George's Quilt

This is another catch up post of a 2014 finish.  I made this quilt for James' lovely godmother, Emma, to gift to her first nephew George.

The fabrics are a bundle that has been in my stash for years from my very first trip to Festival of Quilts.  The back is an old Ikea print - I wish they still made these!

And the pattern is the very fast and very satisfying Disappearing Nine Patch.

Linking up with Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts

Rachel's Giant Purple Quilt

This is the biggest quilt I have ever (and for the record will ever) make!  It is a very late 30th birthday present for my very patient sister.

I started it back here in July 2012 with this lovely stack of fabrics. 

And then I stalled.  In my defence I had got pregnant and then I had a baby and then I went back to work and then I ran out of excuses.  

Rachel has a king size bed so  this was going to need to be a big quilt so I decided to try Quilt As You Go.  And my verdict?  Well the positive is that it gave a beautiful finish to each block and made it look heavily quilted without the need to push an enormous quilt through the machine.  But the downside is it is hugely repetitive and just a little bit boring!  Luckily I loved these fabrics so they maintained my interest which is a good thing seeing as how long I spent working on this! 

Luckily she loves it!

This is my link up post for the Blogger's Quilt Festival Spring 2015 with Amy's Creative Side
Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts and
Thank Goodness it's Finished Friday

What I'm working on right now .....

I'm enjoying being back in this space and recording all my missed makes.  And in doing so I have been thinking some more about why I stepped away from it.  A couple of things stood out.  Firstly I don't have as much time to create anymore so I didn't have as many finished things to blog and so I simply blogged less often.  Secondly because of this, the blog just became a record of things I had made without any mention of the process, decision making, and fun involved in making them.  My efforts to simply just have a record of what I made had led to a very depersonalised account and when I read back over it it just didn't seem to reflect who I was.  I've also been sorting through my online photos and realising how many things I do that I don't record.  So with that in mind this post is simply as stated - a look back at what I worked on (but didn't necessarily finish) in January and a look forward to what I'm working on in February.

I have been working on these Quilt As You Go blocks for my sister's 30th forever (don't ask how old she is now!)  Finally I have completed 42 of them and sewn them all together.  I now just need to pin a back on, add some quilting lines and bind it.

There has also been some knitting: 

A lot of coffee drinking:

Some organising of the new sewing loft:

And exploring of the new house:

Next month should see some more work on the quilt and the cowl (which to me sounds like the title of my ideal craft book).  And hopefully starting a birthday present project for James with this lovely fabric:

And hopefully (please I desperately hope) the first house renovation project should also get completed.

A Christmas Quilt (in January)

This is the first of my catch up projects from last year.  Every December since I started quilting I would look at all the lovely Christmas quilts and wish I had the time to make one.  So this year I started in July!  I still didn't finish it until December but this year for the first time I snuggled up watching The Snowman (a lot - James became somewhat obsessed) under my very own Christmas quilt.

I didn't get around to taking any photos until now but I figured as there is a lot of snow in the UK and it is still January I can get away with it!  These are taken in the new garden which is somewhat sloped, step ridden and unsuitable for quilt photo taking - honestly a suitable quilt backdrop really should have featured higher in my house essential list.

Fabric: Moda Countdown to Christmas & Timeless Treasures in Cream Sketch, Binding - Kona Charcoal, Backing is Ikea Britten Numbers
Pattern: Made in Cherry by Sarah Fielke
Quilting: I followed Katie's fab guide here

I think I may be using this for another few months yet.

Linking up with Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts 

and 

which this week is at Devoted Quilter

2014 - where did you go?

I've been looking back through my photos and noticed just how long it is since I blogged. Going back to work part time in May meant that life just got a lot busier.  But ironically I actually sewed more in the second half of the year once I was back at work.  I decided that I wanted to spend more time making stuff than thinking about things I would like to make.  So something had to give and a combination of less time, a broken photo connector and an iPhone in the washing machine meant blogging was it.  At the end of the year I read this post by Kerry and her comments on blogging got me thinking about the reasons I started this blog and to begin with it was simply to record the things I made.  So I've got some projects I finished in the past 6 months that I want to catch up on blogging so I have a record of them all.  

But in the meantime and in order to not let the second half of 2014 completely slip by here is short summary of 2014 courtesy of Instagram.

I've also really missed the blogging process, the reading and commenting on other's blogs, the lovely people I met,  the feeling part of an online community so I'm going to blog a little more often and find my place here again.