2nd Sunday Stash

Time for more stash already - some Echino this time.



I didn't have time to take many pics and didn't get many good ones but I thought this blurred one was pretty cool with the way everything is floating.



See more stash here.

Sewing on Saturday & Block Party Book

I'm up, I've had a good week and I'm really inspired by some of the amazing and pretty things I've seen lately so I'm ready to get sewing but my sewing machine has other plans. I'm taking it in this morning to get the tension sorted out. The good thing about taking it in though is that it's a really good shop & they'll fit a free motion quilting foot for me. I'm not sure if I'm ready for that yet (eek!) so I'll ask them about a walking foot and if they think my machine is up for the amazing quilting odysey it has ahead of it.

But I did mention pretty & inspiring so I'll share two of the things that made me happy this week - take a look over at Heather Ross' blog if you haven't visited lately. She has the loveliest drawings of the owl & the pussycat, wait until you see the honeybear bottles! She is such an amazing designer and her storytelling isn't bad either. It looks like it might be for fabrics but there's no telling whether we'll get to get our hands on it. With everything I've heard about her deal with Munki Munki it will probably be more cutting up pajamas or bathers or some such for her fabric fans *sigh*.

The second really inspiring thing is that the talented gals over at Block Party have a book deal in the works & are changing over to a quilt along. They'll have a new block to make each quarter - I've never made a block in my life but I can't wait to get started. It's on my big scary list of things to learn so it'll be great to do it virtually with a bunch of other people. They're also having a giveaway to celebrate but there's no point you entering because that Erin Michael paint by numbers bird is mine! ;)

1st Sunday Stash

I love Sunday Stash over at 1/4 of an Inch and have decided to play too.

1. Erin McMorris, New Park Slope Birds in Ivory
2. Michael Miller, Tiny Dots in Paprika
3. Alexander Henry, Bird Seed in Pink

I'm a bit hooked on birds at the moment & these will probably be used for some log cabin blocks. Check out the rest of the goodness here.

Another post? Procrastination must be the answer

Yes, I have a job application to write so of course I'm visiting some of my favourit blogs and dreaming about fabric. I now have an enourmous pile of things to iron included the just washed batch from yesterday. I'm so glad that I bought some of the West Hill, the individual ponies have so much personality & I love the pink floral almost as much. I didn't have the patience to wait until it was washed and have already hacked out a little patch of ponies & made a couple of 1 1/4" hexes. Amazing considering I'm normally the "I can't cut this, what if I need it for something better later" type. I've also made some hexes to go on the back of my Mendocino coin quilt.



That's them before the were sewn together. I also have a hex flower in the lighter colours used for the coins as well. I'm using 16 fabrics altogether.



Sadly, these photos make everything looks so dark! Sorry. It really is bright & vibrant. I have some Kona cotton in berry for the sashing and the final colour not shown in the photo is underwater sisters in plum. It's time to finally get going - if I get this jo I'll be part time and will have plenty of time for quilting & isn't that what all good career decisions are based on!

Happy wash day

Well turns out that I'm as sporadic about blogging as I am about eveything else! Am having a lovely day off despite being too tired & listless to settle down to anything having had 6 hours sleep (thank you kitties, who wouldn't want to wake up at 6.15am on a day off?). It's a mixed day - I'm very frustrated with my sewing machine, I just can NOT get the tension set. I've given it a proper clean and fresh oil but I think it has to go to the repairers to get looked at. No sewing up my Mendocino coins which are all cut up & ready to go. Or even a new iPod cover since I spilt coffee on the old one this week giving me an excuse to retire it & its dodgy beginners stitching. Come to think of it I had tension issues even then. Satisfying myself with washing new fabrics and catching up on the blogsphere.

On the other hand I'm sooo excited to have stumbled across the new Anna Maria Horner Little Folks fabrics today. They are so delicate and gorgeous. I've loved some of her other designs and have about 9 metres of Good Folks Azalea in plum (I need every single metre I swear!) but a lot of her stuff is just too strong for me to bring home. I love looking at it but couldn't really imagine it at my house if you know what I mean. The new designs are smaller and subtler and I can't wait to buy em all up. I really love that she's included some solids in the mix. I'll probably get lots of the pink (which I think she's calling sweet) but will get some yellows too and if I can afford it (hah!) will try to push myself towards some blues too. It's so easy to just stay with the palette you're comfortable with.

1. qm 62, 2. Kokka/Echino at quilt market, 3. sugar.cookie.pillow, 4. playground.pillow, 5. moonlight.pillow, 6. village path / VAH06 berry, 7. baby bouquet / VAH07 berry, 8. little honey / VAH05 berry, 9. village path / VAH06 sweet, 10. four square / VAH04 sweet, 11. baby bouquet / VAH07 sweet, 12. forest hills / VAH03 sweet, 13. voile solid / VS03 rose pink, 14. four square / VAH04 berry, 15. coloring garden / VAH01 berry, 16. coloring garden / VAH01 citrus, 17. coloring garden / VAH01 sea, 18. diamond mine / VAH02 sky, 19. four square / VAH04 lilac, 20. village path / VAH06 lilac, 21. forest hills / VAH03 sea, 22. baby bouquet / VAH07 dusk, 23. booth.5, 24. booth.2, 25. anna maria's booth 1

Size/quality isn't really doing it justice but I'm pooped! Visit the lovely people above who took the photos for better quality.

I'm also waiting waiting for the new Tanya Whelan Dolce line, so beautiful & I see that there's new Echino (1st couple of tiles above) on the way (back to linen/cotton, not double gauze, yay!) on the way. Do these amazingly talented women not realise that I have bills and am supposed to be saving my money?

Just starting out

I'm new to this blogging affair so when I set this up I just ambled on about the first fabric related thing that popped into my head. It never occured to me to write something vaguely introductory, in part because I don't really expect anybody else to read this and I was completely surprised when my link below was noticed - I didn't know that would happen! Anyway, I haven't sewn for about 6 years but have recently been inspired to start again by all of the incredibly beautiful fabrics available these days. My previous projects were mainly made with op-shop fabrics, with the occasional really good sheet or tablecloth find but nothing that compares to the lovely things that are just a click away now. I started by buying two small pieces of liberty and a tiny stash of echino as a birthday present for myself earlier this month but then placed two or three more orders over the next couple of weeks. I now have quite a nice little stash of my own and am waiting on 6 (!) metres of Anna Maria Horner fabric for bedroom curtains. I'm also sitting on my maxed-out credit card trying not to order up a whole passel of Amy Butler - I'm trying to convince myself that I need to stop ordering random fat quarters and actually plan some projects. I have made a few things, the first being the bird above, made with some Amy Butler faves from the pattern at Spool - it has some rough bits (like the tail) but I love it and it was fun to make. I also whipped up this little ipod holder & hiding next to it a little travel tissue cover.



I made a couple of silly mistakes and there's some ugly stitching that I'd like to fix but it's not too bad. I'm now 1/2 way through a knitting needle roll for a friend's birthday and my next challenge is getting up the courage to rotary cut some of my fabric into coins for my first ever machine quilting project.

What to do with Mr Owl?

I've got a fat quarter of Echino's Tiger on the Flower in natural with one complete owl (plus 3/4 of an owl, a tiger, a grey bird and a bee) that I'm still trying to decide what to do with. He's sitting on my mantle piece at the very front of my stash and is the last thing I see at night. I bought a red zipper at the markets for 50c to turn it into a nice big pencil case with room for lots of coloured pens and post-its etc but I also like the look of the Bend the Rules Sewing Artsy Clutch. This one with the Echino leopard looks amazing.
Still waiting for the book to arrive from the library so I guess I'll decide then - until then it's Mr. Owl looking at me from the mantle - I think I'll miss him when he's gone.