Blogger's Quilt Festival: Rainbow Star Mini Quilt

It's been a bit too long since I last posted, but I thought there's no better way to get back into blogging than through participating in Blogger's Quilt Festival!

I love looking at the hundreds of inspiring quilts!!

Today I'd like to show the mini quilt I completed for Leah as part of the Fab Little Quilt Swap through Flickr.

My swap partner said that she liked bright colours, rainbows and stars among other things. I came across this tutorial to paper piece 'Aunt Rachel's Star' block and auditioned a few different colour/rainbow variations:

And finally settled on this one:

Then the paper piecing began .... Each half square triangle block is less than 1 inch square.

Here's the star block all completed.

Prior to completing the block I had been weighing up whether I wanted to make
4 stars in different rainbow variations, but once I completed one block
I knew I wanted it to be the "star" of the quilt (pun intended ;-)
so I decided on a 3D rainbow pinwheel border to finish it off.

A close-up of one of the 3D pinwheels .....

I did a little bit of machine quilting in the ditch around the centre pinwheel, star and border. I then hand quilted it using DMC perle cotton size 8 in white. I echo quilted all of white half square triangles and then around the star and finally around each of the pinwheels. The hand quilting is nearly my favourite thing about this quilt - it gives it so much texture and I really love it!!

So here is a photo of it all finished, hanging out in my local park. It ended up being 20 inches square.

It was hard to give away because it was very much my style too, but I hope Leah is enjoying looking at it on her wall :)

Thanks so much for stopping by!!

I hope you go and check out more of the wonderful quilts linked up to Blogger's Quilt Festival.

A big thanks to Amy for putting it on again!!

Ideas Please!!

I have finished the quilt top for the Fab Little Quilt Swap and I really love it!

It's 20 inches square and each of those little 3D pinwheels are 2 inches in diameter.

I really, REALLY don't want to muck it up with my limited quilting abilities. I can straight line quilt, and can do a little hand quilting, but I need a lot more free motion quilting practice before I'd touch this quilt with it.

Any ideas on simple quilting that would look effective with this design would be greatly appreciated!!

King Auction

The King Auction has been set up by Naomi over at Seven Cherubs to support the King family who have been through so much!! Lisa lost her son 4 months ago and then her husband on Australia Day. You can read more about Lisa and her family on her blog.

I was really touched by their story and wanted to contribute in some small way. So this is what I've donated to the King Auction:

It's my "There's a Square in There" quilt. The pattern is designed by Kate Conklin Designs and the quilt is handmade by me!!

The quilt top (shown) also has a grey outer border and finishes up at approx. 64" x 76" and is all ready to go to the longarm quilter. The auction winner can choose the quilting pattern that they like the most too!

So if you live in Australia and want to contribute through bidding on an auction item, please head over to Seven Cherub's facebook page to bid. If you don't live in Australia or don't win an auction item, you can still support the King family through a donation over here!!

Aunt Rachel's Star

I'm part way there with my quilt top for the Fab Little Quilt Swap.

The pattern is Aunt Rachel's Star, is paper-pieced and finishes at 12 inches square. I like lots of colour and rainbows so I was glad to find out that my swap partner does too!

Now I just have to decide how to finish the quilt top up ..... decisions, decisions ....

4x5 Modern Quilt Bee Blocks Sent

These are the blocks that I recently sent off to my fellow 4x5 Modern Quilt Bee members. I had a lot of fun playing with their colour schemes. I've really been enjoying making dresden plates lately - so much so that I have not 1 but 2 dresden plate quilts in the works.

 

 

Sew Awesome's block:

Locodowo's block:

KD-Quilts block:

Sixtwentyseventh's block:

Guiltyquilter's block:

I hope you like them ladies!!

CRAZY!!

Yep that's what I am!

This ......

(yes that is 72 HST's in a 6.5 inch square)

Is going to turn into this (12 inches finished) ......

..... and if I survive making one! I might even make 3 more .....

.... other options .......

It's for the Fab Little Quilt Swap on flickr.

We'll see if I survive the one!! Wish me luck :)

I think I can, I think I can .......

Fab Little Quilt Swap

I'm so excited to be participating in the Fab Little Quilt Swap over on flickr! Firstly, because I'd love a beautiful quilt to put on my sewing room wall, and secondly, because the caliber of the quilters that are participating in this swap is pretty amazing! Hence I'm not quite sure if I'm really excited or nervous (probably both)!

Over on flickr I saw a few fantastic quilters putting up gorgeous mosaics for the swap. So I headed over to the group to see what it was all about, when I realised it was an administration invite only. Most of the people in the swap had been exclusively hand picked for their amazing work, so I thought I'd have no chance, but I put my name in the hat and was accepted, yay!

So here is my inspiration mosaic .....

(click on the picture to get more info on the sources)

I can't wait to find out who my swap partner is and to get started!!

Swoon-along

Katy from i'm a ginger monkey fame is holding the Swoon-along on flickr for all of us who have wanted to start or finish a Swoon quilt. I started mine in July and I still only have one block completed, so this is just the kick in the pants that I need. Oh and see that block in the Swoon-along button above - it's mine :)

If you've wanted to make a Swoon block or 2 or a whole quilt come and join us!

Ellen's First Quilt!

12 months ago I got to spend some wonderful time with all of my family in Sydney. We did many lovely things together, but one of the things I really enjoyed was going shopping with my sister Ellen to buy fabric for her first quilt. She decided on a lovely stack of soothing green, blue and grey fabrics and a stacked coins theme and then promptly cut and pieced the quilt top in no time at all.

Unfortunately we ran out of time on that trip, so the rest had to wait until we got together again in September. On this trip she pieced the back together, spray basted the quilt sandwich and echo quilted the columns in straight lines all whilst she cared for her brand new baby boy. Unfortunately we ran out of time again!

Over Christmas our sister Kate was able to show her how to bind her quilt and I was so pleased to see a photo of the finished quilt today. Isn't it gorgeous? She made it for her husband, and I think he'll love it!

Great job Elle!! I hope you make many more :)

Christmas Gifts & Happy New Year!!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and that you've gotten off to a good start for the New Year!!

2011 wasn't the greatest year that I've had in my lifetime, it had a few ups and downs, so I am grateful for a new year and new starts, and I can already feel that 2012 is going to be a good one :)

It's been a while since I've blogged, and I've got a fair bit to blog about, but today I wanted to show a couple of Christmas presents.

We didn't get to spend Christmas with my parents this year. They are currently living in Finland, serving a mission for our Church. I wanted to make them something that could possibly fit in their suitcases when they come back home later this year, so I made them a couple of cushion covers from French General's Rouenneries.

.... closer .....

..... CLOSER  :) .....

I have loved making 3D pinwheels, and I don't think this will be the last cushion I make with them.

My Nana is a seamstress and has made me many gorgeous dresses throughout my life, including my wedding dress. Some of the most beautiful things she has made for me was made with silk dupioni, so I thought I'd make Nana a Swoon cushion made with silk dupioni and Anna Maria Horner's Little Folks voile. I adjusted the size to make it a little smaller at 20 inches.

I love the texture of the silk and how the colours change as the light changes.

Nana's favourite colours are purples and pinks so she really loved it.

Oh and this is some fabric goodness that I got for Christmas.....

.... gorgeous Nani Iro double gauze ... I've got plans for a simple, super soft quilt.

Thanks Mum & Dad!!