Flowerpatch exhibition preview & Tamar Threads

Another exciting Flowerpatch Quilters exhibition is happening shortly from Tuesday 6th to Saturday 10th August 2019, 10 am to 4 pm each day at Central Methodist Church Hall, Launceston, PL15 8BA. This year we have sewn three very different challenges and, after our preview evening last week, the exhibition promises to be as interesting and diverse as ever ...... and, we hope, inspirational.

I took some snippets of pics of some of the quilts.
There are a lot of birds!

a few monkeys

and many flowers.

A plethora of hearts for our "Love" themed room

and what a sad life it would be without our sewing machines!

A big 'thank you' to Jo Colwill for inviting us to Cowslip Workshops for our preview evening, and treating us to delicious lemon drizzle cake!

Last month I omitted to tell you about the Flowerpatch June meeting when we welcomed Katy Choroszewska of Tamar Threads. She gave a brilliant and entertaining talk all about her love of colour. She hand dyes and sells fabric and threads from her home in Gunnislake, Cornwall. These are some of the threads that she brought along.

What beautiful colours.

I certainly learnt a lot about colour from Katy and I'm sure there isn't any "goose turd green" or "rotting shellfish" colours amongst her threads. These were a couple of names for colours that had been used in the distant past!!

If you get the chance to hear a talk by Katy you can be assured of an enthralling and amusing time. She is not only a hand dyer but also an accomplished embroiderer.
Thank you, Katy, for your visit to Flowerpatch.

Do come along and see our exhibition if you're able - we have magazines, books and fabric for sale as well as refreshments ...... and cake! - Anita x

Strings and Circles Quilt

After a few stitched forays which ended up in the bin, I decided that it was time to go back to my circles and strings,combining the two in this 2' x 3' quilt.

It was the right decision as I thoroughly enjoyed making this quilt and it was finished in no time.

I thought that you might like to know the method I used for my foundation pieced string blocks which were all done in the same way.I sorted my fabrics into darks, mediums and lights. 
I used strips of medium and light fabrics for 24 blocks; 

and dark and light fabrics for 12 of the blocks.

The 12 string circles are in mediums and darks.

This is the 4½" paper square for the foundation piecing. I marked the edges at the distances shown and ruled the lines with a pencil, pressing very firmly to make it easier to fold along the line at a later stage.

I cut my strips of fabric a tad over 1½" wide and at least 5" long. Here I have 3 darks and 2 lights.

Starting from the left, I put the first two fabrics right sides together with the back of the dark fabric nearest to me. I laid the paper pattern over the top so that the first pencil line ran along near the right edge of the fabrics, just leaving enough for a small seam allowance, and sewed along this pencil line. It's a good idea to have a small stitch length when sewing to perforate the paper, making it easier to remove at the end.

I finger pressed the seam open, turned the paper over and folded it back along the second pencil line.Now you can see the edge of the second fabric which I cut at ¼" from the fold of the paper. I put the next fabric beneath the second fabric with right sides together and opened up the paper.........

........  ready to sew the next pencil line.

Here I am doing the next fabric strip in the same way.

When all the strips are sewn onto the paper it usually looks a bit of a mess, but is transformed after trimming.

I used the same light background fabric for all my 3¼" circles, but it was mottled so each square differs very slightly. Although I really like the quick method of sewing reverse applique circles by machine (which you can read about in my older post), I chose to sew these by hand using this method - then I could do it sitting on the sofa watching TV in the evening. I used a 4" paper foundation to make the string blocks for the circles.

Here is a link to a printer friendly PDF showing a pattern for the quilt and for the paper foundation............. Strings and Circles Quilt

QUILTING
After sewing all the blocks together it was time to think about the quilting. I wanted something a bit different so chose to emphasise the directions of the dark / light blocks with some diagonal straight lines sewing them by machine and by hand.

You may be able to see the quilting better on the back - 

I had seen the smashing effect of alternating machine and hand quilting on a quilt in Victoria's post "Waste not, want not" , but I think that maybe my lines are too far apart this time to create the desired look. This pic below shows how good it can be.

And a last look at my quilt

Thank you for reading if you made it this far!!

Finally this is a quilt that I have made with some dear friends. We have called it "Bluebird Avenue" and it will be raffled in aid of Macmillan Nurses

 Happy Stitching- Anita x

Parkhouse Quilters come to Flowerpatch

Flowerpatch Quilters were so pleased to welcome Parkhouse Quilters of Bude to the May meeting. Such a friendly group of ladies who brought along some of their quilts to show us.
This is a very small selection which does little justice to the many talents on display.

I love this house cushion with it's stripey windows, rickrack eves and intricate hand stitched embroidery on the edges.

Four beautiful, colourful birds cavort in this applique wall hanging

And 4 more birds of a very different kind - my favourite has to be speckled hen on the left!

I always like seaside pictures - we have a lot of coastline here in Cornwall. These two are delightful.

And a very different coastal scene

Thank you so much for visiting, ladies, and we look forward to entertaining you in May next year with a reciprocal evening at your Bude venue.

Also, thank you to all the FPQ members who provided the delicious cakes!!

Our charity quilt is completed. It is called Colour Treat Quilt as many of the patterns of the reverse applique appear in the Dutch Treat Quilts based on tile designs. It is being raffled in aid of the New Heli Appeal for Cornwall Air Ambulance.

You can read more about the Colour Treat Quilt in this previous post.

Our next meeting is on 13th June when we will have a talk on colour by Katy Choroszewska of Tamar Threads.

Happy stitching - Anita x

Penny Armitage at Flowerpatch Quilters

It was lovely to welcome Penny Armitage to the April meeting of Flowerpatch Quilters. This was a return visit for Penny and she had lots of new work to show us. Penny is much inspired by the beautiful countryside around her home in North Devon and by her love of flowers.

This is a picture of 3 dimensional flowers in a vase which Penny sewed many years ago.

Beautiful 3 dimensional flowers appear in many of her quilts.

Penny loves to take part in various challenges many of which involve the making of small wall quilts. These two are for "Your place or mine?"

And these mini quilts show three different seasons.

This is one of Penny's latest pieces of work and the one she is most pleased with,and excited about, at present.

It is eco-dyed using hedgerow leaves and has more printed leaves, flowers and berries applied, along with recipes and names. It is delightful - a labour of love.

It was great to see such a diversity of quilts spanning many sewing years.

During her talk Penny quoted this saying by Joseph Chilton Pearce "To live a creative life we must lose our fear of being wrong". How very true ..... and yet very hard to do!

Thank you Penny for another lovely evening.

You can see quilts from Penny's previous visit here - my very first blog post.

The next Flowerpatch meeting is on 9th May when we will be joined by Parkhouse Quilters of Bude, who will be doing a "show and tell" to entertain us. Such a talented group of ladies - it will be brilliant ....... and I do believe there's cake!!

Happy Sewing
Anita x

2019 Spring Quilt Festival, Exeter

I love visiting the Spring Quilt Festival in Exeter. I'm not much of a shopper, but the range of goodies on the numerous stalls is fantastic. I go mostly to see the quilts and this year there were some gems.

Firstly two quilts that I love for their colour.

This is "Upstairs Downstairs" by Marlene Chaffey

and a detail to show the twin needle cross hatch quilting in the border - a great idea.

This is by Christine Badger - a simple looking quilt made extra special by the choice of fabric and its placement.

I was much amused by another wall quilt by Christine called "Happiness is ... we all like to chat".

This was entered in the South West Quilters challenge "Happiness is ..." and another appealing entry was by Annie Yeo - "Happiness is ... a Snuggle". We all need plenty of these!

Lynette Anderson designs are always charming and this one is "My Country Cottage" made by Jeanette Cox. What a super combination of applique and pieced blocks.

Radiance Quilters - a group who quilt with longarm machines, created beautiful work using ice dyed fabric (I am yet to look this up to see what it entails!). All these 4 are about 24" square and are by Annelize Littlefair, Heidi Simkin, Roz Rossiter and Lynda Jackson.

Kate Andre was running a workshop on printing on fabric and I love these two unfinished pieces that she had as samples. They are very reminiscent of the copperplate printing of Rebecca Vincent - a favourite artist of mine.

Joan Dawson used lots of different techniques, including Inktense pencils, to create "Pebbles on the Beach". This was inspired by the beach at Lyme Regis.

This detail shows the painting of the sky, sea and pebbles combined with lots of quilting to make the surface texture.

Jean Stetson had some beautiful applique quilts in the exhibition and here are a few examples of the blocks in her quilts:

All the above are hand appliqued and hand quilted.

This beautiful work by Karen Lane is called "Summer in the Garden" and is a lovely combination of applique and embroidery.

And finally this is a triptych (each one is A4 size) by Penny Armitage for the Exe Valley Contemporary Quilt Group Challenge - "Tree Time" depicting the same tree in three seasons.

All in all a thoroughly enjoyable day out.

Happy stitching - Anita x

Susan Denton at Flowerpatch

Yet again another super evening meeting at Flowerpatch Quilters. We're very lucky to have such talented quilters here in the west of England who most generously share their work and experience with us. This month we welcomed Susan Denton from West Cornwall, who treated us to a screening of some photos of her travels and the quilts that they inspired, a number of which she brought along to show us.

Susan said that she started quilting 40 years ago, wanting to interpret the many wonderful sights that she was seeing on her travels both here and abroad; and also to satisfy her creative love of colour ....... and stitch.

Most of her works are machine pieced with hand applique and a mixture of machine and hand quilting. I feel that I must be disappointing you with my photos of such small sections of Susan's quilts, but it is her use of stitch that made the most impression on me - the way that she doesn't just quilt in lines on the quilt, but also does cross stitches, adding both extra colour and form.

Another of her ideas (of which there are many) was in designing a block for a quilt which she repeats, but with added or subtracted elements as the mood takes her. Being patchworkers we all love repetition and this seemed like an ideal starting point to stimulate, and not stifle, creativity.

Being an avid vegetable grower I was delighted to see her three quilts showing watering cans, scarecrows, and rhubarb forcers. I love Susan's bold use of colour and pattern.

A favourite quilt which I saw many years ago is the washing on a line in the Highlands of Scotland. After seeing this I had a whole year of making mini quilts with washing in a garden, hanging on the line and blowing in the wind!!

Thank you, Susan, for a lovely and engrossing evening.

Do Google, bing or pinterest Susan Denton to see some pics of complete quilts.

After seeing all that lovely bold stitching I feel another page idea forming for my "Love to Stitch" book!

The next Flowerpatch meeting is on 11th April when the speaker will be Penny Armitage - another talented local quilter.

Happy stitching - Anita x