Little sheep is losing her stuffing...

First up tonight was to fix up little sheep who was losing her stuffing. Sheep belongs to my daughter and was a gift from a special friend. All sewn up, she is now ready to be tied back onto my daughter's backpack and off to school in the morning.

Every year our guild makes placemats to be given to the clients of Meals on Wheels.

The orphan tree block was the inspiration for the placemat. I pulled the bright and cheery colours to make it placemat size. Feeling playful, I added the fork and spoon fabric to the top and bottom, in keeping with the theme.

I brought some extra curved log cabin blocks to Gail's to make another placemat. Gail put the blocks together and quilted it. I finished off the binding. And voila! Another placemat lickety-split! 

This year the guild is making stockings for the women's shelter. We are making 300. They are to be filled with toiletries.  I will be handing these four in this week.

I have started binding the "Woodland Animals" quilt. Cathy did a fabulous job with the quilting.

I will do a big reveal when it is all done!

I am linking up with Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching

Slow Sunday Stitching and Quilt til you Wilt

My hands have been kept busy with needle and thread of late. The autumn table mat shown earlier this week is now complete. 

I added veining detail to the leaves which I think adds some richness to the mat. This is to be a gift for my SIL who has a birthday next week.

I am working on this winter scene right now. Stitching the pine needles is quite time consuming. I will have to turn on a good movie to get these done!

Yesterday was our guild's Quilt til you Wilt Day. This happens twice a year and is always a good opportunity to get lots of work done. I arrived at 830 am and was among the last to wilt at 800 pm. One of our guild members catered a delicious lasagna dinner for us which was a real treat!

I started out the day by working on a Christmas quilt. The pattern is Disappearing Nine Patch (or D9P , as I call it!) I had some Christmas charm packs that I wanted to use and added some stash that I had on hand. It is a generous lap size.

The colours are bright, cheery, and festive!

I worked on this next quilt which is a UFO of many years. I made it out of a jelly roll but hit a road block when I found one of the strips too dark. So it sat for a long time untouched. I decided to bring it with me and discovered I still didn't like it - the dark strips had to go! There was deconstruction followed by reconstruction. Eventually, by the end of the night I had 9 strips ready to be sewn together.

I was happy to spend the day with fellow quilters, enjoying their company, all while working on some quilting projects in dire need of attention!

I am linking up with Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching

Autumn Table Mat

Here is a preview of a new project. It has been coming along quickly. By the weekend, you will see a reveal of this autumn table mat all complete.

Slow Stitching Sunday

Some finishes

I've been busy completing some hand projects started earlier in the year. 

A spring basket table topper in wool applique. I enjoyed using a lighter background this time rather than the traditional dark.

A close up of the flower-filled basket.

This wool applique geranium table mat is intended for my mum for Christmas.

I added extra petals - these were all very tiny- smaller than the end of my pinky finger- and a challenge to cut out- but the result quite pleasing in the end. Rather than french knots for the flower centers, a glass bead was sewn on. Below is a closer look at the petals and beads. Both table toppers are designs by Primitive Gatherings.

You may remember from last spring this block I made from a leftover panel.

Chippy has some friends now! The block has grown into a considerably larger quilt top than intended - big enough for a twin size bed! I am working on the back which is almost complete. To make room for more flannels, I have been using my leftover chunks. I think there will end up being almost as much work in the back as in the front!

I have a lot more on the go but I will save it for next time! 

Today I'm linking up with Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching!

 Hope you all have a great day!

http://kathysquilts.blogspot.ca/2015/11/slow-sunday-stitching_15.html

Geraniums

I'm getting a head start on Christmas by working on this wool table mat. 

Terracotta pots will soon be filled with red geranium blooms. It will be gifted to my mum who has a particular fondness for these flowers.

Today I am linking up with Slow Sunday Stitching.

Slow Sunday Stitching

I've been taking some courses at college, so last week my eyes were looking at books and not fabric. By Friday night, the paper had been written and the midterm taken so I rewarded myself with a little sewing! In fact it has turned into a bit of a buffet! The first thing I did was finish off this feather pillow. The bright colours give me a lift, reminding me that summer is just around the corner!

I made a bit of progress on  the woolen flower basket table mat. It is a bit of a task stitching around the flowers - they are quite small. 

Then I decided to try something new. I had in my stash a panel of  12 woodland animals. They have been there for several years waiting to be put into a quilt. Finally, inspired by a pattern I saw on Pinterest, I adapted the size to fit my animal blocks. Again, my math skills were put to use! Once pieced the new block turned out to be 24.5 inches. Multiplied by 12 plus sashing, this quilt was going to be BIG! So I decided that I will make TWO lap-sized quilts instead or maybe a baby play mat and a wall-hanging. I will see where this leads me. I am trying to use just stash, so they will all  have a scrappy happy feel!

Lastly, I'm including a quilt that I made last fall for a new family member, Baby Natalia. The pattern was featured in Fons and Porter's Love of Quilting magazine last summer. I changed up the colour scheme and added one Kaffe Fassett print in the star and for the binding. I machine quilted it using organic straight line quilting. Cozy flannel is on the back.

I'm linking up today with Kathy's Slow Stitching Sunday.

Woolen Baskets .... and some pillows!

Gail came over this morning to stitch for a couple of hours. We decided to do some handwork so I pulled out this little project started last fall. It is a woolen table mat with a light background and appliqued flower baskets - perfect for this spring weather we seem to be experiencing - knock on wood!

I'm making my way around the leaves and flowers.

Stems and more leaves will be added in due course.

I think this will look nice on the Easter table!

I've made a few pillows lately. This first one began with a scrap of polar bear fabric. Strips were added from my stash to create a fun winter pillow. It now lives with my daughter at her apartment.

I made the Union Jack pillow in celebration of my younger daughter's class trip to England. She landed this morning in London. I'm so excited for her! I used my math skills to figure out the piecing. Who said we'd never use math again???

The last one was made for my friend's January birthday. I selected a number of bright scraps from my stash, many from the Bonnie & Camille collection. I made it using a quilt-as-you-go method. I'm quite pleased with the result...and so is she!

Road to Friendships

In October, the London Friendship Quilters Guild held their biannual quilt show "Road to Friendships".

Our new venue had a lot more space to display our members' beautiful quilts.

Jacqui brought her collection of antique sewing machines and demonstrated how they work.

It was a real treat that was enjoyed by the many visitors to the show.

This is "Road to Kansas with Friends". My mum is posing in front! I made this quilt as part of a Round Robin with three friends. We each ended up with a quilt contributing our talents to the others quilts. I started with the four "Road to Kansas" blocks in the middle, and then passed it on with a bundle of strings/ scraps and red solid fabric for my friends to play with.  Gail, Cathy, and Jacqui  played very nicely with my scraps - I am so pleased!

My son is standing in front of "Scrappy Halloween Trips". I had a nice collection of Halloween prints that I had been amassing over the years. Bonnie Hunter's pattern was a great way to use them! 

  On the left is "Apple Crisp" by me and Edith's fabulous selvage quilt is on the right.

Finally, DH is here with my 9 Patch Mystery quilt that was a part of a guild activity.

Each month for 8 months we had to bring in 20 nine patch blocks in a certain colour. They were handed in and then swapped with other members' blocks and returned. We then had a great scrappy assortment of blocks for our quilts.

It was an excellent show - the guild's Quilt Show Committee are to be commended.

What I've been up to ......

I've been away for awhile...and this is why. In August I decided to go back to school to update my clinical skills. Crazy, right? As if life werent crazy enough! It went well, and I've signed up for a second semester so on we go!

I got in a little bit of sewing and  will update you over a few posts.

Back in September we had a new addition to our family. A little niece named Harper. I made this birdie quilt for her. The pattern came from Quilters Newsletter "Best Quilts for Kids 2011".

The fabric all came from stash. Harper's mom grew up in the country and has a fondness for John Deer - so the green, yellow, and brown were a hit!

This close-up below shows the birds and the quilting.

My friend Gail at The Cozy Quilter lent me her Accuquilt die to make the birds and branches. They were appliqued by machine on to the quilt top.

I did organic style quilting with green thread. I like how the quilting gives texture to the brown tree trunks.

I 

Here is a close up of the flannel backing. I used left over blocks and birds and inserted them as a strip between two pieces of flannel.

This is Harper enjoying her quilt. It was a pleasure making a quilt for this little darling!