This blog should be called "The Adventures of a Fabric Junkie!". I am passionate about fabric, threads, colours and textures. I can record my crazy quilting, sane quilting, embroidery and everything else that I consider important in my life.

Photo shows my block for the Hurricane Katrina fund-raising quilt "All That Jazz".

Sunday, May 22, 2011

Stripes block 16 completed

Well, this was a quick and easy block, started and finished in three days.  Once that central piece with the striped ivory satin and fawn velvet was embroidered in both stitches in cream which I had never done before and fawn stitches which were my favourites, the rest came easily. I wanted to get rid of some of the angles of the striped patch so covered some of the seams with heavy lace motifs, the bottom edges though were left straight.  The block was easy until I got to the last seam - the one at the bottom left. DH and I tried about a dozen braids and laces but nothing seemed to be right so in the end, I stitched the braid, embroidered some of it to match the striped block and added cream ribbon roses.  Not perfect but better than a lot of the others.  I am beginning to realise that this quilt is a reflection of my life.  Every stitch, lace, button, braid, trim is something that I have learnt, collected or gleaned along the way. From now on, each block will have a theme, albeit a mental one - people in my family, childhood holidays by the beach, picnics in the forests with my parents and younger sister, picking wildflowers, school friends and favourite teachers, piano lessons, my Grandma and her Scottish heritage, my children and grandchildren, my sister's children and grandchildren, my lovely Mum and her love of sewing......so many influences that have shaped me into the person that I am today.  At first, the blocks in this quilt were merely that, blocks worked in cream laces and threads on cream fabrics but as they have grown in number they are taking on personalities and identities of their own. Anyway, this is number 16 or the block that completes 1/6 of the quilt.  I laid them out on the table in no particular order to see how they are going to look when sewn together.  I was surprised at how many darker creams I have used to form the contrast in colour without even realising that I was doing it.

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Christmas Block number 15

I finished the Christmas block this morning and would like to thank Colleen from CQInternational because if she hadn't suggested "Chains" as the April mini-challenge, I never would have thought of doing a Christmas block.  When it was finished but "missing something", I asked DH what he thought it needed.......he suggested the gold star above the Christmas tree with the lines running from it and a gold charm of some sort in the bottom left hand corner (I found a bell, candy canes, a ginger bread man and a snowman) and the bell seemed to fit the best. I included the strip of broderie anglaise with the ribbon threaded through it because it represents a child in a nightgown anxiously waiting for Santa Claus.
So, moving on to block 16 with the May mini-challenge of Stripes.

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Birds a'flying Cream Block completed

Two of the Victorian Symbolism Challenges with the CQInternational group were Birds a'flying (April) and Friendship Rings (May).  I managed to put both of these symbols on the one Cream on Cream block while at the same time working on the Christmas block which has the mini-monthly challenge of "Chains" on the Christmas Tree.  So while I haven't blogged any blocks for a while, I have been working on them both and am about to start the May mini-challenge of "Stripes".  This block is number fourteen - only 82 to go now and so far, I'm not getting bored, touch wood!!!