My "Red Letter Life" quilt is completed ...... or is it?
This quilt was inspired by two things that happened in the summer. Firstly, Sophie of lunalovequilts blogged about her "Love" quilt. I love everything about this quilt, but especially the abstract lettering in the centre. Secondly, the theme in the upstairs room of our Flowerpatch Quilters exhibition was LOVE so I did my own abstract lettering to make a mini quilt 7½" square. I foundation pieced the letter squares then sewed them together.
By the by I also did another mini quilt for the exhibition using inktense pencils to draw the letters and added quilting and embroidery.
The quilting of Red Letter Life took quite a while. Its vertical wavy lines were sewn by machine with my walking (even feed ) foot.
I avoided all the red letters and quilted these by hand with horizontal lines. I really like the effect of the two types and directions of the quilting.
From the beginning I planned to sew small circles on my quilt to represent the happy bubbly feeling I often get in my life ......... especially when I'm starting a new quilt! I scattered some buttons on the quilt and took a pic ......
......but they simply looked distracting, so I ended up just sewing on some red circles around the edge.
I think though that I may be tempted to add more little circles to my quilt - maybe very subtle ones - we shall see.
Red Letter Life measures 32½" square and I'm hoping that you've been able to read my abstracted words.
Happy Bubbles - Anita x
I'm in the throes of sewing all sorts of things with nothing getting finished! ...... I badly needed the satisfaction of a finish and what better way to achieve this than by making a twinchie for a friend.
This is a little 2" square picture for my friend who works far too hard at her stressful job.
She has a dear cat called "Blue" who is a delightful companion to come home to ......... and a lovely husband too by all accounts!
I made a bit of a hash of doing a photo method for the making, but here goes:
This is my original rough sketch.
I traced the parts for fabric applique onto Steam a Seam 2, in reverse. This is where it starts to go wrong because I forgot all about the steps in front of the door.
I cut the patterns out roughly, removed the backing paper and hand pressed them onto the correct colour fabric. Still haven't remembered the steps!
This is the ready made twinchie I used - front and back. You can find out how to make a batch of twinchies in this older post of mine.
After removing the other backing from the Steam a Seam 2, I've laid the porch, door ..... and (at last) the steps in position on the twinchie. These can be moved around until you're happy with the arrangement and then ironed for a permanent fix. I used a Micron pen to draw some lines on the door and porch front.
I sewed some of the embroidery before adding the flower tub and the cat.I used just simple embroidery stitches - whipped running stitch, blanket stitch, lazy daisy, straight stitch and french knots.
Here's another look at the finish.
I really don't know why I don't sew more twinchies - such fun.
Happy Stitching
Anita x
The small quilts and cushions, etc add so much interest to any patchwork exhibition.
Here are a few items from the last Flowerpatch Quilters exhibition in August.
This first is a very dramatic "Titanic by Night" made by Chrissie
"Bits and Pieces 1 & 2" made by Sallie
These are samplers of many different dyeing and printing techniques.
2 lovely folk art cushions made by Dawn
"Stars of Friendship" by Jenny
I particularly like this saying on Jenny's wall hanging - Friends are like stars, we do not have to see them to know they are there.
"Heart Warming" made by Nina after the reverse applique evening a year ago
and "Tulips" - one of the items made by Pippa for her thoroughly enjoyable City & Guilds course.
Finally, this is a link to the picture and newspaper report about our exhibition.
Launceston Flowerpatch Quilters Exhibition
You can tell by our smiling faces how much we enjoy putting it on! - Anita x
We had an abundance of small and medium sized quilts at Flowerpatch Quilters exhibition this year.
These are some of the medium sized quilts.
Firstly 3 quilts made by Annie:
The very appropriately named "Buzzing Around"
"Tree of Life" - a Wendy Williams design
and Annie's own design "Time to Go".
These next three were made by Iris L:
"Wonky Stars" made by the stack & whack method
"Cornish Waves" - a foundation pieced storm at sea
and Iris' own design "Peaceful Piecing".
This is "A Quilter Lives Here" made by Chris - a Mandy Shaw design.
"Finlay's Comfort Quilt" - made with love by Cherrie
"Birds on a Wire" - another Wendy Williams design, made by Liz
"Rose Bowl" by Pauline C
"Warm Heritage" by Arnolda - a cosy woollen quilt to curl up under
and finally "Blue Bird Avenue" made by my friends Ann, Brenda, Dawn, Phyll, Sheila and myself. This quilt has been raffled to raise money for Macmillan Nurses.
It's been so lovely writing this blog and seeing the quilts all over again. Next time - even smaller quilts. - Anita x
Apologies for the delay, but at last I can show you some of the quilts at the Flowerpatch Quilters Exhibition in August.
Firstly some, but not all, of the larger quilts:
This is "Tulipa" by Melody which was longarm quilted by Sandy Chandler
"The Fall Guy" by Karen, also quilted by Sandy
"Luna's Little Monkeys" by Chrissie
"Gardening Makes Me Happy" by Pippa
"Life in Blues" by Elizabeth
"Folly Baltimore ll" by Sue - another beautifully quilted by Sandy
"Mr Noah's Quilt" by Jo C
and part of Pauline C's "Lazy Daisy"
More quilts next time - Anita x
I love looking at the pictures on Pinterest and get stuck there viewing page after page. What a brilliant resource for ideas, especially when you want to make something specific. The latest thing it has had me making (attempting) is button flowers. There are lots on there and they all look so cute that I just had to have a go.
This is the result -
They were easy to make and I used green fabric and Steam-a-Steam 2 to do the leaves.
There are much more beautiful arrangements on Pinterest so do go and have a browse if you're interested.
The rest of this post is about things that I have made as presents for friends and relations.
Having not done any crochet for some years I was pleased with how this white rabbit for Sheenah turned out.
I did get confused between the different names for the same stitches in other countries and had crocheted quite a lot in UK single crochet instead of double crochet before I realised he was going to be far too teeny tiny. He's quite a little bunny anyway! This was another Pinterest find.
And yet another I found on Pinterest is this knitted Dude Doll. This was so simple and just made from a stripey rectangle of knitting. All the shape is in the sewing up. I seem to remember that he is about 4" tall.
A golden wedding prompted me to make this fabric card, having previously made cushions for B & V's silver and ruby weddings.
It was the first time that I tried printing on fabric with my hp printer. I ironed the fabric on to freezer paper and it was much easier than I anticipated and not at all messy.
Finally this is a cushion that I made for Marie-Laure. The design was taken from one of her Mandala paintings.
Never a dull moment! - Anita x
