It's finished! (Alternative title: Hexy Heaven)

Yes, you read that right - my hexy quilt top is finished!  I actually finished it a week ago but haven't managed to blog about it until now!  I've had trouble getting photos of it because I can't find anywhere outside where I can hang it and take a photo.  Here's a photo of it outside, before the borders were added:

Hexies on the fence

but it's now too big and trails on the ground!  Once it's been layered and tacked (and so has a bit of weight to it and somewhere to put stones without hiding the hexies) I might try laying it on the front grass and leaning out of my sewing room window but it's a bit breezy today to try that with just a quilt top - it'd be off down the road before I got upstairs!  Right, that's enough chat, let's show you more photos!  (I copied Hadley and hung it in the conservatory - it's a good place to take photos and you don't risk dangling your pale quilt top in mud.)  It took 21 month and 12 days (not that I'm counting!) to get to this point:

and I think it was worth every minute!  Do you want to see some close-ups?  Yes, I thought so!  (Tough if you don't!)

As you can see, I added a narrow (1" finished) border of a grey on white dot (which was going to be the backing fabric but I only had 3m of it - nowhere near enough!) and then a wider (1¾" finished) pale pink and white striped border.  I decided to butt the corners of the dotty border because the corners were next to a 60˚/30˚ corner and I thought a 45˚ angle right next to it would look a little odd but I mitred the corners of the stripy border because I think mitred corners and stripy fabric are a match made in heaven!  

After 'keeping' it in a heap for quite a while I finally got to fold the quilt top (photo taken before the borders were added):

I love how it looks from the back!

This quilt was started during Lynne and Gayle's marvellous Hex-a-long, which was inspired by the Candied Hexagons quilt (designed by Kerry Dear) and this version by Lizzie Broderie - Lizzie makes the most amazing quilts, make a cup of tea and then pop over for a look, you'll be there a while!  I  hand pieced (not EPP, as many people assume) my first hexagon on 13th August 2011 (they're 3" hexagons), my final (178th) hexagon on 13th December 2012, had stitched all the hexagons together by 9th May 2013 (more photos  here) and finished adding the borders on 25th May 2013.  I'll be honest, I really miss piecing this project and I suspect there are more hexagons in my future - maybe a quilt full of type δ?  Or a quilt-sized version of my hexy cushion?!

I've got my backing washed so now need to go and iron it and hoover the carpet(!) and then I can start layering and tacking.  I haven't yet decided how I'm going to quilt it (except that it will be by hand - I have some ideas but nothing is settled) or even what thread I'm using (at the moment it's between Gutermann Sulky 30, Perle #12 or Coton a Broder #16 - a generous friend has given me samples of each so I'll be trying them out to see which I prefer) so if you have any suggestions please shout!  

I also want to mention that I'm part of the Siblings Together Quilting Bee which Lynne has set up.  I'm not a 'full' member but have joined as an emergency/angel bee and am also acting as a cheerleader bee.  (I feel I need little cartoon bees to illustrate this - anyone good at drawing?!)  Each month the bee will make a 60" x 80" quilt for Siblings Together (read more about this charity here), to be given at the 2014 camps.  There are several very generous companies sponsoring the bee:

 Moda are providing a FQ bundle each month

 Lady Sew and Sew are providing the wadding

and these companies are providing backing fabrics:

       

            

      

I'd like to say a massive thank you to Lynne for setting up the bee and to the sponsors for being so wonderfully generous!

The bee is starting this month with Lynne and I can't wait!  I know that I'm unlikely to be making any blocks (hopefully I won't because that means that everyone in the bee is healthy, happy and okay to sew!) but I do enjoy cheering from the sidelines!  There will be lots of blog posts about it, too, because the bee is full of wonderful bloggers - keep your eyes peeled!

Archie finally has a new bed in the conservatory.  Those of you with a good memory for insignificant details will remember that I've already bought him a new bed for there but it was too cold for him to be in there at the time so I put it under my sewing table and realised just how much he loves being up there (it's become his third favourite place, after a sun-filled conservatory and a patch of sun on the front room carpet) so I can't take it away from him.  And he really needed a new bed:

I need a new bed in here...

It's taken me a while to find a(nother) suitable bed but then a trip to a garden centre for compost provided the answer:

It must be for me, it's got my name on it!  

Of course, there's an obvious drawback to getting a dark-coloured bed for a white dog that moults incessantly (it's particularly bad at the moment because he's shedding his winter coat) but he does love it and it's easy to hoover!

Ah, this is the life!

And finally, it's come to my attention that Archie has a twin:

A twin?  Are you sure?  He'd better show himself right now - has he brought biscuits?

Can you imagine how wonderfully cute it would be if he really did?!!  

I'm linking up with Lynne's Fresh Sewing Day - I'm going to make myself a cup of tea and settle down to catch up with what people have been making in May before Archie starts demanding his teatime walk!

I'm also linking up with Annabella for the Let's Get Acquainted link up (organised by Beth@Plum and June) and am desperately trying to think of my favourite holiday destination for the link up!  (I don't really 'do' holidays, I prefer staying at home!  I'm lucky enough to live a fifteen minute walk from the beach, which Archie and I love to visit.  I like to look at the sea and collect pebbles/sea glass.  Archie likes to dig holes, eat seaweed and carry pebbles/driftwood in his mouth as he jogs along the dunes.)

April is over, already!

I'm about to start a new hand piecing project and realised that I didn't have a spare pin cushion or thread catcher to put in my project tin so, of course, I had to rectify that situation!  I spent longer than is probably sensible making this cute pin cushion who was going to be given a name (possibly Ethel) until I realised that naming her may prevent me from sticking pins in her.

I adapted this pattern and made her from Liberty lawn.  As you can see, she's got a little gingham tail and lilac eyes (she tested several and liked these best), nose and whiskers - I'm really quite fond of her!

The question is, can I bring myself to stick pins in her...

Of course I can!!   (sorry, Nicky!)


The other thing I needed was a thread catcher and I can't tell you how much trouble this gave me, especially considering how many I've made and how very, very simple they are to make.  (Skip to the photo if you don't want to read about some really stupid sewing!)  The first problem was when I turned it through and the wadding was too big for the fabric.  Thinking I'd done something daft (and blaming tiredness) I unpicked it and started again.  And the same thing happened.  That's when I realised I'd picked up the wrong piece of wadding and was using Hobbs Heirloom instead of Warm and Natural.  The Heirloom, it turns out, has a bit of give in it, whereas W&N doesn't, and turning it through the stitching gap had stretched the wadding.  I cut the front off that attempt to salvage the fabric, put the rest in the scrap bin and found a piece of Warm and White and started again.  This time all went well until I discovered that the button I'd stitched on wouldn't/couldn't anchor the ribbon so I took it off and stitched it on again but this time adding a thread shank to lift it off the fabric and create room for the ribbon.  That attempt also failed (but at least I tested it before tying the knot) so I had to go back upstairs and empty out my button jars to find a larger orange button.  No joy.  So I picked out a pink button and looked for an orange ribbon.  No joy there, either.  Then I realised that the original orange button sat nicely on/in the pink button so I went back downstairs to stitch it on.  Guess what?  It wasn't in the centre!!!  Off it came.  Fortunately the second attempt (at this button combination!) was successful. If you're still with me, here it is!

So, I finally have a project tin (and I've prepped the first block but I'm keeping it a secret, for now!) and I'm ready to go:

This month I've made quite a lot of progress with my hexies and have added 83 hexagons (I know, eighty three!  It's amazing how stitching two or three a day really adds up over a month) and eight trapezia and it now looks like this:

In other almost exciting news, Archie has a new collar:

What about this pose?  Does it show off my smart new collar?

And a new lead:

It's about time I had a new lead - the old one is really tatty and not fitting for a dog of my standing...

Doesn't he look handsome?!

And when the sun is shining or it's dark and a torch (or camera flash) shines, this happens:

It's shiny!!

I think that's a happy note to end on, don't you?!  I'm linking up, as usual, to the lovely Lynne and her Fresh Sewing Day post - thanks for popping in!


P.S.  If you go here you can see some of my embroidered Summersville squares on the DMC blog - eek!

Sewing, but not blogging

I suppose I should have predicted that three posts in six days would result in a blogging blackout but I didn't.  I bet some of you did though, didn't you?!


Here's what I've been up to:

I joined the Finish-A-Long for quarter two but rather than blogging about it I linked up a Flickr photo:

I'm going to intending to finish off the lovely cushion from Katy (I think this project is a veteran of the FAL list!), make my first ever foundation pieced block into a block keeper/stitching book (using Cathi's examples as inspiration) and, just for laughs, see how far I can get with a double bed-sized blue and white nine patch and snowball quilt.  (Not as far as a finish, I don't think, but miracles do happen!)


I've already got a finish! (No, not the quilt!)

The front.
You can see a photo of the back here.

Inside

Rolled and tied.

I'm about to start a new hand piecing project (no, I haven't finished joining my hexies together yet!) and I'm going to need somewhere to keep all the pieces because there's no way I'm going to manage to stitch a whole block in one sitting which is why this FAL project suddenly shot to the top of my list.  I wasn't intending/hadn't planned to do quite as much quilting as I ended up doing so it has shrunk quite a lot.  It was going to be square but isn't now(!) and the star isn't quite in the middle of the front because one side needed trimming to square it up - there wasn't anything I could do was willing to do to even it up so it's staying like that.  I've added a length of twill tape to the back so that it can be rolled up if necessary but I wanted to make something that could be shoved in a bag in a hurry, etc.  All I need to do now is prepare some pieces for the new project from this lovely lot and I'll be set!

Fabrics for my new hand piecing project, mostly charm squares.  More photos here.

The other thing I've made progress on is the blue and white quilt.  I think the last time I blogged about this I'd cut all the 2.5" blue squares I'd need.  In February I started to piece the (128) nine patches and at the beginning of this month I started to prepare the (127) snowballs and, after a mammoth block arranging and labelling session last weekend (there were 255 6" blocks to arrange - it took ages!), I've started to join the blocks.  This is what I have so far:

I'm pleased with how they look, thank goodness!

Actually, I've made another set of ten but that's part of a set of 25.  (Confused?  See my map, below!)  I'm not joining them in rows, I'm making nine sets of 25 and three sets of ten and then joining them so that I have as few really long seams as possible - I find it a much easier way of working but it does require, for me at least, a map:

A quilt block map.

There are more photos of the blocks and how they're going to be arranged, etc., here.

I've also added some more hexies but I'll save that for another day because I think that's quite enough to be getting on with!

Finally, you may wonder what Archie's been up to while all this stitching has been going on.  Well, it's a dog's life:

What, more sewing?!

It's hard work being cute all the time, I think I'll just have a snooze...

Quarter one is over, already!

In January I linked up with the Finish-A-Long (find my Q1 list here) and put three things on my list.  It's now time to link up again and declare my finishes, so here goes!


2. (I'm saving the first item on the list for later in the post 'cos it's the one you haven't seen!)  Finish my stumpwork anemone - prepare the detached petals and attach to the flower and then mount on a canvas block.  Finished!!

Now living at my parents' house, in a cupboard, I think!!

3. Finish and block the mystery knitting.  ('Mystery' because I couldn't post a photo without spoiling a surprise.  Fortunately, Our Dear Leader is very accommodating and let me email her a secret photo, to prove the project had indeed been started.)   Here's Deb's scarf, all finished!

1. Finish joining my Marmalade hexies (generously donated by Leanne aka Our Dear Leader) and make into a cushion, inspired by this gorgeous cushion.  Finished!

It doesn't have a name but if it did it would be called 'Can I have a P please, Bob?'  For those of you thinking 'Eh?', click here and scroll to about 55 seconds in.  Enjoy!


I love this cushion!  It's made with a Marmalade mini charm pack (or whatever they're really called - candy or something?) and Kona Honeydew (from Simply Solids).  I hand pieced the hexagons and then added a border (by machine), machine quilted straight lines down it and then added an envelope back and a binding.  I was going to put a zip in the back but, after creating a flap and attaching one side of the only zip I had that was anywhere near long enough (light blue), I discovered that the zip tape was shadowing through the green and looked awful!  So I ripped it out and put an envelope back on instead, fortunately I hadn't cut the other half of the back so I could adjust the measurement!  It's not my favourite way of finishing a cushion (I usually use buttons or zips but I wasn't organised enough to have gone to the shops and bought the necessary supplies) but it doesn't matter once it's on the settee and facing the right way!  Not that, most of the time, I see all of it!  This is what I usually see:

A lovely cushion with a quilt top in progress dumped in front of it.

My hexy quilt lives in front of it so the only time I see the whole cushion is either when I'm adding more hexies to the quilt or when someone comes to visit and I put the quilt somewhere far away from cups of tea and coffee!  It's easier/better, in my opinion, for this quilt top to not be folded unnecessarily (although I suspect my mam would say that it's unnecessary to leave it in a heap and looking untidy!) because it 'upsets' the seam allowances.  What I mean (and am finding it difficult to explain!) is that if I fold it then some of the seam allowances end up crumpled (and sometimes fold back on themselves) and need re-pressing whereas if the top lives in a heap then they seem to keep their direction.  (Am I making sense?  No, I thought not!)  It's not a problem I've had with any of my other tops (whether hand or machine pieced) so I suspect it's something to do with the multi-directional seams.  Or the way I fold.  Probably the latter!

Anyway, enough of that because I think you'll find that I finished all three items on my list - hurrah!!  I'm linking up with Our Dear Leader@She Can Quilt - why not pop over and see how everyone else has fared? And, if you didn't join in this time, why not scour your sewing space for projects to populate a list in quarter two?  I've found two things so far...


I can't leave you without a photo or two of the man dog himself:

I'm bringing my stick inside and you can't stop me.
(He carried  for almost the whole of his walk, he loves having something to carry but I can't persuade him to try a shopping bag!)

I'm sure it's time for tea - stop faffing on the computer and feed me!