Exciting Works

Above is some DollyDresses yardage that arrived today from the US; I have been using my stash of this range to make a BOM quilt with the online Friends in Stitching group. Each month one of us posts a link to instructions to make a pieced 12 inch block; we will end up with 12 blocks over 12 months. Until very recently I was a bit niggled as I didn't know how I wanted to 'set' my blocks. However when that pretty floral piece of Dolly Dresses 3 came the other week I knew Ihad to have some more of it! So I have 5 yards of it to do the main border and the backing. The periwinkle spot is for the inner border and binding; and the white spot is the sashing between the blocks. I ordered a yard each of the spot fabrics, but am wondering now if there will be enough for the sashing???? I hope so.

Also in the mail today came Deb Louie's quilting stencils!
The most recent Australia Quilters Companion magazine came with a free dvd 'Introduction to Free Motion Quilting with Deborah Louie'; and in the magazine was an offer to purchse the quilting stencils direct from Deb. These quilting stencils are used with a quilting pounce and chalk - which will arrive here soon. Deb's dvd has re-inspired me to make a move on my quilting. I seem to be able to pile up quilt tops easy enough but am rather slow when it comes to quilting them. I am hoping that the quilting procrastination will ease up as we gain some more living space here - things have been rather cramped here for a number of years.

A recent project is McKenna Ryan's 'Storybook Farm' quilt.

These are art quilts, and something new to me. The majority of the quilt is freemotion raw edge applique. I thought I picked the easiest block to start with for this quilt; however soon realised that even the simple blocks have many many pieces!

Here you can see that I am using an applique mat - a fantastic creation.

Here is the Geese block ready to be spray basted to the backing for me to freemotion the raw edges and quilt. As you can tell by my boot the blocks aren't tiny!

This quilt has been around for sometime now, and I NEVER thought I would be able to make something like this (LOL still might not be able to!). I bought this from Annie's Cottage Crafts in TAS as a BOM - she still has a few left but once they are sold won't be making up anymore BOMs/kits as alot of the fabrics are out of print.

Aunty started an in-class BOM for McKenna's 'Back on the Farm' quilt. (Lucky her, she gets tutoring!) So far they have cut and appliqued their fabrics and are almost ready to start stitching. Aunty tells me they won't be doing the stitching as freemotion rawedge so I am anxiously waiting to hear how they do it and how it goes. We both agree that the purchase of a Clover Mini Iron would be a fabulous help to press all the tiny pieces in these quilts.

I am so excited to be doing this quilt, and to be able to confer with Aunty as she attends her classes making her similar quilt.

Another recently started project is a Moda quilt using the Verna fabrics by Kate Spain.

Gorgeous range... I bought this as a kit a while back from Natalia at Piece'n'Quilt in the US.

I have been working on more applique projects but will share these in the next few days, will also show you why I haven't blogged since last week - it will freeze your toes off!