Another Mixed Bag

Hello again my faithful followers, and thank you so much for all your lovely comments which are always brimful with enthusiasm and encouragement - they cheer me on my way, no end!

I have a few bits and pieces to share with you today and first off is the little hexagonal travel sewing pouch/purse. I have to say that although this is a pretty little thing and will be most useful, I do feel that the work and time spent on it does not reflect in the finished product. 

36 x 3/4 inch (2cm) paper templates to cut out and then cover in fabrics before sewing together, and then to have to cut a fair bit of them away in order to have straight edges to bind - well, I ought to have thought a bit longer about it before I jumped into this particular pattern! Anyway, another lesson learned! Do have a look at it and let me know what you think!

There is also a second table runner, very similar to that of the previous week, but just slightly longer and narrower - well, when one has scraps of fabrics that are rather pretty, it is a nice, and economical, thing to use them up. I must admit to having cut out too many squares to accommodate the little heart quilt so somewhere down the line there will be yet another appearance of these pretty fabrics but no decision yet as to what!

And the back …..

Really, these runners are so quick and easy to make and I've thoroughly enjoyed putting them together and seeing fast results.

Last weekend saw me having a quick gander at a few fabrics which were on sale at Textile Traders - I hadn't been in there for quite some time so it was very nice to spend a bit of time browsing and actually finding a few bits and pieces to add to the very slowly growing (because I keep using it) stash. Just when I had almost decided to order online up come a few attractive, and I think, coordinating pieces, at a good price that couldn't be refused! Pick it up when you see it girls, you never know when it might come in handy …..

Oh and I've also been doing a bit on my granny square blanket after being inspired by the lovely 

Forgetmenotsblue - and you can see from the pics that I really am attracted to aqua …..

…and how about those cute elephants - the fabric is called Elephant Walk.

 Just as an aside - the cotton yarn I'm crocheting into a blanket has had so many trial runs on various patterns as a cardigan - I've never before had such trouble finding a pattern I really like or have the patience to take my time to work on. Anyway, I have loads of this yarn so there will be a successful cardi come out of it sometime ….. down the line somewhere ….. watch this space. In the meantime I'm finding the blanket so very relaxing to pick up and work on a little bit at a time, especially after concentrating on matching and fixing those blocks in the 'disappearing four-block quilt' - yes, I'm still working at it and it's showing good progress so I'll give you an update next time.

Do you remember me showing you the Lillypilly trees with berries last season? Well here are a couple of pics to date, such a good load of fruit on it again; and also one solitary hibiscus flower which is also adding a nice bright touch to the garden at the moment. 

We are very thankful to have had a few showers of rain during last weekend - nothing like enough, but a little bit for the gardens is very acceptable. The good thing is that it fell very gently and that enabled the dry earth to take it in, rather than it coming down in torrents, which it will sooner or later. I had never seen rain come down so hard as in Australia - it was a total shock to us when we first experienced it here!

I'm very happy to be seeing signs of beautiful spring in a lot of your blogs and it must be such a relief after all the rain and snow of winter - I wish for lots of happy, light, sunny times for you over there - make the most of it while you have it!

Have a wonderful week and thanks again for being here with me!

With my love,

❤Joy xoxo

Practise Makes Perfect!

And I certainly need plenty of it when it comes to free-motion quilting on the sewing machine, but I am trying . . . . I had a lovely time yesterday (Sunday) putting together a little table runner from leftovers from my little heart quilt, after watching another YouTube video from Missouri Quilt Company.

 It's a quilt as you go project - lay out your backing fabric, place your wadding on top, and then begin to sew on strips, one at a time! Easy! The only thing to be careful of is that your strips of fabric are precisely cut so you don't start going lopsided, be sure to press the seams after each addition, and in no time you have a sweet little runner.

The cute little blue houses are on the back . . . .

So then today I thought this would be an ideal opportunity to practise the free-motion quilting - you remember my new book, 'First Steps to free-motion quilting' by Christina Cameli - so, armed with a reel of quilting thread and my trusty Bernina, I set to with a practice piece. Have you found that everything works beautifully on a practice piece but once you start on the real thing something goes a bit awry?!!!

Never mind, I just kept going, not being one to give up, and what you now see is my first serious attempt at free-motion stitching - lots of different uneven sized stitches I'm afraid, and quite a few 'too' squiggly lines, but hey, I refuse to beat myself up over it for the stitches can hardly be seen anyway. You see, my friends, there's a wee bit of method in my madness - I didn't use a coloured thread, no, just a lovely creamy off-white which is very forgiving, especially on all this patterned fabric.

Anyway, look closely and you'll probably see what I'm on about, but please be gentle with me, I'm doing my best and will get better - with practise!!!

You see what I mean, some of the stitches are way too big but I'm not unpicking, no!!! But anyway, the back looks kinda cute, don't you think? The stitches do show up better on the wee house fabric and I quite like the effect gained from the swirly spirals and circles, don't you?

I've also been busy this week with the crochet hook, after being inspired by the lovely Forgetmenotsblue and her never ending granny square blanket, thanks so much FB! I will show this another time as progress has been slow - why is it that every time I do a wee bit of crochet or knitting my hands start to pain - anyway, it won't be a 'never ending' blanket, but it will take a bit of time methinks!

What I have spent quite a bit of time on though is a disappearing four-patch quilt, again after watching a YouTube video with Missouri Quilt Company. I really didn't know what people were on about when they spoke of disappearing patch quilts, but now I know and am quite in awe of the cleverness of these experienced quilters. Now if you are really interested in seeing more on this subject then I'd suggest you pop on over to YouTube and see just how simple these things can be, but in the meantime, I did take a few pics with you in mind . . . .

. . . . the pic to your left shows the four squares cut out and ready, and on the right the patches are sewn up and pressed . . . . 

Now this won't be easy to explain, and I probably should have left it to the experts but just look closely . . . . and compare with the pic above . . . .  all I've done in the pic on the bottom left, (after taking the rotary cutter and special ruler and cutting through the whole patch four times, one inch from the centre seam), is take the bottom two big squares and swap their positions, and the same with the top two, okay? Then the little patch in the centre is moved around one position only . . . .  see the bottom right pic, yes?

And then stitch them all together very carefully, being sure to match all those little seams! I hope I've explained that okay, it's just an appetiser for those of you interested in giving quilting a go. There are so many great videos available on the web and they're so helpful!

I have made up a few of these patches but certainly have a long way to go, which is why I took a break and made the little table runner - something nice and quick from start to finish, and which I really enjoyed!

These are roughly set out and you can be sure that this time I'll be more certain I'm happy with the placement for I don't want to be taking this quilt apart to change blocks around. Lesson learned! Anyway, a long way to go yet but a very enjoyable project!

Nothing from the garden today my friends - apart from the roses standing on the runner up top there - our weather has been so dry with no rain at all for a couple of months and we so badly need it, even if only for the gardens; Saturday saw us welcome in Autumn time supposedly, but we had 36c - usually we're about 10c less than Perth but not on Saturday. I am pleased to report though that today has been much more cool and pleasant so hopefully we've seen the last of the hot stuff for a while!

Every time I come to the end of my post I find myself thinking that there were other things I meant to say when I got around to posting, but now can't think! Ah yes, I will be linking up with Chrissie again for Stitching Sundays,  thanks so much Chrissie, you're a darling!

Here are a few wise words I came across this morning:

Live without Pretending

Love without Depending

Listen without Defending

Speak without Offending 

(anonymous)

So I will love you and leave you, wishing you all a very happy week and very good health!

❤Joy xoxo

Heart Quilt Ta-dah!

Well hello again my friends, and welcome; thanks for being here and for all your sweet and encouraging messages, you know I love to get them, as well as your snippets of good advice!

Speaking of good advice I want to particularly mention the lovely Wendy from 'September Violets' who left me a very useful message regarding not using a steam iron when pressing quilt pieces as this can cause some stretching of the fabric - Wendy's message is there in my previous post if you'd like to check it out, and she also relates some funny experiences she's had whilst hand stitching! Thanks so much Wendy, I will remember this and have already learned from it!

I will be linking up again with Chrissie - we surely all know the lovely Chrissie - for 'Stitching Sundays', so do have a look and see what she and other crafty stitchers have been up to this week. Yes, I know, it's not Sunday yet but hey, I just had to get this project finished; can't sit back on my laurels and let the world go by, now can I - and besides, I'm raring to go on another adventure already!

So you now know that this is my Ta-dah post for the little heart quilt so how about we take a look . . .

. . . what do you think? I love this - it finished up measuring 40 x 30 inches, a little bigger than the first quilt (see 'It Started Like This' post), so perhaps the next one will be bigger still - we'll see! I'm becoming braver as I learn! And perhaps I may even be brave enough to risk wrecking the next one by trying my hand at free-motion machine stitching on it: there's one thing, I'll certainly be doing lots of practice at that before I actually risk spoiling a quilt - there's too much work involved to be doing that, methinks!!!

So let's look a little bit at the progression with this since last post . . . here we are with the binding ready to put in place . . . 

. . . and for this I folded the (cream with pink spots) strip double, placed raw edges together and stitched it to the front of the quilt top. Afterwards the binding was folded over and hand sewn to the backing. I know that having chosen the same fabric to back the quilt with, I could have cut that a bit larger to allow for  binding to be incorporated and finally brought round and hand stitched to the front, but for me, and being inexperienced in this quilting world, it was easier to do it the way I did! All's fair in love and war, as they say!

I must say that these little clippy-clicky things were really helpful in keeping the binding in place while I hand stitched, and would also be great when hemming or doing anything of a similar nature. You've probably seen them before, but they were new to me and I might add, so much easier and more efficient than pins. I was getting a bit tired of pricking my fingers, and besides these little clips hold the fabric flat without wrinkles and gathers.

Those lovely little felt balls are the ones so kindly included in my surprise parcel from

'J' at JaB Creations a little while back - I just love that little dish of colour by my side as I work!

Here we are at the final stages - I'm relaxing on my nice comfy chair, feet up, with quilt spread over my wee legs - very comfy position doing something I really enjoy!

And the very last stitch on this sweet little quilt that I love . . . just making doubly sure that corner was safe and secure!

We can't leave it at that of course - I took more pics so you may as well see them, don't you think? Here it is all folded up . . . I don't know why that middle pic makes the background colour appear more cream than it really is . . . 

So that's quilt number two completed and time for me to get cracking on another project, so watch this space. In the meantime here's a pic that shows just a wee corner of our local park, taken a few months ago, but for those of you overseas who have suffered such bad weather this winter, I thought it might bring the thoughts of SPRING to the foreground of your minds - it will come, you know it will!

So lovely that you could all be with me again, and thank you for sharing my Ta-dah moment with me!

Wishing you all a very happy weekend and week ahead, and looking forward to keeping in touch through your lovely blogs and messages!

With my love,

❤Joy xoxo