Stars galore!

 One of our works in progress asked for any sort of stars with the centre of our focus fabric and the background of calico. What an imaginative bunch of quilters we have...

The arrangement at the moment is just random pinned on our design wall but this is looking like fun! And there are even a few tiny ones to fill in gaps where needed.

Carol's challenge

Carol came to collect her next fabric the other day and took home the Winding Ways blocks as I had received the last ones and made one more to complete another row. Carol's challenge is that the blocks are a mixture of 9", 9 1/4" and 9 1/2". So we've decided to trim to 9 1/4" and stretch the 9" ones. Some blocks will lose their corners. Que sera sera!

Today, because I had received the last of the Ohio Star blocks back I started to randomly pin them up on the design wall. I think it is going to be quite a good overall look and will end up about 48 x 49". Ask me about the maths sometime.

All the spaces between various blocks can be filled with the flying geese and other scraps we have available that people have made and maybe even some strips of the focus fabric. We'll see what happens when anyone comes to help. It is interesting to see how the contrasts work and how some don't.

Our latest finished quilt

Karen's Windmill quilt has now been finished thanks to all Jane's hemming. Heather has won the quilt - congratulations.

Heather has decided to donate this quilt to charity. Thank you Heather.

2011 Begins

Last weekend was our first quilting weekend for 2011.

Our first task was to tack the Mr Men quilts ready for quilting. This job is so much better when done by a crowd around a table.


We had two new members Wilma and Jenny who were both very keen to see our quilts and try their hand at anything.

Then we had another tacking job. Leonie has made a quilt for her parents (seen here hanging over the bannister). Our next job was to tack that quilt sandwich ready for Leonie to quilt and bind.

At times there was standing room only with those attending being: Leonie, Elaine, Mary, Evelyn, Linda, Robyn, Wilma, Jenny, Ruth and of course me. I made a bit of a blunder on calculating the size of the small squares so all the sewing that Elaine did had to be unpicked. She looks happy here but that did not last when we realised it was wrong.

Robyn brought along one of her magnificent quilts that she had recently finished. Unfortunately I have no photos of her show and tell. Thanks for the inspiration Robyn.

Of course there was the usual beautiful food and lots of time to chat around the dining table.

The weekend was extended to include a trip to the Craft Mailbox on Monday morning for Leonie, Robyn and I and there were lots of fabrics on sale. Needless to say we spent all our allowances. We now have the sashing, borders and binding fabrics for the butterfly quilt if anyone feels like coming to start that process.

In all a fabulous and exhausting weekend again. Thank you to those who came and those others who support us from afar.

October Quilting Weekend

Last weekend saw the completion of our first Scrappy Quilt.

The structure of the weekend worked better this time. On Saturday we all started making our blocks for our next mystery quilt. This is Jane's birds fabric and an Amish Cross block design. It was great to do it together as this allowed everyone to help everyone else and it meant that the issues with the instructions I had created were ironed out before they were posted.

On Sunday we hemmed the binding and attached the label on our first Scrappy Quilt which is another great group activity.

This time Leonie, Elaine, Linda, Mary, Robyn, Betty and our newest member Ruth came for long and short times during the weekend.

Leonie forgot her sweetpeas so has taken a photo so that we can all smell the virtual sweetpeas from her garden.

As usual, much fun was had by all with lots of chatting and food added to the quilting mix. Leigha, who is staying with me at the moment invited two of her friends for lunch and they rearranged our butterfly blocks into a more pleasing layout.

I will be posting out fabric in the next few days to those who have not yet received theirs by hand. I will email instructions to everyone too. I have now bought Electric Quilt 7 and am experimenting with creating our instructions using that software.

There will be a Rainbow Connection Quilters Christmas afternoon tea in December so if you have not received an email about that and would like to join us please let me know.

Happy Christmas and have fun with your patchwork and quilting from us all.

August in the Attic

Our achievement for the August quilting weekend was to construct our Mr Men quilt tops.

This process involved pinning the blocks on the design wall then discussing their arrangement.

Then we auditioned various fabrics and colours for the sashing. We ended up choosing black.

We then created a production line of Robyn, Liz and Betty on Sunday to piece the two tops. There are 6 blocks left over so the thought is two matching cushions again.

Of course all the blocks had to be trimmed to size (Elaine enjoyed the challenge)

and the trimmings made such a spectacular pile that I had to photograph them.

One very important lesson was learned from my mistake. When you sew borders to a quilt you should measure at the centre of the top and mark the borders to the correct size then pin and ease the edges of the top to the size of the borders. This avoids a border that ends up too big for the quilt. Difficult to describe but easy to see the wavy borders in the previous blog entry on the scrappy quilt. We have now unpicked all borders on the scrappy quilt and re-attached them correctly. The top is now tacked to the polartec back ready for quilting. No-one else volunteered so I will complete that by our next quilting weekend. Here is Leonie ironing our newly bordered scrappy quilt.

One task accomplished this weekend was completing some extra butterfly blocks needed then arranging that quilt on the design wall ready for joining up. We don't think we'll add any sashing to this one.

Of course there was also plenty of time for food and chatter during the weekend as people came and went according to the never ending balancing acts of work and families.

Robyn officially completed our Soft Blue Sampler by sewing on the label. It is now ready to sell or raffle - any suggestions would be greatly received.

Robyn also chose our next lucky dip parcel as she was first to arrive. Linda (next to arrive) was witness to this. Jane D's birds and flowers was chosen. Some discussion ensued about which part of the block would be done in the mystery fabric. Once I have completed the instructions I will send them out with fabric for those who have not already received it. These blocks will be due by the end of January.

Again we had an excellent weekend of patching, quilting, chatting and eating. See you in October (16-17).

Linda's Butterfly Quilt

Our next mystery quilt from our lucky dip is Linda's. I will be sending out instructions with the fabric soon but there are few tricks I thought might be better put in the blog.

Here are the pieces you will need to cut. When you start assembling the pieces of the block there is a small triangle E to add to the corners of B (the butterflies). It is really easy to get this crooked so here is a tip.

• Place the butterfly square on your board to line up with the inch grid and the diagonal line. 
• Draw a diagonal line on the butterflies making a two inch triangle.
• Place the small triangle of E right side down to line up with the inch grid then mark in a diagonal line on this triangle following the diagonal line on the board.

Now place the small triangle to line up with the line you have drawn on the butterflies. Check that it is centred by lining up the diagonal line you have drawn on the small triangle with the diagonal line on the board.

There is a link on the right to a video on sewing half-square triangles.

Even though the measurements I have give are generous my finished block ended up exactly the right size without trimming. If you are worried then make your measurements even more generous but make sure you match points and joins in your final block.

The instructions can be accessed from Google Docs.

Another quilt finished

Patricia's quilt is now finished, labelled and photographed ready to donate to Bezzina House. Well done ladies!

Keeping Kitty Fed

At our last weekend it was decided that we really need to keep a kitty to cover our expenses of postage, batting and backing, and our sashing and border fabrics. Marion had donated money before she left and we've now run out. So Leonie has donated a 'kitty' money box (above). Here is what we agreed to:

1. When you join the Rainbow Connection Quilters we ask for a coin or note donation into the kitty.
2. When you attend one of our quilting weekends you can put a gold coin in the kitty.
3. When you join (or we run out) we also ask for a donation of 1 metre of fabric and a block design (wrapped so it can't be identified) for our Mystery Metre Quilts for charity. These are kept in our Lucky Dip basket (below) until needed. We still have 3 lucky dips which should keep us going until 2010.
4. If you can't afford anything that is OK and we certainly don't want any foreign currencies as these cost money to exchange. Overseas and other distance members can just donate their fabric and block design and pay for return postage of their blocks etc.
   

Please leave a comment if you would like to make a contribution to these rules.

Mystery Metre Quilt

This Mystery Metre Quilt is a communal project suitable for any quilting group. It is great to make one together to donate to a charity of your choice.

It doesn’t matter how frequently your group meets, how big your group is or how far apart they live.

The quilt dimensions preferred by many charities are 40 x 70 inches (102 x 178 cm). A quilt made with fifteen 12” blocks, sashing, borders and binding will end up close to these dimensions.

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Each member selects a fabric they would like to use in a quilt. The fabric will later be divided into 15 pieces to form the dominant fabric of each block in the Mystery Quilt. Large prints or widely spaced patterns may be unsuitable so care must be taken in choosing the fabric.
2. Each member of the group brings a parcel (wrapped for secrecy) containing

• about a yard (or a metre) of their selected cotton fabric
• a simple block pattern on grid paper for a 12” x 12” block

3. When the group meets each parcel is added to the Mystery Bag.
4. One member then draws a Mystery Parcel from the Mystery Bag and opens it to reveal the fabric and block pattern to be used in the quilt.
5. This block pattern is then analysed by the group, resulting in cutting instructions and templates being produced for everyone.
6. Each member then takes home one fifteenth of the Mystery Fabric with a set of cutting instructions and templates. This piece of fabric (and its colours) must be the dominant feature in the block. Decisions can be made about whether the fabric should appear in a common position in each block or in any position.
7. Members make their blocks and either bring them to the next meeting, or send them if unable to attend. Members can also bring any excess additional fabrics used in their block. These fabrics can be shared to help create more blocks for the quilt.
8. When the group has created 15 blocks decisions can be made about placement, sashing, borders, binding and backing. This may require a group shopping trip!
9. The members of the group then assist the donor of the Mystery Fabric to construct and finish the quilt.

© Leonie and Betty August 2007