Eternal Maker - Japanese Scrap Bag Challenge - Final Votes Please …

OK lovely people … if you haven’t voted yet … now is your last chance … I’m extending this until midnight THURSDAY (UK time) because I know a few people who want to vote but maybe are a little jet lagged from Quilt Market :)

To sum up, these are our wonderful entries:


and you can vote here
The winner will receive a year’s subscription to Eternal Maker’s Japanese Swatch Club
The entries are awesome [a word I can type but can’t actually say because I’m a Brit and I find it tricky]

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In other, related, news … have you seen the new Echino Fall 2011 line? … S W O O N …  here are a few pics … all available from the Eternal Maker  …

What I love about Echino is that you can obsess and build a stash over time and it will always work well together … genius!
So, go vote, please … your blogfriends need you!
Or go buy, please … your local UK fabric store needs you too!

sundown & a pencil case - a perfect day

After work today I dumped several kilos of marking and text books on my bed and then turned straight round and headed for the sea.

I just needed an hour of fresh air and contemplation. 

Today was beautiful; the sky was cloudless, the hot sun tempered by a cool autumnal breeze.  As I walked to the beach it was ‘starling’ time.




It was a really low tide, one of the few times of the year when we can see sand and walk far out …



usually this is a good swim out …



I needed a sunset, not that depressingly sudden change from light to dark that so engulfs us in winter.


I wasn’t disappointed.





Coming home and doing chores feels like a small price to pay … especially if you just happen to have rustled up a new mega skool pencil case to match your upside-downside journal !

See! There has been a teensie bit of sewing going on!

Tomorrow my bloggy friends, your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to take some time out and watch some sky.

Boo Blogger – Yay Pants!

Guess the one post Blogger lost from my site in the outage over the last few days ??

Yup.  The  Melody Miller giveaway post LOL!  it disappeared into the ether some time yesterday afternoon. 

Maybe the seagull was good luck after all - cos all blog comments come through Disqus straight to my mail - (I already had them backed up cos I’m a paranoid nerd)


but honestly!  … Can you imagine if I hadn’t ??





Today I have been importing all the questions into the most amazing mega spreadsheet.
Oh I love Excel … whoops, nerdswoon




Yesterday I finished my giant Lynne Bob Square Pants block  – using 5” squares – for my Feel The Fear sampler quilt.

I’m really pleased with it … 


And today I had a little fun with some squares and threw in a couple of pinwheels for good measure. 


… hope your weekends are stress free and colourful …

a little something for me …

Well blog friends, after all the mad activity on swaps recently I realised that I’ve kind of lost my sewing mojo a bit.

Now, don’t get me wrong - I Love Swaps - I love pushing myself to try lots of stuff I haven’t done before, to make something for someone I don’t know, but due to my chillingly extensive stalking, probably ‘know’ better than their neighbours, LOL.

Here’s a little reminder of what I have been doing with my time (not so much for you, more like justification for me).

	Doll Quilt Swap
	Make Mine Modern Swap
	Urban Home Goods Swap

That’s when I realised that I haven’t actually made anything for me in over six months.  I started the blocks for my quilt of good intentions on New Year’s Eve, but then the swaps got in the way a bit. 


It became my first ever WIP (otherwise known as Work In not-much Progress) - I always used to finish something before I start something else, but alas, no longer!


I have big plans for this … another post …











My Charley Harper embroidery is a slow burn thang, I hope to finish it soon though. It may turn into a cushion, or become part of a bigger project, I’m not sure yet … it probably won’t stay with me though.










Even Lynne’s QAL is going to be a present for my
god-daughter, and that’s not till August, so I’ve mentally back-burner-ed that one too.  I haven’t even started all the lovely blocks she’s done too …






My sewing melancholy is, of course, majorly connected to the fact that I returned to work on Monday …  start of term is always a bit of a mindf^k.

So, what to do? 

I’ll tell you. 

Make something for ME.  That’s what.   
Something I need.
Something I’ll love using every day. 

Being a bit of a statonery nut, I have very specific nerdy needs.  I need to carry my diary and a notebook of some sort with me both at work and play.  However, I also need the notebook to be interchangeable, depending on what I’m doing, where I am, etc. 

Over the years I’ve spent countless hours modding notebooks and diaries to fit my purpose … you can see my previous Moleskine modding here or by clicking the pic …

 

The trouble is that only works for one year and then I have to start all over again.

No more.

Enter the Upside-Downside Journal cover!

One way round it’s a diary, flip it over - it’s a notebook! Genius!

I spent a ridiculously long time drawing up patterns and working out the logistics of all the pocketed dividers.  I was also determined to use something from my little shopping trip at Frau Tulpe, and a bit of my sacred Ruby Star Rising, so I really didn’t want to waste any of these glorious Echino fabrics and I was far too lazy too make a mock-up first.

I used stiff interfacing on the patterned fabric pieces, plain linen for the lining of each pocket and also used that plastic you get in the bottom of supermarket shopping bags to stiffen each pocket further.  I would have used card, but I want to be able to wash the blighter.

I didn’t put a button/elastic closure on it as I wanted it to be a bit looser than that … and it probably wouldn’t wear very well, given the amount of use it will get!  There’s also no pen holder - I always have a pencil case in my bag and I can easily slip a pen inside should the need arise.  I wanted to keep it simple and adaptable.

I also made it larger than A5 (it’s about 9” x 6”) because I have a couple of drawing notebooks that needed to fit.  It even houses a paperback book perfectly!




There are still some little revisions I want to make … after a day or two at work, I’ve already added bias binding to the central section … This little lovely is going to get some battering …



… but I’m more than happy that I managed to start and finish something, quite frankly …

So, now my mojo is waking from its slumber, maybe I can get on with some new stuff finish some old stuff. 


Just a little work to do for tomorrow first
*sigh  

Comfort Zone … Schmumfort Zone

Today’s post is about my “Bloody Mary Bendy Block", or Mini Quilt, for the DQS10 swap on flickr … This was my first foray into improv quilting* ... 

*a fancy way of saying you don't measure anything and you just go with the flow ... 

If you're a tad OCD about stuff like straight lines, measuring and geometry (which let's face it most quilters are, LOL)  this can be a little unnerving!








I was inspired by the Gee’s Bend quilts I’d seen online and in a book I was given for Christmas … click on the link for a wonderful website devoted to the ladies of Alabama.

(c) 2007-2011 by Elizabeth Green-Hartman

Then this truly fantastic Echino improv block made by Elizabeth Hartman @ Oh! Fransson inspired me to give this whole quilt block improv thing a go …

 And this is what I came up with:






It’s pieced using tiny scraps of Echino Winter 2010 in the left hand and bottom strips, and then some Ruby Star Rising scraps (leftover from this wonderful little gift), Patty Young’s Zen Garden in Espresso & Sherbet, Lecien dots in chartreuse, and the square multi colour print is Robert Kaufman’s Quilts for Kids.  The solids are Kona celery and tomato ... (hence the Bloody Mary name!) you can get a better look here.


My reflection on this is that the whole improv thing was strangely liberating, once I got over the whole “keep it straight” “what size should that bit be?” thing.  I also enjoyed choosing the fabric Gee’s Bend style, in a random way.  I even sewed a curve!  Woot! Woot!  I’d definitely like to do another, but the next one will be a little less Gee’s Bend-y and a bit more me-y.

So, DQS10 partner, if you're stalking me here ... I hope you like it :) 

Has anyone else tried a little improv?  Did you find it liberating or unsettling?  If you haven't tried it ... go on ... dare you!

Echino Patchwork Quilt? Tick!

I’m so excited to finally show you my first ever machine pieced quilt - using 4 fat quarters of Echino Patchwork & some Kona solids!

This lap quilt is a Christmas gift for my very best friend who, in the last two months, has lost her husband, her mother and her two dogs … I reckoned she really needed something bright and jewel-like to snuggle up on the sofa with, and she is one very classy lady, so I think the Echino is the perfect choice !

--- Whoops!  I forgot to take a picture of the back this morning, so apologies for the dark inside shot … but here goes … 

Now, this would be a very picture heavy post were it not for the fact that I’ve documented the whole process on a new page at the top of this blog … Echino - Quilting As Therapy III … Please click the link if you’d like to see more …

Sunday Evening Bliss

Following a weekend of mega marking and a lovely lunch out today with old friends I haven’t seen in a long, long while, this is where you will find me this evening: 



… snug in my sitting room, finishing off the hand quilting on the Echino Patchwork quilt, listening to a play on the radio, cup of coffee by my side.

Bliss

What was your bliss this weekend?

source unknown

 

 

 

… p.s. click on the pic to enter my giveaway

My Creative Space - 'Echino Patchwork'

 This great adventure is the first machine sewn quilt I’ve ever made!

can you tell what it is yet?

Whodathunkit?  Me, sewing a grown up quilt using measuring and everything!?

*Whooh-Whooh* welcome aboard the Chain Piecing Express … How much do I love Chain Piecing?  Heaps! What a brilliant trick …

I’m so enjoying the discovery process and really like the rhythm of 

one thing x a gazillion

followed by

another thing x a gazillion

All things considered, it’s going well … if painfully slowly - but I’d rather get things right and only do them once! … or twice … or … let’s just say the seam ripper is still my best friend. 

Longer post to follow once I get to that inevitable "I’m totally stuck” stage …

Hop on over to Kirsty’s for heaps of far less cack-handed creative spaces

Sunday Stash - The Yum of Echino Birds Patchwork & Comments Update

 picture from fabricworm

You may have spotted something quite sultry nestling in my stash folding post a couple of days ago …





Well, I could resist no longer - four wonderful FQs of the new Patchwork Birds line arrived from fabricworm in the U.S. (what a great online shop!)

I’ve always worried that Echino colours were a little too sharp, but truth is, the texture and the neutral base of the linen helps to knock the edge off a bit.  Well, I think so anyway.  

There’s something so luxurious about it; a soft rich thickness that just urges you to make something beautiful.  

Feast your eyes on these little beauties … Etsuko Furuya = genius!

I’m sorely tempted just to make them up into napkins - at least that way they’d be seen and used daily - *swoon*

What would you make?

Comments Update: I think (I hope) I've patched the leaky comments link - I'm using Disqus - so let's see how it goes!

I'm going to extend the Melody Miller giveaway until Friday to make up for the missed time -

if you have any problems leaving a comment, please email me using the link on the left.

Many thanks, and enjoy your Sunday!