Natural History

It could have been a Friday (or even Thursday) Finish, but I couldn't catch the light to take pictures. Even today is mostly overcast, but still - here it is, the Natural History quilt.

If you're new here and like looking at WIP photos, you can see its beginnings here and here, and even here for the humble beginnings.

The quilt is made with quilt-as-you-go technique and it was fun to play with the different sashings and the scrappy binding. I love how all of the fabrics I used, have some texture of their own, which makes them blend with some backgrounds and stand in contrast to others. It makes it ever so natural ))). Here are some close ups:

Here is a prove of how the colors blend in with the world outside)))

I hope I'll be able to take some better photos of it in the not-too-distant future.

UPD: We did manage to catch some glimpses of sun on our walk in Howth (again, see how colors in the quilt are the same ones as around it):

Linking up to Linky Tuesday at Freemotion by the River
Fab Tuesday at Quilt Story
Let's Bee Social at Sew Fresh Quilts

#BraveQuilter October Wrap Up

The school break doesn't help sewing progress as we are trying to go out and about every day, still I think I met my October challenge of trying the quilt-as-you-go technique of putting blocks together. This is my progress to date:

I've put some of the blocks together to form larger blocks, but I'm still thinking whether I want to add something between those or just to trim them and connect as they are.

I found a lot of tutorials on the technique, many of them variations on the same basic process. This is the one I used a basis with a minor adjustment - I make the back sashing strips 1 1/8'' wide and stitch them down by machine. It's not as accurate on the back as hand-stitching (and this is why I don't usually stitch my bindings down by machine), but I just wanted it to go quicker.

I must say the block connection process was simpler than I had anticipated and technically goes very fast. It's all the design decisions like choosing the sashing for each piece and trimming down the blocks, which are all odd in size, that keep me back. I'm enjoying the work on this piece as it seems so unusual for me and I'm amazed how people comment on the color scheme in it, although it's very subdued and very natural - just the kind of colors you're most likely to see outside, especially this time of year.

A huge thank you is due to Julie at Pink Doxies, who has been hosting the #BraveQuilter challenge for a long time and has inspired me (and many others) to try out new things, share the experience and take pride in being a Brave Quilter!

Linking up to October #BraveQuilter Wrap Up Linky Party at Pink Doxies
Fabric, Thread and Yarn at France Nadeau
Off the Wall Friday at Creations by Nina-Marie
Finished or Not Friday at Busy Hands Quilts

Tips and Tutorials Tuesday - Nordic Christmas Mug Rug

With Nordic style Christmas decor being all the rage in stores again this year, I'm making some of my own using the "pixelated" or "watercolor" technique.

Here is a little tutorial on a Nordic Christmas mug rug, but the technique can be used for larger things, such as table runners or wall quilts. You only have to find a fair isle knitting chart or cross stitch embroidery chart with an image you like or make your own on a sheet of square graphed paper. I find that the minimum size for more or less interesting patterns is 7 by 7 squares, so my mug rug is 7.5'' squared. Here are some charts you can use.

You'll need:

• 1.5'' squares of red and white fabrics - 49 in all, exact number of each color depends on your chosen pattern (mine required 21 red and 28 white)
• 10.5'' squared piece of adhesive interfacing with grid (more on that below)
• 7.5'' squared pieces of batting and backing
• binding

Here we go:

Fossil Quilt - October OMG

This is still a work in progress, but I thought I might share some pictures of the previous stage as it represents my minimum goal for October - making the blocks for my fossil quilt.

This is the final (hopefully) layout and I have already started putting them together using the quilt-as-you-go method. Sorry for picture quality - I couldn't take it all off my design wall and the light in the room is not good enough.

I had a lot of fun quilting the blocks. Some are based on photos of real fossils (with a lot of artistic license), others are pure art)))

I also made three "geological strata" blocks which work nicely bringing together the colors on the FMQ blocks.

I also included a pieced butterfly block, just because I'm obsessed with pieced butterflies)) Anyway, it ties in somewhat with the "natural history" theme.

I think I might still finish it in the remaining October days, or in early November, anyway)). My work got interrupted by piecing Forest Friends blocks and also making Halloween costumes for the girls.

I didn't actually make the witch dress from scratch, instead I bought a nice "occasion" dress and covered the skirt and collar with the Halloween fabric - raw edges, no fuss ))) Will do for the holiday, and then she'll still have the nice dress to wear for Christmas or New Year parties.

The Witch and her Kitten went to school like this on Thursday, because next week is their mid-term break.

Happy Halloween!

Linking up to:
October OMG at Red Letter Quilts
Free motion Mavericks at Lizzy Lenard Vintage Sewing
Fabric, Thread and Yarn at France Nadeau
Off the Wall Friday at Creations by Nina-Marie
Finished or not Friday at Busy Hands Quilts

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Curve Pieced Butterfly Block - Free Pattern and Tutorial

I've already confessed my love of curve piecing and desire to spread the word many times on this blog, so to help those who are willing try it I put together a tutorial for a really simple curve pieced block.

I think it would be great for beginners as all the curved seams are really gentle (unlike the traditional Drunkard's Path which was my first exposure to piecing curves ;)) Those already acquainted with curve piecing technique can skip the tutorial and just download the pattern. I would be thrilled to see somebody make the block, so please share in the comments!

I tried it out in this quilt, Fly Up, Fly Down, which received some very kind feedback.

And I'm going to play with it again as it seems to offer lots of possibilities in various styles.

Please click here to download the PDF file with the curve-pieced butterfly pattern (two 8'' squares)

You'll need:

• about 1/8 yard of the background fabric
• about 1/8 yard of the butterfly fabric (or two pieces of coordinating fabrics)
• freezer paper
• pencil or fabric marker
• pins, scissors for paper and fabric and piecing thread

The process:

Prized Sunday Stash

It's a very special addition to my stash that I want to share about today - my quilt "Firebird" won the first place in the appliqué category of the Bloggers' Quilt Festival and I got a Fat Quarter Shop certificate which I immediately put to good use. On Friday my parcel arrived (took just a week from the US to Ireland, which is very nice).

Two ten-inch squares packs - Stonehenge Gradations and Bali Crackers in green. Just look at that:

Does it make anybody go green with envy? ;)))

It's impossible to show all the beautiful batiks, they are all different (all 40 of them) and all just gorgeous! I usually am short on greens for my art projects, now I think this issue has been addressed.

There is another gorgeous prize that my fabric pumpkin won (randomly) from the Handmade Halloween link-up hosted by Bernie at Needle and Foot, and it was a pattern by Lorna of Sew Fresh Quilts. My girls chose the Forest Friends pattern and I couldn't but take a break from my current project to try it out. I made two blocks yesterday and they turned out very winterly with the snowy background and snowflakes on the deer's nose.

Aren't they super cute? I haven't yet decided what I'll do with them but they seem very suitable for winter/Christmas decor.

I'm linking up to Sunday Stash at Molli Sparkles
Main Crush Monday at Cooking Up Quilts.

Fly Up, Fly Down

I've got an un-seasonal finish to share with you today. A wall quilt about 30'' squared called "Fly up, fly down".

If anybody visits this blog regularly, they would know that curve piecing has been my big obsession for quite a long time now. I find that curves add a lot of interest to the predominantly straight-line genre of quilting. My previous curve-pieced quilts are more like "pictures", images that are their own thing. What I wanted to do in this case was to design a really simple curve-pieced block, which could work on its own as well as in combination with any traditional or modern blocks.

The butterfly block consists of two squares, so it can work in a grid, and and each square is made of six parts with curved seams, the curves being very gentle and much easier to sew than the traditional drunkard's path block, for example.

I wanted to make a couple of blocks to try it out and couldn't stop until I had 8! In this case the idea was co combine curve piecing technique with the modern quilt aesthetic, so I chose blenders and a neutral background (it would be more modern to use solids, but I just don't have any :))) Then I played with the layout options:

Decided on the last one.

I chose to quilt the butterflies with a custom wing pattern and the background with irregularly spaced vertical lines. I made a freezer paper "mask" to mark the butterflies:

The butterflies were quilted with variegated threads in shades of purple and yellow/brown correspondingly, and I like how different fragments of the thread show on different butterflies.

I like how this quilt turned out, although it's very different from what I've done before (sometimes I feel like I can say that about almost every one of my quilts - I really love experimenting). I hope it has that "modern" feel about it.

While working with this block I had so many ideas about other uses for it - for one thing it would be great to showcase some beautiful prints or hand-dyed fabrics, for another, I'd like to combine it with other blocks, then I though about enlarging it and "cutting" it with more curved seams to create various wing designs...

I'm wondering if anyone would like to try out this block. I could make it a free pdf download if somebody is interested.

Linking up to Linky Tuesday at Freemotion by the River
Fabric Tuesday at Quilt Story
Let's Bee Social at Sew Fresh Quilts
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October #BraveQuilter Challenge and Monthly Goal

Now, the is something I have wanted to try for a long time, but have been putting off and off - quilt-as-you-go. Making the blocks part is pretty much clear, it's connecting the blocks part that I would like to figure out.

I have a few blocks (two of which were featured here as quilting samples for my quilts) that I want to make into a quilt, though I still need at least as many:

So, my #BraveQuilter challenge for October will be to connect my quilted blocks using one of the quilt-as-you-go methods out there. #BraveQuilter challenge link up is hosted by Julie at Pink Doxies and she encourages everyone to try out new things in sewing - whatever is new for you - and you still have time to join in this month's collection.

My monthly goal for October will be to make the remaining the blocks for this quilt and lay them out (probably even finish the quilt!). The OMG link up is run by Heidi at Red Letter Quilts and I even won a prize at September link-up (Thank you Heidi and Bagmaker!) - so you can too)))

I am also linking this post to Free Motion Mavericks at Lizzy Lenard Vintage Sewing, because my blocks are about FMQ and because Muv there has made a beautiful quilt-as-you-go quilt which inspired me to finally take the step))) - click on the link to enjoy exquisite FMQ designs.

Also linking to Off the Wall Friday at Creations by Nina-Marie.

Tips and Tutorials Tuesday - Pumpkin Candy Holder

This tutorial will be linked to Tips and Tutorials Tuesday - a roundup of wisdom from around the net hosted by Yvonne @ Quilting Jetgirl - visit and learning something new and interesting.

Also make sure you visit Handmade Halloween linky party hosted by Bernie @ Needle and Foot for some spooky inspiration, there's still time to make your Halloween projects.

I'm excited to show you a fun Halloween (or just autumn decor) project, with a cheerful bit of color and practicality all in one.

I call it the Candy Holder, but obviously you can use it to hold any odd stuff (including sewing supplies), or probably to store your Halloween decor elements from one year to the next.

I'll let you in on a secret - it's not really full of candy, there's fabric stuffed underneath actually...

My inspiration for this came from this tutorial for a cute fabric tea-pot, which can also be used for storing stuff and makes a nice present. Last year I tried to repeat it small-scale with orange fabrics and made these cuties that my kids now use as trinket boxes:

This year I decided to go big and made the pumpkin about life-size, it measures 7'' tall about 8'' across the bottom. I adjusted the pattern for the larger size increasing the number of segments and changing the shape somewhat. I tried out the first draft of the pattern with another pumpkin, which I didn't like shape of, so I now have quite a harvest:

And I put together a tutorial with tons of step-by-step photos. This is my first sewing tutorial, so I welcome all critical remarks and corrections, and I'd be absolutely thrilled if you made your own pumpkin and shared in the comments!

Pumpkin Candy Holder Tutorial

You can download my version of the pattern here (it's free!):

Pumpkin pattern pdf to download

To make a Fabric Pumpkin Halloween Candy Holder you'll need:

• about 1/3 yard of fabric for the "outside" (or various orange scraps to that amount)
• about 1/3 yard of fabric for the "inside"
• a scrap of green fabric
• card-stock (or plastic) for the bottom and the lid (about A3 page in all, I recycle boxes for that)
• cushion filling (hollowfiber) or batting scraps to stuff the shape
• matching thread

Here's what we do:

Quilters, Prizes and Sunday Stash

I was very excited to attend the general meeting of the Irish Patchwork Society in Kilkenny on Saturday, my head is still buzzing with all the impressions)))

The greatest treat of the day was perhaps meeting in person some wonderful quilters whose work I  admire and whose blogs I follow: Tomomi Mc Elwee of Slaney HandCraft, Ruth Bourke of Charly and Ben's Crafty Corner and Ethelda Ellis of Ethelda's Quilting Journal (she admitted she doesn't have time to update the blog regularly, but you can google the images of her works - absolutely mind-boggling!). I met lots of other people on the day as well and everybody was really nice and and friendly and the atmosphere was great.

The room was decorated with beautiful quilts by the members of the IPS South Midland Branch:

A huge highlight for me was of course the Viewer's Choice prize for my quilt in the IPS National Exhibition "Evolution" and a trophy for excellence (I don't remember the exact wording) for the same quilt. I was just blown away, as you can see below:

Paula Rafferty (IPS International Rep), the Trophy, me, and the Committee - thanks to Ruth for taking the picture!

Everybody's favorite part of the morning was the raffle with great prizes and voting for the challenge, which was a mini quilt on the theme "Witches and Castles". Choosing from all the lovely pieces was a challenge in itself:

The winner is the quilty witch with a sewing machine - very cute! Mine is in the lower right corner and you can read about it here.

After that came a really nice dinner, which was as much about talking as about eating and a visit to the shops, which is where the Sunday Stash comes in:

Reds and Greens are mostly for a Christmas project, and Yellows and Blacks for a little sunshine-in-the-dead-of-winter project I'm not telling you about yet ;))

The afternoon talk was given by a great textile artist from Anglsey - Dorothy Russel. The topic was "The butterfly has two wings", which related to tradition and innovation in her creative work and what she said and showed us was extremely interesting and very inspirational. I didn't take any photos of her quilts, as you can find much better quality shots on her website - do go over there and have a look, they are stunning (though I can testify that viewed in real life they are even more stunning). On Sunday Dorothy was giving a workshop on the "New York beauty" block, but I wasn't there.

After the meeting was over I still had some time before my bus home to run around Kilkenny, which is a lovely town with a huge imposing castle and some wonderfully crooked streets with colorful shopfronts:

I'm linking this post to Sunday Stash at Molli Sparkles and Main Crush Monday at Cooking Up Quilts.