Something scary

Something scary was in my postbox yesterday.... oooohhh....


I know they're frogs, but I think they're quite spooky!
Andrea sent me these fabrics.

DS1 loves them. Thanks Andrea.
I had to use them straight away!!


The Happy Scrappy House blocks are from Toni. Hope you don't mind Toni, but I just had to use those googly eyes in one of the windows and one of the doors so I adapted your original blocks a bit. The borders for the houses are the sum total of Halloween-type fabrics that I have. As it's not a 'celebration' that I am familiar with, I don't have a stash of Halloween fabrics (and you guessed it, I'm not buying any! LOL)

Friday I went to the Lunesdale Quiltshow with a friend. It was held at Jean's house. When we arrived it looked so nice from the outside so I whipped my camera out to take a picture only to discover that I'd left the battery on to charge!! So no pictures except this one of some of my raffle winnings and a few small oddments of fabric that I bought (there must be less than a yard there so I've forgiven myself).

I also bought some batting/wadding offcuts for a future BQL Bag as I need batting. I'd love to buy a whole roll of the batting Birgit stocks, but where would I hide it? :-)

I met a fellow BQL-er at the show called Linda, she is a hoot and I hope our paths cross again sometime!

19 months later...

..and I'm ready to add the binding to DS2's BABY quilt.

Ok, so he's 19 months old, life got in the way LOL
Actually now he'll probably get more use out of it as one doesn't have to worry about baby's regulating their body temperature etc.

Here's the back...

I didn't have enough teal fabric for the binding so I've decided to go scrappy yet again as I am not buying any more fabric!

All I have to do now (after I've put the binding on!) is to decide what to handquilt next:
The +/-20 year old 'monster' I started when I was at school with my Mother's help..



or My BQL Ostrich from 2006? Basted by Chris and ready to go...



The monster is King-size and I've already started a bit of the quilting and the Ostrich is much smaller and only 2 years in the making. Both are UFO's in need of finishing. What to do, oh what to do...

ps we have a new gate..

perfect for dispaying quilts...

Some progress, (not much)

An update on what's been happening around here...
We've had a load of cement delivered to finish off the driveway.



I finished the borders on the Project Linus UK top Kate sent me...

It was really windy so I was struggling to use my trusty gate quilt display!

(you can see the new driveway in the picture.)

And I finally got my shop open again....


There's not much in the shop yet. I'll add a few more things as and when I find the time and when I have less distractions...

And when DS1 is better. He's poorly again, poor chap. He has Slapped Cheek, a virus. Perfectly harmless, just a bit exhausting for the poor guy.

As you can see by his face he enjoyed the chocolate pudding I bought him to cheer him up (or so I thought except I found some of it down the sofa so maybe he didn't!)

It's still a mystery to me

I have completed step 4 of the Orange Crush Mystery quilt.

There are 30 of these star blocks.

And I've chosen my fabrics for the May BQL Bag Challenge.

My friend Birgit gave me this floral fabric some time ago and I just love it, but I didn't know what to do with it. Until now! I've decided to line the bag with the brown African print (as I bought a brown zip for 20p at a local charity shop). I know it's not a perfect match, but it's inside and will not be seen much I hope :-)

I think I need to rest now... I have been sewing like a maniac. But I'll leave you with a few more pictures of life around here.
DS1 on a bouncy castle at a local event yesterday...
The weather was glorious (a few rain drops from a passing thunderstorm, but otherwise gorgeous!)

DH and kids on the ride-on-mower...

Mid-morning traffic jam...

I'm crushed!

I was reading blogs the other day and was impressed by Vicki W's generosity. She gave away 77 yards of fabric! I shot off a comment (on impulse) claiming that I doubted I even had 77 yards of fabric! Well I am clearly in denial!!! I do have 77 yards, possibly much more. When I finally get my official sewing space I shall have to count it all. There's some under the bed, in the lounge under a chair, behind the bedroom door...
This lost grip on reality has prompted me to tidy up my 'stuff' a bit.

I've put quilt tops together with potential backings. Created a box for blocks (orphans and otherwise) as well as half started projects and I've set about trying to organise my scraps in the most useful way. I've also put a pile of leaders and enders next to my machine. I still have loads to sort out: half started bags, cushions etc...
(over the sewing machine is a top that needed borders for Project Linus UK. Kate sent me the top and I've used some of my favourite star fabric to finish it off. I hope to deliver this and 3 other quilt tops to our regional Linus rep Vicky shortly)

On the sewing front, I was relieved that I managed to finish step 3 of the Orange Crush mystery this week as step 4 has just been revealed!

I have cut my strips (the old-fashioned way) for step 4 so I'll be ready to get going on those soon.

Yorkshire has been so beautiful this past week with lots of glorious sunshine!

So DH has been 'doing' the garden....

Pity he's not 'doing' the house, but maybe just as well as my current temporary sewing space will be the first to go :-(

Scarecrows and stitches

This weekend included a Monday bank holiday so we headed off to the Annual Scarecrow Festival at Wray. There are scarecrows all over the village...


And there are scarecrows that walk among the crowds... (DS2 did not like this tall lady at all!)



It's a great day out with most of the villagers exhibiting scarecrows outside their front doors. (DSIL's dog inspects a scarecrow on our walk around town)

Some of the villagers have a silly sense of humour...

The day before it rained so the field where the Fair was held was rather muddy. We took the kids on a few of the rides. While DS2 went on the Mery-go-round, DSI went on the swings. When DS2 was finished he just got off the merry-go-round and headed straight for the swings. I got a bit muddy at this point as I had to rugby tackle DS2 to the ground to avoid him being knocked out by a swing! Rather embarrassing really LOL

I've been handquilting the borders on DS2's 'baby' quilt.

I'm just making up the design as I go along :-) Just one and half more sides to go... I had better start thinking about the binding!

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