Dearie Me

Not enough posting lately. Having been somewhat moribund all Winter and Spring, now the sun is shining and we actually have Somewhere To Go (Festival of Quilts, Birmingham NEC, 29th July - 1st August), stuff needs finishing and patterns writing and such and such

Here is Little Crosses

 Old Oakshott Fabrics "Summer Check and Stripe" charm squares (no, sorry, all long gone) and two whites, improv blocks and conventional-enough sashings. Ages in the making, recently finished 

And 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 x 22 x 22, for The Modern Group Challenge "It Takes Two" - making a pattern for this soon

And, finished last night

Goth Tiger, my latest Goth Baby Quilt, ready to give away (ETA, now gone to a new home)
This is the back - interesting "Lascaux Caves" print

So, a bit of progress, now I will go and melt gently till after supper, then attack the Post

Almost There!

Well, we are nearly ready to go to the Festival of Quilts 2018: sleepless nights, frantic finishing of quilts, preparing free patterns, chasing tickets, arranging rotas, and sorting out of private lives (yes, we do actually have lives outside Festival, although at the moment it is difficult to remember that) are almost done. Today we have hung up the last of our display quilts to drop its creases before packing.

This little beauty is called RATTLE and is made in OAKSHOTT's fabulous cottons with a large dash of batik. Come and see us on the Modern Quilt Group's desk of the Quilters' Guild stand right by the front doors at the NEC where we will be giving away free patterns and postcards and talk, talk, talking to everyone about Modern Quilting.

Now all I have to do is combat that 3am sudden wakefulness "what have I forgotten to pack?" and get on the road (very early in the am) to go and set up. At least we shouldn't have last year's challenges with the weather; desperation to get unloaded undercover before all the quilts got wet!

What else are picnic tables for?

So what are you likely to find many dedicated quilters doing a month before the Festival of Quilts? Despite it being hot enough to melt tungsten (at least that is how it feels) you will find us sitting under large bed quilts. Not because we all have masochistic tendencies (but hey, each to their own, I don't judge), it is because we need to hand-stitch down our binding. That's where the picnic tables come in - a cunning plan

You can't quite see him, but my little helper (large Chesapeake Bay Retriever) is also under the picnic tables (yes both) since he soon found this was the coolest place in the garden - as indeed it is!

As promised (did you hear the swearing?)

Well I finished trimming my blocks and proceeded to lay them out only to find that I had managed to make three of the blocks wrong - much swearing, cursing and unpicking ensued. I also missed two blocks off my making list completely. Once all these were remedied I think the end result was worth the fight:

The basic pattern for these blocks is available on my website (click on the photo to go there)

TWIN PEAKS (aka Trouble & Strife)

Had a fight on my hands with this quilt, but I finally got it done - if it wasn't for such a good cause I would have given up on it much earlier

Not the best bit of quilting I have ever done, but have a look at the SIBLINGS TOGETHER blog to see why I perservered.
The free downloadable PDF version of the pattern itself is now up on the MQGB website. CLICK HERE to visit the patterns page

Been Finishing

Quilts for Siblings Together, leftovers from a student making a Chinese Coins quilt, all sorts of small stuff
Very satisfying..

Word of the Year - Complete

Lots of stuff today, including my long-neglected Wonky Stars in Oakshott reds, now finally bordered and ready to layer
This will be for a gift, I think, as it's not saleable at a respectable price

And I made a start on some Sewing Kit Purses (images later) which will have a little pincushion and a needle book inside, made with a nice modern Sewing-machine Fabric and lined with a delightful Designers Guild print from about 1990, of honesty pods.. Images when finished tomorrow

Also, fixed and finished two sewing machines, printed manuals, made sense of the heap of scrap paper, tidied a whole bunch of oddments away, and started making things from my little collection of 1inch half-square triangles. Quilted and blocked two cushions I am recolouring for Michael Oakshott, in delicious pale colours, and made the back for one, I have another to hand-quilt this evening

Didn't do everything on my List, but did do a good deal of it

More tomorrow