Sunday, June 18, 2017

17 in 2017 - Tablerunner #6 finished!


Tablerunner number six is complete!


This one measures 18 by 29 inches.


Matchstick quilting and a small dent out of the scrap basket!

Sunday, June 11, 2017

Chrysanthemum Quilting!


It was my birthday last month and I did receive some quilting goodies! My sister sent me over a signed copy of Emma Jean Jansen's book By the Bundle and four fat quarters. I ordered myself a copy of Modern Machine Quilting. Grace drew my portrait as a sewing super hero. And my in-laws deposited cash into our bank account so I could go here and spend it! The fabric on the left is what I purchased there as well as two delightful five inch square packs by Kaffe Fassett. I did intend to add it to the pile of "beautiful to look at, I will use you one day" Kaffe fabrics I already have,


But instead I added three more squares to each and they have become Tablerunner 7 and Tablerunner 8. I totally disagree with the husband who suggested I have gone with a simple design to get closer to my tally of 17! I am letting the fabric speak for itself Daz, cutting it up and adding other fabric would have taken away from the beauty that is Kaffe! Can you sense him rolling his eyes at me??!


So to add a bit of pizzazz to this runner, I turned to page 71 of my new quilting book and decided to give Chrysanthemum Quilting a go. It has added a nice texture to it.

Friday, June 09, 2017

17 in 2017 - Tablerunner #5 finished!


I finished Tablerunner #5 earlier this week but it has been a busy week so I'm only getting around to blogging it now. I'm really happy with this one, I love the colours, I love the scrappiness, I love  the spiral quilting. Might be hard to give this one away! It measures 13 by 34 inches.


I quilted this in an anti clockwise direction. Big mistake.It got a bit bulky in my machine's throat towards the end but being a small item it was manageable. Next time clockwise Helen, clockwise!


So Daz worked it out, if this is tablerunner #5 and I want to make 17 for 2017, I have 12 to go. We are in June, so 6 months to make 12 tablerunners. That is 2 a month. Or 1 every two weeks.


Or half a tablerunner every week. He continued to break it down to days and hours and then minutes. I told him to be quiet. But it did point out to me that I need to get my skates on! It is not impossible yet!


Here is the sunset from the end of our driveway earlier this week. Pretty.

Monday, June 05, 2017

Matchstick Quilting


It is a the end of a long weekend here in Western Australia. Today was "WA Day". An anniversary that "commemorates the foundation of the Swan River Colony near Perth by European settlers." Personally to me it means a sleep in till 8, another coffee in bed and some sewing time! So I got stuck into quilting my latest tablerunner. First I did white......


Then I added pale green between the gaps and leaving more gaps to add in some pale blue.


It has created a great texture. I brought myself a copy of Modern Machine Quilting for my birthday a few weeks ago and apparently this is called Matchstick Quilting. Well there you go, I learnt something new today. :)

Wednesday, May 17, 2017

Monday, May 15, 2017

Blue and Green Scraps!


Scraps! Scraps! Scraps! This is all the blue scraps I have retrieved from my scrap basket. I have enjoyed sewing the latest scrap rainbow tablerunner that I thought for next one I would follow a similar pattern but just do blue and greens. I got so into it that I have already pulled the green fabrics and sewn the blocks for green. Time to turn to the blues....


So the first pile looks like this when ironed out. I found myself thinking as I was ironing these scraps, funny how fabric taste can change. When I first started sewing I was into bright fabric. A lot of these scraps are left over binding bits.


And talking of binding..... I have finished the quilting on the latest tablerunner. Now which binding? Some stripes or black and white spots? Help!