Busy as a Bee (sorry)

It's a funny thought but I'm supposed to be moving house on Friday.  We still haven't exchanged contracts but the removal men are booked and what feels like 90% of the house (but is probably nearer 10%) is in boxes in the hall way.  I suppose it's a 50/50 chance at this point...

Anyway, before I could face the horror of packing up my workroom, I knew I had to catch up on a few bits and bats.  For the first time since I joined my two sewing bees, I had COMPLETELY NEGLECTED an entire month.

So, with no further ado, here is my "Squirrel at the Wheel" block for Quiltification (I hadn't realised but judging by that tutorial we appear to share a lot of orange stash):

And my chicken block for Just Jude Designs:

And the last two blocks for my village knitting group's quilt bee, Teresa's Pinwheel and Morning Star II.

Oooh, after the summer "holidays" I've had, I can't lie, it's been lovely to get a bit of a stitch on.  I'll have to start putting it all in boxes tomorrow though.  Wish me luck!

Going with Flo

Ta dah!  A quilt top, finished, for Siblings Together.  I learned a fair bit from this one, I think - not least the differences between what "a 1/4" seam" means on various sewing machines.  In retrospect, a block that required precisely matched seams may not have been a sensible choice.

There are, certainly, a few places on the quilt where four blocks meet in perfect synchronicity:

And there are a few places where it looks more like this:

I will admit, my perfectionist heart sank when I started pinning blocks together, and for nearly a whole row I wrestled with trimming and easing and generally tweaking to try to make everything exactly as I had imagined it.  And then I remembered a very wise lady whom I worked with several years ago.  Her name was Tracey, and when things didn't quite turn out as planned, she was often known to say (in her wonderfully soft, soothing voice) "Go with Flo.  She's a good girl, is Flo, she'll see you right."

So I did, and I'm glad of it.  It's a beautiful quilt top, with all the quirks and individualities of the people who made it.  The pattern still shines out just as I hoped it would, and I think the effect is fresh and friendly.  I am hugely grateful to the very skilled and very generous members of the ST2 bee.  And it has the Moosh seal of approval too.

It's also HUGE - that's it spread out over our super-king sized bed - and I've never quilted anything this big before.  There is every chance that I won't finish it before the Siblings Together retreat...  but if I don't, I can comfort myself that I have at least contributed.  A while back I dug a few finished quilt tops out of the midden of my workroom that I'd completely forgotten about (I KNOW) and asked if anyone would be willing to quilt them up for ST2.  The very wonderful Sue stepped up and has finished all three!

This one was a sort of scrappy, inverted Irish Chain quilt that I put all my most cheerful scraps into and then forgot about.

This one has a ton of Denyse Schmidt Shelburne Falls in it.  I was finally making something for ME, and I painstakingly devised a block, then set it on point, and just as I was finishing up the top I realised that there would've been a vastly easier way of creating the same effect without having to deal with a million bias edges.  I promptly fell utterly out of love with it, despite the fabrics.  Whoops.

And this last one is entirely made of Madrona Road, intended as a showcase for the range back when I briefly dabbled in selling fabric.  I still really love this range.

But more to the point, isn't Sue a hero?!  I got to do the fun bit and then she's made them actually useful!  Three cheers for Sue!  Fingers crossed I can quilt up that beast at the top and we'll make it 4 finished quilts for the retreat.  Wish me luck...

Siblings Together II - my block for June!

Is is really June already?!  Apparently so, and now it's my turn to be "Bee Mama" for the Siblings Together II bee that I'm a member of.  I've been pondering my choice of block for a while, and then I saw a quilt on the Moda freebie quilt patterns which gave me an idea.  (Sadly I've since closed the tab in Chrome and for the life of me I can't find it again - oops)

So, for June's block you will need:

9:  5"x5" squares in shades blue, grey, black and white

2: 2"x 14" strips in red

2: 2"x 16" strips in red

I'd prefer to avoid florals, but plains are fine.  Tonal or blender fabrics are ideal!

First job is to sew the squares into a basic nine-patch, nothing fancy.

Now comes the exciting part - for me, anyway.  I don't get out much.  Measure a line across the top row that is 2.25" above the horizontal seam and... SLICE IT.

Do the same for the bottom row.  Remember, 2.25" from the middle row.  You may notice your detached strips will be about 2.5" wide, which is not a mistake!  It will all even up once sewn.

On your cutting table you will now have something like this:

Add in your first set of red strips and trim up the edges if necessary.  Now you have this:

Time for more slicing!  Place your cuts as before - one along the right-hand row at 2.25" from the vertical seam, and the same along the left-hand row.  Again, your detached strips will be 2.5" wide.

Add in the next set of red strips, which will definitely need a little trim.  My finished blocks ended up 15.75" square, which seems a very odd number but there you have it I suppose.  Feel free to press your seams however you like - entirely your choice.

  

They are quite fun to make.  If my bee-mates could manage one I would be very pleased to receive it, and if any of them could stretch to two, that would be even better.  A 3x4 block quilt would be about 45" x 60" which is plenty big enough for the bee requirements.  And don't they look smashing put together?

Have fun, and if you've any questions, please ask!

Finally, some sewing!

It has been PROPER HECTIC around these parts for various reasons including but not limited to:

• foster kittens
• sick foster kittens
• one foster kitten who refuses to use a litter tray
• grumpy foster mama-cat
• 2 house cats deeply confused and upset by the sudden presence of kittens
• broken cars
• new cars
• house being put on the market
• viewing other houses
• sobbing hopelessly over the thought of leaving my lovely, lovely village

That last one is the kicker, although we have good reasons for relocating.  It will all be fine.  It will.

All in all I have not sewn much, and I have felt the loss keenly.  I'm pretty sure I've never taken so long to complete a monthly Bee block as I have this month, but it was worth the waiting for because these were really, really fun to do!  They are for my Siblings Together II bee, and the pattern is by Patshyn Catrin.

She asked for bright, fresh colours for a tween/teen girl, and I discovered I already had several almost perfectly-sized scraps to make these, so pretty much the only remains went into the ticker-tape bucket for making cards and collage!  Just what the doctor ordered.

It's half term next week and the kittens are returning to the rescue centre on Wednesday so I shall be trying to eke out any sewing time available before Friday.  I can't really begrudge the time I've spent away from the machine though... not to faces like these:

From L-R, Harper, Holmes and Hopkins.  Hopkins is the dopey bugger who keeps getting sick and missing the litter tray BUT he is also dangerously cute and basically my favourite, so he gets a pass.  They all have homes to go to and I will miss them dreadfully, even if Deeley and Marsha won't.

OH LAWKS

Of course, the ridiculous thing is that while I haven't blogged for months, I have been sewing like a mad thing the entire time.

In the spirit of my "use stuff up" project, I've been doing 12.5" quilt-as-you-go blocks for the wonderful Soy Amado project:

And I made some pot-holders for a wonderful friend of mine who got married last week in the US.  I wish I could've been there but from what I've seen it was a fab day and she made a gorgeous bride.

And I've joined a real actual sewing bee!  The Siblings Together Bee (mk 2), where we make 2 x 12.5" blocks per month for a year.  These are November's rainbow coloured slab blocks, although I got a bit carried away and made 3...

I also made a commissioned toddler quilt which I didn't even take a photo of, and half a dozen baby quilts for Project Linus which will go to the Calderdale babies ICU.  I didn't take photos of those either.  I am USELESS!

Worst of all, I've realised I never posted the finished Bear Quilts.  So here they are, two disappearing nine-patch quilts in "Indie Chic" by Riley Blake fabrics and a few stash bits and Kona solids, for a pair of twin boys:

Here's a close-up of the Bear Block at the top of each quilt (based on this block at Quilter's Cache, but tweaked a bit for my purposes):

Each quilt had a little teddybear to go with it, made from a Love Patchwork & Quilting pattern.   Unfortunately the bears had to be posted off before the quilts were finished, so I didn't get a proper photo, but I managed this one while the quilt tops were still on the design wall:

There, that'll do for this post.  Now let's see how long before I post again...