August OPAM

Well another month has flown by.

This month saw our family on the road for a couple of weeks  due to family commitments and school commitments for our boys. 

I am obviously motivated by a tight deadline, as I have been very productive this month.

First up an Aussie Hero Quilt

 This guy said he liked blue, Australia, music & current affairs.

Close up of the Australian town name fabric.

 The music notes appliqued onto the quilt.

 The laundry bag.  This man is deployed on HMAS Toowoomba and they are on pirate patrol, so the boys decided pirates would be good for the laundry bag.

I spent quite a bit of time sewing in the car, fixing teddy, amending business cards

 a set of chook key fobs for my market stall.

 a great take along cushion

and another overnight bag featuring on of my all time favourite photos by Bindi Taneal Photography.

So for a month when I thought I was doing nothing I managed to finish

5 key fobs

1 cushion

1 quilt

1 laundry bag

1 overnight bag

Hope to be back posting again soon.

Hello again & OPAM

Hello to anyone who might still be out there.

My humble apologies for not popping back in sooner.

I have been busy in the sewing room (I think) and busy in life and blogging time has suffered.

Most of my sewing lately has been for my handmade business Dabble Handmade Collective.  I can be found on Facebook & that is where the above link will take you.

The biggest achievement of my July was finishing these adorable Cow key rings and key fobs.

 

I have previously made horses, owls & apples but I had a friend who 'needed' a cow and I thought they'd be cute.

Here is the family 

 

Hope I'll be back again soon, but no promises.

Debra

Quilt of the year - Part 2

The next step in this quilt was of course the quilting.  

I sent it to the wonderful Rosalie of Rose Quilting

The lovely fan style quilting in the 'circle' blocks and the 'square fans' in the outside of the circles

a feather in the border

cross hatching over the pretend embroidery blocks

a larger feather in the external border

The whole quilt on my bed

and hanging at the quilt show over Easter.  You can't really see it here but I bound it with a wavy edge to mimic the effect of the ricrac in the quilt.  The binding is the 3 colours in a random placement.

and from a distance while we were setting up.

To see some more of Rosalie's quilting on my other quilts look here and here.

So in case you can't tell, I love the quilt.  At a healthy 90 x 99" it is great on our bed & when hubby rolls over and takes the quilt with him, there is still some left for me.

Catch you again soon with some quilt show photos.

 

My Quilt of the Year

It would seem that I make one 'serious' quilt each year.

This quilt was started in October 2013 from a stunning layer cake & jelly roll.

"Full Circle" by Kathy Schmitz for Moda.

I fell in love with this fabric when it was released a couple of years ago.  The jelly roll & layer cake were Christmas presents. They sat in my cupboard waiting for the perfect project.  I purchased matching panels because they looked so much like hand stitching.

Image from http://www.kathyschmitz.com/

 One of my UFO craft ladies asked about the drunkard's path and that was all the motivation I needed.

I played with a couple of layouts

(Opera House)

 and jumbled disks - which obviously I chose as here I am holding the pieced center.

 This beautiful piece then just sat in the cupboard while the Christmas rush happened and inspiration to strike for borders. 

Come February I decided it couldn't sit there any more.  I had to finish it.  Our Quilt show was coming up and I have always needed a deadline.

The tan border you can see below came from the panels I had purchased. The panel had little squares surrounded by ricrac with a broad border at the bottom.  As luck would have it, I had enough borders from panels to encircle the whole centre with what looked like a ricrac border

 I was then able to piece the border with  little "embroidered" panels from the larger panel print.

At this point I loved it and here was where I could use my Jelly Roll.

 Now I knew I wanted piano keys, but I couldn't work out what size 'chunks' of colour I needed.

In this photo you will see L-R - 2 strips wide, single strips, big chunks of colour.

 

I liked  the single strip piano keys but felt they were a bit busy for the 'embroidered' blocks in the border, the big chunks were just too chunky, so it was the 2 strips that won.

Sew, sew, sew

 oops a little reverse sew

 and like magic - it was a flimsy.

 

and it looks soooo good on our bed.

 I am so excited by this quilt.  I will give you the next installment tomorrow.

The Challenge Reveal

Well after a long wait (sorry about that) I can reveal my whole challenge quilt & the winners of the challenge.

As much as I had to have my quilt finished by the 14th March, the quilt show was only held over the Easter weekend, so I couldn't reveal anything until after then.

The last week since Easter has been a little busy, but I have had time to sort through the photos now.

Now a reminder - the challenge criteria.

 

my sneak peak (sorry, but I couldn't give too much away)

 

My finished quilt

There are 30 pieces of fabric in the background to represent the different projects we start. Some are quick to make & others take much longer, sometimes one comes along to send us off on a diffferent path.

The hands represent the club  nurturing and supporting. 

 

There are 30 words quilted into the background, they represent what craft gives us and means to me.

The 30 buttons represent the tools of our trade and fruits of our labours. The question mark represents the unknown of what will come next.

 I am very proud of my little quilt and look forward to hanging it in my sewing room.

Now, the challenge was judged and the winners chosen.

Here they are: - 

First by Sue Pukallus

 Second by Gayle Steinohrt

  Third by Merryl Sheppard

  Highly Commended by Cecily Hamilton

 

Highly Commended by Debra Schefe

 

Highly Commended by Tracey Regan

There were 11 entries for the challenge and the ladies all enjoyed being 'pushed' outside their boundaries.

Challenge Time

As part of our upcoming quilt show, we have issued a CHALLENGE to members.

This is the challenge criteria.  What would you do.

 

 Now the challenge deadline is over & all the entries are in.  However as it has not been judged as yet, I don't think I should show the whole work.

So here is a sneak peak.

 

Sorry about that, but after the Quilt Show I will come back and share all the information.

See you soon 

The End of March

Well  it is the end of March & I have sewn like a machine.

Why can't I keep up this momentum during the year??? HMMM - I obviously need a deadline.

The next finish is a quilt for my wonderful friend Becc.

This is a sneak peak of it on O-me. 

 See that yellow thing there - it has made using O-me so much easier.  I can't believe how one little gadget to help get the bobbin out has made life so much easier (that goodness). Prior to this I had to use long nose tweezers, hold my tongue just right & if I was lucky grow a 3rd hand.  So thank you to the inventors of Ezi-bob.  

(I purchased mine HERE the one in the photo looks different, but this is what I got below.)

 Sorry now back to Becc's Quilt.

"Friendship Jelly" was made in 2012 while Becc was pregnant with baby #2.  Bubs came along & they left town taking an unfinished quilt with them.   In early 2013 I offered to quilt it for Becc, so it came home with me.  Then WE moved house & it was packed away.  Now early 2014, I have a quilt show looming & desperately need quilts to exhibit & I remembered it was there.  A quick message to Becc to check her requirements & a request to exhibit it & "Friendship Jelly" was on O-me being quilted.

Now bound, labelled & ready to hang.  I hope Becc likes the quilting when she gets it back.

 

My next finish "Little Boxes, Little Boxes"

 This quilt top was made to demonstrate the beautiful "Bunny Hill" half jelly rolls from Moda that I sell in my market stall.

If you look closely you can see the top in the back of this photo 

 

At the beginning of March while trying to 'unearth' O-me I found some offcuts from my Bargello Quilt made in 2010.  I realised that they matched the Little Boxes, so they became borders.

A quick couple of hours on O-Me and it was finished.

The day I photographed it was overcast & we had lovely clouds so I played around a bit with my photos.

 

This quilt is lovely but I expect it will end up back on my market stall for sale. 

(After it visits the Quilt Show.)

These finishes have been added to my OPAM count for March & make my finish total on Sew it's Finished up to 5 for 2014.