A little bit of news . . . .

So I'm back to blogging with a little bit of news!

First the bad news - I need to give up my lovely sewing room next year.



But the good news is I couldn't think of a better reason why.



 * yes baby due in March (which hopefully explains my absence  from here over the last couple of months!)

A very summery quilt

Finally a finished quilt!  

This year I have been trying to use up some of the fabrics in my stash.  This little set of Fat 1/8s of Lizzie by Anna Griffin has been in my stash for nearly 2 years!

I love the back as much as the front - a real double-sided quilt.

Look at those little house and birds!

The binding uses the last of this stripey fabric that I used before here and here.

And the mother-in-law's garden provides the perfect photo shoot location!

In the Frame Purse

Finally some sewing!  

My purse for the In the Frame swap on Flickr is finished.

It's all packed up ready to go with some fabric scraps hidden inside.  Hope my partner likes it!

A new start

This was intended to be a post about my current works in progress.  But when I started adding them up and taking photos at the weekend it was all a bit overwhelming!!!


So instead I started a new quilt!

To be honest it was about time I got on with this quilt.  It's for my sister's 30th birthday at the end of September so I really need to get a move on.

Fabrics are a selection of Anna Maria Horner Innocent Crush, Joel Dewberry Aviary 2 and some Kona solids which the lovely Mandy at Simply Solids helped me choose.

Linking up with Work in Progress Wednesdays

Because I'm not here . . .

Because I am here There is no sewing other than this to report However there is a little guest post by me here. where I interviewed Lu Summers for my local lovely quilt shop.

Sunday afternoon sewing

This afternoon I sat down with these supplies:

and turned them into these:

So satisfying to have a finished project at the end of an afternoon's sewing and just in time to send off to my Granny for her birthday this week.

Fat Quarterly Community Retreat

It's almost impossible to put this weekend into words (or at least a blog post that won't be so long that everyone nods off).  So I'm going to try and keep it short and show you what I made and tell you what my favourite thing from the weekend was.  All my photos from the weekend  (including my "fan pics"!) are here on Flickr if you want to see more.

I took some brilliant classes and came home with lots and lots of ideas for what I want to sew next.

Frame Purses with Katy aka I'm a Ginger Monkey 

Freezer Paper Piecing with Kerry aka Very Kerry Berry

Portholes with Lu aka the Summersville (Somerfield) Girl

Wonky Log Cabins with John aka Quilt Dad

I had no idea what to expect from the weekend. But in a word it was amazing.  The best thing about the weekend for me was undoubtedly meeting so many lovely bloggers, Flickr peeps and sewing folk in real life.  Everyone was so lovely so I'm not going to mention anyone in particular except my lovely roommate Justine.  Justine was one of my first bee, blogging and tweeting friends and it was so much fun to share a room with her (& the gorgeous Hunter).  My husband still didn't quite believe that I was going to London to spend a weekend with people I have never met and to share a room with "a girl I met off the internet".  So thank you Justine for such a fun weekend, for my lovely sewing pouch and thank you also from my husband for not being some crazy rotary cutter wielding maniac!

Thank you so much to all the Fat Quarterly crew for such a fantastic weekend and thank you to all the people I met who were so funny, welcoming and inclusive.  When I started blogging 2 years ago it was just little old me posting and reading my own posts.  Until I joined a Bee I had no idea that this huge online UK (& further afield of course) community existed.  I could never have predicted when I first started blogging that such a weekend would happen and that I would go, love every minute and cry my eyes out when it was over as I walked from the hotel to the tube.  When it was announced I wondered how the "community" bit of the Fat Quarterly Community Retreat would work.  After this weekend I know how - it's a place where everyone, no matter where you are from, what age you are, what your favourite fabric is, can be part of.  It's a community that I am happy and proud to belong to.