Splendid Sampler 4

This makes me think that I should start a new page on the blog for this project as I'm progressing with this.  There are 100 blocks presented by different designers being issued twice a week on Sundays and Thursdays since this February.  There are some bonus blocks being presented on the way too.  One on which I will show here.

Since block no. 8 posted here, the Sampler has now gone up to Block 12, so here they are:

 No. 10 (this was finished before no.9) Iowa, designed by Sherri McConnell of A Quilting Life.
This was an easy block to male and all I had to think about was getting the purple fabric with leaves the right way up!

Block no.9 Local Quilt Shop, designed by Jane Davidson, aka Quiltjane.  This was a bit trickier getting all the pieces together, which was why the one above was done first.  But a lot of fun and the Patchwork Dreamer ribbon came from the Mary who made my mini quilt last year, that's the name of her business.

Block No.11 Crocheted Thoughts by Alyssa Thomas of Penguin and Fish.  She specialises in embroidery so this was evident in this block.  It comes with an backstitched "tail" of thread and crocheted hook, but I just used chain stitch for the doily in the middle of this piece.  I pieced the block at home and took this away for our break in Cornwall (more of that in another post) to do the embroidery.

The latest block, No.12 is Checkerboard, by Pat Sloan. Using strips of white/black I used other colours to give it a bit of life, than just one other colour.  This took just an hour this morning to do.  I also learned from Lyn Carson Harris of Little Red Hen blog about twirling seams at the junctions of the four patches to get a much flatter block and it was worth doing.

And lastly one of the bonus blocks by Pat Sloan on the Babylock website, which was called Inside Out Log Cabin, which again took no time at all to do.  There is also an Easter one, which I'm not doing as it doesn't really appeal to me.

Here's the link to the Splendid Sampler site here.

International Quilting Day 2016

At the beginning of this year I suggested to the Bourne Quilters to have a sewing day for International Quilting Day. I showed them a sample of a Quilt As You Go block, so that no one person has the task of layering and quilting a whole quilt.  

They were enthusiastic and the school were happy for us to meet on the Saturday, so arrangements were made to get backing fabric (supplied by Freda), I bought wadding. Val came over to my house yesterday to cut up fabric while I cut up wadding squares.  Val also made cakes for today which were really nice.

As the school where we meet is a special school the hall is small we could only invite a few people to join us so in all 16 people came, but not all sewed.  Carol, one of our members, loves ironing and was happy to iron all the blocks before they were trimmed.   Another, Janet, was cutting lots of strips to keep us going. On one quilt the blocks are joined in rows and the rows are to be joined and the whole quilt bound. This is a boy quilt

I wasn't too sure whether we needed 25 blocks (5 x 5) or 16 (4 x 4), but we settled for 20 (5 x 4). There are some blocks left over, so those will be made into pouches, which can be used for charity sales.

The second quilt is a girl one, for which 16 backs were cut, but somehow or other one went astray so ended with 15 completed blocks. The bright green batik fabric (donated to Project Hope by Audrey) they were lying on will be used as binding strips on front and back. Val will be finishing off this quilt.

Because they are less blocks there will be a border around this.

Not a bad day's work and a nice bit of chatter catching up with friends, which is what quilting is all about. The quilts will be going to Project Hope as lap quilts to be given to guests at the Youth Cancer Trusts hotel - the link here http://www.youthcancertrust.org/

I hope you've had a good quilting day today.

Corfe Castle

Want some lovely Spring pics?  We had a Monday afternoon off and took ourselves to Corfe Castle, a National Trust property in the village of the same name, between Wareham and Swanage.  David is no stranger to Corfe as he does some portering turns at the Swanage Railway, a heritage line which runs through the village, but there are no trains running until next week when it's the Easter holiday. It was a gorgeous sunny day, though with a sharp breeze.

For those not familiar, I should mention that the castle is a ruin. From the top of the hill on which the castle remains stand there are some spectacular views. This one is looking across the harbour to Poole, the White-ish buildings in the background.

Looking down towards the entrance and the village.

Zooming in on Corfe Castle station, no trains today, though. Not a bad photo considering I was using my iPhone!

Got to do a selfie!

After some tea in the NT tea room we wandered to the model village to see if it was open as we've not visited that before. Half price offer this week (I guess it won't be next week being holiday time) we went in and had a wander round. Gorgeous small garden with a model of the village

That's what the castle would have looked like in the 17th century before the English Civil War.

A view of the village up to the church.

A few of the model castle with the real one showing behind the trees.

A few from the back of the model with the real castle behind. You may just notice a bit of blue peeking from behind the wall of the model, where there is a model Tardis!

In the model village there is a model - of the model village!

Walking around the garden I spotted a robin having a splashing time in the little stream, just caught it at the right moment. It wasn't the only bird life in the garden as we saw several sparrows and heard a woodpecker in the nearby woods.

I'm glad we didn't take any children with us!

Lastly, on our walk back to the car going past the castle I could not resist taking a photo of the Soay sheep grazing on the (real) castle mound.

Splendid Sampler 3

On Thursday and yesterday evenings, being home alone as David has been away for a couple of days I made the latest block and caught up with previous blocks.

This is what I made on Thursday, entitled Friends Around the Square designed by Julie Karasek, the latest block in The Splendid Sampler.

Meanwhile I had been embroidering this block

Snug as a Bug by Amy Sinibaldi. 

And catching up with the little hearts in this one

Lots of Love by Melissa Cory.  These hearts are tiny 2" square, so they took some doing, but got there in the end.

All up to date now with my blocks and I made a collage of the 9 (8 plus bonus block) and pincushion too.

I started off with red/white, white/red combinations but other colours are creeping in, like the black and white.  I've bought some more red fabrics from my local quilt shop, Cherry Tree Fabrics and will have to look out for more. Seems I don't have much red in my stash ;o)

Splendid Sampler 2

The Splendid Sampler Sew along started last month with the latest block (no 7) having been released today.  It's an embroidery which I've traced out ready to stitch one evening this week.

So far this is what I've made

The bonus block as a starter. This would have been used for a block keeper for the forthcoming instalments.

This was the first instalment, Hearts Aflutter.  The second one is Wings, with the little half square triangles being like butterfly wings

The third one I haven't completed yet, which has lots of small pieces hearts. I hope that I can completed this soon. 

No. 4 is Happy, Happy. Applique with embroidery. I've enjoyed this little bit of embroidery.

The next one was another pieced block called Simple Simon, a split nine patch.

Finishing today with Focal Point. This had to be pieced very carefully to avoid 'unstitching'. It was nonetheless quite a striking block.

So that's my round up of blocks so far.