Rainbow Hearts Baby Quilt

A little quilt I made for a friend's granddaughter...

Brrummm brummmm.... Tractor Baby Quilt

I had a lovely time delivering this quilt today 

to a friend for her new baby.

I had made her another quilt that was a bit more 'neutral', 

but when I heard she had had a little boy....

Well! It had to be a tractor quilt!!

I longarmquilted it freehand

on my Nolting pro-24 machine with stars and loops...

And then I took a few photos as he gave it a trial run...

He is the sweetest little thing,

and his mother is under strict instruction 

that she can use it however she pleases

as it is completely washable and squash-able 

and made for use.

Work in Progress - Rainbow Hearts

I love making these hearts...

Now to work on a layout

Wordless Wednesday - New Project - Heart Block

Wordless Wednesday - Baby on her gifted quilt

Sheep Quilt - Baby Shower Gift

I was very pleased to be able to give this quilt

to a special work colleague today 

as a baby shower quilt.

That meant that yesterday I had to dash out 

and take a few photos to remember it by :)

I am also very lucky to have an amazingly helpful 

(and wonderful) friend

who after a quick plea-full phone call offered her sheep, 

her fence... 

(and a bucket of food to call the sheep!)

The wind was blowing an almost gale,

but I wanted to capture the backing fabric too

so no problem with a bit of wind...

The backing is a piece of fabric 

that I have had for a LONG time!

 I liked it so much that I never wanted to use it.

Crazy!! But using it for someone special was worth it.

(No point saving my favourite fabric for best!

As I have probably said before, 

if I don't watch out and use my stash,

 my husband will send it to the charity shop!!)

The backing is a sort of American Country Fair print

with a 'Quilt Show' tent and Fairground attractions

as well as farm animals and red barns.

I thought it worked well as it is fairly neutral.

The recipient doesn't know what her baby will be...

But boy or girl, 

all we hope is that it is healthy and happy

(and feels free to use and abuse this quilt!)

Wordless Wednesday - A Flock of Sheep

Wordless Wednesday - Super Cute Baby & Quilt I made....

 (ps Thanks to the baby's Mum for the lovely pictures xxx)

Resting my leg, but not my fingers!

A long long time ago!

I fancied making Kaffe Fassett's Pennants quilt,

but obviously being me,

I had to do it differently 

and so I decided to English-Paper-Piece it!

I managed 22 blocks before I gave up and it became a UFO.

A very old UFO now!

Today I got it out

and with a little help from Miss Kalico

I laid it out with some orphan heart blocks.

I had made the heart blocks 

when I was doing a monthly heart block swap -

also many many years ago now (at least 10 or so I think!!)

The hearts were a hit ;o)

And my old scrap of paper with a potential layout

was good for colouring in too apparently!!

*****

The reason I could tackle another 'Unfinished Object'

is because the binding is now sewn down on the baby quilt.

This went amazingly quickly.

Either that or I am not used to having this much time to sew!

I plan to get a proper picture of this quilt

when I am walking without crutches again...

Time to Sew

Time to rest,

means time to sew!!

So I have managed to get all the borders

hand stitched to my rose star hexagon quilt.

But sitting around resting

means you might get decorated

with flower petals :o)

I told Miss Kalico that I was making this quilt for her room

and I think she is pleased about that because

 she wanted to touch the quilt while eating an ice lolly

and so I said 'Don't touch' and she said: 'But it's mine!' ;o)

*****

I have taken all the papers out

of this quilt and hope that as soon as possible,

I can iron this top

and get it on my Longarm.

*****

I took this photo

to show my tiny hand stitches.

I love handwork!

*****

Now I am on to the next thing!

Hand stitching the binding down on this baby quilt...

I feel the need to sew as much as possible at the moment

as I'm sure this 'enforced' resting won't last long!!!

Finished Story-Time Stars

A Finish for February!

Story-Time Stars:

 A Bonnie Hunter pattern.

Quilted with a star and loop pantograph

on my Nolting Longarm machine.

I bought a backing that I thought was just perfect for a baby -

Black stars on white!

***

While taking advantage of the rare sunshine

and our new view for a photograph,

 our new neighbour came to investigate....

Such a friendly pony...

And a curious cat....

 They eyed each other up,

 but they're not ready to be friends yet!

Hopefully sometime soon ;o)

50 Blocks of Mystery

I've made 50 of the first block

of Bonnie's Celtic Solstice Mystery..

The good thing about being this behind on the mystery

is that I can make the parts as blocks and not just units :o)

 I find it's been coming together in fits and starts

as I don't always get time to sew...

*****

My furry friend likes to guard my quilts in progress...

*****

 This special baby quilt is only a few stitches away from being finished:

*****

My machine used for bag making

and was very poorly ;(

DH and I have learned so much from owning a longarm

and now repairing small sewing machines is a perk of the job ;o)

*****

My tree on a day that we had some sunshine.

In front of the tree you can see how wet the land is around here...

*****

 And Miss-Kalico with her plaster cast!

She fell of a chair and refused to walk on it

so we had to get her checked out .

Long story, but thankfully she's ok

and must have just sprained her ankle.

But when they couldn't find anything wrong they put a cast on.

24hours in a cast and she was desperate to walk lol

Like Sudoku, but not quite

Our sofa isn't normally so laden with quilts,

but I am sewing the binding down on a king size quilt

that got plopped on the sofa on top of another quilt for some reason....

 and when I came back to it,

a certain furry person had made herself very comfortable!

*****

Story Time Stars by Bonnie Hunter:

This is the top so far for my friend's first grandchild.

I'm loving the colours and the spots and stars.

The fact that putting it together was like playing Soduku

was not so easy for my little brain!

In the end I had to call in reinforcements.

There are 16 blocks. Each centre is repeated twice. 

There are 4 colours for the stars, 

but each block only uses a combination of 3 of the colours...

and that's where it all started getting confusing for me.

After about an hour and a half of shuffling blocks around we were happy

(a layout normally only takes me a few minutes!)

Now for the borders which are already cut

and thankfully require no more brain strain :o)

***

On another note,

I had to go around to a friend in the village

to borrow some pins to put this quilt together.

It was still early, but very dark

as our village has no street lights...

As I walked home just with my torch,

I thought to myself that I have probably watched

far too many of these murder stories 

set in quaint English villages for my liking!!!