Sunday sewing with Hannah

Almost finished up sewing block seams, more tomorrow and then, hopefully, a completed top on Tuesday

and then a full photo without the addition of my chair back and small ironing surface. Just click to enlarge the photo. Oh for a larger design wall. This was such an easy quilt to make, perfect for using up already cut 2 and1/2 "strips or a jelly roll.

Here I've used strips left over from other projects and also I cut into odd shaped large scraps, a few I also cut from favourite yardage. Two strips I particularly wanted to use were short of a 13" length but by scratching around in my very small scraps I found tiny pieces and stitched together, it is after all a scrappy quilt, here's a joined up strip, tiny piece LH side. 

I began with neat stacks of 13" strips, two of which are below, lots more not in the photo. The throw size is 60" x 72" and I gaily kept on going hunting strips, I only needed 120 but when counting up found that I had stacked 260, perhaps there will be a second Hannah quilt in the future.

Here's how they ended up after random pulling out of pieces

and there are more of these covering the cutting table. Guess what I'm going to be doing come Tuesday!

For a break last week kind husband drove me to the new premises of The Ribbon Rose, a well established store for many, many years here in Auckland. Recently they moved and what a treasure filled three storey building they now occupy. The fabric floor is amazing and it goes without saying that I found a few KF fabrics on sale, just a few quarters came home with me. Large bins had simply rolled up metre lengths of fabrics at good prices, I took a chance and bought this one

delighted when I came back home and unrolled, below is a small section of the full piece.

I just love this!!

Books are a passion of mine, all my life I have been a voracious reader but over the past few years this pleasure, for various reasons, seemed to have been left behind a little. I'm now back on board with books and there are quite a few on my bookshelves which I have never read, some have been read many times over  because they were so exciting, moving and so very interesting.

Two below, the cover of the first one is self-explanatory, having worked in a Pathology Lab for a number of years in long ago days, and also spent time in General Practice surgeries as receptionist, I was excited to find this book a little while ago. 

These Precious Days is a collection of essays  by Ann Patchett, each essay stands alone. I see myself keeping this one to read during quiet time in the evening, perhaps even when settled in bed with a nice hot drink!

Perhaps I could write a little about my thoughts on a particular essay after reading here on the blog.

Silly mistake made by me in my last post.  I spoke about making a quilt for our "soon to be grand-daughter" - the quilt will actually be for our great grand-daughter!

That's all from me for now, a rest day today after a family lunch here at home yesterday on my husband's 80th birthday, we had such a happy time but I was shattered by early evening and my bed called to me earlier than usual.

Maureen

Catching up on houses

I've been so behind with houses for RSC 2016 but

managed to get down to making two

in the colour of the month - dusty lilac/purple with acid green

as the accent. I really don't do acid green but

here's what I came up with.

The top one is most definitely not acid green, more like my favourite
soft turquoise as the accent.

I was going to post photos of our eldest grand-daughter all ready
for her first ball, she's 17 years old, but mine turned out
ghastly so I'll ask her mum to send me on one of hers.
Bea had the most beautiful corset - quilted!!
Next post I hope to have them on here.
Right now I'll link up with
Angela at Superscrappy
and all the other smoky purples taking part in
Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2016.

One down and one to go!

As my post title says one down and one to go, referring to the two medical appointments for this week.

Saw the orthopaedic guy this morning and the issue is with the cartilage in my left knee - short story an arthroscopy is recommended to sort out the probable tear, trim away any raw edges and so on. Just a small surgical procedure he tells me in the day stay ward and I will walk out at the end of the day - not very far but I will walk!! All sounds so simple but with my complex medical issues it is far from simple, however I will now wait for further information re pre-op assessments and in the meantime I've been managing to stand for 20 minutes at a time to cut fabrics for the Fractured QAL mentioned in a previous post. 

With some of these fabrics I intend to use the reverse side, some playing around needs to be done over the next few days plus I have only cut the fabrics in the top photo, yet to attack the ones on the right hand side. Later in  the week it will be a case of hunting out suitable darks and cutting the strips and the start of next week matching lights  and darks together all ready for the start date of September 6th.  So looking forward to this project!                

The new Rowan book "Grandeur"  was due for release some time in September but I was having a look at the Glorious Color  site and they already had the book in early and autographed by Kaffe Fassett so this should be on its way to me within a few days, along with a fabric top up. My favourite fabric of all time I think is Brassica by Philip Jacobs and I ordered a little more of the gray and the green, I now see that there are two quilts in Grandeur using both those colorways - really nice!

Filling time in whilst waiting for my appointment this morning I took my favourite English magazine with me -  "Country Living"-  and they featured the most gorgeous old stone cottage set on the cliffs of the Lizard peninsula down in Cornwall, this is used as a bolt-hole by a young couple to spend their weekends, it had been faithfully restored using original flag stones for flooring and lots of other features and they had hunted down old pieces of furniture at second hand shops in the area, it looked so relaxing. Very basic, no mains facilities, they used candles for light and took their water with them and gas canisters for the stove. Just the sort of place I would love to hibernate in for a few days and quilt with no distractions although I could lose the water and gas carrying set up and I would need power for the sewing machine and iron!! This set me thinking and I remembered an old wooden cottage which had been for sale some time ago just about 10 minutes walk from our place, down the cliffs and right on the beach front, it was really run down but I thought at the time what a great place for a hideaway for a painter or quilter or any artist for that matter and John had taken photographs for me.

Here it is - and what a view to get the creative juices flowing. I can but dream!!

Ah well, back to reality and the laundry waiting to be dealt with, then more cutting fabrics. I also had a new die arrive yesterday - three sizes of strip on one die 1", 1 1/2" and 2" so I would like to have a play around with that.

Enjoy your week

Maureen

Still wet and windy!!

Well we're still having the bad weather here in NZ. Wet and windy here in Auckland but the snow down in the South Island is something else!!

I took a photo of the oak tree next door the other day just as the storms here were starting up, we had a double rainbow at one point but I only managed a shot of the single one.

You can see by the colour of the sky a hint of what was to follow!

After my last post with the two small blocks from the Scrap Swap, in which I said I wasn't happy with them, I had encouragement from Wanda and decided that I should persevere, so two more finished and I had only intended to make four and then add sashing/borders, so here is an up to date photo

Not sure if this is the way they will be set, will have a play around tomorrow.

We have just arrived back home from a birthday party for our eldest grand-daughter Beatrice, she turned fourteen yesterday, it seems only a short time since she was a toddler! Our eight week old youngest grandson was there and he is growing quickly too.

Short post tonight, very cold evening and we're going to settle down with a hot drink and watch TV - we have a few more episodes of House to watch from the last series (8) - very addictive programme and I just love Hugh Laurie in this.

Sewing time planned for tomorrow, probably work on the New York Blooms, and start  Quilt As You Go on my bright bargello style quilt, I think I can handle this sewn in two halves and then add the borders and quilt those. 

Have a great week!