My partner this month was Cyndi who lives in California. Very soon after we have received partner details I had an email from Cyndi explaining that she would be at a temporary address for the summer and would be on holiday for a couple of weeks in May. Because of this I didn't expect to receive this month's block quite so promptly. It was a lovely surprise when the postie rand the doorbell and then handed me the envelope that turned out not to have one but two blocks inside. They fit in beautifully with all the other blocks I've received. When I get a second block included I always set it to oneside in order to make a cushion cover out of it. When I eventually have enough blocks for my Cacti quilt I will also have a lovely set of matching cushion covers to go with it, each one reminding me of the lovely people I meet via Block Swap Adventure. |
Add Comment This was an enjoyable block to make. The end result looks complicated but the block is easy to put together. Seven of these individual blocks were required for this month and not one of them needed to be unpicked and resewn, none went together back to front and all the points meet where they are supposed to. All of that is a first for me. Normally I learn by trial and error with a lot of error teaching me how to do things properly but not this month! Now that I am feeling pleased with myself I'll have a go at finishing the April block. Not made any mistakes with it yet but as curved seams are involved I've not been brave enough to actually put it under the sewing machine and finish it off. Here are some of the other May blocks This throw has been on the needles for far longer than I really want to think about. If I had realized how long this would take before I started I doubt I would have bothered but I have learnt a lot in the process of completing this project. But the pattern is definitely being filed under the "never to be attempted again" category. Each row is 225 stitches long, each pattern repeat is 16 stitches by 42 rows. Its knitted in Jaeger Monte Cristo 4 ply Crepe which is a cotton/acrylic mix and it is based on a pattern by Martin Storey published in Lets Knit magazine Dec 2010. I've linked this post to I can't believe it's over a month since I posted here. February has flown past in a haze of busyness and before I've hardly had time to draw breath it's March. Rather than dwell on what has gone by I'm going to follow Flylady's advice and just jump in where i am. Today that jumping in has been all about completing two blocks for the Craftsy 2013 BOM.
About 20 years ago I bought one of the original Bond knitting machines and loved using it. It knitted up sweaters so quickly everybody that stood still long enough had one as a gift. It was perfect for plain knitting, a bit of lace, stripes and simple cables which meant I had the time to do complicated knitting by hand. Then we moved house and there was nowhere to set it up so it was packed away and stayed packed away all these years. My Christmas present from Leigh was furniture, to be a bit more precise he got me wooden stackable storage cubes for all my craft bits and pieces. 36 of them all together each one being 12" x 12" x 12". As we put it all together I realised that if it was set up sensibly the Bond would fit on top. Leigh didn't think I would still have all the bits but I tracked it down and had everything included the original instructions and pattern book so I set it up and am having the most fun relearning how to use it. I might even get to use up some of that yarn stash. I linked this post to Patchwork Times My Turn for Us have a visit and see the fascinating stuff everybody else is I was supposed to be cutter borders for the blocks of a sampler quilt I made last year. The fabric was all prepared and set out ready to be cut. A moments inattention meant i picked up the wrong die for the Accuquilt Go! and one pass through the machine later had half a yard of 2.5" strips when I needed 1.5" strips. After indulging in some very colourful language Isat down to thing about what to do with these strips. I could have trimmed them down to the right size but that seemed incredibly wasteful. I could have just set them to one side for "later" but I would have felt guilty every time I laid eyes on them so I decided to practise the offset log cabin technique I learned earlier in the month in the Craftsy 2013 BOM and make a wall hanging. I knew I had plenty of matching fabric as there was a lot left over from making the sampler blocks and I checked and rechecked before cutting anything and had enough to make 24 6" blocks. I'm pleased with the way it has turned out, now I'm going to be brave and do some free motion quilting on it. I've linked this post to Patchwork Times We Did It! Wednesday Rae gun ramblings All Star Block Party Go have a look at all the interesting things other people are doing and be inspired. This little quilt normally lives on the coffee table and its function in life is to protect the table from drips and spills. It really earned its keep yesterday evening as two mugs of coffee were knocked over and of course they had to be big mugs still mostly full of hot coffee. Although the coffee soaked through the top, the wadding and the backing the table came to no harm. iI was convinced the quilt would be permanently stained though. I mean we all know that if we want to deliberately make a piece of fabric look aged one of the easiest ways to do it is to soak the fabric in coffee. The quilt went straight into the washing machine and was put through a rinse cycle with no added detergent or fabric conditioner. It came out without a mark on it. No hint of coffee on the front or on the back. Now it just needs to finish drying and it will be ready to resume its role as table protector supreme. Aileen sent me this block for the December swap. for lots of reasons we were both late in sending each other our blocks but I consider this well worth waiting for, all the triangles are made up of strips sewn together and sub-cut which gives a lovely effect. The applique flowers are so cute and the button centres are just the perfect finishing touch. A lovely,lovely block. The sofa has a new quilt. It's lovely to cuddle under and wonderfully warm. It's not supposed to be an heirloom quilt it is a to be used everyday and loved to bits until it falls apart sort of quilt. The small squares are 2.5" and were all cut on my Accuquilt cutter. The die has9 squares on it and I put 4 layers of fabric in each time so each roll through the cutter left me with 36 perfect squares. As you can imagine it didn't take long to cut all the squares need for the quilt. I decided to use a quilt as you go technique and each block was quilted before being joined to another block. This meant I never had more than one 12" square plus wadding and backing under the sewing machine at any one time. I didn't want to free motion this quilt as I thought straight lines would emphasise the pattern better. I found inspiration for the quilting at PetitDesigns blog and am really pleased with the way it turned out. Much more interesting to look at than Quilt in the Ditch and to be honest much easier to do. I just lined up the edge of my walking foot with the seam and quilted. The box effect around where the seams meet looks complicated but isn't. Once quilted the blocks were joined to each other using a technique I learned in a Craftsy class called Quilting Big Quilts on a Small Machine by Ann Petersen. For my first attempt I used the walking foot to try and keep everythng under contol as there are 6 layers under the needle but I found it difficult to keep a consistent 1/4 inch so I swapped to my 1/4" foot, crossed my fingers it would cope with that many layers and tried again. It worked like a dream. The only time I had the whole quilt under the machine was when I added the last row of blocks and attached the binding, this made the whole project so much more enjoyable. I will be using this technique again many times I suspect. I wanted the back of the quilt to appeal to my train obsessed husband and as large prints could be used to effect on this quilt I, at last, have found a use for some of the collection of railway themed fabric that has built up in my stash. I have a feeling this quilt might well be displayed back to front as often as the right way round. I really enjoyed making this quilt which I hope will be a sign of things to come for 2013. When I found out that one of the Yahoo groups I belong to has a secondary group just for the making and swapping of fabric postcards I couldn't join up fast enough. What a way to combine two favourite hobbies, quilting and exchanging postcards. Once I'd been accepted as a member one of the moderators offered to send me a card so that I could see the sort of thing the group made. It arrived this morning and I'm thrilled with it. It think it is lovely, it made it through the post unscathed and while the local postie is used to postcards from all over the world arriving for me this was a first even for her. I'm sure she will get used to it over the next few months. |