a week of stitching

It's been a week of stitching . . . hand stitching that is.

First up, I have a finish to share, my 'chamomile quilt'. I spent a bit of time yesterday hand stitching down the binding.

If you have ever wondered about sending your quilt away to a machine longarm quilter, there are certainly some pluses in doing so. This quilt was big, too big for me to wrestle with on my domestic sewing machine. And all that negative space was just crying out for some special icing. And, there's a lovely sense of collaboration & celebration in working with others. . .  so I sent my quilt off to Leeanne from quiltmekiwi for some quilting magic, et voilà . . .

And the rest of my time was spent doing some extra hand stitching on my 'long distance' quilt. Before stitching all my three pieced columns together, I needed to get the fans stitched down and then I used some simple sashiko stitches to secure those special little extra floating bright patches.

I'm using completely different fabrics to the original design, and happily, I was able to use fabrics mainly from my stash. It's all part of my latest mission, "exploring" my stash and making the most of the fabrics I already have, and popping in a few new favourites to keep things interesting.

And this great improv pattern was ideal, my large scale floral prints work so well here and it all goes together quite quickly too.

- until next time

Linda

making progress

Here's a few progress photos of my scrappy 'long distance' quilt . . .

- adding a pale dresden fan into the mix

It's all still very precariously pinned up on the design wall for now . . . hoping the grandchildren don't decide to do a reshuffle for me over the weekend. One more column to make up and then there's those special little extra floating bright patches to hand stitch down with some simple sashiko stitches.  Linking up with Wendy for this weeks 'peacock party' over here at wendysquiltsandmore

Until next time, Linda

long distance quilt

Oops. I started something new.

I'm finding this 'long distance' quilt is a simple way to tackle improvisational patchwork. It's a recent PDF pattern that I purchased and downloaded from thenextstitch in Australia, combining Courtney Cerruti's Long Distance fabric collection with AMH's creativity . . . love the way Anna crosses over between patchwork & art in her patterns.

It's made up in three 20"wide patchwork columns, comprising of easy-to-piece geometric shapes, ending up as 60" x 60" finished quilt. I'm using quite a different colour palette and fabrics to the original quilt, my choices are based on a fabric pull I had made using my stash.

I've cut out all the fabric choices for my first column, trying to make this scrappy and yet cohesive at the same time. It's ended up longer than my design wall, but you can see where I'm heading, and I think it's looking okay so far.

Loving adding these little bright patches. They float over the background of the whole quilt, and are hand stitched in place, leaving raw edges exposed for that yummy handmade touch.

Linking up my progress pics this week 

with Kelly over here at myquiltinfatuation for 'needleandthreadThursday'.

Looks like Wendy from 'Wendy'squiltsandmore' is also having a play too with another of AMH's latest quilts, follow the link for a peep. It's the beautiful 'Portraits' quilt, showcasing fabrics from Chapter 2 of Conservatory by Courtney Cerruti @ccerruti , Nathalie Lete @nathalie_lete and Anna Maria Horner @annamariahorner .