Piecing

Lots of piecing! Machine, by hand and english paper piecing.

Starting with machine piecing, below is my 3rd block for Monique Dillard's Blogger Girls Block of the Month.  I enjoyed choosing all the fabrics and the fussy cutting with this one.  These blocks are 12 inches finished.

The flying geese in my last post now are these 6 inch blocks...

I still have lots more to make.

Now for the hand piecing.

I am still well ahead of my goal of one delectable mountain block a week. Here are some of the most recent finishes,

Late last year I won a bag of scraps from Christine. I have taken some time to think about how I would use them. I wanted to make a lone star of some sort, so I chose one of the lone star blocks from the Morrell Quilt for the centre.

Many of the Morrell blocks have a saw tooth border, but I decide to do half square triangles for this block. I am still trying to decide what to do next. Maybe 9 patches. Any suggestions???

Recently Karen at Somerset had  some more of these little bags arrive.  They are perfect for holding sewing notions.

Several of us Friday girls now have one of these bags, so some of us have added something extra to make them individual.

This afternoon I finished this little block which I will applique to one side of the bag.

If you have made the Nearly Insane quilt you may recognise the centre section (up to and including the flying geese) as the centre from block 22.  I love these fabrics!!! They are from Jo Morton's Square in Square line.
(scroll to page 4 to see all the fabrics in the line)

Have a look here to see what Dorothy did with her bag! :)

One day I will get back to my Nearly Insane blocks! I think I have 8 finished; and  long way to go!

This English paper piecing project has been going for a while and I finised one section of it a little while ago. You may remember seeing some little half inch hexies on my blog last year. Slowly they have been joined together to make one side of this purse from Brigitte Giblin.

A little closer look at the fabrics.....

Every one of those fabrics are from the scraps left from the Morrell quilt BOM.

I have started the 2nd side, but it is slow going!

Next post I hope to have some appplique to show.

Here in Melbourne at the moment we are trying to keep cool. We are on to day 6 of an expected 10 day run of temperatures over 30 C (86F). Today was 36C  (96F) here and we expect about the same for Monday to Wednesday next week. Night times are not getting below 20 C (68F). Very unusual for March!

Have a great weekend everyone. Especially those of us who will have an extra day with our Labour Day holiday on Monday.

The winner is....

Thank you to everyone who entered and helped me celebrate more than 200 posts and 200 followers! Thank you for all the wonderful and encouraging comments. Its great to hear from my regular readers/commenters and especially great to hear from those who have never left a comment on my blog before. It has been fun to "meet" some new-to-me bloggers and visit some new-to-me blogs.

I numbered all the comments and asked my random number generator (my DS) to pick a number.

He chose Barb from Fun with Barb who said...

congrats on finishing your shnibble top, it is wonderful. I like you plan for the next one and look forward to seeing what you choose.
The DM blocks are so tiny and sooo awesome.
You've got a lot of fun projects going on.
Lovely giveaway - count me IN IN IN


I have emailed Barb and I will get the book into the post for you Barb when I get your mailing details.


Not much has been happening on the sewing front because we have had an overseas visitor staying with us for a few days.

I have completed a few more delelctable mountain blocks and I am happy to say I am still well ahead of my one-a-week goal. :)

I was inspired by this quilt on Jackie's blog (didn't she do a wondeful job!!) to start making a whole pile of flying geese myself...

I don't usually sew with sparkly fabric (except maybe for Christmas time), but I wanted a fabric that said Australia and this is what I found deep down in my stash!  Some Geese have been stitch together, but the rotary cutter and sewing machine are going to be busy for a few more days yet!

Remembering Duncan.

Coming up for air!

I have been busy with lots of sewing!

Successful flying geese! :)

I was so happy with the mini fit to be geese ruler I blogged about earlier, that I bought the larger ruler.

I have tried several different flying geese techniques before and I have found this ruler is the one that I am happiest with. There is very little wasted fabric. This little pile of scraps....

.....is the waste from these flying geese..

I don't have a pile of little triangles I need to find a use for and I am not throwing out flying geese blocks because they have turned out too small or the angles are out. All problems I have struck trying other techniques.
Kathie also posted about this ruler recently.

Here are my flying geese sewn in a quilt. Just a sneak peek because its more secret sewing. :)

Monique Dillard, who designed the Fit to be Geese rulers has also written some books. (Monique also designs fabric) Her techniques and quilt designs are featured in these books.

I have a couple of fat quarter packs these books will be perfect for.

Another package in the mail revealed this..........

The pattern for Kim McLean's latest quilt, Pandemonium. Isn't it an amazing quilt!!

Just 2 more little houses.

You will notice one house is the mirror image of the other! I cut out the roof section of the house on the right the wrong way around! Instead of starting all over again (plus it was the only scrap I had like it), I decided to make the whole house the other way around. When it is in the quilt, no one will notice!

Currently I am also machine quilting 2 small quilts (pictures to come later).

Trailing vines is coming along well. I have almost finished the first panel!!! Yay! Can't wait till I have 2 panels made so I can join then with the sashing.

Hmmm...OK, I am a Gemini, so I "need" to have enough going on to keep 2 people occupied! Lol

It has been ages since I worked on Friends of Baltimore or Roseville Album, but they are certainly not forgotten.

Finally I have managed to get a half decent photo of my quilting and blogging buddy.

Meet Jasper, who is often found sharing my lap with my hand stitching.

Thank you to everyone who offered a solution to the quilt cleaning question in my previous post.

Ok...back to sewing...and

Happy Mother's Day to all the Mothers who read my blog. :)

Flying Geese and more....

I have flying geese: flying geese that worked! :)

I used the Mini Fit To Be Geese ruler to make these. The instructions with the ruler are very clear and there is very little wasted fabric.

I just used charm squares to make these flying geese and cut a single small square from each charm square.  After I made them I discovered that Carrie from La Vie En Rosie blog has a tutorial for using the ruler and charm squares where you can get 4 flying geese blocks from 2 charm squares. No more charm squares with little corners cut out. :)

I recently made a sleeve for a tablet.

Inside:

I bound the seams with bias tape. The outside fabric is a heavier cotton from American Folk and Fabric's Antique Collection. The lining is from Lecien's Antique  Flower Collection.
The button was a lucky find at Spotlight!
I am very happy with how it turned out. :)

Last week I had a day in the city and went to AQC and a little visit to L'uccello on the way home.

I found this wonderful fabric at L'uccello. :)

I didn't come home empty handed from AQC.

Plenty of fabric:

The fabric at top left is a linen from Lecien, and some bargains.
I also found a little bit of Collections for a Cause; Friendship..

Looove those turkey reds!

It was a lovely day with meeting old friends and new.

Here in Melbourne we are enjoying a relatively late burst of warm weather. I found some autumn roses in bloom.

Sokdee Pimay!!

.....or Happy New Year!

Today is the first day of Laotian New Year celebrations. (It is also New Year in Cambodia and Thailand.) It is the last day of the year 2554. Traditionally the last day of the year is for cleaning and decorating.
Today we had friends over for lunch.
Tomorrow is the day between the old year and the new year, a day of rest and for having fun. (If anyone has experienced New Year in Laos, Cambodia or Thailand, this is the day where they throw water on everyone!)
Monday is New Year's Day and is the day for more celebrations and giving of wishes for good luck for the New Year.

Last year my daughter was married on Laotian New Year's Day.


On the sewing front I don't have much to show.....yet.....more secret sewing happening! :)

Just one more little house to add to my collection.

This is my 37th little house from scraps. If I was making one house a day I would only be up to February 6th! Hmmm...a long way to go for me! Lol

A little progress on my next Friends of Baltimore block...

Recently Monique Dillard of Open Gate Quilts blog had a giveaway and I was lucky enough to win one of her prizes.

I am really looking forward to using the Mimi Fit to be Geese ruler. Up until now my efforts at flying geese blocks have been very disappointing! (very sad geese!)  One of the secret sewing projects has a round of flying geese blocks for the next step. I am sure that this ruler and the accompanying instructions will have me making perfect (and happy!) flying geese.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend. :)