Tats and flutters

Another baby quilt this time for one of K's friends (I can't help it - my friends friends keep reproducing!)I have had the quilt top of this one done for a while and finally got to finish it once we knew the bubba's name. It was hard finding the right fabric for this one. The Nursery was going to be done in purple and brown with a theme of butterflies. I actually had a hard time finding some - then I found the Timeless Treasures Rock On fabric - butterflies and tattoos --- ohhh --- K had mentioned that the mother was quite partial to tattoos -- perfect. Though not purple or brown or really goes with either of those colours, so I decided that it would be the back. For the front I found some gorgeous butterfly fabric called Les Jardin des Papillon from Clothworks. I also made a cushion and soft block to match for the baby shower.
Front
Bubba Tags
Back
Block and Cushion

Lakehouse Quilt

I have never used much white in a quilt before - I tend to go for greys or bright and bold solid colours. When a friend asked me to make a girly quilt in French Provincial style with pink and aqua I was actually a bit stumped! Nothing in my stash seemed to be right! So a visit to Hobbysew and I saw and fell in love with these Lakehouse fabrics. I actually spent so long mixing and matching the fat quarters that the sales assistant came to help me. I thought the white background helped these fabrics stand out a bit more! The back is a cheater fabric from good old Spotlight - it was a bit thinner than medium weight cotton but the pattern just went beautifully with the rest of the quilt. I also appliqued a butterfly on the back as it was a gift for a baby shower and the name was unknown! My friend loved it - and her friend loved it as well!
Quilt Front Bubba Tags Quilt back Butterfly closeup

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