Wednesday 2 September 2015

Spring has arrived with some suddenly warmer sunny weather and a rush of new members to patchwork. The whirring of machines at one end of the hall made us look very industrious indeed.

The Bomb this month resulted in two blocks being made, a Twin Star with the units that had the blue triangle on the left, and a Double Pinwheel with the units that had the blue triangle on the right. Template-free, simple stitching and perfect points. What more could you ask for in a quick pattern? No wonder we had such a good return of finished blocks.

Twin Star blocks drawn by Michelle aka Jan

Double Pinwheel blocks drawn by Marlena.

There was quite a long Show and Tell today. Always great to see people lined up ready to show their finished masterpieces.

Elizabeth has appliqued these cute critters with a tiny raw edge  zigzag stitch. Joan machine quilted it for her. It was made for the next door neighbour's granddaughter. Isn't that hedgehog adorable?

Beth has been making more little baby quilts from panels. They are quick to make and so bright as well as being able to be thrown into the washing machine and used well. 

Another simple and gorgeous baby quilt. Beth made this one for Aurora - obviously.

Marilyn's tuffet. Marilyn booked into a workshop at the new Mackay Sewing Centre and was the only participant. Just look what individualised tutoring can produce! It looks great Marilyn. Although husband apparently insists it needs another leg for more stability.

Robyn Mc has made this quilt for a friend's grandson. You have to love 'I Spy' quilts with all their fun fabrics. This one looks a bit like a jigsaw puzzle.

This is going to be the raffle quilt at the Carlyle Gardens Spring Fair. Kay has coordinated the making of it with the ladies at their craft group.  Many ladies worked on the centre flower pentagons with either applique or embroidery or both. Floral fabrics were gathered and Kay and another sewer cut them into strips and sewed the crazy patch. It is certainly a beautiful garden quilt for spring.

Brenda has completed another cushion in blackwork

Some closer detail of Brenda's perfectly accurate stitching

Del was surprised to receive an extra bundle of squares when she opened her order from Iddybiddy Cottage so she incorporated them, along with some squares from her stash, into one  of the soft minkee backed crocheted together quilts. (We must make up a name for these!) This is the finished pattern, but Del will probably add some fancy crochet around the border just because she can.

Elaine bought the Moroccan looking panel from the Red Bus at the Sarina Quilt Show and has designed her own quilt around it. The photo doesn't do justice to the beautiful warm and glowing colours in this quilt. Now Elaine just has to find a home for it.

You may not have seen these quilts at the meeting, but just to prove that Barbro has been busy quilting.

The Good in Life. A quilt featuring shoes, bags, hat and chocolate. Barbro hand appliqued the blocks and used both hand and machine quilting to finish. 

The Gingham Girls. This quilt was a BOM that has been a long lasting job out of the cupboard. There is embroidery and applique in the blocks and Barbro machine pieced them and, of course, hand quilted it.

The badge draw today was won by Lesley who now has a lovely piece of white on white fabric and some very pretty dyed cotton embroidery thread called 'forgetmenot'. Just the thing for hand stitching in a caravan!

Wednesday 26 August 2015

Beautiful warm weather today for our last week of winter. Liz picked up a visitor who came along to join in the fun in the sun. (Will teach unsuspecting ladies in caravan parks to sit out the front of their van sewing!) Bomb Day today and a great little technique for making perfectly cute stars and pinwheels without sewing one edge on the bias. We forgot to take a photo, but wait for all the clever little blocks to appear for the draw next week. 

As predicted some weeks ago, this quilt Cathy was making for her brother-in-law
has turned out fantastically. Cathy would attach the waves with fusible interfacing
 if she was doing it again, as she thinks they are not flat enough. But we're sure the fisherman
will love his quilt. Wrinkly waves or not, it is adorable.

Jan was ordered to demolish the UFO pile in her sewing room cupboard.
 The flowers are a panel given to her by daughter and are mostly hand quilted.
 (This is probably where the WIP became a UFO.) The border was a demonstration in 
how to do Stack and Slash. The binding is almost on and then a little machine quilting 
to finish the centre  panel and it will be ready to hang on the dining room wall.

Jeanette, our visitor from Melbourne, with some very pretty hand made 
Christmas decorations. There was a special plastic template to use, but apparently 
it is just a square with the corners cut off and anyone could make them 
template or not. We hope Jeanette enjoyed the morning
 and meeting a whole lot of new quilters.

The Badge Draw today was won by a very excited Elizabeth.

Wednesday 19 August 2015

Today was the first day for new President Marilyn,  best wishes for a successful term.  Numbers were low but we still had a lovely day amongst lovely friends.

Heather has made this beautiful quilt for grandson Nathan - 'Urban Tracks', material bought from the Red Bus.

Anne W. made this basket and serviette holder for a wedding present.

Anne W, Anne F and Jan E have completed their Mystic Mountain Table Runners

Margaret had Foundation Pieced this Table Runner and much preferred doing this to the paper pieced Leaf  Place Mat.

Cathy Mc called this 'Cathys's Curves, pieced the background then cut the curves.  Ironed it onto the lightweight interfacing and then joined with a Bias Strip.

Wednesday 12 August 2015

Anne W made this very handy bag at Janome with Joan Flack.  she purchased the bird fabric from America

Elaine likened making this quilt to childbirth 'the pain is soon forgotten'.  Moon Glo is a Jinny Beyer B.O.M, Foundation Pieced and Quilted by Di.

Brenda has completed her 'Mystic Mountains'  Table Runner

Brenda also whipped up these Sewing Caddy/Pin Cushion/Scrap Bag for friends of Joans.

Brenda's 'Striped Roses'.  A Disappearing Nine Patch, the fabric purchased from the Red Bus and quilted by Di.

Wednesday 5 August 2015

Quite a good crowd of quilters appeared today with Jo and Robyn McG back after some extended time and even Carol M from many years ago popping in with "cleaning out the cupboard" presents from Barbara now in Brisbane. And Karen was here between Solomon Is and Flinders Ranges excursions. We all certainly get around! There was even a message from ex-president Sue all the way from England who says hello to everyone and is off to the Famous Birmingham Quilt Show.

There were a few workshop results to show with Iris and Anne W sewing frantically all morning under Joan's watchful eye.

Well done to Robyn McK, Marlena and Phillipa who had completely finished examples.
 Doesn't the choice of materials make a diverse range?  No doubt there will be more completed by next week.

Show and Tell

Marlena  has made the quilt 'Petal Power' for her daughter-in-law.
  It was quilted first by Joan  and then Marlena needle turned all the petals on afterwards. Apparently the traditional pattern has many many more petals but it was decided that this was enough!  A pillow sham in the same pattern has already been completed and left over fabric is still being incorporated into other coordinating cushions. 

Beth made 'Spider Man' for a girlfriend's 65 year old young at heart husband after being provided with the front panel and coordinating fabric. There was so much fabric Beth had to make a fancy pieced backing. 

Robyn McG made this delightful and large quilt from a kit of Kaffe Fassett fabrics.
 The blue border and binding just draws out all the fabulous blues in the quilt.
 It was machine quilted by Judy Easton.

Linda W has two quilts in the camping swags. This one is a McKenna Ryan BOM pattern called 'Ocean' .  It is all  raw -edge appliqué.  I'm sure many of us have looked at these patterns and thought , "Way too hard!"  

A detail of some of the intricate free machining with invisible thread.

The second "swag quilt" Linda completed in the same year is this McKenna Ryan "Barnyard" pattern. It is just  stunning. We are glad we got to see them so thanks Linda for bringing in some work from a couple of years ago.

Deane  has been making 'Fiddle Quilts' for dementia patients. They are made with fabrics of  different textures and incorporate buttons, zips, elastic bands, braid and other things that can be fiddled with and are backed with a soft flannelette. The next step is to use the same principles to make some aprons.

Badge Draw today was won by Anne F who was very excited as this was only her second win ever. She picked out a little parcel with some pins in a fancy tin, a quilt label and some papers to make an English piecing pincushion. We'll have to wait and see if the English piecing is ever attempted!

Wednesday 29 July 2015

Our In House Workshop 'Mystic Mountains' with Joan proved to be very popular.  Joan was very busy buzzing between all the participants.  As usual, the different array of fabric colours chosen made for a large variety of stunning combinations.  It was, however, quite easy to make a mistake and distractions did cause  a few hiccups!

Part 2 of the workshop will continue next week for those that don't finish them at home.

Very busy ladies

Margaret going well with her choice of green, red and white
at the workshop

Show and Tell

Joan's huge quilt 'Floral Cornucopia'  made with Kaffe Fassett
fabrics. It is one huge mass of flowers

Brenda's intricate quilt done with curved foundation piecing.
The Fire Island Hosta  design  is by Judy Neimeyer.
 Fabrics are from Patchwork Paradise and it is quilted by 
Lisa Warne at Quick Quilts

Di's '12 Days of Christmas' made in the Shadow Box Design.
 The embroidery was done by Heather C.

 Heather W's  China Doll quilt. Each doll has a different
 oriental fabric dress and different styled  hair.

Reverse of Heather's quilt

Close up of the favourite doll

Here is a mini photo workshop from Di for finishing off binding. 

This tip ensures the binding is joined accurately and sits flat.

(If you can't follow the instructions, Di will shortly do a In-house Demo on this.)

This example uses a 2 1/2"binding. It will work perfectly though for all binding widths.

1. Attach binding, leaving an overlap gap of approx 8"

2.  Cut off a small piece of fabric from one overlap approx 1"

3.  Open out cut piece ( example 2 1/2" x 1" when open)

4.  Line up the cut piece with the  2 1/2" length (width of binding)
 under the top binding along the bottom overlap

5.  Trim top overlap excess back to cut edge of open piece.
Then join ends of  binding on bias as usual.