Joel Dewberry - Pristine Poppy

Just saw this over at Fabricworm.com in the new Joel Dewberry range: Notting Hill!

The design is (I believe) called Pristine Poppy in Magenta and I am in love with it.

Look at those colours! The Art Nouveau lines of the poppies! The leaves and buds!

I love the elegance of it - although, really, I think I'd either want to make a dress out of this, or wallpaper a dining room in it. Maybe just a little more muted.

For very 'Art Nouveau' lines, the Tulips in Canary hits the spot, too. Almost like feathers!

I've been keeping my nose out of the fabric scene, ever since I realised I have far too much fabric stashed away and that the chances of it being used this year were very low. I even went to the first weekend of the Craft Depot sale (all November, up to 20% off a lot of fabrics - some of them last season) and came out with...nothing!

But this...this could be my Achilles' heel - the thing that drags me back into fabric purchasing...

So, are there any fabric lines you're looking forward to? (If I'm going down, I don't see why I shouldn't take others with me!)

Plans to prosper and not harm you...

Because I'm drowning in fabric right now, I need to make some plans!

1. A Land Of Summer Skies
This is going to be an Australian flag quilt, using Australian-made shot cottons.

My Instagram

2. Terrain Challenge with Penny Poppleton.
Any quilt design we like, using Terrain and 2 solids of choice, at least 60" square. Top to be done by start of October, whole quilt to be done by December.

3. Tula Pink quilt with Ooh La La collection
I borrowed this book off Penny (she's basically my quilt book lending library) and really love the instructions and ideas in it. I'm thinking of doing something based around Beanstalk right now, but that could change.

4. Quilt with Aviary 2 fabrics.
I've had this fabric for far too long. Originally I thought I'd make some messenger bags out of it, but now I'm thinking that a subdued, stylish quilt would be perfect for the more conservative of my friends. :)

5. Baby Bag for friends.
They've got an about-to-be-newborn on the way, and she really loved the wedding quilt I made for mutual friends. I'm thinking that the Sunkissed Layer Cake would be perfect for this. I've had it lying about for at least a year. And I might make a second one from the Makelife cake... :)

Then there's the design idea I have for this bundle of Cuzco...

There are also several things on my to-do list:
- stepdad's pillows
- all my birthday blocks - both for the Books and Blocks bee, and for my LJ Birthday Blocks challenge (which I'm backed up from May right now)
- le Petit Poulet
- borders for Build Me Up Buttercup (and the Modern French Maze)

⅔ of the year gone, ⅓ to go! Let's see just how much of this I can get done!

The Generosity And Helpfulness of the Blogosphere

It's been pretty much a year since I started blogging here, and I'm nearly at 100 posts. It's been an interesting journey and learning experience, both following the BNQs (Big Name Quilters) and the 'little people' or friends I've met and made along the way.

And some people have been very lovely!

During the massive WIP Wednesday bloghop in November last year (the one where Lee of Freshly Pieced offered entry into a giveaway if you commented on every blog at the link party), Felicity of Felicity Quilts displayed a secret project with a very adorable flamingo fabric in it.

I inquired after the fabric and the maker, and discovered it was a scrap from a scrap pack she'd received from Elizabeth Harman of Oh, Fransson! A Google search showed it to be almost impossible to find, so I figured it was in the "twelfth of Never" category - ie. I had Buckley's of finding it. C'est la vie in the wonderful moving world of quilting fabric.

Then Buckley unexpectedly beat the odds! Felicity spotted some in a shop and bought me a half-yard of the fabric!



We swapped fabrics - I sent her two fat quarters from my collection, she sent me a half yard of the flamingos.

And now I have flamingoes! Badly photographed flamingoes, alas, but flamingoes nonetheless!

This is one of the things I love about the quilting blogosphere: they're largely wonderful, helpful people willing to assist complete strangers. Oh, I've seen some bitchiness here and there - a few catty comments - but mostly, people are lovely.

So Little Time!

And so many things to do.

Not least of which is the Blogger's Choice Bundle challenge!

Select 12 patterns and 3 solids to make your own 'Blogger's Choice' bundle, as though you were a famous blogger!



I've been extremely random in my choices: I started with three solids I liked and then picked fabrics to match from anywhere and everywhere.

Running from top left-hand corner:
1. Power Pop: Freesia Posies (Free Spirit)
2. Kona: Royal (Robert Kaufman)
3. Fanciful Flight: Aqua & Pearl Fun Flowers (Hoffman Fabrics)
4. Impressions: Blue Roscoe (Free Spirit)
5. Fanciful Flight: Buttercup & Pearl Fun Flowers (Hoffman Fabrics)
6. Crazy Daisy: Pink With Orange Crazy Daisy (Benartex)
7. Crazy Daisy: Yellow Tile (Benartex)
8. Nature Elements: Sweet Mango (Art Gallery)
9. Sunny Happy Skies: Yellow Festive Stripe (Riley Blake)
10. Taza: Yellow Lisa (Free Spirit)
11. Kona: Slate (Robert Kaufman)
12. Kona: Pomegranate (Robert Kaufman)
13. Happy Mochi Yum, Blueberry Fiji (Lecien)
14. So Sophie, Purple Tapestry (Riley Blake)
15. Impressions, Purple Roscoe (Free Spirit)

I like the look of it, which is sunshiney bright, and cheerful - a fabric selection for a quilt that can be spread on the lawn on a spring or summer's day, and on which you can settle down with a good book!

Fabric Friday

(I'm going with the "it's 5 o'clock somewhere" theory of Fabric Friday...)

It's time for a good old-fashioned Aussie road trip!

Sing along with me now!

Give me a home among the gum trees!


With lots of sun, please!


A view or two and some skies of blue,


Sheep run out the back!


A quilt shop out the front!


And a dirt road somewhere!


A couple of weeks ago I went on a road trip to Leura with some friends, then down to Melbourne and the Armageddon media convention, and then down to Ballarat to visit some friends.

While I was there, I (naturally) visited fabric shops. It was a week full of purchases.

Starting with Friday!

Jenn from PennyPoppleton.com and I headed off to Material Obsession in Balmain, where we bought...things. Fabric-y things!

Like some Reece Scanell two-tone cotton!

No, I didn't buy all of that! Just five FQs.

And some backing on sale:


Then, a friend who works at a craft-y magazine in Sydney acquired for us a charm pack and a FQ set of Maywood's Return to Romance line in flannel! Jenn was kind enough to let me take the entire FQ set!



Friday afternoon, I headed up to the town of Leura, up in the Blue Mountains to stay with a bunch of friends at a self-contained guesthouse for a weekend of fun and writing. Well, fun, anyway. Not too much writing actually happened in the end!

While up there, I discovered Leura Quilt Shop...and ended up picking up a 12" ruler, and a lovely Japanese-style fabric panel: Golden Carp!


It will nicely match with the RK Imperial Collection #6 that I accidentally acquired while looking for more fabric for Mum's Impstar.

Then it was down to Melbourne to gift the Kaleidoscope quilt!

Unfortunately, I forgot to get a pic of the finished quilt - or the actress with her quilt. Damn stupid of me! :(

After Melbourne, I went to Ballarat to stay with a friend who moved down there a couple of years ago with her husband. Now they have two kids that are made of adorable (even when they're wailing and thumping). Of course, I can say that: they're not my kids!

But while I was down in Ballarat, how could I possibly pass up the chance to visit the Ballarat Quilt Shop?

The lady who runs Ballarat Quilt Shop turned out to be a Buffy fan! So while I browsed through fabric and notions on sale, my friend and the shop owner talked Buffy. :)

I love it when fannish geekery comes together!


And then what does Craft Depot have to do but have a sale! 20% off everything in-store! Resistance is futile! Your bank balance will be assimilated!

So on Monday, I bought a lot of Plume:


Some of that is the Reece Scanell two-tone cottons: they're pricey, but oh so nice-y! I usually get one or two each time I visit a shop that has them. And there will be quilt-age from them. But they looked so nice against the Plume fabric.

Also: Art Nouveau flowers:


Then, I purchased a pretty brown batik to join together the French Lace batiks I've been dithering over for the last couple of months: the colours and batiks are lovely, but I needed something to join the blocks together:


And now that we have it, Modern Basics quilt, here we come!

Finally, I bought a random azure batik fabric because I love batiks and there is no such thing as 'too much' batik - especilly in azure!


But wait, there's more!

And then on Thursday I went over to visit Killara Village Quilts, because they had Alexander Henry's 'Wonderland' print, which I've been seeking for a while!



Plus, some stash building.

So, that's my fabric purchases of the last couple of weeks and I think this is beginning to get out of hand.

As a result, I've set myself a budget for the end of the year. A set amount that I can spend on fabric and then NO MORE. There's got to be limits. And I need to focus on making quilts, not adding to the stash.

So there may be a Fabric Friday post or two later this year, but hopefully not too many!

Fabric Friday!

My friend Jenn at Penny Poppleton is having a No-Buy October because she spent (or possibly over-spent) her tax return on fabric in September.

I am not quite so principled, alas!

I bought a bit of yardage to match with the Autumn Leaf design seed - I found these wonderful William Morris prints that mix yellows oranges and greys together in small patterns and although they were in one of the highest price bracket for fabric in HobbySew, I bought 0.4m of each.



Aren't they gorgeous? They'll make a beautiful addition to the Autumn Leaf range:




There were a bunch of fabrics I wanted to buy at HobbySew - autumn leaves and christmassy prints and, oh, half the shop's stock! But I didn't. I was good!

Because I'd already bought a lot of fabric a couple of weeks ago...and it arrived on Monday!



Yes, that is Kate Spain's Terrain (which is anything but plain). And Timeless Treasures' Fruit Punch set.



And then a package arrived from Etsy seller Sew Fresh Fabrics. One that I didn't remember ordering.

The tag on the package said 'Happy Birthday', but I'm not that good a customer to receive a birthday present like that (at least, I don't think I am...maybe I am?). So I have this feeling that a 'Halloween Witch' (from a gift exchange taking place on one of my forums) has sent this gift to me.

Oh. Em. Gee.



Peoples, that is six yards of fabric that someone sent to me for a gift exchange. SIX YARDS.

Did I say OH EM GEE before? Because I'd like to say it again!

And I adore the Pachyderms! I've been watching the Pachyderms fabric drift by as various shops promoted it... They're just so adorable!

So, um, WOW. And I'll say it again in bold: WOW!



Odyssea fabric from Three Rivers Etsy shop to add to the Odyssea layer cake I bought two weeks ago... Borders and backing and suchlike. Really!

October is going to be a month for doing stuff. Blocks. Projects. Getting as much done before the heydays of (Inter)National Novel Writing Month - or NaNoWriMo - takes off in November. And then it's December and, well, we know just how much stuff is going to be done then right?

Also, towards the end of September, I received the quilting magazines sent to me by Quilt Inspiration:


Lots of fascinating and excellent ideas for quilts in there - just what I need to use up my stash!

Except that Fat Quarter Shop keeps on having sales! I ask you: how am I supposed to stop buying fabric if they don't stop having sales???

Dead Simple QAL - palette choices

Time for colour choices!

The colours in the photos don't exactly match the colours of the cards...I think my camera phone colour-adjusts into the blue range, which means the shades don't match exactly. Plus, it's tricky to compare a backlit graphic on a computer or phone screen with a fabric.

















I know the Dead Simple QAL is supposed to be, well, dead simple, but I'm thinking of doing it in concert with the Bloggers Quilt Uber-Fest QAL that's taking place in the 1st half of October. Because, really, I already did my 'Dead Simple' quilt - The Colour Of Magic. Sure, I could do it again, but I'm still new enough to quilting that I'd like to try different blocks - have a range of styles and materials.

WIP Wednesday #20

So it's been a pretty exciting week. Not as busy as last week, but still pretty hectic.

I had friends over on Saturday and so had to clean up my quilting stuff (my sewing room is actually the lounge/dining space of our house). That put a dent in the time that I could be sewing, of course, although now the area looks wonderfully neat!

I got another block for my 'birthday quilt' in the LJ Birthday Block Swap, and received a package of fabric I'd ordered a fortnight ago.

And on Tuesday came the news that I'd won some quilting magazines in a giveaway at Quilt Inspiration!

FINISHED!
Shaz and A's quilt: Sunshine and Lollipops!





Now I just need to sew the label on, and then get it into the post... It's only two years late! :)


Gothic Summer Sampler



I did a hard push to get the blocks finished over the last week - I had 9 blocks and needed 16 for a four-by-four configuration. Cripes. That means I made 7 blocks in 7 days!

Evening Star:


Rocky Road To Kansas:


Denise's Star:


Breaking Out:


Pennsylvania:


Grandmother's Puzzle:


And Bear Claws:


And all together now, sewn with the vertical sashing:


I'm trying to decide on the colours for the posts. Then I'll just throw together a back and quilt and bind it very simply. In black, natch. :)


No Progress

Mum's ImpStar quilt
I received the next bundle of fabric for my mother's Imperial Stars quilt.

Unfortunately, it was the wrong fabric! Imperial Collection 7 instead of Imperial Collection 6! The seller had the wrong picture up on her etsy shop, and I looked at the picture rather than the description!

So I got this:


Instead of this:



D'oh!

So now I'm stuck. I can't find Robert Kaufman's Imperial Collection 6 in any shops anymore, and most sellers only sell one or two fabrics out of the collection.

Do you have any of RK's Imperial Collection 6? I can't remember the colourstory, but it was blue and gold-cream and green. Would you be willing to swap fabrics? Or do you know of someone selling it and can direct me to them?

This quilt is a gift for my Mum and I was hoping to have it done this month. It can wait, but it's already waited longer than I like and I don't know where I'm going to find this fabric now that the major sellers have all sold out of it.


Binding to do

- postage stamp (from ps. i quilt's QAL in January this year)
- supernova (from freshly pieced QAL in April this year)
- modern rail fence


Planned Works

The Dead Simple QAL
I'm thinking of doing this with the Quilt Uber-Fest being planned for October, but I really have to pull my finger out and hunt up a design seed and the fabrics to match it!