Intulawoven - finished top!

I've been posting about this one for a while - mostly in my WIP Wednesday posts, but the top has finally been finished!

Confession time: I'm not actually all that fond of making HSTs. It's not the sewing and cutting I mind so much, it's the ironing and trimming. sometimes it feels endless.


But I do love the patterns that can come about from HSTs. This one is from the book 'Crazy For Scraps' by Sally Schneider. 10 HSTs + 6 blank squares make for a 16" finished block that is then rotated through 90degrees repeatedly to give the 'Interwoven' look.


It's being entered in the Tula Pink Charm-Along Linky Party over at Ms Midge.

I think I'll just quilt this one simply with an all-over fiery curls pattern. The stunning is in the pattern, and I don't think the quilting should detract from that.

If I don't manage a separate, self-designed quilt for the Sydney Quilt Show, I think this one will be one of the entries for 2016.

WIP Wednesday: the one with Intulawoven

Intulawoven

I love the Interwoven pattern - it's basically the same block repeatedly rotated through 90degrees.


But the result is really stunning!


Especially when colour-shifted!


I was planning to do 6 x 4 blocks, but discovered I didn't have quite enough pieces, so it'll just be 5 x 4 blocks.

Full pics tomorrow.

I could theoretically get it quilted and bound by Monday - spend Sunday quilting it - just the all-over flaming curls that are my quilting trademark. Part of me wants to get funky with the quilting, but I'm just not sure. This one might benefit from an all-over - and I do need to practise my FMQ...

Not much else to report this week - no movement on anything else.

Linking up to Lee at Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday!

WIP Wednesday: the one with Tula Charms

Trying to keep up with everything in January is a lot of effort!

My garden is growing, my social life is humming, my work is an effort, and my writing is laboured. Plus, I'm having small and niggling health issues that are taking up a lot of time and energy.

Quilting is way down the queue right now.

On the plus side, Swarm made it to the QuiltCon offices and the dodgy points and the machine-sewn binding couldn't defeat the visual power of the design! (At least they haven't said "your points are rubbish and we're not going to hang this", so I'm guessing it's okay?

I'm so positive! :D


My big WIP this week is The Aussie Tula Charm-Along. The original charm swap was organised by Ms Midge, and involved (I think) 112 charms. Ish?


And they're being sewn into HSTs:


That's a lot of HSTs that need cutting and ruling and sewing and cutting and pressing and trimming...


Did I mention lot of HSTs?


But they're sewn and trimmed and sorted!


And now it just requires sewing into blocks, and thenceforth into a quilt.

The problem is that it's due - finished - on the 27th, and while I could make it at a sprint, I find I don't have the time/energy to sprint. It's a hard knock life! Especially when my garden is growing so well!


Linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced, as I always do.

WIP Wednesday: The One With Great Plans

Wow, hasn't it been a while? I hope your holiday season was full of good things, and if it wasn't, I hope you got to come home and think "well, at least that's over for another year!"

My Christmas was pretty awesome - food, fun, and family. And apart from the absolutely urgent stuff (frantic gift-making, getting Swarm ready for posting), it was marked by almost a complete lack of quilting!

However, I do have a few things to report!


Cushions for my mother

The frantic gift was my mother's cushions, which I promised to her many months ago.

The initial attempt didn't quite turn out the way I planned.


So it was back to the drawing board:


And this time I liked it a lot better.

It wasn't that difficult sewing the curves - the problem was mostly the piping - I'm very bad at doing piping, it's never as tight as I'd like it to be. Do you have tips on how to get really tight piping?

But the end result was pretty spectacular - and matched the quilt and pillows I made her several years back!


And the close-up:




Blocks for the Sydney ModSQuad group quilt 2016

Done! Easier than expected.


There will probably be a sewing bee in January to put it all together in a top, and then it's time to quilt it!


The Tula Pink Charm-Along

I did a charm swap with a bunch of other Aussies, organised by Ms Midge.

112 different Tula Pink fabrics in 5" charms!



And the challenge? To make a quilt using them. Any additional fabrics are fine, so long as the charms are in the quilt.

The Charm-Along runs to the 25th January, and of course I waited until I was back at work to start piecing it.


HSTs right now. Lots of HSTs...

There's definitely a plan for them, we'll see how it turns out...


The 2016 Plan

I have a UFO Challenge laid out - 12 quilts to complete in 2016

1. Plain Jane Passacaglia
2. Duct Tape, or the Force (have you seen the new Star Wars yet? I have! Multiple times!)
3. Selvage Strings
4. Batik Logcabin
5. Tula Pink Interwoven (Charm-along)
6. Scrappy Disappearing 9-patch
7. Dancing Stars

Not sure about the last 5 - I have plenty of tops and quilts to be quilted, and then I'll have to start making some hard decisions about who gets what, because we can't keep all the quilts that I'm making - there are just too many of them (and we have limited space).


Anyway, how is your New Year going? Have you linked up to any of the WIP master posts that are around?