Hexy Progress

My trip is advancing at a scary speed, the main holiday part is over and I'm flying to the US today for a conference (and then three more days of holiday in New York). Since leaving my Gran's house last week I've been having a great time catching up with friends; one night in Bristol and then a week in Birmingham.

I haven't forgotten that I promised you updates from the festival of quilts, and you will get them once I have more reliable computer access and thus the means to post photos. However, something I have been plodding along with (aided by my new pouch for them) is my hexagons. A fair few done on train and coach journeys, and some more done quietly in front of the tv, I'm amassing quite a few hexagon flowers now. 25 down and a hundred or so to go, and then I need to get some pale green solid to add borders around the flowers. It's a good job that I'm still enjoying the process!!

Hexagon Holder Pouch

I've been working my paper pieced hexagons on my travels and decided that I needed something better to store it all in than the zip-lock bags that I've been using. So, while I was staying with my Gran I made a pouch to hold them all in.

I used some lovely japanese fabric and some matching silk for a bit of luxury. I added a closure of two buttons and some ribbon, a la Aneela's pouch

On the inside I have a few different sized smaller pockets to hold papers, fabric and basted hexes, two big pockets the size of the pouch to hold completed flowers or other bits, a pocket for my snippers, and some felt for storing pins and needles.

I've used it a couple of times so far and so far it's great! I just need to get some smaller rolls of thread, or try using thread on bobbins that I saw suggested somewhere (I can't remember where, sorry) so that I can store thread in there too.

New Fabric - Thankyou Granny!

My gran is incredibly generous, and while I was staying with her she instructed me to choose some fabric that I like and that she would give it to me. And so, here is the fabric that I chose:

Some lovely navy blue japanese fabric (the third one along has a heap of different prints on the same piece of fabric):

Some gorgeous japanese prints, and some coordinating silks:

Also, not pictured, I have some lovely pink/purple/blue japanese charm squares.

These three pieces of Liberty fabric. These will become two dresses. The two blue ones are big enough pieces for dresses, so I will be thinking of what pattern to use for this. Any suggestions pattern more than welcome:

And some smaller pieces of these Liberty Fabrics which will be made into a quilt:

Lastly, this piece of fabric, which has more drape than quilting fabric and i'm not sure exactly what it is. It's going to become an elastic waisted skirt:

So thanks again for your generosity Granny! I look forward to sewing with it all!

Incase what I already showed you wasn't enough...

I'm sure you'll remember the Liberty fabric that I showed you the other day. Well we have a confession to make... we found some more!

Above is what more we found, below is all of it:

And all of it laid out:

And yeah, I know you're all turning green with envy, that's why I'm posting it ;) We all love a little bit of fabric pron don't we! Sadly the fabric's not mine so I'm green with the rest of you... well that's a lie, a little bit of it is now mine :) hehe! I also have had some inspiration about what to do with it, so stay tuned!!!

Beautiful Bernina

Last year my gran got a new sewing machine, and while visiting her I've had a chance to have a go on it. She has a Bernina Aurora 440QE, which is lovely to stitch on, and even has a stitch regulator for free motion quilting.

I've been having a go on it, and have made something:

Sadly I can't show you anymore of what I've made as it's going to be a gift. I'll show you the rest of it once the recipient has recieved it.

"I didn't realise I had that much"

While staying with my Gran I've been helping her sort out her (extremely extensive) stash. Refolding, consilidating, reorganising, pilfering, things like that. Today we hit the jackpot. We found, hidden away in a couple of boxes, enough Liberty fabric to make your jaw drop.

Apparently it was mostly bought from a guy that used to come down a couple of times a year and sell off-cuts of Liberty. A lot of it was taped into rolls of fabric, so this afternoon I unwrapped it, ironed it all and measured it, so now we know exactly how much of it there is. The pieces range from small pieces through to 3-4m cuts.

Granny has been kind enough to say that while I'm here I can select some fabric that I'd like and I can have it ... and I have to say, the Liberty is awfully tempting... What would you make out of it? What quilt patterns would be great made up in some of the above pictured Liberty? A summer liberty quilt would be amazing wouldn't it! I'd feel bad taking more than I need, so suggestions please!!!

Festival of quilts - part 1

Today was the first of my two days at the "festival of quilts" and now I'm completely knackered!

The show is absolutely amazing. And so incredibly huge. Quilts and stalls as far as the eye can see. I'm very glad that I bought a two day ticket as I certainly still have more to see even though I was there nearly all day today. 

I have taken HEAPS of photos, so many that my camera battery ran out! I'll upload the good ones at some point but as my Internet access is via my phone at the moment that'll have to wait. 

There were so many stalls and I didn't know where to start with buying stuff. I had the same problem as I did at the amitie sale a few weeks ago - so much stuff to choose from that I couldn't choose!

The highlights that I think I'll probably go back for on Sunday are liberty for half the price that it is in oz, some gorgeous flower fairy fabric, and cutting mats so much cheaper than in oz. Sadly that last one I wouldn't be able to get home with me. 

Leaving on a Jet Plane!!!

The day has come, I leave for my trip today!!! In a few short hours I will be flying to England!! :D

I shall leave you with some pretty pictures of my hexagon project, which is coming with me to be stitched on boring train journeys and such.

Posts may be few and far between for the next few (and by few I mean 5!!) weeks while I'm away, depending on how busy I turn out to be.

Oh, and any potential burglars reading this; I have housemates who aren't going on holiday so I'm not worth bothering with ;)

I know I was supposed to wait...

I know I was supposed to wait to start turning my new fabrics unto hexagons until the MMQG meet tomorrow, but I just couldn't!

I pre-washed them last night and ironed them today and the little pile of fabric was just yelling at me "cut into me, start stitching me"... and I gave in.

I've made one flower and I love it!!!

Now no more until tomorrow... maybe...

Breaking Radio Silence...

It's been quiet around these parts lately because my life has been the complete opposite. It's 11 sleeps until my trip and I have a LOT to get done before I leave. Couple that with injuring my knee ice skating two weeks ago (thankfully just a really bad bruise) and not much sewing has been happening. Also the knee injury prevented me from going to the craft and quilt fair, which was very upsetting. Thankfully I have the quilt show in Birmingham in two weeks to look forward to.

There has been some progress on my genome quilt- I've started sewing the HST's together into 5x5 blocks, which I'll then sew together to make the whole quilt top. I'm doing it that way because hopefully sewing blocks together like that will keep the whole thing more square. Sewing them together is slow work though; cutting off the little 'dog ears' from the corners, making sure they're all in the right orientations and pressing the seams open makes for very slow progress. At the moment I'm averaging a bit under an hour per block. There will be 49 of these blocks and I've done 5 so far... as I said, slow progress.

However, I'm not just breaking radio silence to update you on the slow progress of my genome quilt, I have much more exciting news than that!! Today was the Amitie sale, so I took a little trip out there after work to take a peek (naughty I know since I'm about to go on holiday and plan on lots of fabric shopping while I'm there, but who cares!)

I bought some lovely fabric. Firstly a couple of black and white pieces, as down the track I intend to make a black and white (and maybe red) quilt so I thought I'd get the ones I really liked while I was there.

Secondly, and more exciting, I bought some fabric for my plan of paper pieced hexagons!! Which I'm happy about as I have an almost solid 7 hours to start work on them on Sunday at the MMQG "sit n sew" day.

I've decided to go for a grandmother's flower garden style quilt. These are the fabrics I got and I plan on making flowers and using the purple in the middle in the centre of each flower with the other prints as the petals (with one kind of fabric per flower).

It's very traditional making the hexy flowers from these repro prints I know, but the extensive range of fabrics at Amitie just overwhelmed me a bit and without a set idea of what I wanted these were the only fabrics thar jumped out at me. Not that I'm thinking badly of my decision, I love the fabrics, they are gorgeous colours, and since I'm being traditional with my methods by hand sewing it there's nothing wrong with being traditional with my design too.

So, did anyone else go to amitie today? What did you get? If you are a member of the MMQG I hope to see you on Sunday!