Amy Bradley and Paper Piecing

You'd better grab a cup or tea or coffee, this is a loooong post.

Remember this quilt???

I started it some time back with stash/scraps for my eldest son. After his recent 'I'm not a little boy anymore' revelation that ended up with some of his intended quilts being sold, I am feeling lucky that he still loves this one.

As you can see I have already done HEAPS of it! Not! Looks like I need to make a bigger effort with this quilt as my animal loving son has found a second quilt for me to make for him, ALREADY!

Kim over at Honeysuckle Cottage is going to run some Amy Bradley quilts as BOMs, mmmmm! These are so bright and cheery; and not all for kids either!

My two daughters are in love with Kitty Ballerinas.

Looks like I am about to embark on an Amy Bradley fest here; anyone care to join me???? I would love for some others to join me while I work on these quilts....nudge nudge!

Another option would be to purchase patterns and use as much of your stash as you can to make them.

While I was laid up with my fractured foot (now almost back to normal!) I started on a paper piecing project.

It's funny how things change, some time ago I started on small hexagons and lost interest. Then I started a Pies and Tarts quilt; and didn't enjoy making these either. By then I thought paper piecing wasn't for me. Sue's dvd on paper piecing came out with Australian Quilters Companion magazine a few months back and I really enjoyed watching it; but held back from paper piecing feeling fairly sure that I would start and not continue. By chance a fellow quilter sent me a link to SouthernCrossQuilters blog (she attends their monthly meetings) and the first post on their blog showed a paper peiced quilt that sucked me right in! Don't get me wrong here; so many of Sue Daley's and Robyn Falloon's paper pieced quilts have come close to tempting me, but this one just 'got me'. Kate found that the quilt pattern, Candied Hexagons by Kerry Dear, was in an out of print Quilters Companion mag. Kim found that Sue Daley is designing/making a quilt paritally based on this one; and has a starter's pack of templates and papers, which Kim is now stocking. Another turning point with paper piecing for me has been the basting. I hated basting. Now with the Sewline glue pen that Sue uses basting is much quicker and easier. Love it! Also, on Sue's blog are tutorials for all the paper peiced hexagons, which actually total more than what is in the Candied Hexagons quilt so you can pick and choose if you like! You will need to go back through her blog because there is no quick link on the sidebar, but they aren't too far back.

Have I lost you now???? Have I made sense???

Here are my blocks so far, about 15 done. I have another 10 basted up ready to stitch too. So that will make it 25 done out of approx 100 needed. Not too bad for someone who didn't paper piece! The block on the bottom left is JessieGirls; we made one block the same together one day and she really enjoyed the mum/stitching time.

A closer look at some of the blocks. nah, don't look too closely; I wouldn't get too far past the quilt police for accuracy!

Animals aren't allowed inside our house, but kids leave doors open from time to time and earlier this morning I found THESE four cats on MY Valori Wells 'Sole' quilt.

I often see photos on blogs with a cat or a dog on quilts but rarely do I see more than two at once; so before kicking them OFF and OUT I photographed them.

For no real reason their names are (left to right) Salem, Cactus, Eddie and C-Fa. LOL.

C-Fa was named by Mr Busy as he has a large C on his back and Mr Busy said 'C for cat, we'll call him C-for', which has become C-Fa.

Well I am off to do some more on Matilda Station!