just to join them together, then use the coffee print as a border for the small top.

Nearing the end of the Scrappy Log Cabins

I've been making lots of block sets and tops using up some scrappy log cabin blocks I had - bordering them in other fabrics or joining them with sashing between, etc. I'm down to the very last handful of them now (though some are still lurking as block sets waiting to be put together). I decided to do something coordinating with these, so grabbed a fabric from my stash of prints to use as borders (the coffee pots), and then pulled out two smaller pieces of fabric which coordinate with the border, to use as outsides for these last few log cabin blocks. Haven't stitched them yet, but they are there waiting, all nicely coordinated!

A little (or not so little) talk about quilts...

My local library has a monthly craft feature, run by the Friends of the Library - sometimes it's a practical thing, sometimes it's just a talk, and the co-ordinator, whom I have known for years as our kids went to school together, asked me ages ago if I'd be willing to do a quilt talk (not a how-to, more of a trunk show).  Well, I'm pretty good at talking, and I have a lot of quilts I can show, so I said ok - today was the day. I took a big pile (several, really) of quilts, and kind of made it up as I went along. I showed a few to start, then we looked at some simple patchwork blocks and talked about construction and the stages of that. Luckily, I happened to have things in all stage of construction lying around the house - who'd have guessed!

Not many photos, unfortunately - we just put a table in the middle with some chairs around in a circle and I'd laid all the quilts out, sort of in a sensible order, on the table, and I peeled them back as I went.  The smaller art quilts, etc.  I sort of had out to the side, and we talked about those too and  about different kinds of community quilting (especially online, virtual stuff), like Block of the Month projects, Online Bees and Challenges, The Block Lotto, Quilt Swaps, Round Robins, and so on. It was really good fun, and I think the ladies who came (there were about a dozen - and yes, they were all ladies) - enjoyed it - I hope so!  Although it wasn't a practical session, one lady did bring along a hexagon piece she'd been working on for many years, with scraps of kids' clothes and other meaningful things, so we did have a quick chat at the end about what she might do to kind of finish it up  - I think it was a bit of a Topsy patchwork - it just grew!

I'm going to go back at some point later in the year to talk about ATCs - that will be a little show and tell, but also we'll do some practical stuff - probably do some round robins because that's sort of easier, and more social. 

ATC Friday

Some more round robins, which have come back to me, finished. These are all ones which I started, so you get to see the final card and the starter, but not the middle stage.  This Key card started very simply: 

This one was a bit more busy, with a ticket themed backing paper as well as an old bus ticket. 

And this one had some vintage feel paper, and a small picture, but got several other interesting things along the way - very happy with all three!

Blue Trio

These blocks don't constitute  "using up" my stash of blocks, but they are a way of turning smaller blocks into something a little more substantial, and of course, of using up some smaller pieces of blue fabric. I can't remember offhand  how many of each there were - possibly only four - but it will still make a sweet small kids' quilt for Project Linus...

Cross Stitch Update

Another week of Christmas stitching - I was hoping to finish this one before I got tired of Christmas, but somehow, I don't think it's going to happen. There's not a huge amount more to stitch, but...

Rainbow PAT swap

This ATC swap is a Pick-a-theme swap - the sort where, instead of everyone making cards to a given theme (e.g. birds, 60s TV shows, Famous Quotes) and the hostess gathering them all and then sending them back out to the players, each player specifies a theme for what they would like to receive. I was in a group specialising in Altered Playing Cards (APCs) - I asked for cards with a bird theme (the whole swap also had a rainbow theme to it). The themes in my group were John Cusack, Audrey Hepburn, Alice in Wonderland and dogs. The butterfly card at the top is for a different group - there were only two of us in that group and it wasn't a playing card group... 

Scrappy Log Cabins with Pink Flowers

Another set of scrappy blocks - these bordered in small remants of hand-dyes in (more or less) solids, then bordered with a cheerful border print. I won't make it to Farnham Maltings this year (the yearly quilt show and cheap fabric sale where I tend to restock my border (for donation quilts) and backing (for lots of things) fabrics, so it will be interesting to see what I come up with in 2015 for some borders - I do still have some things left from 2014 purchases, so I guess I'll get through quite a few of them!

Ready for quilting

Not much stitching today, but I did seam a backing for this quilt, which is going to be quilted up as a present for one of Sarah's friends.  Here's a really bad photo of the quilt top (the colours in the top photo are much truer) - which was done with a layer cake, quite a while ago. Better photos once it's quilted (which will be pretty soon - watch this space).

Sheep Virtues

These are all pieces you've seen before, but I finally got around to attaching them to the bits of wool they come with - not sure what I will do in the way of displaying them - and actually there are a few more already put together, but these are the four that were sitting around waiting to be done. I do really like them with wool backgrounds - they really suit.

Mayeb 2015 will be the year I finish the sheep! I've just looked back, and it appears that I've stitched 7 of these - these four, and Courage, Hope & Peace. Which means there are just five to go - not an unreasonable goal for a year!

Christmas "ball"

Many years - though not necessarily every year - I use some of the Christmas cards we receive to make a Christmas card ball.  I've done this so many times now that I don't need any instructions, but if you want to make one, you need 20 circles and some fast drying glue. These instructions on the web are very good at explaining the process.  I chose the 20 cards I wanted to use - I usually pick just the ones I like the look of, but sometimes I make sure to include a special one - for instance, the angel on the yellow background was drawn by the daughter of  a friend, and the Christmas tree on a funky map was hand-made for me by a friend (Hi, Ruth!), so both of those definitely had to be in. It's also nice to have fairly flat cards, otherwise it's hard to fold them. 

After cutting the circles, I use a triangle template and a ruler and something (this year, a little screwdriver) to score some lines to make the folding easier.

Then you begin to assemble the parts - 5 each for top and bottom and a ring of 10 for the middle.  The most important thing is quick drying glue as it means you can really assemble these easily, without paperclips to hold things together while they dry, etc.

middle

top/bottom

And here we have it - a finished Christmas ball.  This year, I even remembered to write 2014 on it somewhere - I usually forget the year! I think I have about 7 or 8 of these now, in various sizes - they are a great way to remember some of the cards you've received and a lovely Christmassy decoration, without spending any money...

The rest of the Christmas cards get turned into gift tags or bases to build ATCs on - and the offcuts go into the recycling box - very little waste at all.

Cross Stitch Update

Lots of progress on this one, this week - that's what a week off work, with sitting around watching films every night will do for your cross-stitching, I guess! Next week it's back to the Angels (in fact, I have already moved back, but as I posted something else on Wednesday this week, my cross-stitch update is on Thursday - shock, horror) - probably only one more week of stitching on them, as I'd actually quite like to finish this piece and sew another little tiny Christmas one before I get out of the mood for seasonal stuff. However, I do intend to finish the feet of the green angel, and perhaps extend the frame of the border. Or maybe work on the bell-pull - not sure which. And I've made a note of which reds I need to work on the border properly next year!