Reviewing 2019

It’s always interesting looking back at what was achieved during the year.  My first finish for the year was not till March, I think we must have been busy tripping away in the caravan for some time early in the year.  I finally completed my long winded Animal ABC quilt, which had been hanging around for ages.  I had fun collecting animal print fabrics for this quilt, and pen friend Janet from Australia really helped me out when she printed out a picture of a Quokka to send me to use for the letter Q.  This one I’m keeping for future babies in the family.

Animal ABC quilt

Next up was making six draw string project bags to put my UFOs in, so much nicer than having things stuffed in plastic.  I really didn’t want to get involved with making vinyl pouches with zips, that seemed much too hard for me, so did a simple design using netting and various fabric choices for the top and bottom.  The bags certainly do their job very well, and I can see at a glance exactly which project is put away inside each bag.

Project Bags

The final finish for March were two little nine patch cot quilts.  I’d had nine patch blocks stitched and hanging about for ages, and finally did something with them.  Not too sure if I used all of them up, there could well be some more hiding away in a crate somewhere.

Two nine patch cot quilts

In May I put together all the HST blocks which dated back to our UK trip in 2008.  These traveled with me, and I noted down flights, train and boat trips, where we had stayed, attractions visited, people we had met, all that sort of thing.  A real fabric diary of our wonderful trip.  The blocks were finally stitched into pinwheels, and assembled together.  I plan to use this as a quilt backing sometime in the future, and will probably have to add fabric to the outsides to get the correct dimensions.

Memory Pinwheels

In June I finally completed my selvedge bag, and stitched two little mug rugs for overseas pen friends.

June finishes

And July saw me stitching up a donation cot quilt from neutral string blocks.  These were originally made for a Quiltville Mystery quilt, which I obviously didn't keep working on.  In fact, I have enough of these blocks left to make another two donation cot quilts in the future!

Donation quilt

August was a great month, with three finishes, although you must remember that I had been working on these projects off and on for a while.  Two large quilts came back from being commercially quilted, Running Free, for my grand-daughter Megan, and a Pinwheel quilt for a friend’s grand-daughter, so I had bindings to apply and stitch down.

And then I completed Jingle Christmas Runner for our coffee table, a combination of stitcheries and piecing in Christmas fabrics. 

Jingle Table Runner

Another Christmas quilt was completed in November, always good to get this sort of project finished before Christmas.  This was my Christmas Mystery Quilt and it started with a whole lot of 5inch squares of festive fabric from a Sew Wot Christmas gift a while ago from Helen.

Mystery Quilt

This was my first year taking part in the Rainbow Scrap Challenge and each month I diligently stitched both Bow Tie blocks and Selvedge Asterisk blocks in the suggested colours.  I worked hard to get both projects completed before the end of the year.  The Bow Tie was a donation quilt, and the Asterisk quilt was made for my car.

RSC projects

And last but not least December saw me busy making cushions for the caravan.  I completed a stitchery Christmas cushion, then made six other cushions from extra matching  upholstery fabric I had purchased.

Cushions for the caravan

I like to support the charity Foster Hope who gives items to children taken into foster care, and this year I have donated four cot quilts, eight small soft toys, and a dozen draw string bags.  These bags are used by the children to keep their toiletries in, or used for pencils and such like.  And after the terrible tragedy of the Christchurch Mosque shooting rampage, I joined many other quilters from New Zealand and around the world to make heart blocks in green, as requested.

And I’m pleased to say that I even managed some knitting this year and completed a blue toddler’s jumper.  Then two other projects which had been hanging around for ages finally got finished, a pretty pink hooded baby jumper, and a cream winter cardigan for myself -  I wont tell you how long that has been waiting for me to get on and finish!  (Won’t mention the socks I’ve been knitting the last couple of winters and are still not finished.)

We have been out and about in our caravan for various trips throughout the year, some short, and some a little longer.  Our big trip this year was riding the Indian Pacific train from Perth to Sydney.  That was really enjoyable, wonderful food, and lots of off train excursions to interesting places.  We had boarded this train the previous year and the trip was cancelled due to a derailment further up the line, so this was our second attempt to do this trip.  Luckily it all went to plan this time.

Stop on the Indian Pacific train trip - Cook, “The Middle of Nowhere”

So that’s been my year, another busy one, filled with stitching, social outings and lots of caravan trips.   Meeting up with my Sew Wot friends each fortnight is always special, and I attend the local quilt club when I can.  It’s been a great year, we can't ask for more than that, can we?

Christmas is Coming

It’s official – Christmas is coming, and in our part of the world, Summer has now arrived.  Together with the Silly Season too, and all the various Christmas break ups from the groups we are involved with.  Tomorrow we have two – a birthday/Christmas lunch out with one group of friends, then an evening dinner date with friends from our village.

So it was time to get the festive quilts out and get into Christmas spirit.  These ones have recently been put up in the sitting room.  And as I took some photos, I realised that all three have stitchery on them!  Long time readers will no doubt have seen them before.

On the wall – All the Love of Christmas, Bronwyn Hayes design

On the back of the sofa – Alphabet Noel, Michelle Ridgway design

On the coffee table – Jingle Table-runner, Red Brolly design

As we are going away in the caravan on Boxing Day, we have decided not to put any Christmas lights up outside this year.  So it will just be Christmassy inside our little home this year.  How is your Christmas decorating going?

A Friday Finish

I’m so pleased that I’ve managed to get my Jingle (Christmas) Table Runner completed this week.  With the straight line quilting completed earlier in the week, the next step was to do some FMQ in the stitchery panels.  Have I ever mentioned how much I dislike doing this sort of machine quilting?  Probably because I’m not very good at this free motion business and find it a strain to do.  As you know, when we are up close and personal to our work we can see all the flaws, but now it’s finally completed, it doesn’t look too bad.

The binding was next and I found a piece of green and burgundy stripes fabric which toned in well.  I’ve spent a very pleasant hour or so sitting at the dining table hand stitching it down.  The winter sun was streaming in the window and even though the wind was getting up strong, it was nice and cozy inside.

Hand stitching the binding

Our Birman cat Gemma was keeping me company.  She was curled up in the window, sprawled over the base of her scratching post, enjoying the filtered sunshine too.  Here’s a photo from above, looking down at her.

Gemma is snoozing beside my chair

With the last stitch done, I laid it on the coffee table to see how it looked.  There, I’m quite pleased with my finish.  This is a Red Brolly design, and I changed the end blocks from applique to stitcheries.

Jingle Table Runner now completed

I used up a rather old piece of Christmas fabric on the back, so I’m pleased about that.  Not quite big enough but that wasn’t really a problem.  My taste in Christmas fabrics has moved over the years from the bright reds and greens to more muted burgundies and forest greens. 

 

The pieced back

So that’s number 6 off my list all done and dusted.  Wonder what number I’ll work on when I “roll the dice” again on Monday?

Jingle Table Runner

Sunday was certainly sewing day here today.  After Robin cooked Sunday breakfast of bacon and scrambled eggs, I did a few chores and got on with the job of finishing up my Christmas table runner top.  Santa had to gather up his reindeer while they were enjoying munching on the grass.

The reins have now been stitched on the reindeer so Santa could control them while he goes on his merry way on Christmas Eve.

Here are the stitcheries added to the centre section, enjoying the winter sunshine out on the patio table.  My runner turned out a little bigger that the pattern, as I already had some wider strips of Christmas fabric cut, and didn’t want to trim them down .  It all worked out OK in the end.

So that’s the top completed, I’ve made a pieced backing, using up some more festive fabric, and prepared the binding.  All I have to do now is sort through my crate filled to the brim with wadding pieces,and hopefully find something the right size.  Then I can pin the layers all together ready to quilt.

Christmas Table Runner

Monday is “Roll the Dice” day and it landed on  number 6, my Christmas Table Runner.  The actual name is “Jingle Table Runner” and the pattern was a free download from Red Brolly.  I first saw this lovely design when Maria from Life on the Block wrote about it on her blog a couple of years ago. 

The pattern

I completed the four stitcheries which go on the ends of the runner a couple of months ago, then put it away to add to my list and await the roll of the dice.  In the pattern these blocks are done with applique, but I decided to change it to stitcheries.

Santa with the reindeer

Various strips of festive fabric have been cut and stitched

There’s more cutting and rearranging to do, so I’ll see how it all goes this week.  I may or may not have the top all pieced together by the end of the week, with a couple of social outings things tend to get a bit busy.  But every little bit helps, and this project will be moved along a stage further by the end of the week, regardless of how much I do.  One thing I’ve decided though, I will not be making those “tongues” on the ends, just couldn’t live with them.

A finish – candle-wick Table Runner

It all came together rather well, if I do say so myself.  Three gifted candle wick blocks, and a little left over fabric in cream patterned with pink and green from my daughter’s 50th birthday quilt all worked well together.  And here it is, machine quilted and bound.

How to quilt it – that was the question.  I finally decided to do some echo quilting around the outline of the stitching.  And add a heart in each corner.  As I started marking the heart I had a worrying thought – hoping that I was using my Frixion pen and not just any old biro.  All was well, thank goodness.  I love the way the pen marks just disappear with the touch of the iron.

Quilting and marking

I added a little bit of quilting to the centre of each block, to hold it down nicely.  Then did gentle wavy lines around the borders.

The middle block

With this project finished, that’s another one I can cross off my list.  Now, what shall I replace it with, I wonder?

New runner on the coffee table

Reflecting Back on the Year that was

What a year it has been, our lives have certainly changed.  Not quite as much P&Q was completed during 2013 but….. After we sold our house in Upper Hutt we spent three months living in our caravan while the builders got busy, and I made the decision not to take my sewing machine along in the caravan too.  With travelling up to Levin several times a week to check on the house building project, there wasn’t much time for stitching, although I had some hand sewing and knitting to do when time allowed.  My one and only finish to show for our 3 months of living in the caravan was a little toddlers jumper.  Knitting this little jumper really brought back memories.  I remember knitting this same pattern in light blue for my little toddler Michael many years ago.  My little boy is now, I can hardly believe it, 49!  The old pattern is Patons 1845, and is knitted in double knit wool. Perhaps we’ll  have another little boy in the family one day?  Then I will prepared for him.

First finish of 2013

We moved into our new home in March 2013 and had curtains to order, furniture to arrange, pictures to be hung, and a million boxes to open!  My sewing room is still not organised exactly as I want it, and I am contemplating buying a bed settee for this room.  Or not – perhaps it will be too big and over powering?  So I’m dithering a bit on this decision.  Sewing took a back seat for a while, and then I felt motivated to make a few things for our new house.  Such as a new bag to store all those plastic grocery bags in.  I made it from a tea towel showing pictures of New Zealand flowers and flowering  native trees,  and it now hangs nice and tidy from a hook in the pantry.

Every kitchen needs one of these

Next on the list was sewing for our lounge:  a pair of green cushions using the left over fabric curtain fabric, and not one, but two table runners for our new coffee table.  Making the cushions was quite straight forward, but the table runners got put aside for a while and took a little time to complete.  The saw tooth stars were made from some of the extra curtain fabric, using a cream patterned fabric for the background, and plain green for the borders.  The second table runner was a bit more challenging to make.  Now I have two for the coffee table, to ring the changes.  I used some of the left over curtain fabric in both, the same green for the borders, but different neutral fabrics and both are made in different styles. 

Muffy on the couch with the new cushions

First runner made with Saw Tooth Stars

Second table runner

Then it was time to make a few gifts.  My old school friend Merilyn loves gardening.  I had been busy doing the stitchery off and on to make her cushion for ages, and luckily completed the project in time for her birthday.  The pattern is “Bless my Knees”, designed by Mulberry Street, USA.  I used No 5 Perle cotton for the stitchery, and added highlights with fabric pens. The body of the cushion is a pale green cotton fabric.  It fits in well with the decor, I was told, and has pride of place on one of the couches.

Made for Merilyn

Another gift was for my friend Dot, a belated 65th birthday present.  Two oven mitts, the green one is for Derek and Dot’s kitchen in their new house, and the lilac one will tone in  nicely with the colours of their motor-home.

Gift for Dot

Dot’s son Brent  has a real affinity with the American Bald Eagle and has quite a collection of eagle related items.   Tucked away in my sewing room was a piece of eagle fabric, eagles soaring against a blue sky.  It didn’t take too long to stitch up a pair of simple cushion covers.

For Brent

More sewing for me was next, my old peg apron was ripped so I stitched myself a new one.  Plus a Givenchy apron (sounds so posh, doesn’t it?)  This was was a panel purchased from an Op Shop for a mere $2!  I always wear aprons in the kitchen as I’m such a messy cook!

Blue Peg Apron

Purple Givenchy Apron

Not forgetting my ever so handy block roll which started life as a “quilting” tea towel, sent to me by my UK pen-friend a while ago. I backed it with calico, added a light wadding, and stipple quilted the layers together, then added the red binding and ties.  I use this to store my stitcheries in, keeps them nice and flat. 

 

Block Roll

We are getting near the end of my stitching year now.  And I have only one finished quilt for the year.  What a mammoth task this has been, machine quilting and unpicking time and again.  You are all probably heartily sick and tired of reading about the trials and tribulations of me and this quilt!  This quilt was a long time in the making,  I was working on the straight line machine quilting about seven years ago when I was diagnosed with cancer and underwent many long tiring weeks of radiation and chemo.  I couldn’t physically cope with it back then and when I finally returned to P&Q, this quilt held too many memories of this scary time.  But here it is, finished at last, over the back of the couch in the lounge looking very Christmassy indeed.

My Christmas quilt

Looking back over the year, although I have only finished one quilt, I’m surprised how many other smaller items I have made.  And it hasn’t really been a quilt free year, I’ve been spending time working on a couple of other UFOs during the year.  It’s just that they are not yet up to that all important finished stage.

Another thing I’ve noticed, is that I’ve done a lot more cooking and baking in my lovely new kitchen, with friends popping in for lunch, and afternoon tea, which is nice.  I’m also pleased with my jam making during the year – I made batches of feijoa and kiwifruit jam, plus marmalade.  And not forgetting making my first ever Christmas Cake, so yummy!  Wonder why it took me so long to finally make one of these?

I'm also so very pleased to have joined the local quilt club, Town and Country Quilters.  And been invited to join the Sew Wot ladies for their fortnighly get togethers in each other's homes.  Yes indeed, this has certainly been a good year!