African animals

This bright, colourful top - a mix of an orange gradation print and scrappy rectangular log cabins - went really nicely with this African animal print - close up of the border fabric below. I really like how this one came out.

Fashion Border

I got this little top bordered with some fabric with dressmaking dummies and the names of major fashion cities - goes well with the colours of the blocks in the centre I think, and will add appeal for a young person, I hope.

Lots of little neutral blocks...

Yay, there's been more sewing in my January! Here's another set of blocks which I had waiting around which has now been sewn into a top (and which will probably, in time, get a border around it). 

ATC Friday

A couple of finished sets, with insect themes (coincidence!) - these first ones are quite different to the starters, despite the large butterfly image. 

This set shows much more of the original  - but that's why I like working on cards with other people - the variety is great.

Squares and rectangles

...And here's one of those sets of blocks put together into a little top - the blocks were made of a long rectangle, with three squares on each side - I pieced them together alternating direction. Now it can go in the pile of Linus tops waiting for borders...

Block Sets - January

As it's a new year, and as I didn't do much sewing in the latter half of 2016, I thought this was a good time to take stock of the blocks I have hanging about waiting to have something done to them. Here they all are on my dining room table - looks kind of crazy, I know.  There are twelve different sets of blocks, though some of them have a lot of blocks and will make multiple tops. And some of them are small and may be turned into larger blocks before using.

Here they are a bit more organised - and here's what you are looking at:

Top right: 8" rail fence variation blocks (33)

Top middle: 6x9" birds on blue sky background (42)

Top right small pics (upper): 8" brown, pink, red bordered Red Riding Hood blocks (20); 8.5" batik chunky pinwheels (18)

Top right small pics (lower): 4" 3 patch blocks (2 squares, one rectangle) (155) - these will almost certainly have something else done to them before being used; 7" neutral bordered wonky 4 patch blocks (36)

Bottom right: 8.5" aqua Roman stripe blocks (30)

Bottom middle: 12" circular flying geese blocks (9)

Bottom right small pics (upper): 6.5x8.5" rectangular log cabin blocks (90); 4.5" Christmas four patch (84)

Bottom right small pics (lower): 8" string blocks (90); 6.5" scrappy rail fence blocks (48)

Polka-dotty Linus Quilt

Here's another little Linus top, with a border added. These novelty blocks are a little more geared to boys - tractors, cars, guitars - but the dots work well with them, cheerful and colourful.

Backings ready

Not the most exciting of all sewing jobs, but I did stitch together the backings for the two shirt quilts, so they are ready to go to the longarmer later today. I feel much better having this project nearing completion!

ATC Friday

A couple more finished ATC sets - these were both sets which I started, and two other people added to. This first one, I just put the birdcages on - they were quite large, so I thought they didn't need anything else. 

With these, I put a single stamp on the background, which means there was a lot more room for embellishment. I love seeing what peopke think to add to things!

Fireworks Top 2

And here's the second top, with the same border fabric - looks very similar to the one from Saturday, I know, but I promise there are two of them!

A trip to Farnham Maltings

Almost didn't make my annual trek to the quilter's show and fabric sale in Farnham this year - I just drove to and from Brighton yesterday, I am at the end of a rubbish cold and my friend who I often go with couldn't go this year. But I decided to do it anyway as I really needed backing fabric for a couple of quilts - and I'm glad I did. I picked up backing for the two t-shirt quilts (the stripes at bottom right), for a wedding quilt for later in the year (the elephants) and for a baby quilt I need to do soon (the flamingos). Also picked up a couple of yards of cheap cute fabric for Project Linus, some fat quarters (the spots will be binding for the t-shirt quilts) and a fun half metre piece with a major league baseball theme. Think I might make a cushion from that. Success all around!

Fireworks top 1

I don't normally have much time to sew on Saturdays, but Alex's swimming lesson was cancelled this morning, so I had some unexpected space in my weekend - enough to get the border on this centre. I love the firework fabric!  There's another centre waiting for the same fabric as a border, hopefully I will get to it later.

ATC Friday

Here are two more sets of finished ATCs - these are ones where I was th third person to add something, so I didn't have to worry about leaving space.  The oriental card spoke to me straight away - I knew it had to have some of the little Japanese squares. A gold foil flower finished it off.

The seahorse definitely needed something at the bottom of the card, so I cut a fun green tonal paper into freehand seaweed. I think it works!

Linus top with Frogs

This cute frog print went really well with this slightly quirky centre top. The frogs are great!

Another Brown Top

This one very similar to the last, but with slightly different blocks. Same border fabric, though.

A brown quilt top...

Here's my second finished top of the year for donation to Project Linus (or other charity - sometimes my Linus Coordinator works with other charities to house tops more suitable for older children or adults, like Teenage Cancer Trust or hospices, etc).  More to come soon, as I make my way through that stack of tops paired with borders...

A stack of matched up tops!

In preparation for doing some actual sewing in 2017, I've now got a  stack of Project Linus tops which want borders adding to them. I did do quite a bit of sewing in 2016, just not in the second half of the year. One of those years!

Anyway, I started this process by putting all the top centres which I'd been accumulating out on the floor and then trying to match them up with suitable prints for borders. 

Managed pretty well with most of them, though I think there were one or two which didn't really work. And that's fine - I'll put them aside for later.

ATC Friday

I struggled with these cards when they first came to me, I admit. The central image was quite large and I didn't really know where I wanted to go with them. But after some experimentation, I think they came out pretty well.

These were easier - although they also had quite a large design on them, it was more obvious what they needed  - a touch of piratey text!

Little Wall Quilt

This has been hanging around for ages, quilted and with binding attached but not stitched down. It had no purpose, though, so it never was finished up. Finally, it found a purpose when I needed a quilt for an occasion, so it's done now - I attached some hanging mechanisms as well...

Project Linus in 2016

Looking back at last year, I see that I finished up 23 quilt tops for Project Linus. Entirely in the first part of the year. I did actually make a lot more later in the year, but none of them got quite to the finished stage - which means I have a big pile of tops with no borders hanging about, needing bordering. I know I have one more which has a border fabric set aside for it; I need to spend a little time on the weekend pairing up centres with border fabrics to see what I can finish up.  An aim for 2017 is to work through my block sets, of which I have quite a few.

Here's a look back at all the tops (bordered ones, or ones I've donated without borders) completed in 2016.

April/ May:

March:

February:

January: