Easter Fair Preparations and Colour Curiosities

Pretty huh?, but just how many colours do you see? 20 or less, you have something in common with dogs, up to 39, well it's the bees for you.

 Following the controversy surrounding 'that' dress, there have been various interesting ideas and explanations thrown up on the net, including this rather interesting article on Linkedin by Diana Derval.
Want to know more, pop over here and read all about why we see colours differently.

Someone who has no trouble with colours at all is Marie, she shared this terrific alphabet quilt with us.  Marie created 26 lovely alphabet blocks using machine embroidered motifs and appliqued letters.

To get the setting right, Marie needed two extra blocks, enter the Mouse and the Kangaroo.

Sashed and bound with a gay (that is the happy and bright gay - ta, I do know that shows my age) multi-coloured fabric to finish off an Easter Fair offering.

Which block is your fave? Marie is for the sea urchin, me, I'm for the mouse.

Karen is learning a new skill, yep, with Mary tutoring, Karen has joined the ranks of the Hardanger enthusiast. Look closely, you will see that she has completed her first half inch, so we are truly in on the ground floor of this new enterprise.

Wendy, with the aid of her new toy, a wonderful and wondrous ipad (aren't they all) googled Hardanger,

we were curious to see where it had sprung from, seems it had its beginnings in Persia but between 1650-1850 it flourished in Norway, called Hardangersom it was used for national costumes and even household linens - bet they only used them on special occasions!

Co-incidentally, at the other end of the room Gwen was up to her elbows in a beautiful piece of hardanger, a table throw, started some time ago by another and given to Gwen to finish, she is reveling in the piece, Gwen loves Hardanger work.

Another gal wielding a needle was Susie,

She took pity on some poor 'needle challenged' soul last week and volunteered to stitch these corner bookmarks together.  Susie has taken them from 'yawn' bookmarks to these,

bookmarks with personality! - They are for the Novelties table at the Easter Fair - Thank You Susie.

Courtney is taking a break from her 'horses' piece and has started a floral long-stitch piece that will eventually become a lovely cushion.

Diane and Sandy were both hard at work, Diane is learning to hand quilt, tutored by Gwen she is making great inroads.
Sandy is working on this beautiful pattern, 'Sweet Daisy Dreams' by Robert Kaufman, embroidered blocks interspersed with pieced and a stunning scalloped border.

Karen has finished her version of 'Leanne's House' B.O.M. by Leanne Beasley.  Several members have made this quilt and all the different versions will be part of our upcoming Quilt Show in July.

Karen has even put a label on her quilt......and it is reported others have not.....hmmm....does that mean they aren't finished yet?  Wendy??

It is one heck of a cute label-yes?

Lots of laughter and shenanigans going on with this two, and lots more of those little fabric parcels...

Gwen had two stunners for Show and Tell, the hexagon quilt originally started  by our sadly missed Janet not long before her passing.  Gwen has finished this lovely hand pieced hexagon quilt with a difference, hand quilting daisies in each hexie center.  Janet had a million - well lots, of little pieces already cut for a pieced border but after a lot of thought Gwen went with a black and white pin striped fabric for the border, mitering the corners, it sets off the quilt beautifully.  You will just have to take my word for the pinstripes, unfortunately the fabric photographed as a light grey.

The second quilt was created from Gwen's left over check fabrics using a pattern from one of our library books.

The black and white check on the border was also from another project, Gwen's 'Venitian Floor' quilt, inspired by photos she took of the floor of St.Marks Basilicia in Venice and the winner of the 2013 Quilt Show Viewers Choice award. The check fabric was very difficult to work with but Gwen had quite the meterage left over, all pre-fused with vliesofix and no way was she going to waste it, hard to work with or not.  Happily it fitted around the scrappy quilt perfectly.

 The book is Scrap-basket surprises by Kim Brackett, a book of jelly roll friendly patterns.  Gwen mentioned that the pattern construction is deceptively easy, after the first block she busily stitched away only to later realise that she had created extra work for herself.  Her advice, read the
instructions!

Thursday night gals have been busy, busy, lots of chickens, hens and easter egg collection bags made for the Novelties stall at the Easter Fair.

And lastly Sheila bought along her thread catcher, we will be having a workshop on this in the near future.

Great Hints and a little silliness

Two posts in one this week, firstly we had the free motion quilting class presented by Pat, lots of tips, a great info sheet with some online sites to check up on including Lori at 'The Inbox Jaunt, who coincidentally has this great post on stippling- well worth the read. 
Pat had us starting out with a few curves and points and then moving onto more adventurous designs finally finishing up with writing our own names.  A great class, thanks Pat.
Lyn and Christine had a great time, Lyn was one of the first to stitch her name.

 

Jackie was really into the curves, doing a great job on her name.

Wendy and Marcia really nailed the F.M.Qing, Wendy then decided to give free motion circles around applique a go.

Diane with some help from Fae worked on names and hearts.

Denise concentrated on F.M.Qing around the icons on this lovely quilt to be.

Queen of the Gizmo's for the day was Marie, she bought along these pads for us to all try, they are called Grip and Stitch quilting disks from Clever Craft Tools, an online search will bring up sites that you can buy them from.  Lots of muttering on the day about 'gotta get me some of these', they make quilting close to the edge of your quilt a lot easier and are so restful on your hands if you have a problem with arthritis.

 

Marie also had '50 Styles of F.M.Quilting' by Helen Godden a nifty little book that pair's with your smart phone or tablet to bring a video of Helen and a 'live' presentation of some of the designs, or as Helen describes it 

"My first Free-Motion Machine Quilting book, 70 pages with 50 advanced quilting styles plus bonus 20 embedded demonstration videos using the free Aurasma app for tablets and smart phones giving you your first taste of Augmented Reality!

Yep, hover your tablet or phone over the sketch (L) in Helen's Book and up pops Helen on a video (TR)- I know, blew us all away!!  If you haven't seen Helen's work before, pop over here but make sure you have a drink, a snack and lotsa time. Amazing just doesn't cover it.

One of our group, who I have to get permission from, created this lovely 'I Spy' crazy log quilt for the Uniting Church Fair.

They have their fair the week before our Easter Fair and our very own Ailsa is one of the stall co-ordinator.

Found another little pile of these, pretty aren't they........

 Hmm, wonder what they are for??

Val has been busy again....still, with these quilts for Laurel House.

Just right for a little boy off the land.

A cheerful flower applique 

The third quilt is a lovely soft girly quilt.  The white blocks were orphan blocks given to Val, she cheered them up with a little floral embroidery and off set them with one patches of a pink floral given to her by Beryl.  

Val uses her machine embroidery or fancy stitches for a lot of the quilting on her charity quilts, for this lovely she has teamed some free motion daisies and swirls on the border and for the quilting in the large pink blocks Val sketched a daisy onto tissue and stitched the design out following the sketch lines, she then just tore away the tissue to reveal a great quilted block.

There is a nephew somewhere who has just got the bestest birthday pressie, this fab bag with a bottle of scotch. 

Marcia is pleased to be giving and I bet her nephew is pleased to be receiving.

Using the large 'Drunkards Path Templates' from our Library, Sue created this great quilt, not only does the path meander around the quilt, a bit of a more modern take on the design 

but Sue has also used quilt as you go techniques with a little simple echoing in the center of the blocks.  

That bit of silliness spoken of earlier?

how 'bout this.....

next thing you know some bright spark will work out how to put lipstick on 'em.

Thursday night..........

Supper .......................

Sue had some knitting on the go.

Jenny's crochet flowers.

Michelle's hexies - big ones!

Jules's hand quilting lesson.

Charm pack stitching by Letitia.

Fabric basket - Leanne.

The jury is still out on the chooks!

Did I mention supper?

Jackie's cream hexies!

Jules' tin of scraps.

Till next Thursday night.
xx

Workshops - Notions and Easter Egg Bags

Next step on the organisational agenda for our upcoming Biennial Quilt show (just over 3 months away - deep breaths everyone) is the creation of 700 notions, you know, those little gifts that are handed to attendees. Betty is in charge of prodding us into action and presented a workshop on Wednesday on the best way to uniformly create these little somethings.

As you can see, everyone had a ball.  Betty's Mum, Inge was helping Christine, the real Christine that is, not the red headed Christine/Michelle, with an ever ready digit for strategic placement.

Courtney is back working on her cross stitch of show ponies, wondering if she is using it for a quilt medallion or cushion, or perhaps will frame it - time will tell

 

Yola, one of the regular Thursday night gals visited with us on Wednesday, she bought along some very cute Show and Tell.

Firstly, the little Easter egg collection bags will be for sale on the Novelties table at our Easter Fair.  The pattern is from Ayumi over at her blog Pink Penguin.  Jenny has a link to the bag tutorial and a pic of some more of the bags in her post, just scroll down.

Yola also bought along a brood/cheep of chickens in all sizes.  A workshop was presented last Thursday night on creating these cuties and they will also be for sale at the Easter Fair. 

Lyn had some Show and Tell, but not in the flesh so to speak, these goodies were made as gifts for her family who visited from overseas at Christmas, and of course they took them home with them, but it's all good, we have pics thank you. 

Her Grandson requested a new Quillo, he has grown somewhat since Lyn made his first one, and because they are currently living overseas Lyn chose a very Australian theme.

Lyn's daughter also sent an S.O.S. asking Lyn to make her another laptop bag as the last one wore out!

Just the thing for a music lover.

And of course, a new lap quilt was a must for her Daughter.  Created in a similar vein to the yellow and blue quilt Lyn made last year, but using red this time round.

Lyn also had this darling music box to share with us, the needle goes up and down, the cotton turns and the foot plate also goes up and down.

 A lovely Christmas Pressy.

Julie shared this charity quilt with us, made with fabric donated to the Palmwoods patchwork group of which she is also a member.

The quilt was machine quilted by another Palmwoods group member who does a lot of the groups charity quilting using her longarm quilter.

The blocks are reminiscent of  'Hope of Hartford' in their construction, using logs instead of H.S.T's.

All that girlish giggling was a bit catching, Wendy and Marcia went all 'Princess' showing off their Show and Tell,

Wendy found this W.I.P in a cupboard and decided the time had come to finish it off.  Originally started a wee while back when Gwen presented classes on drafting patterns and hand piecing blocks

Wendy mentioned it's funny how our tastes change, there was a time when more than one group member was influenced by the pink and purple craze. Brights are more the go at the moment.

Marcia did the whole 'Ta Da' thing presenting her show and tell.  Using the strip pieced Q.A.Y.G method to create a lovely quilt for a young family member's birthday.

 All in all, a day of fun, frivolity and yep, cake.