More Catch Up

 Another Hatched and Patched project finished off. 

This is Petite Sewing Kit and all I had left to do was put the bag together, I don't know why we put off finishing things when there isn't much left to finish! 

 This is a baby quilt that is now bound and awaiting the arrival of a friends first grandson.

Fabrics are Pure by Sweetwater and the pattern was Verna by Kate Spain.

 I'm so very pleased with how it turned out, though it is looking a little wrinkled here in the pictures...

This is a finished project.

It is a surprise, my birthday gift ready to post closer to the birthday, for the online Friends in Stitching group that I am part of. I am so very pleased I was able to get this done just prior to having the baby because if it was now there would be no way it would be finished any time soon!

The fabrics are Aviary by 3 Sisters and the pattern.....you will have to wait till later in the year to know that and see the rest of it!

Quilting over a few weeks

Lately I have made the choice to quilt/sew over blogging, I couldn't do both with my limited time/energy of late. My full time nausea that I had for both first and second trimesters of this pregnancy dissappeared when I got to third trimester, so I set about to get done what I could while able. Until this week Mr Busy had been away for eight weeks in a row, sometimes only home for two nights/one day before leaving again, though this didn't increase our chore load much it is a relief to have him home again. Add this in to numerous appointments for myself and the children, home schooling, keeping on top of living in major renovations, preparing for a new baby and being rather tired. 

So this is what I have been up to in recent weeks.

Finally finished is the Sheep quilt for DS. I started this quilt back in 2007. It sat for a long time just pieced as I wanted to put tractors on it instead of the sheep. Then DS was calling sheep 'heep' and we were coaching him to put a 'shh' in front of the 'heep', so I then put the sheep appliques onto the quilt. LOL, that brought more delays as with the quilt top together and the appliques needing to be stitched down I didn't want to do this, so the quilt sat again for ages until late last year (2012) I decided to baste the quilt and do the applique/quilting in one go. I just worked on a little bit at a time and got through it; I even had the binding on and stitched down before the quilting was finished - this nice.

The quilt was in Australia Country Threads magazine vol 8 no 1 and is designed by Roz Leadbetter of Country Cupboard Designs. The original quilt was 40 inches square with 8 sheep appliques but I increased my block numbers (now 12 sheep) to make it larger.

A little boy is loving having this on his bed finally!

 Butterfly Garden is almost quilted. I basted this almost two weeks ago and basting on the floor when 34/35 weeks pregnant isn't easy; in fact it left me feeling so tired and achy that I'm not basting again till after the baby comes.

 Here are the other quilts I have been working on in the past few weeks, they are all quilted and are waiting for me to hand stitch down the bindings. The top three are for babies that are due soon to friends/family of ours. The second from the bottom is a Fig Tree quilt for my neighbour who had breast cancer a few years ago (I may be slow but do get there eventually!) and the bottom quilt is the QS Luna Notte quilt for our bed that was basted twelve months ago, so it will be on our bed this winter. I don't recommend leaving quilts basted with pins for too long, a lesson learnt!

 Three more quilts that I was hoping to have basted/quilted before the baby comes, but it isn't to be as I can't baste on the floor anymore. These will just have to wait a bit longer!

These quilts are; Little Macca's Farm for my youngest DS. the 'lolly' quilt, for DS who has the Shheep quilt I showed above. My Friends in Stitching BOM from 2010 for DD who owns the Floral Bouquet quilt in this post.

Once these are quilted I should only have 7 quilts left to quilt! I tend to like putting the tops together more but with quilting my own and having such a large pile to quilt I had to make this priority; and I have enjoyed finishing these quilts off.

 last week I put together my hand quilting hoop that I bought from Anni at The Home Patch (Hatched and Patched) over a year ago. This quilt is the cheater cloth from Bonnie and Camille's Bliss fabric range. I ditched all the straight bits but did a terrible job on the circles. So much for putting together a quick to make quilt! A while back I decided that I would hand quilt the circles in as the quilt doesn't feel finished without the circles being done. It has been years, 2004, since I did any hand quilting......

 Floral Bouquet in Sunkissed is finished.

DD loves it and was over the moon to put it on her bed in her new room (well for a short time anyway). As you can see there is no proper flooring (cyrpess floorboards need to be laid) and no window trim; there are also no doors either.

DD moved into her room so her brother can move from our room to make room for the baby. She will have to move out when Mr Busy lays the flooring down, but in the meantime she is loving having space to herself.

 Such a pretty quilt and fabric range....

Quilts

The above quilt is HeMingHos that I actually finished a number of months ago but didn't have a camera at the time to show you. I made it using only two jellyrolls and backing fabric. The centre squares are pieced with two JR strips and the binding is a scrap binding. I had very little left from the two jelly rolls which was fantastic. Even better I bought the JRs on sale! The quilt is SB size and is on our lounge at present.

This one is ready for me to stitch down the binding. It is a baby quilt to put away for when I need one for a gift. I used two American Jane charm packs to make the dissapearing nine patch, then sashed it with white. The quilt size is about 50" square, so a generous size for a baby/toddler.



Another baby quilt to have the binding stitched down and be put away for when I need a gift. Another dissapearing nine patch quilt, this time using Basic' Grey's Max and Whiskers range. Size is about 38" square.



The Friends in Stitching online group that I am in has been doing pieced block of the months the past two years, with one person choosing a block per month for everyone else to piece. This is the BOM from 2010, I didn't start last years because I hadn't finished the previous years quilt top, and I when I decided to put this quilt together I didn't piece the four blocks that I was behind on, so it is 55" square, lap quilt size and not single bed size. I used my stash of pretty Holly Holderman fabrics to make this. 

A quilt top to quilt and put away for a baby gift. LOL It seems like I am  building up stash of these, but with two nephews and one neice being born within a couple of years and me being as slow as I am at getting their quilts made I wanted to be a bit prepared from now on.

I used the Verna quilt pattern and Pure fabrics to make this one. It's about 40" square.



This quilt top is a project from last years Fig Tree Club and once quilted it is a gift for my neighbour who went through breast cancer and a masectomy a couple of years ago. The layout of this quilt was quite simple and basic, and to start with I was a little dissapointed with the design; but once I started piecing it I fell in love. It is so much prettier in reality than the computer image. I feel a little reluctant about giving it away! I am sure my neighbour is going to treasure it when she recieves it. I think it's about 68" square.

This is a SB size (78" by 50") dissapearing ninepatch, lol I think I have made enough dissapearing nine patches for the time being! I used two ranges, Farm Fresh and Fox Trails, both by Riley Blake Designs.

This quilt is for our new baby, lol it was meant to be cot size as I haven't any patchwork/quilted cot quilts but as wanted to make as much use out of the charm squares I had bought the quilt has ended up being much bigger! Before I quilt this for the baby I have set myself the goal of finishing off quilts for my other children as I have only finished quilts for two out of five children. Luckily don't have much to finish the remaining three quilts, provided I can manage better with this all day nausea that doesn't seem to be going away.

This is Floral Bouquet and it is for my eldest daughter, made with a JR of Sunkissed that Kerri sent me as a thankyou for when I helped her out last year. On the back is one of Heather Bailey's Fresh Cut fabrics. This is one of the quilts that doesn't have much to go on it; and I need to get it quilted so I have pins to baste some of the quilt tops I have recently finished. Don't get me wrong here, I do have quite a pile of basting pins so I don't need to purchase any more. I also happen to have a QS quilt that is also full of basting pins at present too; AND I need some motivation to get these tops quilted!

Chicken Run

This is Chicken Run by Hatched and Patched, and it was the second quilt top I pieced!

I pieced this one while I was finishing the sampler quilt top I made in my intro to patchwork and quilting at Anni's Shop, The Home Patch in Bathurst.

We used to live in Bathurst and it was while we were in transition to moving to our farm (6hrs drive) that I walked into Anni's new shop and liked what I saw. After speaking to Anni and Kate (teacher) I signed up for the 8 wk class though I would only be there for 6 weeks of it. Before leaving town I stocked up at Anni's shop and actually had this top peiced; a big thing for me then as I had two children under two and was 5 months pregnant with the third. After we moved, I appliqued the chickens on and was desparate to have Chicken Run and my Sampler quilt quilted. I rang and ordered a walking foot and once here made a terrible mess of the practice quilting. No way could I do that. (Now I know that the silly shop sent me a freemotion foot and not a walking foot, no wonder I had trouble!) So I rang for an approximate price to have the quilts quilted. DH said no way were we paying that. At this time I only had a few weeks till the baby was due so I resigned myself to not having my quilts quilted.

As you can see in the above photo I did start to handquilt, but that didn't get very far! My arms got very tired of holding up the hoop. I looked into buying a hoop on a frame like Anni uses but again DH was a firm NO.

So Chicken Run has been sitting tucked away, out of sight.

EIGHT YEARS later I have now ditched the blocks, leaving my hand quilting in and giving the option to handquilt more in the future. It is finished and I am so very pleased with this lovely quilt! The chooks are so cute....

This is my second oldest UFO....

I am very sorry about not posting for so long, I didn't realise how quickly time has been ticking away. As a result I do have quite a few posts to put up in the next few days to catch you all up on what has been happening here.

Matilda Station Finished

Lovely wrapping paper!

Matilda Station is finished, wrapped and gone to it's new home!

A massive quilt and a huge amount of work; but very satisfying to have it finished.

A few weeks ago I went to make another sewing purse for a friend and stuffed it up. I didn't re-pin and sewed right over a pin and then caught almost the tip of the pin and broke the machine needle. It is the white headed pin in middle of the photo; and this project is still not finished!

Since I last blogged I have been head down working hard on my SSCS present to send. I finished it today and have it ready to post. The little parcel on top contains a christmas ornament and the recipient is to open this upon recieving the parcel; then the larger parcel is to be put away to be opened on Christmas day.

Happy Days

Finally finished after about 3 years!

This quilt has been sitting, about three quarters quilted for that long. I wasn't happy with my quilting and left it. Could not stand the thought of unpicking and starting again so it sat collecting dust. My friend Kim found out and told me to GET IT FINISHED! I didn't unpick, just picked up where I left off. Most people would not notice what I was unhappy with; and the quilting is part of my learning and progression; so I look at this quilt with a GREAT BIG smile now - it's finished!

My corners are a little rounded, actually looks nice for a something different. I had trouble binding my corners and when I finished the last one I worked out how I should have done it! Isn't that often the way!
What a beautiful sunny day we have here today, and some lovely green grass!

In the pattern Anni suggested using 10 inch squares for the backing or a single fabric. This was my first pieced backing and I love it! A pieced backing makes the quilt more reversable but I also don't think all quilts are suited to having a pieced backing - some just say one fabric to me.
The pattern is 'Happy Days' by Hatched and Patched. The fabric is by Heather Bailey.

I had trouble with lighting and camera's this morning; this is why I have two pictures here.

These fabrics are Beach House by Robyn Pandolph.

There is almost a full FQ bundle (missing maybe 3?), a couple of half yards, some full yards, some yard and a halves; also a couple of yards of wide backing fabric.

Anyone interested in making an offer for part or all of these fabrics, email or leave a comment.

I originally bought them to make a couple of quilts for some people who the fabrics suited, but have gone on to choose something different since the purchase.