Needle book and fabric

When I sewed the stitchery to the front of the hollyhock needle book it went a bit crooked and the tiny prairie points went a bit skew. I thought the best way to get better is to do it again. I loved the poppy stitchery from Red Brolly so I made that up to make a new needle book. I didn't think it needed inside pockets so I have used some of the aplique elements from the SKOW book. I have yet to sew it all together.

I was very surprised to get my new fabric so fast. Just 8 days from America. 40 half yard pieces of Audra's Iris Garden. I worked it out to be $14.75 per metre. I was pleased I found the shop selling the 1/2 yard pieces. It was much better value than the fat quarter bundle. It will be perfect for the Go Wild Garden quilt from Country Cottage Quilting that I will be making this year. It is a nice subdued range, quite a bit darker or duller than I am used to.

I have been wondering what I will have as a home page after Google shut down iGoogle. I decided to go with my blog page. I have added some links to sites I like to visit then I made a list of some shops I often check out. It is now more like home. I set my browser to open my blog page, my email and google plus as tabs on start up. The computer is such a cool tool.

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Happy Quilting,
Val

Country Cottage Quilting SAL

Shirley from Colours of a Butterfly and myself are sewing some projects from Country Cottage Quilting by Lynette Anderson.
We have started with the Hollyhock Sewing set. The needle case is first.
We plan to post each two weeks. Next fortnight we should be finished the needle case.

After the sewing set we will probably do the Garden Pillow then finally the Go Wild Garden quilt. We haven't really thought about a timeline for the quilt. We will just see how we go to start.

I finished the stitchery for the front of the needle case. It is early days for me and needle turn. I quite  like the way it turns out. Nicer than visible stitching. Not sure I would bother doing a whole quilt this way. The Go Wild Garden quilt is raw edge applique and I will do the blanket stitch on the machine I think.
Anyone with the book thinking they might like to join in just let us know and we can sew together.

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Happy Quilting,
Val

North Pole QAL - May update

I have made some progress but not a lot to show for it. I managed to get all but a few bits glued down for another house. This makes 6 blocks with just a bit to do to finish them off. I have put off doing any appliquing sewing until I get my machine serviced so this last block is not sewn on at all. I bought some blue homespun to make the sky blocks. I have 6 blocks in white at the bottom of the quilt and 9 blocks in blue at the top. The first blue blocks will have the barn on them on the horizon. I have reversed the barn ready to trace it onto the applique paper so that will be next. The top two rows of blocks will be for Santa's sleigh and the moon and stars. I have found a Santa and sleigh in another book that I will be using. It just looks a bit easier to applique.
I have seen some great blocks done for May already. Doing a bit each month makes the project much less formidable. I keep telling myself there is plenty of time before Christmas. Maybe in September I will have to pick up the pace a bit. I really want to get it finished this year.

If you have some progress posted please link up that post below.

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Val

Slow sewing

With much of my May commitments out of the way I slowed down a bit. I got my newsletter from Bustle and Sew with a link to the little mouse pattern. Ladies at Beenleigh Quilters were making pantry mice for the sale table for the upcoming quilt show and I thought it would be nice (and also useful) to put one in my pantry. I have noticed a few moths in the cupboard so I had a bit of a cleanout and put in a jolly red velvet lavender mouse to keep those pesky moths away.

With winter definitely here now I felt sorry for Stumpy so I made him a nice cosy bed. I put running squirrels around it to give him sweet dreams. I got the pattern from The Zen of Making blog. The squirrels were from a book I had.

I pulled out my holiday lap quilt project from It's Quilting Cats and Dogs and put a frame on one of the blocks. This is meant to be English paper pieced but there is now way I am going to try that yet. I sewed all the triangles together on the machine then sewed each side down along one edge and turned it out. I then hand stitched as needle turn along the outside edge. Then I sewed the corners on.   Purists need not comment on this block :)

I had a lovely time at the Brisbane bloggers group. I started some knitting.

This Wednesday is update day for Welcome to the North Pole and Thursday is update day for my Country Quilting SAL with Shirley. The Saturday is One Xmas Item a Month. Lots of posting this week.
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Val

Country Cottage Quilting SAL and the rest.

I just love a good sew along and I am a sucker for a good BoM so I have quite a lot on the go. I seem to be fitting things in quite well so far. I have even made some extras like the fox and my crochet gloves.
I am determined to finish all my May obligations before the end of May and earlier if possible. As soon as the new owl came out I whipped him up ready to sew. My sewing machine is making some complaining noises so the sewing will have to wait a bit.

I got another block from "Summertime" glued down ready to sew and I will try to get a couple more ready. I am making a square wall hanging from 9 blocks.

I got the April Adventure block out and put it onto a little bag pattern. I will put the May block of cute post cards onto a zippy purse.

I spent some time working on my much overdue photo album from my trip last year. It is fun to look at the photos and remember stuff.

I like to use the iPad in bed just before I get up so I made some fingerless gloves to keep me warm.

I am making the needle book from Country Cottage Quilts with Shirley from Colours of a Butterfly. We are warming up to make the quilt with the watering cans on it. We will be posting some progress every two weeks. I did a bit of cutting and sticking to get started.

That's it for another week. I feel much better about blogging once a week. I seem to have more time for visiting and commenting on other blogs.

I am linking up with Applique Thursday.

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Happy Quilting,
Val

FNWF The Fox

I started sewing up the fox on Friday night but had to finish him off on Saturday. I like sewing during the day better.
He was a little bit fiddly but after struggling to sew on the snout with a straight needle I decided the curved needle would make it easier to attach the ears and legs. The instructions say sew on the tail with the button and that's it. I ended up sewing the button on the tail then attaching the tail with the curved needle.
He is quite dashing I think.

The neighbour's cat just had to see what was happening during the photo shoot.

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Happy Quilting,
Val

Countryside Softies

I have been admiring this book by Amy Adams for over a year now. Since this is my year for buying books and patterns I now own it. I just love all the little critters.
I don't have any knitted felted wool so I am going to have to use my woven felted wool and see how I go. It doesn't have the stretch that knitted fabric does so it may be harder to get the right shapes.
I have started the fox and hope to work through them in order.

Since changing over to a google+ profile I have become a no-reply blogger when I make comments. That's just the way it is. Luckily people I know have been replying because they must have my email address in their contacts already. Thanks to all these people.

I have also changed my comment section to google+ so anyone with a google+ profile can make a comment and decide who they want to see the comment. If it is just a normal comment I think public is fine. If you haven't signed up for google+ then you can't comment.
Leaving comments is part of the fun of blogging.
So...
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Happy Quilting,
Val