Other WIPs.

My Easter Bunny stitchery is all done, just need to add border fabric.  It was just a bit of simple stitching as a break from other bigger projects, so I have no plans for it other than to make it into a mat for the coffee table.

My friend G. will be over the moon with the snow scenes runner that I completed last week!  Hope to give it to her after the Easter weekend.

   I think I forgot to post pics of this apron when I made it.  It was for a swap on the Down To Earth forum, for a lady in Glasgow, Scotland.  I discovered she is an Elvis fan, and I had this fabric in my stash, so I whipped this up for her.  She LOOOOOVED it - lol!

Progress on UFO quilt.

Last week at the Quilt Shop UFO workshop, Leanne and I played around with my completed blocks until we agreed on a layout.   Then we discussed how I could do the borders.  I took photos with my Ipad but can't post them here (computer illiterate after 15 years, lol) so I took some photos at home once I had sewn all the blocks together and added the first border.  I am restricting myself to only using the fabrics that were in the bag when I found the makings of this quilt.  I had enough of the small print burgundy/green fabric to use for the first border.   Leanne suggested I used all the half square triangles to make the second border, as I had already sewn them into 2 inch squares.  But I doubt if there will be enough to go all around the quilt, so I will just add them to the top and bottom.  The third border will be the plain green, as I have enough of that to do the backing as well.  The binding will be in a small length of burgundy which was in the bag and probably intended for binding anyway.

Current projects.

Like most of us, I have a few things on the go at the moment.  The two quilts are in limbo for a short time.   I am going to get the Handkie quilt professionally quilted as I think it will look better.   I've been given the name of a lady not far from me, but she is overseas at the moment, so I will wait until she returns.

The UFO quilt blocks are all done, and I laid them out on the floor to see how they would look when sewn together.  The blocks might not be laid out exactly as they are here, as the centre flowers are slightly different, and could be better organised than this.

I was going to use the green fabric to put sashing between all the blocks, but I realise now, looking at this, that it doesn't need sashing at all.  So I am planning to add several borders, in the green and maroon fabrics, with another maroon material for the binding.  There is a lot of the green fabric left, so I might even have enough to use for the backing.  This will all be decided next Thursday night at the Quilt Shop, when the next UFO workshop will be held.

Sharon and Alison at the Quilt Shop had some fabric samples spread out on a table last week, and invited us to take any we wanted for 50 cents a piece.  I found some lovely bits, including a couple of panels.  I made up this table runner from the pictures that were printed next to each other.  I separated them, and used green fabric from my stash for the borders.  I will bind it with black, and give it to a friend who loves the snow scenes because they remind her of where she grew up.

I found a cute Easter Bunny stitchery in an old magazine recently, and as I felt like doing a bit of light stitching for a change, I decided to have a go at it and see if I could finish it before Easter (this year...)  I got quite a bit done at the Sit and Sew session this morning, and hope to finish it next week, so I can put it out on display by Easter!  Not that anyone else will see it, but I'll feel good about it - ha!  This pic was taken last week, so the eggs have more colour  on them now.

Handkie quilt top finished.

It was a great help to be able to put my handkie blocks on the design wall at the Quilt Shop last Friday.  Sharon (one of the owners) moved them around until she thought they looked about right, and I took some photos before I took them off the wall.

There were two extra blocks, and when I got home, I had another look at the photo, and decided to replace one block in the layout with one of the extra blocks.   Other than that I didn't change anything, and got to work finishing the sashing and the border. I'm not going to quilt this one myself, as I think it needs professional quilting on the proper machines, to make the most of it.  I would just quilt around the edge of each block, or diagonally through them, and I don't think it would look as nice.
Here is Ken holding the top up for me in the kitchen at 1 am this morning!

Elvis quilt with new owner!

Last night I presented my Elvis quilt to the lady I'd made it for - Simone.  She was delighted!

Slow progress on the Handkie quilt.

I chose a toned blue fabric for the sashing and have started cutting the strips.  When I laid the blocks out on the floor again with some sashing strips between, I was quite happy with the look.  But I am still undecided about how many handkie squares to use - will I use them all and make a bigger quilt?  Ken says the darker handkies drown out the lighter floral ones, and I tend to agree, although once I have sashing between all of them, it might look better.  I have enough handkies to make a brighter coloured small quilt and a light one.  I'm going to take the lot to the Quilt shop on Friday morning and get them to put the blocks on their quilt wall where we can move them around to see what looks best.  I don't have the space to hang a flannel sheet anywhere at home, otherwise I would do it myself.

Slow progress with the UFO quilt.

I am so glad that I have made a start on this project.  I have learned quite a lot in the short time I've been working on it.

Part of the block consists of Flying Geese.  I have been shown how to make these before, but not had the chance to use them in the things I've made in the past.    I ''chain pieced" the blocks with some success and one or two messes.

I have heard about quilters who save all those little triangles that have to be cut away from the Flying Geese, and thought to myself, what on earth for?  I'll just chuck them out.  Fortunately before I had thrown too many in the bin, it dawned on me how easy it was to stitch the little triangles together, as when they are cut off the main piece, the two bits of fabric stay together and all you have to do is run them through the machine.

And come up with these!   I have a few ideas on how I might use them - possibly in the border of this quilt, or maybe as a completely separate item down the track later on.

So here are my Flying Geese pieces (still to be trimmed).

And here is my first block - the first one I've made, I mean.  I was relieved to find it matched the original blocks that were in the parcel....phew!