Six Monthly Review

Wow!  I can't believe we are halfway through the year already.  Looking through my planning journal on the one hand I feel like I've made some huge progress, and on the other I still feel like there is so much to do.  Of course, both statements are correct..., I just shouldn't have so much on my plate.

On my To Quilt list I have three quilts completely finished, and one more that is about three quarters completed.  This is EPIC and I am sure that this would not have been achieved without this whole planning process.  Looking forward to next month I am planning to finish the rest of my Modern Applique hand stitched binding and continue with hand quilting the 3 applique blocks.  I also want to start basting the Trip Around the World quilt as i have a quilting plan more or less formulated.

Harder to judge progress with my WIP list  (and maybe this could do with a better layout for future endeavours).  Although I have completely finished/quilted one - Loosely Woven, and finished the top of another - Patchwork City.

I have been plugging away at Dash to the Finish, which started the year with 3 or 4 blocks... and now there are just 4 blocks to complete a square setting!  These are 17" blocks so quite large and effective for the large scale florals.

Timeless Traditions has taken a back seat due to the quilting going on earlier in the year, but having caught up with the blanket stitch, yesterday I remade the block that had been irritating me...

And I feel it sits quite nicely with the other blocks and balances out the other low contrast blocks.

I've just got one more seam and this section is fully complete!  This is the top three rows, with only two more rows to finish the centre panel... this means well over halfway!

Meadowland has become a long and slow piecing process.  15 blocks complete so that's another 10 to have a 5 x 5 layout.  In hindsight I should have cut out all the fabrics in the beginning (even though this is not the way I work).

Laid out like this it has a very soothing palette.  Long term I can see this one getting sewn together by the end of the year.

Although I made a list of projects to start, I haven't started any of the ones I should have, instead picking up the Meadowland and the new This Little Piggy applique BOM.  I have accumulated fabric for a Thimbleblossom log cabin pattern and I'm thinking about a scrap project... even though last year's scrap project is unfinished.

Once again, the hardest thing is not starting new projects.  I have some clothes sewing ambitions also but I always find this the hardest to get around to!

Rock on the second half of 2019!

One finish... one start

Patchwork City is now a finished top!  After more months than i really want to admit to, the final seams were sewn... including borders... And now it just needs to wait for its turn in the quilting line.

I made the final border slightly smaller than pattern so the whole quilt is around 86 inches square.

This little dot was totally unplanned but is probably my favouritest thing!

This pattern and the solids bundle I worked with really pushed my limits on colours I am comfortable working with.

It also stretched my piecing abilities with heaps of different construction ideas and various different angles. Not necessarily my favourite, but a great learning experience.

Getting block 25 done was a mission in itself... but getting the last few quilt seams sewn was easy due to getting the bulk of the construction finished earlier in the year and keeping up to date with piecing each row as the blocks were finished.

Ok, now onto the new quilt.  I saw a mystery BOM on instagram run by The Red Boot Quilt Company called This Little Piggy and fell in love with the cute farm animal shapes.

Some fun fabrics for the piggies...

The blocks are large at 17 inches including the frame.  Makes the applique relatively quick and painless.

I think I'll use this striped fabric for the binding.

And partial construction of the centre block... took me a long time to narrow down the fabrics.  The blanket stitch will help differentiate their skintone from the background and highlight them holding hands.

This quilt is destined for grandchildren in Australia (two little girls which explains the girls on the block)... although I have warned that the finishing of this quilt may well not happen until after Xmas.

Loosely Woven - a finished quilt!

The evening's over the last week have been spent hand stitching down binding.  I am not the quickest at hand stitching, and I find I am only able to sew relatively small sections before my hands get sore.  So I was really pleased last night to sew the final section of Loosely Woven to complete the mammoth task of binding.

Just to recap, the quilting plan was feathers in the striped columns, and interlocking boxes in the plain squares and border.

The backing fabric is a beige wide back, and I used a beige Seralene bobbin fill which blended nicely.

A narrow binding and label to finish it off.  As you can see, the quilting has great texture.  This interlocking boxes design is going to reappear on my Patchwork City quilt when I get to that stage (still a few more seams and backing decisions to make yet).

And some beautiful Aurifil threads to complement.  The FMQ does gobble through the thread!

This quilt was started in December 2018 after a couple of test blocks made in November.  Christmas holidays were mostly spent with piecing and I finished the top in late January 2019.  I had thread delays which resulted in about 8 weeks down time... so all in all, not bad progress (for me anyway). 

This quilt was commissioned so I will be very happy to hand it over to its new owner tomorrow, and get my sewing machine set up for blanket stitch again.

Moving right along

My mantra this year has been to just do the next thing... whether it is iron that next lot of fabric, or cut out some blocks... or prepare a backing.  And I'm making progress!  Slowly but surely!

With just one block left on Patchwork City, the first thing was ironing the grey fat quarter!  These mass produced bundles are folded with impressive fold lines!

And start the units.  All weird shapes in the units left to last, but they went together surprisingly well.

Until I had all three shapes completed.

And laid in place with the rest of them.

Woohoo!  So worthwhile getting that first section sewn earlier in the year.

And it didn't take too long to get those last couple of blocks sashed with the thinner sashing, and added to the row with the wider sashing.

I also added the bottom plain border, and the between row sashing.

All that is left is to sew these rows together and add plain borders to the sides.  What an epic quilt!  This really feels like a huge achievement.  And so close to being finished!

End of month roundup

It wasn't until today, the last day of the month, that it seemed at all possible to get some of my monthly tasks finished. 

The month started with 6 tasks:

I made great progress with the Meadowland blocks... Love this floral and neutral spot!

And to top it off I got these bonus units sewn... not quite finished, but a good start for next month.

Huge news is that I finished off the last of the FMQ on Loosely Woven... so I'm all ready to start binding over the weekend.  Finishing this corner was the best feeling ever!

I wanted to get one more Dash to the Finish block done...

And almost  finished a bonus second one as a leader ender project!

And finishing two Patchwork City blocks seemed impossible on Monday, but a few seams here and there... and the addition of a sneaky stripe in this block...

... meant I got all the units finished today for block 24...

... to add to block 23...

... and June is going to be a busy month finishing the last block - 25, a little bit of sashing, borders and finishing touches and this one will be a top!

Wiggly quilting...

... and binding... this quilt is so close!

So yeah... 5 out of 6 and it felt so good to get those stickers on!

Almost All the things

I've been doing a little bit of not quite everything... but certainly lots of things.

Like Meadowland blocks...

Walking foot wiggly lines on my modern applique Buggy Barn Blooms quilt...

That was after this diy attachment of the seam guide to do my straight zigzags... good old sticky tape!

Then wiggle wiggle I went!  Discovered that your organic lines still need to be somewhat horizontal, resulting in some fix ups along the way 😤.  Also that while they may seem wiggly while you are doing them, sometimes they come out pretty straight.

 After that I developed a method which seems to have worked well for me, stitch lines that are relatively straight about 3 or 4 inches apart to use as guidelines, and work from the centre out to the edges (I did end up marking a starting line and using the seam guide to do these).  Then go back and fill in a straightish line between each of those lines, but having a lot of variety in their widths (this line I just eyeballed and didn't worry too much about)... then finally, doing wiggly lines in each irregularly spaced gap, using wiggles of different wiggliness!

I've only got a strip about 10 inches wide left to quilt on this... woohoo!!

And finally back to some good old free motion as I start the border on Loosely Woven.

With an 8in border, it is going to take some time!