African Mavericks

It's my turn to make a block for Kate for our African blockswap. I thought I'd give Bonnie's Maverick Stars a try...


I think these could get addictive and they're a great way to use up smaller bits and scraps.

Of Pirates and Beauties

Here's the last of my New York Beauty's:
A2 (again)


These are the rejects. All a bit too small due to 'scaling' and not 'cropping' the printouts...

(So just one more for a cushion...)

I have no more of the patterns for this quilt. The BOM that I signed up for is sadly no more and I only have about half the blocks done. Unfortunately the lady organising the BOM has had some difficulties keeping up and her Yahoo! group has been closed before she released the other half of the blocks month by month (- bah humbug!!!). Apparently one could have purchased them previously, but I believe even that option is now untenable.

I'll have a little think how I'll arrange what blocks I have done, but I think I'll only make one or two more and move on to something else.... (no change there then LOL)

On a brighter note. Look what I got in the post today: A pirate parcel of precious patchwork pieces!



Thank you Toni! a.k.a. The Quilting Pirate for these lovely 'spare' blocks from her course with Bonnie Hunter. She also sent some great fabric, a memo pad, a pirate duck (which is apparently now DS1's!!), a pirate card and a cool pattern.

DS1 says the house with the skeletons is the best!

Last year at Halloween he borrowed a skeleton outfit for the day.

We went to 2 parties and still months later that's all he can talk about. Skeleton parties, skeleton outfits, skeletons, skeletons... (he is only 3!). I guess the search for a skeleton costume is on LOL.

The pattern of Toni's blocks is Bonnie's Happy Scrappy Houses, my all time favourite pattern and how I initially found Quiltville.com. I just have to make some myself sometime soon!!

Busy, busy, busy

On Friday I made another New York Beauty.
here is E4:


I started another A2, only this time I printed it out the right size! But on Saturday I thought I'd better make my step 2 of Bonnie's Orange Crush mystery quilt. I finished these split 4 patches on Sunday
they still need trimming etc. I had to do them the old fashioned way as I still haven't had a chance (or robbed a bank LOL) to buy the Easy Angle and now the Companion Angle rulers needed for this project.
The Quilting Pirate bought her ruler for $2.50 and then another for 97 cents!!!. I can't seem to find one in the UK for cheaper than around $18 including postage.

I also made DS1 a new schoolbag with a zip pouch in the front to carry his 'to and fro' book.
I used some shark fabric that Kate had sent me a while back.

The 'to and fro' book is a really sweet book that the teacher writes in to let us know what he gets up to at Nursery.

The back is also shark fabric that I bought from my friend Angela who has an Ebay shop.

DS1 loves sharks (hope he doesn't mind the rick-rack LOL)

And here's a lovely parcel from Nicolette.

We did a private fabric swap. Nicolette sent me rose fabric and I sent her some African fabrics. We were both pleased with this swap. I got sweets too mmm! And inspiration for another project.
Thanks Nicolette, these fabrics will go beautifully in my rose hexagon quilt...




On the side I have also been handquilting DS1's baby quilt. A lot overdue, but here it is.
Only two blocks and the borders still to go....

3 Steps forward. 1 Step back!

I've made some more progress on my New York Beauties.
Here is E3

And A3

BUT here is A2!!

When I printed it out I must have hit 'scale' instead of 'crop' on the printer! So it's too small. I'm sort of relieved as I wasn't crazy about the colour scheme...

But it is still so annoying as I've done this before! I now have 3 orphans from this project - I feel a cushion coming on LOL

New York (& German) Beauties

I have fallen behind on all my BOM's while being away. Because the New York Beauty goes together as a wallhanging I thought I'd better get cracking on catching up. Also there are 2 a month. I didn't do October before I left so that means I have something like 14 to do just to get back on target...

Here is C1

This is C5

This is E3 in progress..

But this is DH in progress!!!!

I feel the loss of my sewing 'space' is imminent so I better get my sewing skates on!

I have lots of handquilting waiting for me so I won't be idle while I have no access to my machine. In fact as Ruth handquilts her African quilt I get more and more driven to finish DS2's baby quilt. OK, I know he'll be 2 this year, but things got in the way..

Here he is!

I went to take the picture of the hole in the wall which is next to my sewing space and turned around and the little guy had found a place to play. He doesn't mind the mess (much).


My friend Birgit sent me an amazing birthday present today. Boy was I spoilt again!!!
A beautiful 'treasure' box covered in Batik fabrics:

plus a huge bundle of batik fabrics and more chocolate than I can eat in a night LOL.

Thank you so much Birgit! The fabrics also came with a pattern.

Also in the box was my Walburga. Each year Birgit hosts a Quiltfest in her shop in Germany. This year it's on the 26th of July (so if you're in the area do pop in). Each year Birgit also gives out a free pattern. Last year it was a paper-pieced flower by Ula Lenz for a charity quilt and the year before it was the Walburga pattern (also by Ula Lenz). (see her online shop under 'Kostet Nix!' for the patterns and conditions)

Anyway here's my Walburga:

Bit of a self portrait really especially with those hips LOL.

A bad work(wo)man always blames her tools!

Here's April's Block of the Month (BOM) designed by Carol Doak. I am a member of Carol's online Yahoo! group and just love her patterns.


And here's what the block looked like when I thought I'd finished it.

Can you spot the mistake? I left out 2 black bits in one of the quarters! (see bottom right quarter) Not sure how I did that!

I've learned that it is possible to 'fix' a paper-pieced block when you've torn most of the papers off the back because you've sewn the 4 sections together, but it is pretty darn fiddly!

I guess my workspace doesn't aid concentration, but then a clear desk is the sign of a disturbed mind I've heard :O)

BQL April Bag

Here's my April effort for the BQL Bag Challenge.



The patterned fabric is from South Africa. A Makoti wax print that I bought from a fabric shop called Lapland in Montagu. I had bought the gusset fabric for my hexagon quilt as I wanted to add more red to it, but after I'd washed my fabrics these two ended up on top of each other and I thought they just had to be something together... so they are my April bag.

Here's my 'baby' eating alphabet noodles from Germany.

Both kids love these noodles and DS1 likes to try find the letters for his name, while DS2 just likes to get them in (or near) his mouth LOL

Spoilt rotten

The timing for the arrival of Kate's parcel was perfect. It arrived on my birthday and was full of swap blocks:


These two blocks are great and are part of our private African Block swap.

This star block is awesome. I'll have to count up how many African blocks I have so far and think about what my plan for them will be... (something for DH I'm thinking)

Kate also give's loads of lovelies away on Mondays and I won these while I was away:

I've never made any string blocks before so I was pleased to get them. Thanks Kate

Then being the generous sort that she is, Kate also included a Jennifer Chiaverini book for my birthday as I'm enjoying the other one she sent me. This came with some soap/bubble stuff which is perfect because as my time is limited, I tend to read in the bath (not smart quilting books of course, but novels etc)
The Ricky Tims book (which will NOT be read in the bath!) is just on loan as I was disappointed not to win Kate's convergence blocks she gave away one week. (See I don't win ALL the time LOL) I have started reading this book and hope to give this a try. (yet another thing on my wish list. Meanwhile Toni had a workshop with Bonnie and now I'm itching like crazy to make someHappy Scrappy Housestoo!)

And here's what I spent some of my birthday money on...

Andrea who finally got my parcel (posted from SA about 11 weeks ago!) gave me a great fabric shopping tip. Thanks Andrea! Now I have some yardage for the Orange Crush mystery. Getting birthday money makes me feel like a kid in a sweet shop. Thank you very much (you know who you are LOL)!

And the winners are...

Well me again, because I got a beautiful painting from my son today.


I put all the comments in a container and DS1 picked a winner:

KATE you won, but Kate already has those fabrics from me so I'll send her something else.

So we needed another winner for the Da Gama fabrics:

Loulee! You're it.

But DS1 was having fun so more names were pulled out:

Anne Ida & Sarah Jayne

Still the child wasn't finished.

Next came:
The Quilting Pirate, Kerry, sbonetsue and Ruth.

After that, I took the container away!!!!

You'll all get something in the mail. I'm not sure what it will be, but I'll have a dig in my stash tonight and mail it off this week. In case I don't have it, could you just send me your address to sewkalico at yahoo dot co dot uk

Here's a pic of me today taken by DS1, definitely feeling older (with Anne's heart wallhanging above our bed.)


Lucky my DMIL gave me some anti-aging creams for my birthday, I'll just go and put some on quickly LOL

And the winner is...

...ME! Ha ha Just kidding, I'll draw a name tomorrow (the 14th), but in the meantime I won a gorgeous mini-quilt on Hedgehog's blog. I am thrilled to bits and it came with all these great goodies too.


I also received a book I won on Kate's blog (this was one of Kate's Manic Monday offerings, and I've already gotten stuck into reading it) Kate also sent me some super-cool shoe fabrics.
Thank you both for your generosity.


Today my lovely husband took me to Embsay Mills near Skipton to buy some fabric for my birthday tomorrow. He asked me what I wanted, I said I know I have a room full of fabric....., but I have no yardage. I'm doing Bonnie's Orange Crush Mystery quilt and have asolutely no yardage for it.

And this is what I bought:
One Fat Quarter of lovely brown stars, I did want to buy more of these lovely brown stars (which were in the sale bin), but they only had this one FQ left (yet again no yardage!). I'm sorry, but birthday or no birthday I am not paying almost $20 for a metre of fabric!


Here are my 4 patches (clue one) for the Quiltville OC Mystery.
While I was sewing these I got a bit carried away and made over 180 and then I started sewing more four-patches for my Mom's quilt. While doing this I started digging in my stash in an attempt to sort some fabric out and scrabble together a bit of yardage (i.e. fabrics that from afar might pass as the same) and instead I unearthed some blocks Kate P had sent me for Project Linus UK which became (with a little help from my stash):


I also found some leftover blocks and squares from another Linus quilt I'd made. So I made another top, almost the same as the one I did last year:


And if you can keep a secret, I'll show you the top I've made for my mother...

She chose the colour scheme and wanted a Double-Four Patch type design. (I say 'type design' as I got a bit confused and ok, it's got lots of four patches...but not many doubles). I plan to quilt this myself as it's only a lap quilt and she says she likes quilts soft and underquilted - I can manage that LOL.

Apples and Bears

My friend Birgit has a wonderful tutorial on her blog for making Apple placemats. Pop on over and take a look. The instructions are in German, but the photos aren't LOL. (Instructions not for commercial use and please don't download the photos without contacting Birgit etcetera, etcetera...)

Now if you have any spare fabric (!) and you're feeling charitable Sonnja makes bears called 'Beertjie Zonn' for African children affected by HIV-Aids. Here are some of the bears she's made with fabric that I sent her.

Sonnja blogs about all the bears she makes and she is just so clever turning your fabric into gifts for the children. Please feel free to click on her blog should you wish to send her some fabric. (Pieces only need to be 12 x 24 inches)

And if you still want to win some fabric for yourself feel free to comment on this or my previous post. I'll draw a winner (or two) on Monday the 14th.