Summer Village

Bestie Maureen was gifted a full fat quarter bundle of the Tilda Blue fabrics by one of her groups as an early special birthday present.

She decided to make a few quilts from them....including Summer or Winter Village - a pattern by Laundry Basket Quilt.

                               

Two of our friends have made this quilt, and I have always admired it ...well, maybe not the one with the snowflakes...LOL....and of course, it's houses....Need I say more???

So, I decided I would tag along with her and make that quilt too.  We have been looking for a project we can do together.

I like to have "a plan", so that I keep on track . .  I sent a message to her . . .vaguely about when we would make it  . . .she came back with February 2027....!!!!!!    6 months????   No, she meant starting in February....    After a bit of toing and froing, she decided she needed to have one house made for her birthday in September and the top finished by her next birthday.

A plan was hatched:
August to January, 1 house block per month
February 3 blocks
March 4 blocks
April 3 blocks
May 4 blocks
June 3 blocks
July sashing and border
August applique

Top completed by midnight on 11th September....at the latest???

I thought about the background - white, cream grey - all very predictable and similar to the other house quilts I have made, so I started thinking about using something like a blue...I had been looking at Pinterest for ideas.

I went shopping and found a fabric I decided would be very different and work with the strong colours in the Kaffe Faset fabrics I had already decided to use.

I am the kind of person to rush in and start something new. . . . is that why I have a loooong list of UFO's??   Anyway, I didn't tell Maureen, but I had this block completed by 24th July . . .ssssh...it's our secret.  Once you decide on the fabrics, it's pretty quick to make up.   Good directions, including which direction to press the seams.

The colour doesn't show well here - it's a darkish taupe brown.

I added the sashing for the picture, just to see how it goes. 
I'm happy with it.

I am vaguely using the colour scheme in the picture on the left - a bit like a colourwash rainbow effect - red in the top left - moving to orange, yellow, green, blue & purple.
I have laid out the fabrics I have and have kitted the fabrics for most of the houses.
I need to find some more orange/yellow and maybe a green or two.....  

Hexie Quilt - Bigs and Smalls

I have had quite a few opportunities lately to work on my hexies for this quilt.  Started here.

I originally had the idea that some flowers would be made from fabrics from some of the quilts I have made... and then just add flowers of various colours....

But recently, I saw that Lin (in the UK) and a long-time blog friend was joining hexie flowers made by friends.  So, I offered to make her one.  She then, of course, being a lovely bloggy friend, offered to send me something in exchange....I asked her to make me a hexie flower - I had made her one in yellow with a blue centre, so I asked for hers to be blue with a yellow centre.   And she stitched her name in the middle hexie....mmmm clever idea I thought . . .

She also included a piece of fabric that she knew I would love - so I will make a hexie from that - with a yellow centre I think!

Here is the fabric & hexie.

The idea of including hexies from friends appealed to me.  So I asked my various sewing groups if they would each make me a hexie flower in fabrics that represented themselves, so that when I saw the flower I would think of them.  It was an "optional" request.....no hard feelings if they don't.

I have one so far, from Sandi.   Sandi & I both share a love of houses/buildings etc.

Here are the others that I have made so far.  Mostly they are made up of fabrics from quilts from the past, but some are using fabrics that I like for one reason or another.

So, maybe if you are a bloggy friend, you would like to send me a hexie flower, using 1" hexies.   Entirely optional of course.

And if you want to join in making a similar thing - let me know, and I will reciprocate. 
I also have a small Facebook Messenger group going with friends who are making Bigs & Smalls...always happy to add new friends to that group!

Tally Board

143 x 6.5" cut squares
111 x 1" hexie flowers.... 28 made/received
8 x 2" hexie flowers


PS: I turned on Comment Moderation, so I now get an email with the comment so I can publish it.....Not an ideal solution, but better than it was.

Sunday Stitchers #10 - Grey Buildings

I am cheating again . .  .#10 was supposed to be to make up two cross stitches - More Any Tiny Town and Any Tiny Town . . . well, when I wrote my list, I thought I had stitched both . . LOL . . .Nope . . .only one.

So, I set that aside as I want to do them together or at least using the same finishing technique - whatever that ends up being.

And I was looking at some other cross-stitch projects that I had stitched way back - before Patchwork took over and decided I really wanted this one on show....Back in the day, I added my initials and the year I completed the project . . .  .1987 . . . . no rush for these things.

So, this became #10 for Sunday Stitchers......  A finish is a finish after all.

This was in my early cross-stitch days -
Danish Flower Thread, Linen, No hooping....
I also used to have finished projects framed professionally.

Things have changed!