Still hexagons

Yes, I am still working on hexagons and probably will be for several more weeks. It is nice work to do while watching the Olympics! I have decided to make a wall hanging out of them. It is just too much work to do for a purse. I am not careful of my purses & often throw them down on the floor of my car, etc. I have decided to just sew some strips of fabric together, by machine, and make the purse out of that. All the hand work will be much nicer to have in a wall hanging or single bed quilt, if I don't get too bored doing them. I am trying to alternate rounds of light and then dark "flowers". I have 15 completed after going out and shopping for a bit more dark fabric. Saturday, several friends & I went down to the quilt show at Black Creek Pioneer Village. The weather was a bit warm, but the quilts were great! The village looked wonderful, with the quilts all over the place. I do hope this week to get back to my block on the month blocks. With a long weekend coming up, maybe I will manage to get caught up! Happy quilting!

Cathedral Windows & Hexagons

Anyone interested in cathedral windows and hexagons should check out Jean's Quilting Page at: http://quiltinjeanie.blogspot.ca/ Cathedral windows are on July 22, 20, 19, & 16th. Hexagons are on July 17th. I think they are great!

Hexagons

I got more hexagons made this week. I am up to 12 "flowers" for a total of 84 hexagons. The following is a picture of them laid out over the freezer paper purse pattern that I have decided to make. I need about 24 more, to complete side one. That leaves the two flowers that are in the top two corners, so 14 hexagons to go on side two. The only reason I got so many done, was that I was watching the British Open Golf with my husband. So I did my measuring and need 108 hexagons per side for a total of 216 - 1 inch, which is much better than the 340 3/4 inch ones that the pattern calls for. This is another picture that I would like to do photo thread play with. It is one that our youngest daughter took of Quinn Lake, up north of Parry Sound. This coming Saturday, is a road trip day! I am going with two friends to Black Creek Pioneer Village for a quilt show. I think this is a wonderful setting for a quilt show and am really looking forward to it. Have a good week and enjoy yourself, whatever you are doing!

Photo Thread Play

As I mentioned last week, I took a photo thread play class this past week. I used a picture supplied by the teacher, Wanda, at Thimbles & Things, in Orillia. I am not sure about my clouds, but over all am very pleased with the results! Now I will be picking out one of my own photos to experiment with. Actually, I might even use one that our middle daughter took. It is lovely and available. When I praised my daughter for her photo taking, she told me that she had just snapped it on her cell phone, quickly, with a dog leash in her hands, with her dog wanting to get moving. What do you think? I think it is beautiful! While my husband was having his angioplasty this past Monday, I managed to finish the one hexagon "flower", I had been working on and complete another. I am now up to six flowers (42 hexagons) done. I think they will all go together nicely. I am waiting until I have more made before I do sew them together as I will want to mix up the colours. As a result, I have had to buy more mylar hexagons. You aren't supposed to take them out until all the edges have been sewn to other hexagons, so that will be a while. I still am not sure how many I need, so I see some measuring in my future. What I need to do this week, is catch up on my batik block of the month. With all my other projects, I have managed to get four blocks behind and with my guild meeting coming up this week, I will be getting two more to do. For anyone wondering about the e-reader cover I was working on, our youngest daughter blew the screen in her e-reader, so she says to hold off on finishing the cover as she thinks she will get a slightly smaller one, when she replaces it. That means I should be able to get back to her table runners (her idea, not mine). I also have my one fabric quilt pieces up on my design wall, that will be getting dusty, if I don't get moving on it. My husband came visiting my studio this morning and mentioned that it is a bit of a mess, so it must be time to do some sorting and tidying. I really need a vacation from work to catch all of this up! Oh well all this is part of the enjoyment of having quilting as my main hobby! I never have a dull moment. Hope you have a fun week sewing!

More Hexagons

It was a busy week but I did manage to get some more hexagons sewn. Four are done, but the top left one needs to have the center hexagon sewn and then the whole thing needs to be stitched together. I also got another twelve "flowers" (seven hexagons each) cut out from six different prints. I found a bunch more Asian prints while looking for something else in my stash, so will be adding more variety. I also did some shopping this week. I am picturing 10 inch squares of the top fabrics with 2 1/2" - 6" squares of the batik sunflower fabric set into them. I picked out the batik and then managed to find three to coordinate with it and knew what colours I wanted for the others, but just couldn't seem to find the right ones. Thanks to Wanda & Sue at Thimbles & Things for helping me put the rest together. I am also taking the Photo Thread Play class with Wanda this week, so I hope to have something different to show you next week. Have a good week, lots of sewing time and lots of inspiration!!

What A Month!

Well as you have probably noticed, I haven't posted anything for several weeks. Sorry to all of you who kept checking. We had company from Northern Ireland and from England. I thought that I would still have enough spare time to do a bit of sewing and blogging, but it just didn't happen. I was supposed to be off work, but that just didn't happen either. It made it very difficult to stay up late visiting and then get up for work in the morning. As of Friday night, we were back on our own and missing our company. I haven't gotten back into sewing very much, but am working on a couple of things. Our youngest daughter, who is waiting for her table runner, asked if I could whip up a cover for her e-reader, so the screen won't get scratched if she throws it into her purse, to take with her. She looked over my stash & came up with the fabric she wants. This is what she picked out. I did a quick design plan, cut the fabric, and started quilting. It will be folded in thirds, with one third sewn to the middle third at the edges (after binding the end), to make a pocket. Then I will bind the remaining three edges, fold over the flap & close it with Velcro. The following picture of the strip of fabric folded will give you an idea of the size. Next week, my husband is having a procedure done as day surgery. I went hunting for a hand sewing project, already on the go that I could work on while I wait for him, and came up with my hexagons. There is a neat pattern for a purse in the August issue of "Better Homes & Gardens American Patchwork & Quilting" that I am going to use them for. Mine will be flowers using some of my Asian fabric scraps. The pattern calls for 340 of the 3/4 inch(side measurement)hexagons. I very rarely follow a pattern exactly. My hexagons have one inch edges, so I won't need quite as many. I have a busy week ahead with work, Tuesday - Thursday (Monday is a holiday in Canada), dinner & a movie with my friends after work on Tuesday, my kindred group meets this Wednesday night and then my best quilting friend & I are taking a road trip on Friday to see a quilt shop we have never been to before. Hopefully, I will fit some sewing in there. Have a good week & happy quilting!

A No Sew Week

I can't believe that I really didn't sew anything for the past week. I did sew for several hours on Saturday, but I was just trying to figure how to bind a 90 degree inside corner. I tried and tried on scraps and still don't have it right. My table runner needs to have little squares cut out of the corners, making a regular 90 degree corner, then a 90 degree interior corner then another 90 degree regular corner. All these corners are just over 1 cm apart. I still don't have it right, but will figure it out. I did do some crocheting while watching the French Tennis Open. I just made two pairs of slippers for myself. This is my own pattern, that I have perfected over the years. They fit my narrow feet quite well. I can't buy slippers as they do not make them narrow enough. I have enough of a problem finding shoes that fit. This week I have company from Northern Ireland and from England. There is a big family wedding on Saturday that is turning into a family reunion. I was supposed to be off work for 2 1/2 weeks, but we are too busy, so I am just managing with 2 days plus the weekend off and then will be right back at it. My sewing time has been cut right back to practically nothing. I hope the rest of you have more time to play! Have a good week!

I Did It!

My rail fence quilt is done as of this past Wednesday at about 9:30 pm. I am very happy with it. I threw it over my bed to give you an idea of what it looks like, up off the floor.

Now, turned down, so the sheep show!

I really like the touch of blue in it.

So what did I end up doing next? The table runner for my youngest daughter. What else could I do after she helped me shop for annuals for my planters and did all the carrying. She also cut the grass the past two weeks. So Eleanor Burns "Day & Night" it is.

Here are the four blocks plus the start of the first border. Sorry, I still haven't learned how to crop pictures.

That is all that I have been up to this week. I hope to finish the table runner this coming week and start on my "Itty Bitty" wall hanging. Enjoy your quilting time!

Almost, but not quite!

I have one more sheep to applique! I am too tired to make a good job of the last one, so will leave it for tonight. I did get the binding all stitched & a bunch more threads finished off, so I didn't do too badly!

Wow 11 appliques all sewn and one poor set of sheep full of pins. Oh well, not for much longer. I should be able to finish after work tomorrow, although there are a bunch of threads to finish off still, so maybe by Tuesday night? Then, the big question. What do I do next? Our youngest daughter is pushing for a "Day & Night" table runner, but I'm not sure if I am in the right frame of mind for that. I am thinking of something a bit more fun than that. Of course, I still have to sew my two charity quilt squares together & do my block of the month, so I will have time to decide, while I work on those this week. This is also my week for my Aclasta infusion for my osteoporosis, so I might not get much of a start on anything. Enjoy whatever you are working on!

Better Late than Never?

I'm late & I am sorry. I forgot it was a long weekend & I have been busy with non-quilting things. I finished the quilting on my rail fence quilt and got the front of the binding machine sewn on and pinned it to the back. I promised interesting? things and here goes!

Knitting Sheep from Timeless Treasures Fabrics, Inc. Now for some close-ups:

In case you missed me talking about this quilt, it is for my sister. All the prints on the front of it represent parts of her life. The big thing I missed was her knitting. I found these knitting sheep and had to add them. They are going to be appliqued across the top of the back of the quilt, up-side-down, so that when the quilt is on a bed and gets turned down, the sheep (3 repeats of 4 sheep,)all 12 of them, will be right-side-up across the top. I think my sister will get a laugh out of them! For a number of years we lived on a farm and raised sheep, so these cover that part of her life as well as her knitting. I even found clip art of a rail fence, so thought that it was appropriate to add to the label. Sorry, I still haven't figured out how to change a picture from landscape to vertical without making it smaller, so here is my label, sideways.

I did end up working five days last week and will probably do the same this week, so it cut into my sewing time. Il Divo at the Air Canada Centre, in Toronto, were great Saturday night! My two main gardens acquired a bunch more perennials on Sunday. I had hoped to have the binding completely sewn on rather than the back pinned. This week my aim is to do the hand sewing on the binding and applique all the sheep on as well as finishing off a bunch more threads. Gee, that would mean the the quilt would be finished! All I am saying is that I will try! Happy quilting!