Final block (block 20) of Civil War Bride Quilt

Finally completed the last block of my quilt ! 

 



It has been nearly two years, although I have done many other projects at the same time.

I'm still planning to do an applique border and eventually will have it quilted.



 

  

I had some visitors in my garden to keep me company with their magnificient appearance...

 

Sometimes the dog scared them away so they still kept me company from the safety of the trees...

 



Now that the weather is so much better, I have been dividing my time between quilting and gardening. This past weekend, I planted some vegetables and other plants. 

Some more beautiful roses from my garden...

 

 

Corded Fabric Bowl

Something quick and fun I made today...
Based on the techniques from the books "It's a Wrap" by Susan Breier.
It starts with strips of fabric and cotton cord..

And it turns out like this....

I used just one piece of fabric.

 

The bowl below I made a couple of years ago with thinner coils.

I used a braid I purchased on my trip to Canada and I love the way it turned out.

It's full of charm pack squares.

 

 

  

More inspiration from my garden.... 

We can't beat nature on perfection !

Funky Quilt

When I completed this quilt top today, the word came into my head to name this quilt was ...

funk·y/ˈfəNGkē/

Adjective:

(of music) Having or using a strong dance rhythm, in particular that of funk: "some excellent funky beats". Modern and stylish in an unconventional or striking way: "she likes wearing funky clothes".



 

The fabrics and pattern came from a kit I ordered from Connecting Threads earlier in the year and this week I was in the mood for quick piecing...

 

One evening I cut up all the pieces...

 

Another time I arranged all the pieces that make up the blocks...



And this morning I was ready to sew them all together...
Being a public holiday today I'm giving myself a quilting day...

And this is the quilt top done !!!

 

And since I hear music in my head, here is a picture I recently took when I saw Dave Koz and Brian Culbertson performing live...



And this is a taste of their music.....

Civil War Bride - block 19

 

This is all I have completed to show for this week. The original pattern does not have a groom, so I designed my own.

I'm getting to the stage that all I want is to complete the top as soon as possible, which was the biggest goal I set for myself for 2012.



 

Civil War Bride - block 18

I haven't completed many projects, mainly due to work commitments and hand-applique is not something you can rush.

But I have completed my 18th block for the Civil War quilt.  Two more blocks and the border to go.  Would love to finish it by the end of the year... We'll see.

 

 

These are the blocks I have completed so far.  I am happy how they have turned out and when they get assembled it will make a beautiful heirloom quilt.

 For a bit of fun I cut out this wall hanging which need to be blanket stitched..
 

 I just love the beautiful roses blooming in the garden at the moment.  This one almost doesn't look real!

These flowers, commonly known as Pigface, are just about everywhere in people's garden including mine.

 

Signatures Quilt

After coming back from my cruise  I used up the signatures I gathered from the artists to make up this memory quilt for me.

 

 

All the fabrics are music themed, the same ones I used for Dave Koz quilt. 

 

 

 

This is a close-up of one of the blocks, Elan Trotman.

 

 

My first yellow rose for the season...

 

 

 

 And another of my favourite variegated roses ...
 

Double bloom ....

And now for some music...
I saw Paul Brown and Marc Antoine perform this song on the cruise...such fun.

Smooth Jazz and Quilting

For those who follow me on a regular basis, it's clear that Smooth Jazz and Quilting are my passions.  At every opportunity I get, I indulge on these two activities.

Recently I combined these two persuits. I made a quilt for Dave Koz to celebrate the cruise I attended with him and many other of my favourite smooth jazz artists.

 

 He was delighted with the quilt and agreed to have a photo taken with myself and the quilt.

This is a close-up of the quilt... I used a variety of techniques from machine applique, piecing and hand embroidery. I added fotos of Dave and the circular blocks are a representation of his released albums.

 All the fabrics used are music themed including the back of the quilt.

Before the cruise I visited Portugal and discovered this small shop called Loja do Sr Jacinto 
in Caldas da Rainha (appr. 80 kms north of Lisbon).

 It's an old fashion looking store and I believe it has been there for many, many years.

I was looking for "chitas de Alcobaca" which is a portuguese cotton fabric with bright and specific designs which include stripes.  These are the ones I purchased.

Silvia at the store, tempted me with some of her button collection and I could not resist....
  

 The foto also shows the thimbles and pins I managed to collect during this trip.

But the highlight of the quilting part of the holiday, was to meet face to face my quilting/blog friend Teresa Teresa in Lisbon. 

 

We spoke for hours and I promised to visit her again ....

Here are some photos of some of the places I visited in Italy, France and Spain...

Amalfi Coast:

The Vatican:

Pisa:

Palacio da Pena in Sintra, Portugal:

Monserrate Palace, near Sintra (Portugal) which was an exotic palatial villa, the traditional summer resort for the Portuguese court.

Applique Vases Quilt & my Travels

Finally finished this quilt top !!! 

I began it in a class many years ago and everyone in the class made theirs using Civil War prints but I opted for brights.  At that time, it wasn't so popular using these types of prints like it is now but I wanted to do something different and add to my fabric stash these colours and designs.  I used needleturn applique and a bit of embroidery.

The vases are in black and white to tie the theme together as well as using polka dot fabrics.

I wanted to keep it simple so I just added applique vines on two opposite sides in the border.

And this is the completed top.

I am going to put it aside for now and may consider doing more applique.  

Do you think it needs more applique ?

And now for what I have been planning for over a year....

I'm going to be doing my first Smooth Jazz cruise. We leave Australia later this week to fly to UK, Scotland and Lisbon to see some of our family and friends and then my cousin and I (husband and daughter not coming) are boarding the ship in Barcelona....

This is a dream of a lifetime to visit some of the most historic European cities in the Mediterranean and enjoy the music as well as hanging out with some of my favourite smooth Jazz artists.

David Koz - Mediterranean cruise 

 

More Journal Covers and Baby Quilt

"...  A dream is a wish your heart makes..."

Wanted to use up fabrics from a pre-cut so made 3 more journal covers with ceramic buttons. I'll keep one for myself and the rest will be gifts.

Made this quilt for a recently born baby girl, to give to a fellow worker tomorrow. All the fabrics came from my stash.
It was a very quick project because all the cutting of the 5" squares were done on the GO Quilting cuter machine.

The technique I used was Disappearing Nine Patch.  The center square of the Nine Patch is the red fabrics on all the blocks with the 4 squares of the sashing fabrics on the same position in the block. Because the block is cut in the center to yield 4 separate blocks, there is no need to plan the fabric choices of the novelty prints on the Nine Patch block, so it;s a very fast quilt to put together.

 

I have a lot of novelty prints so it was fun to play with them again. Still plenty left for more projects.

What's growing in my garden...

Spring is coming soon although it will still be cool with rain and wind, I'm happy for the color.

Pansies... 

 

Flowering Cherry...

Daffodils (/Narcissus)...