Finishes

It's been a while. In fact, so long, I have two quilts finished.

Firstly, the proverbial quilt featuring the lyrics from one of my favourite The [Dixie] Chicks songs. Coincidentally, the words kind of go with the big lockdown of 2020 when I put this one together.

Being shot cotton and hand quilted with a wool batting, it is super soft. While I remember, this quilt contains little bits of 'other' blue gingham, as seen in the G above, given to me by my Gran's cousin. She passed away in March 2020.

Even more recently, like this weekend, I have also finished my other big make started in February last year - the Free Wheeling Single Girl quilt.

It's a big one. About two metres x two metres. Again it is hand quilted with a wool batting. I splashed out on a wide backing for the first time. It weighs a tonne. This one is destined for my cousin. The first on my Mum's side to turn 50. 

I like both of these quilts very much.

Green Baby Quilts

These were also part of the original Modern Building Blocks quilt. Two measure about 1 metre x 1 metre and the smaller third quilt about 70 cm x 70 cm. The selve on the Denyse Schmidt says 2013 - from the days when Spotlight had less dirty and dull looking quilt fabrics!

I have put these ones away in the cupboard for gifting.

Yes my garden shed needs a clean and re-paint. Maybe the Sept school hols we'll be able to use hoses again. Auckland has been in water shortages and restrictions for months now. It also needs new steps. So much dirt was removed during the house fix last year, it's a massive step up into the shed now. I have to stand on an upturned bucket to reach the top lock (-:

10 NICU Quilts

Back in August 2015 I finished the quilt top for the Moda Modern Building Blocks. It was ginormous measuring at least 2.5 on one edge. This August, August 2020 during the Auckland only 19 day Level 3 lockdown I got 10 small NICU quilts quilted and bound. Ta-da! (Nine make a better collage.)

I am no machine quilter - generally I find it very stressful. I found it quite calming on these small quilts that easily fit into and under my little Bernette. Every quilt is cross hatched apart from one. And that one taught me that cross hatching is way more forgiving than straightline quilting! The whole process taught me that hand quilting hides many more sins than machine quilting - where a slight waver to get from one block of the quilt to the next stands out! I did love that machine quilting sped the job up enormously. It probably took about three hours to 505 baste, quilt and then bind each little quilt. I hand sewed the back of the binding down. 

It feels good to have the quilt top off the 'in progress' page and onto the 'quilts' page. I look forward to passing these over at our next in-person gathering of Monday Modern ... whenever that may be.

Lockdown 2.0

The first I knew about our current lockdown was a late night phone call from a colleague. Emails between our leadership team then followed for the next hour as we made plans for the next day. And here we are a week and a half later with four days to go all being well.

I re-started running and that lasted the first three or four days. I really don't like it and I couldn't talk myself into keeping it up. I have replaced it with a short strength workout (using equipment I didn't return to the school gym after the last lockdown!) on days I start work at 8 or 8.30am and a round the block 7.4 km walk on the days I don't need to be online that early. I got the walk down to 64 minutes this morning - it's usually around 67 minutes. A big chunk of it is up hill so my heart rate gets up and I can feel my lower back and butt muscles by the end of the day! As always, I am grateful for good health and being able to exercise.

For the first three days we had one learner at school so I was on supervision duty with one other. Then he didn't show after the weekend, so I have been able to work completely from home over the last week. I have decided that a five hour work day at home easily equals a nine hour day at school. No interruptions!

I have made time in the afternoons and evenings (and of course the weekends) for sewing. I have caught up on my Treehouse Textiles cushions.

My big sewing goal for this lockdown is get at least five NICU quilts quilted and bound. I unpicked my Moda Modern Sampler last lockdown for this purpose. It was a huge quilt top that I didn't need. So far so good. 

Also on the go is quilting my Proverbial Quilt. I am procrastinating a bit there and doing these other smaller projects. It's not even hard work, and it's pretty quick. So no excuses. I just need to knuckle down as I need to get the quilting on my cousin's 50th birthday quilt started in the next school holidays to meet the January deadline.

The PM is making an announcement on Monday about the current lockdown. I imagine we will back at school Thursday but most kids will choose not to re-start until the following Monday.

The Kilim Quilt Finished

This quilt was finished a week or so ago, but it has been raining since then. Apparently. not enough rain to get the Auckland dams to their usual levels so we are still on water restrictions. I am convinced the council needs to a put a dam in my back yard as it rains all the time here! However, I took advantage of a break in the weather this morning a) to put the washing outside to dry and b) to take the finished photos of the Kilim Quilt on the neighbour's wall as per.

The main part of the backing was purchased on Trade Me. It is a textured cotton - maybe a barkcloth. The colours are just right. Most of the rest of the fabrics were left over from my Free Wheeling Single Girl quilt - which is next in the queue for quilting. Others came off the shelf. I was deliberate in using the yellow and orange binding as I didn't want orange binding on the orange backing.

And for a finishing touch, I added some orange stitching to my label. The quilt is quilted with a Sue Spargo variegated Eleganza thread. Her threads are my favourite for their texture.

Now for some inside shots -

Eight Years in the Making

I made this back in the summer of 2012. I pulled it out of the wardrobe during Covid lockdown and finished the quilting earlier this week.

It's made from old wool blankets taken from my Mum's linen cupboard. The blankets may have come from my Gran before that.

It's quilted with Perle thread #8. When I first put it together for quilting, I used wool batting but it was too thick to quilt. So I pulled it apart and used a flannelette backing only. The binding is a nice green floral Tilda. I think if it had been around eight years ago, it would have been a perfect choice to use in the body of this quilt. The curved edges came to me during the quilting process. During the quilting process the quilts tend to lie over the couch or on the floor and that's when the curved edges came to me. It's my first curved edge quilt.

This quilt weighs a tonne. Hence the name, the woolly mammoth.

Free-Wheeling Single Girl. Half Way There.

When I say half way, I mean half way through constructing the top. This quilt requires a bit of planning and thinking so I end up with 'spaced out' colours. On the upside, most of the time my ring matching is getting better.

Free-wheeling Single Girl. A Start.

I have had my eye on this pattern for years. Thanks to a QAL last year, I came across some versions I liked and that left out the million pieces in the rings. I particularly liked Isabel's (https://www.instagram.com/lambandwolfie/) version.

I expect this to be a big project. Even bigger than I anticipated, now the first block is made. They are huge!

I struggled with trimming the blocks. Trimming is on my dislike about quilting list. Consequently, my rings don't meet perfectly.

Denyse Schmidt and Sewtopia put me onto a 'how to trim' video. Let's see how I get on with block two.