Aviatrix Again!

Since playing with my Checker blocks last week, I've been working pretty frantically on my Aviatrix medallion. Last time I shared it, I'd only added the x plus blocks:

But last week, the teeny neutral squares went on (and I have to say I adore this neutral border. It breaks up all the colour so perfectly, and it was nice to have a really quick and simple border after those x plus blocks!!) I sewed these on during the day, and I think this is the only day-time photo I've managed to get of this quilt so far. I'm usually too impatient to wait to take pictures the next day in daylight ;o)

Since then, I've been steadily working on piecing the log cabin border. Although they are really simple to put together, they did take a fair while to make - an hour or two each night over the last week. Seeing them all together like this makes me want to make a log cabin quilt soon - yet another border in this quilt that could happily be a quilt top. I have always loved log cabin blocks, but the wide coloured strips combined with the thinner white strips and alternating placement in these is particularly effective, I think! 

I finished sewing them into borders and attached them to the centre of the quilt top tonight - and I'm way to impatient to wait to tomorrow to share it. I am SO in love with this quilt top! It's getting really big now (around 70" square I think?) so it meant balancing on books on top of a table to take this photo (which is why it isn't quite straight-on and kind of looks like the cat took it). The colours in this photo aren't great (again, impatient to share!), but you get the idea. It's just such a happy quilt, and it makes me so happy when I'm working on it! 

I've been procrastinating over the butterfly border since I started this quilt - but I'm so excited about quilting it I think I'll get them done as soon as I can. I do have a bit of time pressure to get them done too - I'll be teaching this quilt starting this weekend, so it would be good if I've finished the quilt top before my students get to the final border ;o) I'm so looking forward to teaching this quilt - and we have split the class into two because it got so big! It is going to be amazing seeing 16 different versions of this quilt being created!

Since it's still Wednesday (just!), and this is a WIP, I'm linking up with Lee (for the first time in a loooong time). 

I hope you're all having a fabulous week!

xx Jess

WIP Wednesday - Planning and Pattern Testing

While my machine has been out of action, I've been trying to get stuff done that doesn't rely on accurate piecing.  So, I've been making teacher presents for the amazing women who have taught my sons this year. Earlier this year, my fabulous friend Jen pattern tested for Michelle of City House Studio and made her fab 'Read Library Bag'. I instantly knew it was perfect for teacher presents. I've done the back and front panels, made the lining and am just waiting on my machine to quilt the outer panels and put them together. The boys asked their teachers what their favourite colours were, and I was under strict instructions not to deviate from it (hence all the pink and purple!!)

I've also agreed to pattern test for a couple of my quilty friends - these don't need to be done until mid-late January, so I'll have plenty of time to get them done, once I've finished up my HFWYG QAL quilt (I SO want my machine back so I can finish it off!!!) The plan is to start cutting for these while I wait for Friday and the return of my baby ;o)

First up, I'm pattern testing for the uber talented Jess - making her Lucky Square quilt in the twin size. This will be for my little girl - and I'm using my Sherbet Pips stash (plus a few other Aneela Hoey fabrics). Jess's used a much wider range of colours, so I'll be interested to see how it looks in a more restricted palette.

And then my gorgeous and talented friend Alyce asked if I'd test her first full size pattern (which is seriously fab!). Cue my FMF stash, plus a few other Denyse Schmidt prints. I'm deciding on background still (probably ash or white), but I'm really excited about this one too!

I also have bee blocks a plenty to catch up on, so I'm going to be busy, busy, busy for the next couple of months!

Oh, and please check out my Massive Aurifil Giveaway happening right now - it's open until next Monday.

Linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced (button in sidebar) - and looking forward to seeing what everyone is up to!

xx Jess

WIP Wednesday

I've had a ton of sewing energy of late - which has partly been channelled into projects I need to be working on, partly into something new ;o).

I finished my Windsor Lane baby quilt today - and I'm visiting the very new mum tomorrow with my sister to give it to her, so just a sneak peek for now. I'm really happy with how it finished up (although if you'd asked me last night during the four hour un-quilting marathon I may not have been so enthusiastic. Full details tomorrow!)

I've also made another couple of blocks for my HFWYG QAL quilt - these are called Clay's Choice and the tutorial can be found here. Busy blocks, but I really love the design of these - another block that would make an amazing quilt.

I've also cut and nearly finished my first Wiksten Tova top (I just need to insert the sleeves). Back when I started sewing (nearly 2 years ago now) I did a lot of garment making - and it's really nice to be doing it again! The Tova pattern is so easy to follow - so much so that I've ordered fabric for another couple (thankyou Black Friday sales!!). I haven't taken any pictures so far - so depending on how brave I am there may be a blog post with the big reveal in a few days :o)

I hope everyone is having a great week. I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced (button in sidebar) - and looking forward to checking out everyone's works in progress!

xx Jess

WiP Wednesday - Bunnies and Roses

This week has actually been pretty productive (a good thing, really. There's a lot to produce.) I got my Stash Bee blocks done and my block is made for the QAL tutorial on Friday.

The Windsor Lane baby quilt has grown too. The 40" central part is done - and I think I'll add a 5"-ish border using the background fabric.

I still need to sew all the sections together - but I'm pretty happy with (most of) the points so far. 

Still no idea how I'll quilt it - I'm hoping for some brilliant plan to occur to me while I'm basting it ;o)

Linking up to Freshly Pieced (button in sidebar). Looking forward to seeing what everyone has been up to!

xx Jess

WIP Wednesday - a growing (retro) flower garden

Not a whole lot of sewing since last Wednesday - we've been struck down with gastro and colds and general grumpiness. I have managed to put a few more flowers together though...

Nine done - so more than half way! I'd forgotten how painful all the trimming was with these - definitely my least favorite part of these blocks. I've found my groove with them now though and I'm finding it SO much easier to get the seams to match - there has only been a small amount of unsewing ;o)

But the other seven flowers are now trimmed as well, so it's just a matter of sewing them all together :o) Now it's getting closer I'm trying to decide how to quilt it - no firm ideas yet, I think there will be a lot of sketching before I tackle the quilting part!

In the next week, I need to get my bee blocks done (and my next tutorial for the QAL) so I'll be having a wee break from these. Still, it's so nice to be knocking over a WIP at last!

Linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced (button in sidebar), and I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone has been up to :o)

xx Jess

WIP Wednesday - Quilting Along

Not a huge amount of progress this week - although I have finished putting together the quilt top of Sweary Tula (I'm stealing that one, Katy. Slightly more grown-up than Rudey Tula :oP) and it's basted and waiting for me to have an 'ah ha' moment and start quilting it. I made the mistake of looking at how Angela Walters quilted Tula's Love version and I'm trying to stop thinking of its brilliance and just get going... What's really got me stumped is how to quilt the letters - I'm using poly batting with quite a high loft (which I wanted so the quilting really pops) and I'm tossing up whether to quilt the crap out of the letters, or to leave them fairly unquilted. Suggestions welcome!

Apart from that, I made the Weathervane block for our QAL, using Jess's revamped method. It's a 10 1/2" block, and it's a 9 patch so it was going to be very tricky anyway - but Jess has done up some paper pieced templates, and I'm stoked with how well it's worked (thanks Jess!).

All the blocks so far (they are actually square - dodgy warped design wall's fault!):

And I've paper pieced the sections for my St. Louis Star:

Hope everyone is having a great week,

xx Jess

WIP Wednedsay

The little sewing time I've had this week has been spent quilting Finn's quilt. It's probably 90% done and I am so happy with how its coming along. I'll be honest - I hate the process of straight line quilting, but the results are soooo good, it kind of makes it tolerable. 

I've quilted the coloured parts with straight lines 1" apart, following the zig zag pattern in the quilt top, which has given it the most amazing texture. I've used 50wt Aurifil in off white and its worked beautifully (the stitches kind of dissove into the quilt top). I'm really happy I decided to echo quilt - it is totally perfect for this quilt. 

Please ignore the massive amount of batting fluff on the back - and this is after a go over with the lint roller!

I decided to get a little bit fancy in the black sections - they're quite large areas, and I wanted to give them a little more visual interest, so I've quilted 1" apart, then 1/4", then 1" etc. using 50wt black Aurifil. I am totally over the moon with the black sections - it looks amazing! And Finn is thrilled with how it's coming together, so it's a win all around!

Hopefully this will be a finish by the end of this week :o)

Linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced (button in sidebar) - I'm looking forward to checking out what everyone has been up to this week :o)

xx Jess 

WIP Wednesday - Hopscotch begins

I've been getting a bit of sewing done in the last week or so which has been really nice.

A few more blocks for my Mendocino quilt

I've made my first two blocks (and photographed all the steps) for the upcoming QAL I'm co-hosting with Jess (if you're interested in joining us we have some great prizes up for grabs!). I'm actually organised for once, which has surprised me no end. I'm using this stack of prettiness:

And then this little beauty arrived in my letter box today and everything else stopped. Someone was destashing it in an Aussie Facebook destash group (?!?) and I was lucky enough to nab it.

Au-then-tic was Sweetwater's first collection and it's brilliant. Black, cream, greens and pale brown, loads of text prints and dots and stripes. Very rarely do I start using fabric as soon as I get it, but I was compelled to cut into this while I was still spellbound (and before I lost the nerve).

I bought the Hopscotch pattern by Thimble Blossoms a while ago, but hadn't gotten around to using it. To be honest I was a bit put off by the equilateral triangles - so many bias edges! But as soon as I got this jelly roll I thought it would be really cool in a Hopscotch quilt. I pulled out some of the green Reunion print below (which coordinates really well with Au-then-tic) and some Kona Ivory (I think?). I've also cut some Kona green - I think it's sage but I'd have to check - for some of the triangle points. After fighting with the templates a bit (for some reason none of them printed with the right angles, even with no page scaling. very frustrating.) I kind of winged it and hoped. But the first one turned out fine, so I think I'll keep doing what I did :o)

I love the greens (it's my very favorite colour) so I think this quilt will be just for me. I don't have a lap quilt for wintery nights so I think this will be perfect. Off to make a few more blocks - they're still at the 'oh these are fun' stage :o)

x Jess

WIP Wednesday: HST finishes!

Wow, this is my third post today. Heh. The other two were Festival of HST entry posts though so I really did have to split it into separate posts...

Anyway. I have had two finishes in the last couple of days. My Outfoxed on the High Seas quilt (you can read more about it here)

And my Rainbow Trail mini (blogged here)

Mojo is definitely back I'm happy to say! So plans for this week are to put together my iPad case I mentioned last Wednesday (didn't get any further than a few drawings and picking the fabric) and my biggest boy's giant chevron quilt. I am getting frequent 'so where's my quilt, mum?' so I really need to do that before I get onto anything else!

WIP stats for this week:

New Projects: 1

* Giant chevron quilt for Finn 

Finished: 2

In progress: 5

* iPad case

* Retro flowers QAL - at fabric selection stage still. So undecided about what to use!

* Baby quilt - no progress

* Swoon - completed 5/9 blocks (no progress)
* Stained QAL - no progress

 
Long term WIPs: 3
* Outfoxed on the High Seas  DONE!! Yay!
* Fandango
* Pop garden
plus a few other abandoned projects that may never see the light of day again ;) 

I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced - go check out what awesome stuff everyone's been doing :o)

xx Jess

WIP Wednesday - Making sushi of the fabric kind, and a destash GIVEAWAY!!!

WIP Wednesday - bee blocks and fabric fondling

I've managed to get a bit done this week, mostly working on finishing off the second commissioned quilt (which is basted and ready to quilt tonight hopefully!) but also making my bee blocks for the 4x5 bee. 

Yes I made some snail trail blocks for my hive - they worked really well (and came out at 12 1/2" which was awesome!) I actually pressed my seams open for these - and they look much crisper than normal. The blocks people have made in my hive are amazing, I am so honoured and excited that I'll be lucky enough to recieve them! Most of them I wouldn't have any hope of making myself ;o)

There has been quite a lot of bundle building going on too. I'm really stumped with what I want to use for the Retro Flowers QAL. I put together this set of fabrics today:

I'm still not entirely certain where I'm going to go fabric-wise. I might end up dropping the grey/black prints in favour of some more colour, but I do like these together... I think there's a good mix of value in there and I love teal/purple/orange/mustard together (a little bit retro?) but I'm really dithering on it. 

Anyway WIP stats for this week are:

New Projects: 2 

* Retro flowers QAL - at fabric selection stage

* Baby quilt - started fussy cutting my Meet the Gang

Finished: 1 (bee blocks)

In progress: 5
* Swoon - completed 5/9 blocks (no progress)
* Commissioned quilts - first quilt top done except binding, second one basted and ready for quilting.
* Stained QAL - no progress
* 4x5 Bee blocks done
 
Long term WIPs: 3
* Outfoxed on the High Seas
* Fandango
* Pop garden
plus a few other abandoned projects that may never see the light of day again ;) 

WIP Wednesday - How to quilt a monster (and a giveaway!)

After a week or so of working on another (secret) project, I gave in and started quilting the giant Just Wing It quilt. It's really not that massive - just a lot more massive than my usual baby quilts. At around 60" x 85" I was a bit scared of trying to wrestle it through my machine to FMQ it.

I've been pleasantly surprised at how easy it's been - the middle part has required a fair bit of starting and stopping to manipulate the part I have rolled up within the throat of my machine, but otherwise its been smooth sailing. I'm doing a loose stipple (not sure if that's a mutually exclusive statement? Does stipple mean tight?) - around 1" between the quilting. This should hopefully make it a good texture for a bed quilt, and mean its snuggly and soft once its washed.

I normally start at one corner and quilt like Elizabeth's tutorial. This time I did it differently. I drew a (really dodgy) diagram showing how I did it. Note how bored I got of drawing wavy lines - they get progressively more sloppy. I did not do this with my real quilting ;o)
* I started at 1 (with the quilt rolled up from the bottom side in this picture) and quilted that quarter, moving from the centre to the side edge and back again, all the way down the quilt..
* I removed the quilt completely from my machine, and rolled the quilt from the right hand side in the photo - starting at 2, I quilted down from the middle to the bottom edge, then up, then down etc. until that quarter was fully quilted.
* Once that quarter was finished, I rolled the quilt from the top side in this picture, and started at 3, quilting across to the edge and back to the middle etc.
* Finally, I rolled the quilt from the left side and started at 4, quilting up and down until I had finished the final quarter.
I will definitely be using this technique for quilting larger quilts from now on. It involved minimal quilt wrangling (the weight of the quilt was on the table top as much as possible) and I didn't have too much of the quilt under my machine at any time.

I finished quilting it tonight - but the photos are of a part-quilted quilt taken during daylight hours (better ones tomorrow I promise!)

Oh, if you haven't already entered, I have a giveaway open until next Tuesday (sponsored by Sew Fresh Fabrics, so it's a goodie!!)

Linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced - as always, go check out the awesome stuff being made :o)

WIP Wednesday - Just Wing It #1

I did a small blog revamp last night, and I now have a 'current WIP' page so I can keep track of what I need to finish off - although I really can't imagine that will stop me starting new projects anyway :-p

I've been sewing up a storm this week, getting the first of my commission quilts done - I've nearly finished the quilt top. I will be about 55" x 85" when its done, and I'm struggling to get a good photo, because it's been raining and I don't have anywhere inside to hang it...

This is the main central panel (really crappy photo sorry) - mostly Just Wing It by Momo with some Just Dandy, metro circles and a white/pink/red polka dot print (not sure what collection its from...) I'm hoping to get this one finished, basted and quilted in the next week or so, and then get started on the second one.

WIP stats:


In progress: 3
* Swoon - completed 5/9 blocks
* Commissioned quilts - first quilt top nearly done, second one cut ready to assemble.
* Secret project

Long term WIPs: 3
* Outfoxed on the High Seas
* Fandango
* Pop garden
plus a few other abandoned projects that may never see the light of day again ;)


Linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced (link button on sidebar).

WIP Wednesday with a few more finishes!

I am so glad to have a few more finishes this week. Phew, my WIP pile is not shrinking exactly, but I am getting somewhere at least!

I finished off my FTLOS big item (post here), and now just have to package it up with the small item (*cough* yet to be decided on *cough*) and send it off to the other side of the world. Yikes!

I finished my Modern Mini Quilt Challenge quilt. It's so tempting to show you all, but I want to wait till the 5th. Not sure why, its not really anything special, I just want to keep it under wraps!

I've discussed with my client and finalised the fabrics I'll be using for her commissioned quilts. We've decided on (mostly) Just Wing It by Momo as it matches her daughters' room's decor quite perfectly, with a few additional prints thrown in. I've been stashing prints from the collection for a while, and I'm really looking forward to starting to put these together, as I love the fabrics and I think (hope) they'll be really great quilts. While I was chatting to her on Sunday, she asked if I could put together a library bag for her daughter who's just started kindergarten. I obliged - its nice to get back to my non-quilty-sewing roots occasionally and I had some Flower Fairies fabric I was struggling to come up with a plan for. I've used Jeni's drawstring bag pattern and it is totally fantastic! I plan on making a few of these for my own kidlets for toys etc.

I've appliqued her daughter's name on it - and got to try out a few stitches on my machine that I've never used, which was fun! It does a really great blanket stitch which looks really cool around the letters. It's very sparkly and girly and I'd imagine her little girl will love it (what little girl doesn't love fairies?)

I've also made a bit of progress on my secret project.

WIP Stats:
Finished: 2
* For the Love of Solids project - DONE!!
* Modern Mini Quilt challenge - DONE!!

In progress: 3
* Swoon - completed 5/9 blocks
* Commissioned quilts - almost finished cutting (120 6" squares, 100 3"x6" rectangles and LOTS of white sashing - about 4 yards worth!)
* Secret project

Long term WIPs: 3
* Outfoxed on the High Seas
* Fandango
* Pop garden
plus a few other abandoned projects that may never see the light of day again ;)

I'm linking up to WIP wednesday over at Freshly Pieced (see link on left hand sidebar) - pop over and see all the other quilty inspiration!

xx Jess

WIP Wednesday - the one with a new obsession

I've had a fun week this week, trying a new-to-me technique: English paper piecing! I'm loving it, cos I can sit on the couch and sew and watch a bit of TV (Mr Elven Garden is working interstate at the moment, so I'm a bit tired most nights to sew on the machine.) I can only give you sneak peeks so far - this one is my mini quilt for the Modern Mini challenge:

And this is a secret project (so you won't be seeing any more of this one ;) )

Other that these new projects (I just can't help myself!!) I've finished off the quilting on my FTLOS project, and have made the binding so its ready to be finished finally. I've run out of thread though, so its waiting on me getting into the city to buy some more :)

I also finished and posted my Name Game swap mini quilt - and my partner has recieved it and likes it (so relieved - first swap and I was really nervous that she wouldn't like it...)

I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced (no WIP stats this week - it will just depress me, what with the new projects and lack of finishes ;) )

xx Jess

WIP Wednesday: minis galore!

I've actually had my first finish for the year - and two more very near finishes this week. So its been a good de-stress week. I wasn't actually stressed precisely (I knew I had plenty of time to get them done) but didn't like the feeling of lots of projects with deadlines, and none of them done.

My finish was my Name Game swap mini quilt - I sent it today so I still can't show the name but this is it (please ignore my highly technical method of covering the name :p)

I really struggled with what to do for this one - my swap partner is into very country-style quilting (WAY out of my comfort zone!) so I was clueless as to what to do. I don't think I've mentioned that I'm doing the Curves Class over at Stitched in Colour? Well I am (uh, obviously now!) and the scalloped applique part was one of the projects from our first week - modified from a cushion into a smaller panel on my mini quilt. I used my Freebird by Momo fabrics (pretty, but not really my thing... the remaining ones might be a destash giveaway soon...), and actually quilted the name onto the mini. I wrote up how I did it - so you can check out my tutorial if you like (it may give away the name pretty well - but I'm positive she doesn't read my blog anyway!) It's not something I would usually make, but its a pretty little quilt.

I've made a fair bit of headway on my For the Love of Solids project as well. It's fully pieced and mostly quilted.

I was going to hand-quilt the entire thing - but at about 30" x 18" it was going to take forever (I'm VERY slow at hand-quilting!) so I've machine quilted around some of the stars, and I've started hand quilting the rest. Still not sure, but I think it will be a sewing machine cover rather than mini quilt.

I've made another swoon block as well - five down, four to go. I'm kind of enjoying the sporadic-ness of making these blocks, but another part of me wants to buckle down and get them done - I can't wait to see how they all look together.

I put together another mini quilt as well - which I am in the process of hand stitching the binding on. I'm doing the 4x5 bee, and I've chosen to make snail trail blocks. One of our hive members has asked for rainbow colours with dark grey, so these blocks were an experiment to see if it worked (plus its going to be a present for my mum).

Stats for this week:

Finished: 1 - yay!!
New projects: 2

In progress:
Swoon - another block done

No progress:
* High seas
* Pop garden
* Fandango
* Commissioned quilts (2) - waiting on fabric

Hope everyone has had a great week - I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced

xx Jess

Fresh Sewing Day and WIP Wednesday - another one with no finishes, and more beginnings...

I still haven't had a finish for 2012. Lots of starts, but no finishes. Looking through what I've actually gotten done though, I'm not too upset - I just need to get a lot of these done in the next month :-)

I have finished my Outfoxed on the High Seas quilt top - and I'm still deciding how to quilt it, and whether to put a border on it (I am actually thinking I will - pretty sure I'll use a solid, just not sure what colour) Any suggestions would be most welcome!

I've started my Swoon quilt - four blocks done, another two cut and started (HSTs and flying geese done)

I've almost finished the piecing for my For the Love of Solids swap project:

I'm doing a smaller sized sparkle punch (squares are 2.5") and its going to be a sewing machine cover. Once I've finished piecing it, I'm going to hand quilt around the stars using embroidery floss. And I'm thinking a scrappy binding using the same colours as the stars...

And I've finally decided on my Name Game Swap quilt. My partner is into very country style quilty stuff, which is totally outside my usual comfort zone - so I'm going back to my pre-quilty-cross-stitch-obsession and cross stitching the centre part of the mini, and will do some patchworky stuff around the outside. We're going on a mini break tomorrow for four days so I'm hoping to get the stitchery done while we're away.

I have a semi-secret paper pieced project I'm going to start very soon. And there is a great little paper-pieced sew along happening over at A Labour of Love, inspired by the very awesome, paper pieced issue of Fat Quarterly which I am going to get involved in (check it out - the more the merrier!) Oh, and I've just been commissioned to make a couple of twin sized quilts for some little girls which is very exciting :-) A bit frazzled, I need my kids back at school so I have my nap-time quilting again!

I'm linking up to Fabric Tuesday, WIP Wednesday and Fresh Sewing Day.

WIP Wednesday: Stars in my eyes

After last week's stuck-in-bed sickness I am really, really glad to have my sewing mojo back. I tried on Sunday but still felt really flat, so it's been nice over the last couple of days to feel well enough to get some things done.

I finished my third Swoon block. This is all three of what I have so far:

I'm pretty happy with how they're going, although there have been a couple of great threads on working with large-scale prints which would have been brilliant to have read before making the centre block... I might possibly redo the big points, but I'll wait and see. I don't hate it, but it bugs me that the stripes don't align in all of them...

I've also started working on my partner's item for For the Love of Solids swap. I'm hoping she'll like it - she's a bit of a silent partner, so I'm working with what's in her mosaic and form. Here's what I have so far:

She asked for stars and her mosaic had similar colours to these (teals and purples, and wine-reds) so hopefully she'll like it. I'm (obviously) using the Sparkle Punch quilt along as inspiration - but I've made my squares 2.5" instead of 3.5" so I can fit more into the space I need to fill. At this stage I'm thinking a sewing machine cover, and I think I'll hand-quilt around the stars... It's a bit over half-way there size-wise.

WIP stats:

* New projects: 1
* Finished: 0
* In progress: 8 (I think...)

I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday and Fabric Tuesday

xx Jess