with it having fallen badly for me the previous 2 years i am yet to make an appearance at retreat but this time i am going...
i have to...
i'm teaching!!
i have to say i feel very honoured to be teaching and to be in such esteemed company. (check out here for a list of some of the teachers if you haven't already seen the announcement today.) what a line up...oh and then there's me!
i'm very very excited to be teaching and to finally get to meet so many blog and instagram and other quilter friends.
so are you going?
have you bought a ticket yet?
they are available right here and you can pay in 2 instalments too before March 2014...perfect!
i really can't wait. i just hope in between the teaching i have time to hang out...maybe i won't teach after all...
1. i finished a quilt that had been sitting on a pile waiting patiently for its turn since january and...
2. it was sunny enough to take a stroll across the road to the park to shoot a few pics of it.
the quilt in question was my scrappy trip along quilt below, which was my xmas vacation project last year.
oh so embarrassing to be about to embark on this year's xmas vacation and still have it unfinished. having found an unusual free gap in my week i finally set about to finish it.
there is actually something rather nice about revisiting an unfinished project...memories are wrapped up in it...you get to revisit and rework with fabrics that you may not be anymore.
advantages galore...and that's my story for being a lazy a*** and i'm sticking to it.
im so so pleased with how it's turned out and hopefully ruby, who it was originally made for, is still keen on it too.
i had a fun little photo shoot in the park...dodging the dogs and the wind (weather wind not the dogs' wind) andto show you a few more of the photos i have attached a little flipagram here, which may or may not work. i have never made one before, but have fun with it if it does!
what finishing this quilt has taught me is...
1. i can be a finisher...
2. i actually enjoyed being a finisher...
3. i really really must finish more things before i start anything new.
that last one is my new year's resolution...good luck with that huh?
oh and that first picture at the top?...
that's a sneak of a commission that i have been working on and is about to head off to its destination. just as soon as i can i'll tell you more about that one!
choose the size of your bundle from charm pieces up to full panels...
you can become a yearly member and receive additional discounts or spread the cost and pay month on month, either way you will receive significant discounts on regular panel prices.
and tell all your friends about it...although not too many as i am keeping it small, exclusive and limited. after all if everyone has them, it won't be special any more will it?
i hope you will be as excited about it as i am and enjoy all the benefits of being a member of my club (i have a club!...i've always wanted to have my own club!)
i am very excited to tell you that my new fabric club will go live and ready to join later this week.
it is a club like no other...
:: choose your size ::
...from charm pack up to a full panel size.
:: choose how often ::
...join for a full year or month by month
:: unique hand printed unavailable-anywhere-else fabrics ::
i have taken all your comments on board and hopefully providing what you have asked for.
so what do you get for your money?
:: 2 designs a month ::
...printed onto a carefully selected group of fabrics printed onto kona cottons
:: ideas sheet ::
...suggestions of what you can do with your special pieces of hand printed fabrics
:: mini project ::
...every issue comes with a mini project
all you need to do is purchase before the 10th of the month of that issue (blueberry park fabric club will be every 2 months, starting in january). there will be limited availability so do book early! if you want a special heads up email on release date to ensure you don't miss out, please leave your details here.
i hope you will be as excited as i am and look forward to telling you in full later in the week.
way back in the summer aylin and amy asked me to be part of their new QAL - {big} city girl QAL and i jumped at the chance.
so here i am, the final leg of the QAL with my home capital city London.
whilst i am from leeds in the north of england i lived in london for 16 years and it will always in some ways be home.
i really couldn't decide which landmark to use in my block. there are so many to choose from - tower bridge, big ben, houses of parliament, st paul's cathedral, buskingham palace, the gherkin and even the meandering river thames.
but there was one that stood out for me...one that is a modern renowned landmark, the london eye. i used to travel up to the centre of london by train regularly and my heart always skipped a beat when the big wheel came into view.
so here is my interpretation of one of my favourite london landmarks, the drunkard path way.
you will need:
for each circle: 4 dark circle quarters, radius 2"
4 low volume outers with a 1.5" radius cut out.
Using a 2” inner circle and a 1.5” concave
outer piece make each quarter piece. Check out this
great tutorial if you are struggling with making your drunkards patch pieces.
Sew together each quarter and trim the combined square to 4”.
Repeat to make 6 drunkard path circles.
In addition you will need a 4x4” square for
the centre and 4 2x4”corner pieces. Sew the 3 rows together as illustrated
below and then sew each row together. Finally cut and sew a 3x11” border along
the bottom.
Now for a little hand embroidery detail to
sew the frame of your London Eye. Sew with a running stitch from capsule to
capsule and across to opposite capsules. Use chain stitch to sew the support
posts.
And there you are done!
please do add any make to the {big} girl city QAL flickr group and do catch up on all the other wonderful city blocks from around the world if you missed out on visiting them.
i got a little feeling of what it must be like to win an oscar or the like yesterday when i discovered that my advent calendar kit was voted as number 2 in BT lifestyle's best advent calendars.
we will just sidle past the question of who actually goes on the BT lifestyle website to see it shall we?
actually i think plenty of people surprisingly have as i have been printing these kits ad infinitum as alice of backstitch will testify.
with regular weekly emails of "help, need more red Klona!"
what makes me particularly excited more than anything is the thought of so many people a week on Sunday hanging their advent calendars, filling with them with their choice of treats until xmas eve.
i thought i had printed my last panels last week. i even told alice so. but no, with just 8 days to go until the start of advent orders are still coming in fast and furious.
and panic upon panic...alice has run out of klona crimson! i've run her dry!
thankfully i have managed to secure another source who have guaranteed me delivery tomorrow...printing on sunday...mailing on monday...happy people making kits on tuesday.
i may have ordered just enough if anyone else still want one...shout now because this really is the final order.
and if you don't fancy making one up i do have one available to buy ready made. i guess i felt i was missing out on the sewing up fun and wanted to join in. anyway it's available here and the kits are available here.
my life has been opened up to the wonderful world of barn quilts.
i had never heard of barn quilts until i read about them here today.
i know...where have i been?
i have always had a thing for american barns, ever since i was old enough to hop across the ocean to visit my family in connecticut but i have never come across barn quilts there.
having flicked over to the barn quilt trail website (yes there is such a thing) i did in fact see that nowhere in CT was registered on the barn quilt trail.
this made me relieved that i hadn't been going around there with my eyes shut but saddened that i will have to go further afield to find some.
i will however be rectifying the lack of barn quilts in CT by painting one on my aunt's barn next time i am there...
american barns are so evocative and full of life and by painting a quilt on one of the walls just adds to this.
i've posted a few of my favourite barn quilt photos here and have started a new pinterest board where there are more. i know...obsessed.
there is even a book on barn quilts...that's obviously now on my wishlist.
the question is was i on my own here with my ignorance of barn quilts or have i enlightened a few more of you too?
do share you favourite barn quilt photo if you have one.
i was lucky enough to be sent some from the collection to make a quilt for them. i'd like to use the excuse that there was a short deadline on dashwood needing the quilt, for marketing purposes for the reason for the rapido making, but really it was down to it's irresistibility.
not only is the collection right up my alley, designs, colours, but the fabric itself is beautiful - really soft and light and i just couldn't wait to get sewing.
so sewing i did...until midnight last night.
as you can see from the top photograph, all the designs are really lovely but it is possibly the prints in the one colour designs that are most striking - perfect blenders for any project and would make wonderful dress-making fabrics too.
if you haven't come across dashwood before do check out their collections (this one is in store end of november). at the moment they are available here (see stockists bottom right) but i am sure it won't be long before they are more widespread.
in the meantime i am off to make a replica quilt as this one is on its way back to dashwood headquarters...sniff...
i was thrilled when kirsty asked me to be part of her blog hop. i have long been a fan of kirsty's and her work having 'met' her over the internet when i first entered this wonderful world of ours.
kirsty is one of those effortlessly clever people who produces things that are so quirky and original and, as this book demonstrates, is not short on ideas.
hoop-la is a gem of a book that incorporates {well over} a hundred ideas and projects to do with embroidery hoops.
whilst the book is not only a visual delight with all of kirsty's fab fun designs but it is a fantastic manual too with pages upon pages of templates to use and detailed instructions on how to carry out all the different skills. i love all her
::top tip::
ideas too.
so embroidery hoops are for, well, embroidery? aren't they?
wrong!
think again! kirsty shows in this wonderful book that this little humble piece of equipment can be used in oh so many different ways and decorated in an endless variety of ways.
my favourite ideas are the ones that make the hoop into a functional piece, rather than merely as a frame for a piece of art...although those are obviously all awesome too.
i love the chalkboard idea...and the noughts and crosses game...the vase of flowers, although you may not want to put water in them...the pen holder.
with this theme in mind i made my own little homage to hoop-la frame...an advent calendar pocket decorated in washi tape...ok i should make the other 24, and it would probably look rather cool if i did, but i just love how again you can take something quite simple and make something very striking.
i love when kirsty's thinking outside the box has resulted in more than one frame being the whole picture like the giraffe...the conversation...the hot air balloon.
so the giveaway! kirsty is very kindly offering one of you lovely readers a chance to win one of her fab frames from the book. being a screen printer the one i was instantly drawn to is the mix tape screen print. it's so cool!
all you need to do for a chance to win this frame is to leave a comment here. it is open to anywhere in the world and please feel free to tweet and the rest about it! i will be drawing a winner sometime on sunday 17 november.
thanks again for stopping by and if you have missed the rest of the blog hop (it finishes on friday) do check out and catch up on the other posts right here. you may still be in with a chance of entering some of the other giveaways!
i hope this has given you a good insight into this really marvellous book (put it on your xmas list) you will never look at an embroidery hoop in the same way again!
and i will leave you with this really cool little video that kirsty made. if what i have said hasn't persuaded you that you need a copy, then this really will!
it's that time of year again...xmas fair season...where i can normally be seen galavanting off all over the place at various fairs around the country.
it's an unusual year this year however, due to other work and personal commitments, as i am actually only going to be out and about at one fair.
i am going to be exhibiting at the selvedge winter fair at chelsea old town hall on fri and sat 29 and 30 november.
coincidentally this is one of my favourite fairs to exhibit at and also to shop at. it is full of beautiful handmade products that make exceptional gifts. i'm hoping to conquer my complete xmas/chanukah list whilst i am there!
if you are in the neighbourhood and fancy a great day out do come along and as a little incentive to come over to my stand i am offering all my lovely blog friends 10% off at the fair. just make yourself known to me quoting {fair13}.
right, i'm off to make some more goodies for my stand and hope to see lots of you then!
ps if there's anything in particular you are wanting to buy do let me know and i can make sure i have it or put on one side for you. x
