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

Winter

Today I've been working on another baby quilt. I'm enjoying using some of my snowflake stash - mostly Wintergraphix. And it's appropriate, on a cold, wet winter's day, although admittedly the heavy rain was interspersed with bright sunshine!

I can't do too much more today, as I've run out of foundation sheets, and am waiting for more. I ordered 3 packs of 100, so hopefully they'll keep me going for a while.

While I'm sewing (and when James and Eleanor nap) Simon has been making this boat for James.

He designed it himself, and has made it completely from scratch. The core is foam, and has been fibre-glassed and carbon-fibred, and he's now working on the rig.

Round and Round

After an extended stay in Adelaide, first with Joy and then in the depths of my sewing room, AJ's Round Robin centre is finally ready for its trip to Helen's. Here are some cryptic peeks:

A backlog of other projects, and indecision about what to add in my borders has meant it's only about a month and a half late!

In the end, I only added a fairly narrow 4.25", as AJ has said she doesn't want it to get too big, so she can use it as a wallhanging.

Over to you, Helen!

Farmer's Market delivery

My 18y of the delicious Farmer's Market by Sandi Henderson of Portabellopixie arrived this morning.Much of it is destined for a quilt for ME, but there will be plenty left for lots of other projects. Isn't it yummy?!

Stash = 846m

Summer Sunset Wow!

I'd admired Helen's FSQS quilt all along as she was making it, and even made comments when she wasn't sure whether she should alter her design, never knowing it was destined for me! As soon as I saw the return address when I collected the parcel from the post office this morning, I laughed. What is the chance of being paired with one of my own EB quilting friends in a big international swap?

But I'm delighted with my quilt. It so closely matches my preferred style, but in Helen's inimitable style too, with perfect applique and beautiful tiny quilting.

My favourite fabric is the dark blue waves, but I don't have a favourite part of the quilt; the whole thing is just put together perfectly!

As soon as Simon gets home to wield the drill, it's all set to go above my sewing table. Helen has already attached a hanging pocket, and I happened to pick up some fine dowel and cup hooks the other day in readiness.

So thankyou Helen, for a beautiful quilt, and thankyou Margaret for a wonderful swap. I've come in at the fourth season, and I'm really hoping you'll be continuing this swap through another cycle of seasons!

Frogs

Nothing much to show here progress-wise, so I thought I'd share another pre-blog quilt!I have a love of frogs (rather like Island Kylie! ) and have been collecting frog prints for years. I decided to make a frog quilt to hang in James' nursery in 2005, and when he moved to his new bedroom, the quilt went with him.

I was really stuck for inspiration until I came across a diamoned-shaped piece of glass in a leadlight shop, quite by chance, since I don't do leadlighting! It has bevelled edges, and a frog etched in the middle. Perfect! What I hadn't counted on was my lack of ability to keep a diamond-based quilt 'squared' and flat, and it shows!

I spent hours weaving the wriggly strips of black bias tape, which was a complete waste, since the stitching isn't woven! But I do like the quilt, and I have a few favourite frog prints in it. I also tried my hand at some decorative quilting, one of my first attempts.

Stash enhancement

Just a few photos of this week's stash enhancement:
Stash = 830m


and a peek at my FSQS quilt:

And now onto some neglected Round Robin centres...

Thankyou ???

There was a parcel in my letterbox when I got home. It was clearly not one of the fabric orders I'm expecting, maybe my FSQS quilt?

No....

This beautiful outfit for Eleanor, but from who?

The cryptic card only hopes I enjoy my special Ladybug Loops surprise. Well, I am! And I'm certainly surprised! And bewildered....

Winter's Garden

Now that this quilt is in Lily's surprised hands, I can reveal that it was a joint effort by AJ, Bec, Cylie, Helen, Joy, (Island) Kylie, Leah, Mands, Xena and myself, of the EB Quilters. Sorry; I'm too sore to link all the blogs individually, owing to having torn a back muscle a few days ago in one of many nasty coughing fits!

Each girl made one (or even two!) blocks in green and white, and I put them all together.

Blogger is again stubbornly refusing to upload this image in its correct orientation, but you can see that I had to quilt almost every square differently - quite an enjoyable challenge - on a small quilt at least!

How's this for a photo different setting? Double-sided tape is my new best quilt-photography assistant!

Pay it Forward

I recently won Cath's Pay It Forward and am anticipating something good arriving in my mailbox when I'm least expecting it in the next 12 months! So now it's time for my part of the deal:

"I will send a handmade gift to 3x make that SIX (since I find myelf winner of another!) random people who leave a comment on this blog post. I don’t know what that gift will be yet (chances are, it might be quilty though!) and you may not receive it tomorrow or next week but you will receive it within 365 days, that is my promise! The only thing you have to do in return is pay it forward by making the same promise on your blog."

You have a week to comment before James helps me pick the winners; overseas comments welcome and included!

More FSQS peeks

Just sharing some summery colour on a winter's day!
PS - Margaret, I hope you're not peeking!!!

Show and Tell

This week I submitted Seaside to a new blog.

Hermione set up Quilters Show and Tell just recently with an aim of showing a new quilt each day for everyone to admire. It's a great idea, and we can all help by submitting our work. Just click on the link, and there's how-to information on the blog.

A Garden Theme

Today Eva's Garden arrived at its new home, after a lot of very late nights, and just in time for Eva's first birthday on Sunday. Unusually, this quilt photographs better with flash; the colours without are much different (although I prefer the bluer, muted version without flash, below!).

But the advantage of my new hanging location is that I can stand well back, and this minimises the way the edges of the quilt are out of focus.

I also love using our bridge; especially with some afternoon sun:

I did a meander on the background kaleidoscope blocks, outlined the purple inner and outer points on the New Yory Beauty blocks, and a double-swirl around the buitterflies in the main border. I will never try the latter again! Here's a small section which worked reasonably well:

Eva's mother requested a matching pillowcase to go with the quilt, so I made two. I kept the piecing to the side, because I don't think the seams would be soft enough on a face, especially the cheek of a litttle girl! And I used the remaining backing fabric for the rest - mostly because it's nice and soft. I detest sheets and pillowcases that are remotely scratchy, and have been known to get out of bed, strip the sheets and wash them again, because they're uncomfortable. Just another reason why I love winter - flanelette sheets are always soft! I appliqued a butterfly on each from the tiny scraps remaining from the quilt's main border. For some reason, blogger insists on rotating the photo 90deg clockwise:

Along with this, Winter's Garden went in the mail to a surprise recipient yesterday. Here's a fun peek. I'd folded it up after photographing the label, and it sprung open to reveal a good photo opportunity I couldn't resist, even though it almost made me late to the post office! More of this one once it arrives in ...........

And finally a glimpse of some fabrics for my FSQS to be called Plant in Full Sun:

I went through several ideas and umpteen redesigns before settling on what I'd do. Now I just have to hope I can pull it off to my satisfaction.

Did I say 3 quilts?

Yes! And here's a peek at part of the third:Continuing with the snowy theme, how gorgeous are these prints? The selvage runs across the top and bottom, and I couldn't resist adding a yard of each colourway to my stash.

These all came from Quilt-this where they have a beautiful selection, with fabrics not found everywhere. The top 2 below are Surrey Footpaths by Sue Beevers for RJR: