Which way??

I posted one of my two feathers a few days ago, both are

sewn up and on to the setting now.

So, there are three ways

Number one

Number two

Number three

I like number three best, it will be a smidgen smaller when I stitch the
centre seam and they need  trimming.
Which of these three settings do you think would
look best for a cushion/pillow? Let me know.

Photos are not the best, number one doesn't show the background
fabric clearly, the sun was coming out and going in,
the last one is nearer the true colour.

My Gypsy Wife is coming along, I'll post an update at
the weekend. I've enjoyed making this quilt so much that
when I saw a post from 
Angie at Gnome Angel
with details of a Sew Along using a pattern by Jen Kingwell -
Long Time Gone -  I thought, yes, that's for me. Sent off for
the pattern booklet and it arrived yesterday.

Now, having seen the size of the pieces I may shall pass on the Sew Along which
is held over 4 months and just proceed at my own pace over the year, maybe longer!
The size of the quilt is 66 and 1/2" x 67 and 1/2" so you can see 
there's a heck of lot to fit in!!
I don't need the pressure of a deadline for this.

Back to quilting my grandson's quilt, not many more blocks left now.

Slow Stitching and Unpicking!

I haven't hand quilted for a few years, used to love it but my arthritis in my hands

put a stop to that.

Feeling the need to sit, relax and hand stitch again (with the aid of

good pain medications) I'm working

on my Paintbox quilt - just look under Labels on my side bar

for older posts.

Because I like these fabrics to take centre stage

the quilting will be minimal, just outlining the central wedges

in the ditch with 

a beautifully variegated Oliver Twist cotton which blends in rather than

shouting "here I am, in fact you can barely see it at all.

Unpicking an older quilt is quite a relaxing

task for Sunday Slow Stitching! This is a wall hanging made 

many years ago, lots of black fabric which had faded badly.

Some components could be salvaged, the central log cabin portion was

made from my own dyed silks, lilac silks from one of my

daughter's ball dresses and a few pieces of bought

hand made paper with silk which I dyed.

 I was hoping my border of Flying Geese - again the dyed paper/silk -  could be saved,

it was always quite fragile and over the years of storing it's become

really fragile, I could only save the piece below.

So that was my stitching on Sunday and here we are with another

Monday morning, washing out on the line making the most of the sun

and the windy weather.

Floors swept and shopping put away, the rest of the day

is mine!!

Linking up now with

Kathy hosting Slow Sunday Stitching.

More Strips and a Sunrise

Let's start with the strips.

I have a birthday gift to make for the end of February and thought

that for once it would be good to get in early!

Strips out of the clean up cuts bin, but I did cut them down

into various widths 1 and 1/2" through to 3".

Some of these strips were too short for the project,

I just joined two together of similar colour.

I'm making a pillow with two of the Anna Maria Horner
feathers.  I still have

the side pieces to sew on tomorrow, and one more

to get together.

I had to starch the strips within an inch of their lives to try and make

sure they held their shape, they do need trimming up a little.

Also I've gone for slightly more subdued colours, had they been for myself

I might have gone quite wild with very bright fabrics, but not everyone

likes "in your face" fabrics!

You all know I love my sunrises and sunsets, here was sunrise

on Thursday morning.

Sadly we still have the overhead telephone and power lines in little old Howick, at

least on this street.

Tomorrow (Sunday) I'll be linking up with Cynthia at Oh Scrap!

RSC 2017 have purple as the colour of the month but I have three
from last year so I'll wait for next month's colour.

Enjoy your weekend.

Maureen

Saturday again!

What on earth happened to the past seven days?

Is it just me or do the days and weeks fly by,  I don't think I'm the only one.

I have a list of quotes by Dr Seuss, they're real gems, this one sums up the time issue:

"How did it get so late so soon? It's night before it's afternoon.

December is here before it's June.

My goodness how the time has flewn.

How did it get so late so soon?"

A message for us all!!

So, on the quilting side I have finished Section 8 of 

Gypsy Wife. I stuck it up on the wall yesterday alongside

the other seven sections, photo below.

No major seams sewn yet so it's a bit higgledy-piggledy!

Section 8 is on the left hand side.

I spent time with my GO cutter strip dies, pieces of very old Hoffman fabrics

and KF Collective

the left hand side are 1" strips. I have in mind a number of quilts using strips

of various widths, lots more to cut before I make a start.

Assigned two of my plastic storage drawers to

my KF Collective quarter yard pieces. I had culled these when I made a start

on Gypsy Wife, all the pieces less than 1/4 yard I set aside

for this project.

I began trying to stock up on 1/2 yards or larger a few years ago, I did a pretty good job,

there's no more space in my wire baskets!! No more fabric buying!!

The garden grabbed a little bit of my attention, but it's so very dry,

we really need rain and hopefully this weekend. My Canna lilies seem to

be perfectly happy even with the dry soil.

The "Peace" rose is blooming beautifully, goodness knows

we could use some of this in the world today!

And below she (I always think of roses as "she") had a visitor.

OK, I'm all done now and heading back to the cutting table.

Enjoy the weekend.

See you all soon.

Maureen

Plans for 2017

My plans for posting during the week with projects for this year

came unstuck when I had to go along to visit the doctor.

Armed with antibiotics (again!!) and an increase in two other

medications I am now getting back into the quilting zone.

However, I had so many things on my original project list made in December that

I was obviously dreaming when I made it! 

As mentioned in my last post I have one or two special projects on the

horizon, I'm looking forward to these very much. Over the next week

I shall work on refining my original plans, but, I had to begin

something new of course!

A new kaleidoscope and a new name -
Pizzazz.

Material Obsession 2 by Kathy Doughty and Sarah Fielke

has a few quilts I'd love to make one day and the "Stashbuster"

was just what I needed at the moment. The original uses strips of fabrics cut

between 1 and 1/2" and 3" and in most cases only shows

two strips in the wedge, I'm using the clean up cuts from my two bins

and have a variety of fabrics this block.

Just the one "prototype" made at the moment but I'll get on with

more next week.

Houses or stars are planned for this afternoon for RSC 2017.

Time for a cuppa but here's a flower photo to finish

one of my favourite hydrangeas.

RSC post tomorrow!

Happy New Year

Dawn on the 1st January 2017 in New Zealand

and I'm pondering on projects and finishes for 2017.

Exciting things going on in the blogging world, QALs and one in particular
looks very interesting indeed, this was

a BOM from Jen Kingwell, I think last year, and it's called

Long Time Gone. More on that when I have the information, but

if you Google you can pick up photos.

AHIQ with Kaja and Ann is taking a new direction, and
there is an exciting new project coming up in my quilting life, which
I'm looking forward to very much indeed.

I shall be back with a quilting focused post
tomorrow or Tuesday, but I'll sign off for you folks in the colder climates
with a summer beauty currently lighting up the garden

glorious orange nasturtiums.

Wishing you all a Happy and Healthy New Year
and lots of quilting time!

Maureen