Memory Quilt: Block No. 8

No, you haven’t missed seven previous instalments – this is the first of nine blocks that I’ve tackled for a new memory quilt.  I wanted to make a quilt as a ‘souvenir’ of our trip to the USA over Christmas – in addition to my travel journal which is yet to be finished…

We chose the fabric whilst away, in a lovely quilting shop, Stowe Fabric & Yarn, in Stowe, Vermont, and once I got home and had five minutes to myself, I started designing. It’s the first quilt I have made that uses appliqué techniques – and I’m going to need a bit more practice on my satin stitches I think. The quilt is going to feature nine appliqué panels, and here’s the first. No guesses as to which tourist venue this panel refers to…

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Quilt No 017: Aldi Christmas Special

img_7435_wI can’t believe it has been over a year since I have completed a quilt. That’s not to say I haven’t been quilting – I have a couple of tops that I have been procrastinating over (I really hate laying out and pinning), one of which is a year late being delivered (so sorry Beth and Mike!). These two table runners use Christmas-themed fat quarters that were part of Aldi’s recent ‘So Crafty’ promotion. You really can’t go wrong with six fat quarters for less than £4. They’re not necessarily patterns and contrasts that I would have chosen but after cutting them according to Barbara Chainey’s ‘Fast Quilts From Fat Quarters’ cutting plan, I put them together to make the main squares (12″x12″), before sashing and binding with left over fabric.

I used basic stitch-in-the-ditch quilting in the long table runner, and a holly leaf design of my own making for the shorter side table runner below. I actually quilted the smaller runner first, and had such a hard time marking the quilting pattern on the dark fabric that it put pay to more complex quilting on the larger.

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‘1704’ – Quilt No. 13

Quilt No 013Notwithstanding a minor burn injury caused by not having my arm far enough away from the iron whilst folding the binding for this quilt, I’ve finished my sampler quilt for the workshop I am running at Quorn Country Crafts in Loughborough on 17th April. As you can see, it’s a nine 10×10″ panel quilt-as-you-go with contrast joining strips featuring continuous line free motion quilt patterns that I have adapted from my tangle patterns.

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