Two Cats and Journal Project

All ready for linking up with the
Rainbow Scrap Challenge girls
with two more kitties in the colour of the month

a small alteration is needed tomorrow on the right hand one - you can see her ears should be both going towards her back not where they are presently, this is what comes of doing about six things at once!

I am also working with aqua/teal for my March Journal Quilt Project. This is associated with the Contemporary Quilt Group which is a specialist group within the Quilters' Guild of the British Isles of which I am a member. We commit to one 8" square piece each month over this year, I am behind as I didn't join the project until mid February so I am working hard to meet my deadlines.

These are silk squares which I painted a few years ago and have been waiting for the right project to come along, I will post the finished pieces for January and February next week.

We have our daughter and two grandchildren coming for lunch today so cooking is next on my list for today.

Happy Quilting and don't forget to visit the RSC 2014 with the link at the top of my post - beautiful examples of working with the colour of the month.

Cyclone weekend coming up!!

Here in New Zealand we are hunkering down ready for a cyclone to hit this weekend.

We sometimes get these, or at least the tail end, coming down from the tropics and they can be nasty.

Information coming to us presently is that we must remove heavy objects, fasten things down, have emergency rations and plans in place, prepare for possible loss of power and telephone coverage, land slips, heavy rain, flooding and storm surges on the coast. Add to all this gale force winds and we have a weekend which is great for folks wanting to catch up on reading or playing with Gelli Plates but a not a lot of use for outdoors folk!

In readiness for all the above I am hoping today to work on a cot size quilt today for our youngest 10 month old grandson, a very simple strippy quilt which now needs quilting and as we have power today I am playing safe.

This began life as alternating owl fabric strips and flying geese strips, cut everything out and started to put the geese together but in a moment of non-concentration I cut the triangles as quarter squares and of course had huge problems, the fabric was so stretchy. After fiddling around for a day with these they all went into the rubbish bin and I had a rethink.

When he moves into a bed I will make a special quilt.

Given the prospect of all the above weather predictions I am gathering things together. On the reading front I have a couple of lovely Home and Garden type books on the table, latest magazines from SAQA and Quilt Guild UK and a very special book which arrived yesterday.

This is absolutely delicious!!

I knew Kathy at Material Obsession had written another book but until reading about it in a post by Wanda over at Exuberant Color
I didn't realise that release was imminent.

Added to my book shelf is now a beautiful copy, signed by Kathy,  all ready to join me when I curl up in a chair with a cuppa and listen to the howling wind and rain.


If I feel like being a little more adventurous here is the Gelli Plate I mentioned in an earlier post and I have plans for that over the weekend.

Hopefully my sewing studio will not be getting the direct force of the cyclone and I will be able to work in there safely. We have been told to prepare for possibly having to have windows repaired/replaced!

Hope you all have happy quilting weekend, or a happy whatever you are doing weekend.

Maureen

Scrappy Cats and Prayer Flags

Another week gone by, I have been busy binding my Fractured quilt

I was undecided about the binding earlier but very happy with it now and just two more sides to go!

I have met my goal of 10 more cats - teal this time and will be linking up with everyone at Scrap Happy Saturday. I rarely do solid fabrics so all my cats, whatever colour they be, will usually have a bit of something else in them, although I do love Jinny Beyer fabrics and you will see a Jinny cat in there! I think because of my lighting the cats are slightly deeper in colour in this shot. One looks definitely greener  and another more blue than teal - but they are teal.

Before I end this post I would ask you to do something for me please.

Below I have posted a photo of a Prayer Flag. I contribute to The Prayer Flag Project and if you would go along please and visit you could learn of the tragic circumstance which  led to my making this particular Prayer Flag yesterday. To learn more about the project generally see the button on the right on my sidebar.

Please visit the two links in my post

Maureen

Busy Binding

More quilt binding today this time on my Fractured quilt renamed "Catastrophy".  First on my list was to bind the quilt early this morning and then take the plunge and wash it later in the day but when I came to unfold and check for any stray threads I realised that I hadn't finished the quilting on the dyed fabrics - can't imagine how I missed that but suspect it was when the dye run threw me out of sync. Finished the quilting and now have the binding machined on and all ready to hand stitch down.

I've used  multi coloured fabric for binding which half way through I thought was the wrong choice but the body of the quilt is so colourful and the one I have used does blend in quite well I think.

Tomorrow John and I are on duty at the Cottage looking after our small exhibition and it will be an ideal time to sit with hand work.

My goals for this month include the quilt for Sam and finishing MATO but I also have one or two other projects to work on at the same time - more about those in later posts. Also bought a Gelli Plate to use for mono printing, I have done this before using a small piece of heavy duty bevelled glass, but these look as if they will be great and all being well will start to play this weekend.

I desperately want to get out into the garden but the weather here has been so very hot and even with steady watering a lot of my plants have suffered. Thankfully when I checked my clump of Babiana bulbs they were quite plump and look as if there will be another beautiful clump flowering later in the year, I love the colours of these little flowers

Autumn weather

March 1st is the first day of Autumn for us down here in New Zealand and today (Monday) is a true Autumnal day, a drop in the temperature, showers, wind and sun all in the one day - time for an extra layer on the bed at night time!

The weather began to change on Saturday as we went for a drive up the coast, low tide and a boat on the lean.

 Saturday we finished hanging a few pieces for our small exhibition. John and I are members of the Howick Art Group and we are having a joint display of our work at Green Gables cottage just a few minutes drive down the road. This is the "headquarters" of the Howick Art Group and all members, apart from myself, are painters. We have to go down to the cottage to take more photographs - I took mine here at home but having issues with my camera. I have one below "Bridge to Nowhere" complete with two small white lines which are flower head pins and I forgot to remove them! I have made three small pieces in this style using three blocks left over from Fractured. I will post the other two next time. What an enjoyable process - slicing, adding and more cutting and turning bits around - lovely and as I have two more blocks left I will do the same with those.

More cats will be cut tomorrow after pressing the pieces from my large scraps bin, the colour this month is teal and I really don't have hardly any plain teal fabrics, most of my fabrics are multicoloured, I had collected a few batiks and Kaffe Fassett fabrics and then remembered my Jinny Beyer stash so grabbed one from there. Hopefully these kitties may be ready by Saturday.

That's me finished for now my screen is telling me I have low keyboard batteries so better publish.
                                   Have a good week, happy quilting from me