Happy Twisters

Before my machine broke, I finished a quilt last week.  It's called Happy Twisters and I used the Lil' Twister tool to make the centre.  This has been a work in progress for quite some time, maybe October.  Not because it takes a long time to make it, but because of life.

I used a charm pack from Moda called "Happy" (hence Happy Twisters).  I thought it would be fun for a baby quilt.  I sewed the centre together and then stalled.  I wasn't loving it and it was a weird size.  Too big for a doll quilt and too small for a baby quilt.  I also didn't really know how I should quilt it.  I began to work on other things.

I was poking around blogland and saw a quilt that looked like it had the same centre. I liked this one however, and it had a triple border around it.  I decided that was what my little quilt needed.  It would add what I felt was missing and make it big enough for a baby quilt.

I wanted to outline each pinwheel for the quilting, but that would be too much work. I decided to outline just part of each one and I like the zigzag lightning bolt thing it has going on now.  I stitched in the ditch on both sides of the skinny border and did a large meander in the outermost border.  I think it has the perfect amount of quilting.

Katja just got in some new fabrics from the same designers called Twirl.  There was a wonderful wavy stripe that was just calling out to be the binding for this quilt. I sewed it on by machine and had a finish!  Now it is in the Shoppe on display and I wrote up a little info sheet.  If you like the pattern, you can just make a $2 donation to HOPE International, and get the instructions.

I hope you have a lovely day.

xo Nicole

Confound It!

Imagine a lovely Saturday afternoon with loads of time to work on a quilt that you want to finish before next weekend.  You have some tunes to jive to, no hubby at home to worry about, and piles of laundry and vacuuming to ignore.  You set up your machine and grab your quilt that has been prepared since the end of December.  Finally. Let's quilt it!

You even decide to try out a new quilting design.  It isn't perfect, but it sure looks cool.  Somehow you manage to wrangle your giant quilt through the itty bitty space in your machine to achieve this awesomeness. You use up almost 4 bobbins of thread and are quite pleased with yourself with how this is turning out.

Suddenly, your machine makes a terrible noise and jerks to a halt.  The screen reads: STOP FOR SAFETY PURPOSES.  Oh no!  It is jammed up. Not the thread. The mechanics inside! You manage to get your quilt out from the machine and see if you can figure out what is wrong.  You turn the hand wheel and nothing happens.  Confound it!

It. Is. Broken.  That means that your quilt will not be finished for next weekend, nor will the birthday gift or the bee block (from November).  Nor anything else.

I sure hope the shop can fix her up.

I guess that means I have to clean the house now.

xo Nicole

On Hex-A-Thons and Winning

I joined in with the crowd at Katja's for the Hex-a-thon.  We are English Paper Piecing 3" hexagons; one each week in 2012.  I decided to use an older layer cake called Patisserie by Fig Tree and Co.  It has some wonderful soft colours and prints.

This is week 1.  Fairly straight forward, but some of my points were off.  Hopefully I will improve in this area as the year goes by.

Week 2. I liked doing this one.  The fussy cutting turned out pretty well.

Week 3. This one gave me a lot of grief.  It doesn't even lay flat.  Hopefully once the papers are removed it won't be too noticeable.

I also won a prize over at cynthia f.  Cynthia designed this piece of fabric herself and it was printed at Spoonflower. (You can even buy one for yourself if you want.) It is a super cute calendar for 2012.  I better hurry up and make something with it before too much more of the year passes by.  I was thinking about sewing on some bright borders and making it into a wall hanging for my sewing room - a mini quilt of sorts.  (It is fat quarter size, so it will be on the larger side.)  I really love it and I am so thankful for Cynthia's generosity.  I will delight in this all year - and even after that!

xo Nicole