Just another Manic Monday …….

I intended posting this last night but time got away on me and

it was a real busy day, more present shopping, laundry, ordering fabric and so on!

My cat quilt - Alley Cats - should have had a few seams sewn yesterday but didn't

happen because of the above reasons and I couldn't

stop myself from starting a small quilt using the Hourglass Block from the new book by
Sujata Shah - Cultural Fusion Quilts - over at The Root Connection
pay her blog a visit, it's wonderful.

 Cats -  I made around 126 for a quilt 70" x 81" and was undecided whether to set them as the original or put a narrow strip between rows.
Putting them up on the wall I realised I didn't really want it so big
more of a throw over the couch or over a chair, even
hanging on a wall in the hallway so I lost the bottom row and two side rows

Alley Cats

here they are in the final arrangement, untrimmed and still with threads hanging off
some of them but I'm not worried about that I just
wanted to see how they all looked. Also you can see I'm going
with the original design. Head on over to
Super Scrappy and RSC 2014 and catch up
with everyone, only two more Saurdays' left now.

 On to the sewing machine to get them all in order, before doing that I need
 to go and dead-head some of my roses, the wind and rain here
have ruined the blooms.
I did take a couple of photos before the bad weather

Can't remember the name of the rose

day lilies and penstemon

Off to the sewing machine  - happy quilting.

Maureen

Cats for RSC2014 - stripping!

In my last post to RSC2014 I showed a few of my cats

set out in two rows HERE and
 Sally T left a comment with the suggestion that perhaps a thin black strip between
rows would improve the look of the cat's ears
coming right into contact with the row above
so

tried out with a few more cats with what would be a 1" finished strip between.
I think they look much happier (bearing in mind they're just popped up there
nothing sewn yet, nor will be until 126 of them are all there).

What do you think?

Cats Creating Mayhem for Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2014

Actually I think I'm the one that's creating mayhem, I was doing so well tidying things up in my little studio and then went off at a tangent with something

else - looking at the quilting books available with Amazon

for reading on my iPad - fatal!!!!

Cats - I just pulled them out of their drawer and began

playing with a few on my moveable design wall which of course isn't big enough

so I need to use my larger one which is fixed to the wall.

So, then had to move a stackable set of drawers to another

space in my studio but there isn't one!

It is in a temporary home at the moment so I am just posting

a photo of a few cats on the too small wall.

Ignore colour placement, and the fact that they are not in a straight line on the

wall, they look as if they're sliding off on the right, I was in hurry to get moving things around.

This is just to give you an idea of placing right and left facing

creatures.

They will be set 14 across by 9 down in straight rows!

I think we're all busy arranging blocks ready for a grand reveal so I don't feel too bad about not having stitched anything together yet.

Heading off to link up with everyone at Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2014. 

Thursday - an early start

An earlier start than I would have liked because of going down to the laboratory 

for a whole lot of blood tests following

my visit to the Rheumatologist yesterday - a downer was that

two of them had to be fasting so I was outside

the door as soon as they opened!

I haven't done a thing for a few days with quilts, grabbed a handful of

clean up fabric strips yesterday to make a cover for my birthday

iPad, turns out most of the strips were in the green range

quilted the lining and now need to trim to the size needed. I may not quilt the strips, 

I did flip and sew so they should be OK, I'll think about that

whilst writing this post.

Yesterday I found that I had quite a collection of yellow fabrics bought

maybe two years or so ago with the intention of making

a yellow diamond quilt - now I've changed my mind so I 

have heaps more yellows to add to my already considerable yellow stash.

I also bought around two and half yards for the border

so I will not need any more yellows!

Sorting out scraps is turning out to be a major I have just folded some of the ones I have 

used recently which were piled up on my table and

decided to keep them in one drawer just for Kaffe Collective scraps 

I would really like to begin on a quilt from the book by 

Sujata over at The Root Connection
but as having my eyes dilated is on the cards for around lunchtime and therefore not
being able to focus for a few hours after that the new start is out!

Off to make the most of the morning whilst I can still
see clearly - have a good week!

Last of the Blues!

Yes it's officially the last Saturday (Sunday here in NZ) for anything Blue for Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2014, sounds as if something exciting is in the pipeline for 2015 so go along over to
Angela at superscrappy
she's not giving much away but
Vicki over at Field Trips in Fiber
will have details in her December Newsletter.

Well, I am all "catted out" right now but have two more 16 patch blue blocks

excuse the large watermark on this and the next photo, far too large but I'll remedy this for next post.

My H blocks kept me busy yesterday and some were blue, well sort of blue

I made a few positive and negatives in two other colours and four others

so nothing exciting this post I'm afraid!

I'm trying to organise my three tubs of scraps but it's a mammoth task and only possible to achieve this in short bursts. I must have some fabrics in there from up to 20 years ago and I suspect some of these may end up being culled and go on to be given away.

Time for putting all my cats together this month and I need to baste Red Sea Sunset and Cotton Candy, these two should be basically straight line quilting, the tricky quilting will come when I have to work out how to quilt my cats.
I'm off to link up with
RSC 2014
Happy Quilting
Maureen

One more for RSC 2014 and a few blues!

Recently Linda aka Razzle Dazzle Quilter a fellow blogger and superb quilter here in New Zealand emailed me a photo of her new feline friend!

What a beauty he is, I loved  his amazing colour - which is classed as Lavender Mink - and said what a good idea it would be to make a cat for my quilt in that shade.
This is the nearest I could find

so he will be in good company in my cat quilt! Note he will not have one ear larger than the other  both will be equal in size when he is stitched up with the others!

 I think I mentioned  that I found quite a few blue fabrics hidden away in a project (16 patch) started a few years ago,  so to meet the blue theme for the month
I have four more blocks made this morning.

It's a very humid day with us, not conducive to sewing and I'm really hoping this gets less towards evening, terrible trying to sleep when you feel as if you're breathing in water! No doubt we'll have to watch for things like downy mildew etc. on the veggies and roses.

Better get a move on and go link with

Angela and friends at RSC 2014

Have a Happy Thanksgiving