But what about the sewing??

have many of you been asking me.... I have told you about sailing, holidays, outings and now workspace... but what about the sewing?

Well...... it has been a question of life taking over for a while... flu in the house, migraines for me, with a dollop of school related taxi service thrown in! So not a lot of major sewing going on...

I have managed to re-arrange my workspace. Coincidentally just finished when the studios challenge came up for saturday! Been sewing a little thank you gift for someone but won't blog about it (of course) not to spoil the surprise..

What I should have done is doing the Old Red Barn Co sew along ... I finished Dana's quilt totally and am so chuffed with it!! Then Amy (Park City Girl) led us through a zigzag (which I so totally haven't done yet) and now John (Quilt Dad) is our sensei on a wonky journey! I must say I am shamefully behind on both quilts 2 and 3 and wonder if there is hope for me yet... (would think not with Christmas coming up!)

Funnily enough there was some wonky involved lately and thanks to Quilt Dad's wonderful tutorial I actually managed to do some wonky blocks!! I have recently joined the Eurovision Quilting Bee. 18 of us girls, all within Europe (to make posting quicker). Every month we all make a block (or maybe two) for one of us with the fabric we get sent. It is great fun! Both getting to know everyone in the group (Hi y'all!) and have a new technique and set of colours and fabrics to work with each month. I can't wait to see all the quilts we are going to make together!

So I was doing this month's block. A wonky logcabin. I tried to follow John's tutorial and cut a little off on one side (a subtle wonker, he calls it... am sure I could not be persuaded to be a severe wonker!). Working along I realized I subconsciously had cut a little off the other side too to even it up! I tried hard not to do that... and eventually managed to get some wonkiness going....
Last month we did a lovely Katy Jump Rope series of blocks in Dutch Man's Puzzle. I just realized I have not shown you those ones either! Here they are;


They are going to be lovely quilts when all put together! So you see, I have been doing some sewing, if not achieving whole quilts in one go....

I have also been putting together some babyballs for the charity 'Babies in Prison'. When a mother is expecting and either gets her baby in prison or has a very young baby, the baby stays with her in the prison until (I believe) the baby is 18 months old. Then, regardless whether the mum still has to stay to serve out her sentence or not, baby gets 'out' and is cared for in the real world. Now it has been noticed that these babies are very far behind their contemporaries in the outside world in terms of their development. Just think, they won't have seen things like dogs, cats, cows, cars, buses, roads, etc etc. and most of all, the prison environment being very bland colourwise (greys mostly) no colours! They come out in the world and suddenly this overload!

So for quite a few years, our local Guild has been making babyquilts in bright colours with pictures of things on like farm animals, cars etc etc. The babies can then take these with them when they leave, a little bit of comfort taking their familiar 'blankie' with them, when having to miss mum. The quilts have been received with much happiness and the scheme has now been expanded with toys made of fabric. I have been making these baby gripper balls. Some of them are going straight to the Guild to be passed on to the charity. Others are going to be sold to buy more fabric to make some more! These are a few that are either finished or nearly finished at the moment.


Last but not least, I am working on a lapquilt for my mum's birthday in November. She doesn't read this blog, so I am safe in revealing the quilt so far.. This is also the main reason I have not been able to do the Old Red Barn Co quilts yet... November is rapidly coming up!

The quilt is a medallion quilt. I have had a real trying time doing the applique in the middle and made a real hash up of it. Mainly because I just gave it a try without knowing how to do it! But you learn from your mistakes... Since then I have seen the wonderful tutorial on Cabbage quilts and am hopeful that the rest of the applique will go a little better... Thanks Cathy for putting that on!!

The geese have come off ok.. (phew) and the borders have been added (double phew... who would have thought it was so hard for those blue lines to look continuous and line up??). Now there is going to come a small celtic applique on the four corners and bigger flowers on the outside border. Then a lot of quilting..... Hawaian in the centre (going to be first time also) and a lot of in the ditch first and filling in borders for afters.... It is supposed to be handquilted I think but wonder whether I will have the time.... We will see! I will keep you up to date... promise... (I realize I have been a bit lacking in showing some actual sewing... hope this post has made up for it!!)

So there you go... all up to date ... For the coming weeks I am hoping to press on with the applique and then quilting of this quilt. Keep fingers crossed for me everyone... it is not as easy as it looks!!