Stay Home Round Robin and Journal Quilt

I've just realised I didn't show you the next stage of my piece for Kate North's Stay Home Round Robin which I completed last week.

The instruction for this month was to add a strip 9" x 3".  I have continued with the theme of the red/orange batik but couldn't find anymore of the dark blue fabric.  Luckily I found the blue chrysanthemum fabric and decided that would work.  Some of the girls have been including circles in their pieces but I didn't feel brave enough to give them a go yet so I decided to balance the curved lines of the right hand side with very slightly curved horizontal lines in this strip which I added on the left.  I am really enjoying following this Round Robin and it feels less scary than working on somebody else's piece, although that would be a fun challenge sometime.

Yesterday I decided it was high time I got on with my Contemporary Quilt Group Journal Quilt for September.  Just running a little behind!

This is called "Scrap Happy" and it is what its title suggests.  I raided my scrap bags and only used fabric I found in them.  I used the 'mile a minute' technique (mostly) and was surprised to find enough matching pieces to do the repeats.  The backing, which you can't see, came from an offcut from an old embroidered tablecloth.  I now have three more to do, hopefully before the end of November so that they don't get lost in the lead up to Christmas. (Oops! Sorry, I mentioned the 'C' word again!)

Now for some really good news!  My friend Grace is home at last!  Her leg is healing well and she is getting about on two sticks.  She has carers going in but she is able to potter about fairly happily.  I would like to thank everyone for their messages of support and good wishes. :o)

Mamma Mia! I did it!

Yay! I finally got to see Mamma Mia! What a fantastic film! It definitely lived up to all the publicity and to everyone's enthusiasm. It had everything! Abba music, beautiful scenery, colourful (and how) costumes and backdrops, Colin Firth (!), a great spirit, lots of laughs a few tears (from me - what a softie!) and a happy ending! Magic! I can't wait to see it again.

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I didn't think I would be able to do it but your faith and encouragement spurred me on and........I did it! The mile a minute bag is finished! Just in time for the Festival of Quilts!

What do you think? This is the first bag I've ever made. If I tell you the blocks are approx. 4 inches square you will have a rough idea of the size. I had the option of backing it with Timtex but I chose to use a lightweight wadding type fabric for the interlining as it would be easier to sew (apparently). I think another time I would use a stiffer lining as it's very floppy. The actual lining is a lovely bright red from the fabric I dyed last week.

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I am absolutely delighted (and exhausted!) to have completed this project in a week so I will be showing it off tomorrow ;o)). If you're going to the Festival of Quilts have a great time. I'll be back with lots of pics!!

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Have you noticed there are a lot of exclamation marks in this post? I think I'm a bit excited!!!!!

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PS Apologies to Gina for "borrowing" her Mamma Mia picture.

Mile a Minute

A couple of days ago I said I would post some details of how to go about making a "mile a minute" patchwork block. I can't pretend that this is a tutorial as I am not a patchworker and I have only done this the once (well, twice if you count making this post) but I will just describe how we did it.

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The first step is to cut your fabric into strips. The beauty of this method is that there are no rules, no measurements to worry about except making sure you have a minimum seam allowance of 1/8th inch. You don't have to worry about cuttuing in a straight line particularly, the blocks look great if the angles are all different. Variety is the spice of life!

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OK. Take your first strip and cut that into sections, say 1.5 to 2 inches wide. Take a second strip and sew the small blocks to it as shown below.

Place the stitched strip on the ironing board wrong side down and press the full strip up, then cut through the strip as shown below, using the line from the original block.

Take the block of 2 pieces and stitch that to a new strip and repeat the ironing and cutting (Are you with me so far?)

The photograph below shows you the ironing process when the fifth strip has been machined.

You continue to add the accumulated block to new strips until you are approaching the size you finally want.

I found that my block was looking a bit square so I cut the sides off at a bit of an angle as I prefer it to look a bit haphazard.

I have included the photo above to clarify how the growing block is stitched to the next strip.

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Once the block is near the required size you can use a template and a square (not sure what that's called) to check the size. You can turn the block in any way to find the area you want to use. It may be necessary at this stage to add a piece to one edge if the size or shape isn't quite there.

Finally, you use your square-thingy and a rotary cutter to square the block up and cut it to size, in this case 4.5 inches.

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Your block will not necessarily ever look like mine as you build the sides up as you wish and not in any particular order. Mine does have a bit of a pattern to it but that is unintentional. Once you've made the number of blocks you need you can make anything you wish. This is also a great way to use up all those odd scraps of fabric you've been hoarding. You can also cut up plenty of strips in advance and then have a good blast at making up blocks.

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I've got a feeling that is all as clear as mud but I am a beginner so you'll have to excuse me! As long as you follow the principal that anything goes you can just have fun!

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I've almost finished my bag so I'll hopefully show you tomorrow! Yay!

Modems, dyeing and blocks

The last few days have been pretty hectic, I'll tell you why in a minute. First of all I have to thank my brother for the fact that I can be on the computer at all today. Our ISP, in their wisdom, offered me an upgrade a couple of weeks ago and, without thinking about it too much, I agreed. That was the easy bit. The hard part was installing a new modem and setting up the wireless bit for the laptop! I knew it was going to be beyond me and fortunately my brother offered to come over and sort it all out for us. Today was the day - pretty lucky really because I only asked him this morning and he rang up just before lunch to say he was on his way! I think he might have regretted it.....it took ages to get the kinks out of my laptop! Actually, don't tell him, it was just my way of getting him to stay a bit longer lol!! I have to apologise to my sister-in-law though. She was hoping to go to the local Superstore but they ran out of time. Sorry C! (I was a bit slow there. Us girls could have gone shopping and left the guys to it!!) Anyway, thank you very much D for sorting us out, again! :o)

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The last two days I've been to a workshop at the sewing shop in town. Unfortunately the course was so hectic that I didn't get chance to take many photos. On Thursday we were dyeing fabric using Procion dyes. I don't expect to be massively into dyeing but I wanted to learn a bit about it to try and de-mystify the process. The only photo I managed to take was of the fabric sitting in all of the bags "cooking".

As you can see I worked with colours I don't tend to use normally. The whole process was really quite simple and was done in a dye run so that all the amounts were controlled so that there was a smooth colour run from yellow through orange to magenta. We started with 7 bags, each prepared individually and the fabric put in with the dye, salt solution, soda solution and water and the bag sealed before the next bag was filled. As we wanted a random dye, not a flat colour, we tried not to handle the fabric too much, just tipped the bag to make sure it was all wetted. Once the fabric had been in the bag for about 2 hours we put a second piece in, expecting to get a lighter effect.

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After a minimum period of 4 hours a lot of rinsing, washing and more rinsing followed and eventually, once dried and ironed, the beauty of the fabric was revealed:

I am really pleased with the gorgeous colours and marks in this cotton which was the first batch.

The second batch are much softer and more in the pastel range but are equally lovely. (You may have noticed that I had 8 bags - I used up the left over dye on the final 2 pieces of cotton). I have to say, if I do this at home I will probably spread the process over a couple of days as it was exhausting doing it all at once. You can actually leave cotton overnight in the dye and it won't come to any harm. Also you can make up the salt and soda solutions in advance and they will keep.

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Yesterday we went back for day 2 which was to make use of the dyed fabric. Thursday was a steep learning curve but yesterday was even steeper! The idea was to use the fabric to make a bag or wall hanging. The technique we are using is "Mile a Minute" blocks. I am not a patchworker so I hadn't a clue what this was. I know now! Fortunately it's a great method of piecing blocks! No accuracy required, no measuring just lots of strips cut and sewn. I think I'll try and put the whole process on here in a day or two as I'm still working on it but here's a glimpse of blocks in progress till then for those of you who aren't familiar with "mile a minute".

It's a bit like sewing bunting. The red square is the central square. You gradually build up the blocks till you reach the size you want (in this case 4.5 inch squares). As you can see they all grow in different shapes. Conformity comes when you square the blocks off and cut to size.

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I'm aiming for a bag, if I can remember how to do it. I had to leave early so had 2 hours of tuition in 10 minutes! I've given myself the goal of having it made for the Festival of Quilts on Thursday! It'll never happen! lol