Flower boxes

I bought a roll of Kaffe Fassett Collective fat quarters in purple and teal at a show a while back, and thought they needed to be cut into rather large pieces to shine. I ended up with a bento box variation with small and large "boxes". I used Kona snow as a contrast. Once I started laying out the blocks, I discovered that at was all a bit meh... I loved the colours , but they needed something more to make them shine. After an audition with members from my stash, I ended up with a couple of yellows and that seemed to do the trick.

Once I had assembled the top and had a good look, I realized that one member of the cast wasn't pulling his own weight. he fabric in itself was lovely, a light blue with pink polka dots, but there was just too little contrast to the white. I ended up with making four blocks with a bright pink, unpicked the bland blocks and inserted the pink ones. Ah! Much better!

I quilted this one with wavy lines through the blocks, creating large petal shapes, using a petal shape cut from thick paper as a guide. In between the petals I used a tight meander to make the petals stand out.

The back is a lovely chrysanthemum print by Philip Jacobs that I just couldn't bring myself to cut into. Here it comes into its own and brings a smile to my face every time i look at it. A triangular label sewn into a corner an purple binding finishes the quilt.

A glimpse of Spring

Yesterday was the warmest day we've had for ages, the snow has been gone for almost a week and the temperature was high enough to let one's shoulders down and fill one's lungs with sweet fresh air. The sun was out, and although I lovingly welcomed that old friend again, it sternly pointed out to me that I had been neglecting a few things. Oh well, cleaning windows is not so bad once you get started, and while I was out on the balcony I also enjoyed the first spring preparations in the various pots and planters out there, pruning, cleaning and tidying. My friend the sun pointed out to me that some dusting was required indoors too, but never mind, with the door open and all that fresh air filling my rooms, the job was almost pleasant... The ranunculus (or should that be ranunculi in plural?) I bought a week ago looked a bit peaky, with the lower half of their stems grown soft and mouldy so I took advantage of the clean windowsill with all the candleholders and vases on display, cut the stems of and distributed the flowers among them. How's that for a nice little Welcome Spring tableau? It turned out that Spring wasn't all that interested, so this morning I woke up to a world covered in white again. Most of it has melted by now, but there is still enough of it on the hillside to see our Mountain Man. Hopefully for the last time on this side of summer. Can you see him?

Oh well, I'll just stay in and make another quilt backing for now, and enjoy my new quilt books. More about those later.

A promise of spring?

A promise of spring?
Originally uploaded by crafty mathea

That's what finding tulips in the shops after Christmas is for me. Yes, the snow will go away, the days will be longer and flowers will bloom again.
Winter has seemed incessant this time around with a long period of cold weather and loads of snow. It seams to have hit the whole northern hemisphere at the same time as well, making us all ask: "What global warming?" But apparently those of you in Australia for instance are getting more than enough heat at the moment... Anyway. As I was saying: got some tulips in and I have been enjoying their pristine beauty. I love them at this stage, when the flowers have just begun to open, and they have this kind of waxy sheen to them. The cold weather will last for a while yet, and I know we have both February and March to get though before we can start preparing for Spring, but it's nice to get a little reminder of the changing of the seasons again. Off we go again on our little journey through the seasons, and before we know it, it will be Christmas again...
... which brings me to this:
My latest purchase. Two Honey Buns of the lovely Figgy Pudding line from Moda. Just in time so I can make a little log cabin quilt for Christmas 2010. Best be prepared ;-)

Looking up

What a difference a day makes... At least with the sun out, and my trusty old weatherbeaten ladder back in place, the flowers look much better. Now, for a bit warmer weather so they really can get encouraged to grow and start resembling the hanging plants they are supposed to be, and summer will really be here.While I'm waiting I'm having fun with my sewing machine and my lovely Keiko Goke book that I rediscovered on my shelf this morning. I have made one quilt from it earlier, but there is so much great stuff in there that it really deserves a second workout!

Waiting for spring

Yesterday I gave in to temptation and let myself believe that spring had finally arrived. So what does one do? Go shopping for flowers of course! There are som wilted daffs from Easter in the background here, but the rest were put outside yesterday in nice balmy weather. So what happend today? We got snow! It melted before it hit the ground, and the little storm settled as quickly as it started, but still! I didn't order snow for May! When I came home from work I had to take pity on this little group all huddled together, so they get to spend a few more days indoors. But really, this won't do! All the weather is good for now is crafting.

So that's what I've been doing. I finally finished piecing the backing for my Mod Sampler yesterday, and the trapunto hearts on the other one are done. So today I suddenly found myself with two quilt tops and backings ready for layering. My least favourite task. But the thing is, I finished one of them, and it wasn't so bad! I used a new method (for me) from the quiltalong, where you place the top on the batting, cut the batting to size, roll it all up with the batting on the outside. You then place the backing down and unroll the top and batting on to it, smooth it out and pin. And you know what? It worked!
I didn't have enough floor space, so I did it all on my kitchen table with the extra leaves in, and it was just fine. Earlier I have been struggling with batting and backing folded in four, smoothed out half at a time, unfolded, refolded and added the folded top, smoothed, and unfolded.... I don't know if this makes any sense, but it was an elaborate and tedious process where I always felt that I could do with an extra pair of hands. And that wouldn't have been very attractive, not to mention the problems I would have had in finding tops with four sleeves...
So, what I'm trying to say here is that you live and learn. This makes the thought of layering the other quilt less daunting, so I might get to that on Thursday. Tomorrow is a night out, though - dinner with my quilting friends followed by a guild meeting, what fun!

Rosy Sunday

I treated myself to a bunch of roses yesterday. I thought they were beautiful then, but this morning I was just stunned when I entered the room and caught sight of them. Such beautiful flowers! I usually buy fresh flowers for the weekend if I'm going to be at home - it's one of my "little luxuries". Even during my student days or first years in the workforce I'd rather treat myself to a bunch of flowers than have dinner at the end of the month when money was running out.
Luckily I can have both, these days. And luckily their beauty can still stop me dead in my tracks on an ordinary Sunday and bring a happy jolt to the heart.

On to something more mundane. I really must go and tidy my sewing area, there is quilting to be done!

Trientalis europaea

I have been struggling with some crazy log cabin flower blocks lately. It took a while to get my head around the concept - starting with an uneven triangle and stitching wedges and uneven strips around it in a haphazard log cabin fashion, having to discard a lot of offcuts, seemed to go very much against the grain (pardon the pun!) of my early lessons in quilting where following the grain of the fabric, cutting precisely and making good use of even the tiniest scrap of fabric has been the most important rules of all. After a while I got into the spirit of it all and it became a lot easier and more fun along the way, so here they are, my three flowers stitched together to form a table-runner.
It started out as a christmassy thing with the flowers being white poinsettias, but I couldn't resist adding some blues and teals, and in my mind the flowers have now become Arctic starflowers, making the runner suitable for all year usage. Never mind that the real ones have six petals and mine only have four - I'm allowed some artistic freedom, right? ;-)

I was going to crop the picture, but why not leave some hints around the edges of what is going around outside my quilting realm. A bit of laundry waiting to be dealt with, some wine wanting to be drunk (although some of the bottles are empty already...) and my craft box of paints and brushes waiting under the table for when inspiration strikes. A wider angle would have revealed a lot more mess, but I'm slowly, slowly bringing my home into some semblance of order - throwing out stuff I never use and pairing down to get more room for the things I really want to spend time on. I have some great projects in mind that will bring that box up on the table soon, but first I'llhave to deal with some of this domestic mess that seems to accumulate out of nowhere... I am going to spend some time quilting my flowers first, though. I have added some french knots to the centers, but it looks like it needs something more, maybe some beads? I'll

do the quilting first, and see what it tells me.