Napkins, Blocks and Charm Swap Received

There isn't much going on here lately.   In between clearing and cleaning the house for the Raya  holiday season, visits to my in-laws and relatives, I haven't sewn much.   Here's what I did get done in the 3 days I did sew prior to the outstation trip to my hubby's late grandmother's hometown for the holidays.


I've made Gingham Napkins from Handstitched Class :

It was my first time sewing with ric racs and definitely won't be my last!    Had so much fun sewing these together.   I've hand quilted using pearl cotton thread to match the ric racs used for the individual napkins.   A lovely set of napkins for picnics, wouldn't you agree?


And I've also made some blocks from the How Far Will You Go? QAL :

Week 3 - Pieced Star

Week 4 - St. Louis Star

This block was done using the foundation paper piecing method.  It was my first attempt at foundation paper piecing and it was abit tricky piecing the fabrics at the beginning for me but fun nonetheless.   The middle part of the block isn't flat though ( even after numerous unpicking ) only because there are 16 seams all bunched up together!   Oh well...

I've received my package last week from the  I Love Kona Charm Swap  that Alyssa @ Pile O' Fabric hosted.  This was my first swap, there were 28 swappers and 112 charms in each bundle.  I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do with the charm squares yet.   For now, I've been enjoying flipping through them.  Alyssa has planned for a second charm swap soon and I'm planning to join in that one too.   Hopefully by then I would know what to make with all the charm squares received.


Since Raya is a whole month affair, there'll be lots of gatherings over at relatives and friends, thus I know I'll be neglecting my sewing machine for awhile - so I'm hoping I do get some sewing time or make some more tessellation blocks in between these gatherings.


Linking up with Jen's Building Blocks Tuesday over at Quilter in the Closet :

Hope you have a lovely week ahead!

My Precious Little Folks Quilt

My Little Folks lap quilt is finally finished!  Thanks to Kelly of KelbySews, the host of My Precious quilt-a-long in encouraging quilters to make something with their precious fabrics instead of hoarding setting them aside.  I am so happy that I took the courage to cut into those precious fabrics by Anna Maria Horner.

Well I guess some of you have heard me rambled on about the piecing bit, but in the end it was sooo worth it.  I pieced the half square triangles with solid white.  I was frustrated a little when the points did not match up.  Voile has the tendency to fray if you have to rip out a seam and that happened to me a few times, but please don't let that discourage you from quilting with the voile. 

There are many beautiful quilts made from it and there were no issues so far.   It's just my lack of experience in making half square triangles and this being my first attempt in making a whole quilt with just HSTs.

The back is pieced with the leftovers from the front.

I've hand quilted using white embroidery floss - stitched 1/4" away from the seam on the white areas only as I wanted to preserve the softness of the fabric.  I bound it in Marine from the pastry line and added a thin strip of scraps placed on the top  right of the quilt.

The lightweight fabric makes it the perfect quilt considering the weather over here and I'm sure I've mentioned before how wonderfully soft they are.  It's machine washable too!  My precious lappy measures 54" x 72".

Over all I LOVE this quilt and can't wait for it to get a bit cooler ( it's been raining alot recently...woohoo ) so I can snuggle under it...

linking up with

Cast a Vote for Baltimore Blues

Over at Quilting Gallery, it's time to vote on Quilts for Mom.   I have entered the Baltimore Blues quilt into their weekly contest and would really appreciate your vote!

This quilt was a gift to my mom for Mother's Day last year.  It's the second Baltimore Album quilt I've made. It measures 60" x 85".  The pattern was purchased from Fat Cat Patterns by Sindy Rodenmeyer. 





Do check out the wonderful quilts submitted over at the Quilting Gallery.   I would love for your vote to be for my Baltimore Blues, but if you find others you like better, I certainly understand.  They are all just gorgeous!  Voting is taking place now through Monday 6pm Eastern. Click HERE to get to Quilting Gallery.

Thanks a bunch!



And to all the lovely moms out there, hope you have a fabulous weekend with your loved ones!

My First Improv Quilt

I am so glad to show you my first finished quilt for 2012. I have used a pattern from Kate Conklin Designs called There's a Square in There. I love the contemporary look of the quilt and decided to make one for my son.

I have mostly used Denyse Schmidt's Greenfield Hill line -dogwood colourway, a mix of prints, Essex Cotton/ Linen solids and a whole lot of Kona Cotton in Snow.

It was a lot of fun cutting the fabrics using Kate's 'stack and slash' method.



I wanted to add more blocks as I wanted the quilt to be bigger and the blocks smaller than the original design. So after a few exchanges of emails with Kate and based on her recommendations, I made the blocks smaller without compromising the look and added 9 extra blocks to make it 72" square. Love the improv look!

Quilting was fun too.   I hand quilted it using Perle Cotton No. 8  and
followed Kate's method

using masking tape to mark out the squares and then quilted on the inside and outside of the tape.

I love her pieced back design
and did the same for this one.  I used
Denyse Schmidt's Hope Valley line-new day colourway for the backing and added a few green prints to tie up with the front of the quilt.

I made up two scrappy binding strips using the remaining fabrics I have used for the front and placed them randomly on the sides and I love how it looks!

I am very happy with how it turned out and knowing that my son, Iliya loves it....PRECIOUS!!!

Baltimore Album Quilt

I've always been inspired by pictures of Baltimore Album Quilts in magazines and decided to make one.

This project started in mid 2010. My LQS had a series of BA BOM and with much enthusiasm I've ordered the templates and started immediately upon receiving them.

A few of the completed blocks before trimming to size

These blocks finished at 16".  I hand appliqued the blocks using my favourite needle-turn method.   It took 5 months to complete all 13 of them.

 I wanted to try a new layout so I set the blocks on point and pieced them on a diagonal by machine.  I used a green tone-on-tone fabric for the stars and a soft green solid for sashings.

I hand quilted all the blocks, side and corner triangles. Machine quilted 'in-the-ditch' for both sashings and stars.

backing

Completed this baby in 8 months.

My Baltimore Album Quilt measures 103" square.

My hubby loves the fresh and vibrant colours of this beauty.

My Flower Garden Quilt

It all started with this photograph which I saw in the Australian Patchwork & Quilting magazine, Vol 18 No 9.

I love hexagons and thought that it would be a nice project to start off after a long while (1995 to be exact) when I last made my daughter's baby quilt. 

This is my very first big quilt. It measures 85" x 95".

I started this project in January 2010 and completed it in February 2011.

There are more than 4,000 hexagon pieces in there, all hand-pieced and hand quilted. 

I used Marti Michell's 3/4" hexagon template to cut and mark my fabrics. These hexagons were pieced following Marti's dot-to-dot piecing technique.

After completing the centerpiece, I've appliqued it to the borders as I wanted to keep the hexagon shaped edges. I stitched 'in-the-ditch' for the hexagons and used variegated thread for the borders.

Backing

I wanted a crinkly, vintage finish thus I did not pre-wash the fabrics prior to cutting.




LOVE the traditional look!

Even though it took me about 13 months to complete this project, I have enjoyed the whole process of it!