Wow, Wow, Wow and What I've been up to...

The Auckland Festival of Quilts has been held this weekend, and I was lucky enough on Friday to attend this with Monika.  The Auckland Guild do a wonderful job of showcasing their talents, and put on a wonderful display.  I was mostly interested in details of quilts... often not taking a photo of the whole, rather a closeup detail of something that caught my eye... here are some of those things...

There was some amazing machine quilting:

Also some very interesting embellishment:

More quilting:

Lots of colour:

I just liked these:

I had to take a photo of this as it was a Mystery Block of the month through Grandmothers Garden in 2006 - I did the same BOM but in a "vintage blue" colour range - although we use it, I have never finished either the quilting or binding... nice to see that someone else did!

Amazing details...

... on a beautiful quilt.

Monika volunteered to be the 20c piece in this photo - the quilt was huge... and I just had to show that other people make big quilts too!

Once we'd walked around the exhibition... we spent a bit of time walking around the merchants.  Barely in the door I found this thread from Wonderfil which is a variegated light neutral - sort of whitey, creamy, grey-ey...

A little bundle of fat eights that took my fancy...

Some fun buttons that have absolutely no purpose but you never know when you might need a button like this!

And after much angsting a collection of 5 fat quarters, buy four (get one free) - I could have bought 100 but was very good :-)

Our evening was spent attending the opening of The Big Quilt Show in Northcote.  This is on at Northart until the 23rd November.  It was great to see quilts in a different setting - very calm and controlled - not necessarily what you find at a quilt show!

Monika's entry is on the right...

I've just got a thing for understated chevrons at the moment...

and straight line quilting...

This was quite stunning... and very expensive!!

This was made out of some very interesting materials... some feedsack, and some areas had been distressed, burnt, stamped etc.

There's mine next door:

And a bit of a shot over the top of the heads...

Needless to say we got home Friday night well and truly exhausted and no sewing was accomplished on Saturday as a result of it.  However, Sunday has been a bit better day, so I headed to my shed this morning and started piecing the backing for my bulls eye (double disappearing nine patch) quilt.  The front had used 41 of the charm squares, so I was determined to use the last charm square on the back.  Funnily enough, the fabrics I had bought with the idea of using them on the back - I didn't actually use!  Well, apart from the grey solid which I tend to just buy every time I go to Spotlight because I use it so much.  The other things came out of my stash (the blue was also on the front) - and the DS floral (even though it's my favourite and I didn't want to use it) helped to make it all cohesive and make sense.

Basting... cotton batting, pins... patience...

And the start of the design... concentric circles, walking foot... so far so good.  This quilt top has sat for quite some time waiting for the quilting design "to come to me". 

I'm determined to get this finished while I am still enthusiastic about it.  It shall be done!