Winners all around!

Tonight I got James to pick a winner for my blogiversary giveaway!
But I think I'm the winner today. Amidst the expected parcels I ordered from the US to celebrate said event (like I needed an excuse!) was an Australia Post satchel at my door tonight. I couldn't imagine what it was, but knew things were promising when I saw Island Kylie's name on the back. Even so, I wasn't prepared for the wonderful slection of almost 40 frog fabrics she'd managed to stuff in there!
Kylie has been making her son a frog quilt, and knew I had an affinity for the little creatures, too, so she sent the pieces she didn't use my way. I can't call them scraps - they're too big! The photo above shows a little bit of each. Despite my collection of frog fabrics, I only had a handful of these, and a few in different colourways. And I was amazed how many I hadn't even seen before!

And here are some of my other stash enhancements to arrive recently. Just a couple more books and some long-awaited fabric found through MissingFabrics.com to come:

Stash = 870m


Oh, and the winner - Mothership!
Completely unbiased, since James can't read that well yet, I promise! There were so many of you I wanted to give it to, but I don't have time to make that many. I hope you'll stay around with me as I enjoy my second year of blogging - maybe next year?


By the way, the quilt with the most pieces is Canadian Inspiration with approximately 3600! Beach has around 2200, the Blue and Yellow quilt aroubnd 1500, and Eva's Garden (the green and mauve one) has 930.

Potato follow-up and a finished quilt

It seems that the eardrops have worked, and James' ear is free of potato. Thank goodness! For now he is quite certain that potato belongs in one's mouth and that it is not a good idea to try it in his ears, so let's hope that's the end of that trick! Oh, and in case you're like everyone I've spoken to and want to know, it was neither mashed potato nor chips, but roast potato!!!

I finished An Early Snowfall watching the final late night of Olympic events. But I'm not sure how I feel about it. I love the fabrics, but somhow it's missing the zing I like to see in my quilts.

This quilt includes a few firsts, or things I haven't done much before;

A flange narrow border, which looks pretty cool (and worked well thanks to some insightful questioning from a visiting friend - Thanks Tracey!) even though it's not completely even;

some quilting done with embroidery stitches, with contrast thread back and front;

And some more raw-edge applique snowflakes.

We're due to go and visit the recipient on Friday and hand it over, and I confess I'm rather looking forward to newborn cuddles again!

Swaps, ears and potatoes???

Since the FSQS wound up, I've signed up for two more swaps; Kate's Another Little Quilt Swap and the second EBDQS, organised by two of the Essential Baby Quilters.

Tonight I have finally managed some quilty progress; An Early Snowfall is now sandwiched, and I'm going to make a start on the quilting before I go to bed.

And here are some photos of my little boy, who last night decided for some peculiar and unknown reason, to push some of his roast potato into his ear, resulting in him and Simon being at Emergency from 1-4am this morning, with a follow-up visit tomorrow!

At Cleland:

Fishing (complete with boat, rod, line and hook, burley-bucket and gents as bait, and foam fish and squid!):

Knitting:

bloGIVErsary!

My littlest baby is One! It's a year today since I succumbed to the pressure from Helen and AJ and created my own little spot on the WWW.

I'm so glad I did! It has been a great way to record the process of my quilting, as well as the finished products. And I love the blogging community I've joined! Until joining the EB Quilters and starting my blog, quilting was a solitary journey for me. Fun, but incomparable with the enjoyment I'm getting from sharing my quilting (and indulgent photos of James and Eleanor)with others.

In true blogging form, my blog and I are celebrating with a giveaway. Sometime next weekend, James will help me choose a winner from the comments to this post to receive a custom mini quilt. You don't need to be in Australia, and you don't even need to blog - just make sure I have a way of contacting you if you win (maybe I have your email or know your EB name) so I can get your address and find out a bit about what sort of quilt you might like.

The winner may or may not be the closest answer to this: Which of my quilts has the most pieces? And approximately how many are in it? You can see them all in Flickr (link on the right).

Thankyou Lily!

Yesterday James pulled a lovely parcel from our mailbox - from Lily for me! Just look at these lovely goodies: a much-needed pin-cushion (with plenty of space for the new pins I'm about to buy!), a beautiful FQ (which is already missing a 2.5in square for my eventual quilt containing a square of all my fabrics!) and a handy mini retractable tape-measure.

This wintry quilt has been assembled as far as the first border, but refuses to lie flat, so for now you just get a completed NYB block, and you'll see the whole thing once it's been forced into flat submission by quilting!

I'm hunting for some of this white-on-white fabric, which has previously been purchased from Spotlight. It's photographed on a dark surface to show the pattern. I need some unbroken length for a border, so a minumin of 1.25m, but up to 3m would be perfect. I've checked my 2 closest Spotlights with no luck. There's no selvage information, and the pattern isn't easily described, so my internet search was unsatisfactory. If you can help, I would love to hear from you, and we can make arrangements for payment or a swap.

Although these visits and a stop at my LQS failed to turn up the one item I really wanted, they did result in the following irresistibles:

and a small pile which may or may not end up in Helen's Round robin border:

And a quick heads up about a milestone post and giveaway tomorrow...

Bliss

Tonight I had my first massage in ages. Ahhhh! Pre-children, I used to have them weekly, but it's just so hard to fit in these days. I've booked another in 3 weeks. It means leaving Simon to finish dealing with James' and Eleanor's dinner, bath and bed, while I indulge myself - or I'd do it more often!

Today's photos are of Canadian Inspiration. I made this for my parents in 2003/4, inspired by their holiday in Canada. The autumn tones were bought in one fell swoop (I kept Rhonda at Canberra's Calico Patch cutting 25cms of each for ages!) but the blues were collected over an extended period.

It was my first queen-size quilt, and remains one of my favourites, although I now lok at it and see several things I would do differently with the benefit of more experience (and a bit of hindsight!)

The maple leaves are all pieced in the same way, and range from about 3" to about 8" . The stalks are home-made bias tape, machine-appliqued on top.

I quilted the whole thing in variegated blue thread; twice around each leaf and a meander over the rest. This was probably my first effort at an overall FMQ 'pattern'.

A Treasure Chest

Firstly, the winners of my Pay It Forward. Could the following people please email me (via my full profile on the right) with their postal address if I don't already have it:

Joy

AJ

Valentina

srk quilts

Tracy

Jo

Then just share the fun through your blogs and sit back and wait!

Today's photos are of a cover and matching cushions I made for a trunk my parents have. It was made before I moved out of home, so about 10 years ago! I finally photographed them today while I was visiting them. Here's the top from above:It's not a true quilt, in that it's just the pieced top layer. I used one of Margaret Rolfe's foundation-pieced animal patterns (a swallow), but in my own setting to suit Mummy's uncluttered style. These foundation-pieced designs were the start of my love of foundation piecing, and I've branched off to start designing my own images where needed, such as the seagull in my Beach quilt (featured here on Quilters Show and Tell).

Revealed! Four Seasons Quilt Swap - Summer

I think it's now safe to post photos of the full quilt; I've noticed my recipient lurking in here over the last week!

It's foundation-pieced Radiant New York Beauty blocks, with flowers and butterflires appliqued broderie-perse style.

I've never made such a small quilt before, and enjoyed the experience once I got over the challenge of fitting a design into such a small space. I hadn't fully realised just how small 20" was until I started!

I had fun quilting the 'hidden' symbols into the corners (blogged here):

TL: a Christmas tree, because summer in Australia means Christmas

BL: the South Australian floral emblem; the Sturt desert pea

BR: a snowflake, because the quilt was made in our winter

TR: the recipients' state' floral emblem