ice hockey and quilting - who would have thought?

One of my friends asked me to make a quilt for his gorgeous new niece. As usual I asked "What are the parents into". Response - Ice Hockey. OK challenge set. I started looking for ice hockey fabric - and there is a fair bit out there but most of it looks like it is directly out of a horror movie (Friday the 13th). In the end I found this cool Robert Kaufman Ice Hockey field (?) panel. I can work with that! So the supported team is the Canucks so I found their team colours and put some strips down the side. Now for the back - well I wanted to make it a little more girly so I also found out the mum is a bit of a foodie fan. I found some cute strawberry fabric and from my stash some lovely Lizzy House fabric and just did a really simple back.

Funny Story

This is me at the start of the year ... Yeh my friend J was having another baby!!! A new little cousin for Miss E. Excellent great, must start looking for fabric, OMG Laurie Wisburn Modern Whimsy, there is bunnies, geese and sheep: J loves bunnies, all things whimsy and especially bunnies. Order fabric from Pink Chalk - how awesome they have a co-ordinating solids pack as well...waiting patiently...yeh it has arrived!!! Sew sew sew - quilt top done in a night. Now just need to wait until bubba is born as i like to applique the name on the back of the quilt. Patiently waiting until March - how super organised am I! Yeh - beautiful baby boy born yipeeeee!!! Wait what was his name again ... Fox. Cool name (think X-Files Fox Mulder) but wait I can't give a quilt with bunnies, geese and sheep on it to a kid called Fox... umm don't foxes eat bunnies???? Ohh what is that gorgeous fabric... Walk in the Woods by Aneela Hoey - awww what cute foxes (and here is the precise moment that I break my 6 month fabric ban) Ordered - well I better add some extras to make the postage worth it! waiting patiently... yeh fabric arrived, a few nights sewing with my new awesome Westalee Ruler and voila.. a quilt for Baby Fox! Now what to do with the other one... well I am sure J will love it (even though it has some bubba tags on it) so another volia ... two finished quilts.

Quilt for Fox

Modern Whimsy Quilt

Oh and while I am here - I also sewed by this cute little cushion while I was patiently waiting for fabric. Inspired by A Beautiful Mess

Gifts

Golden Horseys, a photo by craftykat on Flickr.

Been busy rolling out a few more baby quilts lately! Firstly this lovely Golden Horseys quilt for one of the bubbas in my mothers group. I got her in the secret gift draw for their first birthday. Little Bridget loves horses so somehow I had to incorporate them into the quilt. I did not have enough time to order fabric from OS so I raided our local spotlight. How hard is it to find cute horse fabric? I was lucky I found a fairytale panel on the bargain table - and on of the bits of the panel was magical horses which I used on the back. Then I was going through my stash at home and found I had some Heather Ross Unicorn Far Far Away fabric = score! I used most of it on the back of the quilt. The fabric in the front was random bits from my stash.


A few other quilts I did for friends - Green Circus with some Laurie Wisbun Urban circus fabric, and Hot Pink Flowers with more random bits.

Quilt for Oof

Quilt for Oof, a photo by craftykat on Flickr.

Wowsers it seemed like I started this a while ago. A selection of lovely African fabrics with a rainbow of Kona colours for my friend Ruth's 30th. (and yes, in true lateness she will be 32 in December). It was part of the Oh Fransson Paintbox Quilt-a-long http://www.ohfransson.com/oh_fransson/paintbox-quilt-along.html
Oof (as people of the toothless variety call her) loved it! She has spent a bit of time in Africa (Tanzania, Uganda) doing good stuff and she could identify most of the fabrics used. And her test to see if it was authentic? Lick the fabric - if it is salty it's real (and it was). She then preceded to lick some of my other fabrics...tsk tsk

Back is some scraps + Timeless Treasures Wild Thing fabric. Bit scary from a distance but I love all the animals in it - very "Where the Wild Things are".

Bec's 3 year quilt

Bec's 3 year quilt, a photo by craftykat on Flickr.

How long does it take to create a quilt? Well in this case - 3 years of planning and collecting and then just over 1 week of hard work.
My poor friend Becky - a quilter herself, I promised to make her a quilt for her 30th birthday. As soon as I decided I was doing one I started to collect fabric of things she likes - like Heather Ross' horses & gnomes, anything to do with airplanes (she is an aeronautical engineer), cooking, gardening, music and sewing (wow just realised she has many interests). But I never really had a plan for what I was going to do with the fabrics so I just collected more and more. Fast forward to about a month ago when I was planning a little visit to her in Perth (yep long way from Sydney) and suddenly the inspiration to get it done hit me. So I spent some time looking at patterns and thinking how I could organise this mismatch of fabric. I finally settled on one of Elizabeth Hartman's The Practical Guide to Patchwork patterns called "Rain or Shine". I also teamed it with some Kona Solids. So I pretty much started cutting on the Sunday, flew out to Perth the next Saturday with just the hand binding and about half the little rosettes to do (which I finished over there). So happy I finished it and she loved it!

The back


Closeups




At the little bakery in Margaret River where I sat all morning to finish the binding

Urban Circus Quilt

Urban Circus Quilt, a photo by craftykat on Flickr.

I have been sitting on my stash of Urban Circus for a while pondering what to do with it. I combined it with some Kona Solids scraps and kinda winged the desgin - and volia! Very happy (and so was my friend). I used Sandi Henderson's Butterflies for the Back and some stripy fabric from spotlight for the binding.

New Library Bag

New Library Bag, a photo by craftykat on Flickr.

As a librarian - my daughter needs a library bag! She has just gotten her first library card (who knew that you could get a card at 8 months old?) so Little Miss E finally has another thing made by her mum. Made using the new Avairy2 fabric from Joel Dewberry.