So Excited

Well not much on the quilting front, I did get to play a little today on the small kit I picked up at a quilt show earlier this year. Isn't it cute? Thought this would be a nice way to try working with wool, and on my stitching.

I had to do some house work as my mum arrives tomorrow (just looked at the clock today). I am so exited. It is the first time she has been to Canada. So much I want to show her. Have a few road trips planned, these will include a couple of quilt shops.

She is also a quilter, she made her first quilt when I was 15. They is one big difference, she does all her quilts by hand, every part of the quilt, piecing, applique, quilting. I have a few quilts she made, I will need to take photo of them to share. On the other hand do as much as I can by machine. I think I will see if she can help me a bit with my hand work.

I will try to kept my blog up while she here, but no promises :)

Last 6 Blocks

Have not done much quilting this week, I have been reading. Decided I wanted to do something easy tonight, so I completed the last 6 Australian Log cabin blocks.

I was asked why I called this my Australian Log cabin. Beside all the Aussie animals in the center of the log cabins, all the fabric on the dark side are Australian print, mostly aboriginal prints, with a few flora and fauna added to the mix. Most of these fabrics were a gift from my mother, I did add a few just for more variety.

Stack'N'Whack

I finished this today, almost melted with it on my lap while I did the hand sewing on the binding. It didn't help that when the cats saw me they thought it was a nice place to curl up and have a nice nap. I don't think it is possible to bind a quilt without a cat "helping". Here is the back.

This will most likely be a Christmas gift for a friend, she has wanted a quilt since I stared quilting, this is the first one that the colours say her to me.

Pay it Forward

I have signed up on Jodie from Quilting in Paradise blog for her pay it forward. Basically she will send a handmade gift to the first three people to leave a comment on her post.

As I signed up with her, I now will do the same thing. I would like to offer a handmade gift to the first 3 people who sign up. Perhaps you could advise your colour preferences, I like as much info as possible, and also make sure I can get onto your email address from your comment! Then all you need to do is make the same offer on your blog!

Sound like fun :)

Note added on 26th of July:
To play, I will need to be able to contact you to obtain your snail mail address.

Nice Weekend

Every now and then I have a really nice weekend, and this was one of them. On Saturday morning headed a little way out of town to a little quilts show. Such a lovely setting.

The show is put on by Country Creations, it's quite a small show, only takes a couple of hours to view but very enjoyable. Here is one of the quilts that caught my eye. I nearly purchased the kit, but I was a good girl.

On Sunday we headed out to the mountains for the day, went to Johnston canyon. This has a walkway up a canyon to some waterfalls. Its about half and hour to the lower falls.

There is a small cave where you can get up close to the falls. It's about another half hour to get to the upper falls (unless like me you decided that a bathroom break is required, and have to go back down to the base before going back up). You can view the upper falls from a platform over the water.

It was lovely and cool by the water, was surprising how much warmer the city was when we got back. One last picture, here is a section of the walkway, not all of it was catwalks, only where the canyon is to narrow for a path.

Happy Day

The carpet in, my stuff has been moved, and I have a sewing area again. I still have more stuff to put away, but happy day. The sewing area is in this corner, the love seat is facing the TV and there is storage (and a freezer) around the room. The only thing I want to add right now is a better storage unit. I was a little smart and left a space for when I can get it. I don't think the sewing area will stay this tidy very long.

Sheba Update

Thanks for everyone checking to see how Sheba is, it looks like she is going to make a full recovery. She did give use a bit of a scare. She lost a pond, and she was only 7 to begin with. After a few days trying to nurse her back to health, we got up and when to check on her, and she strolled out of the room with her tail in the air and headed to breakfast with the other cats. This is her this evening, its hard to tell in the photo (hard to get a good photo of a black cat) she is looking back to normal.

I still can't get in my sewing room, was hoping it would be today, the carpeting is taking longer than expected, the guy installing it doesn't seem to be in a hurry, glad we are paying for the job and not by the hour.

This is a photo of the back to the stack'n'wack in progress, I was trying to use up the left overs from the front. I finished it up by adding a blue fabric with black printing that I had picked up at a quilters' garage sale.

Sewing room

I didn't get as far on the quilting of the stack'n'wack as I had hoped, decided to outline the leaves in the border fabric, and it is taking longer that what I was originally thinking of doing. I did get three sides done when the thread started knotting, rethreaded the machine, but when it still did it, I decided it was time for bed.

I would have got it done today but I had to pack up my sewing room, as we are having carpet put in the basement on Monday. I was going to keep a few things out to do, but not sure where they ended up. At the moment the only room with flooring in the basement was the small bedroom I was using as a sewing room, the rest is concrete. Once it's all done, my stuff will be set up in the bigger room. I will have to share with the second sitting and TV area (so sad).

I also thought I would share a picture of my first quilt, this was made at a weekend class at Freckles. They still offer this class, it was great. After the two days you walked out only having to finish the binding. I like the idea of this, for a beginner class. It is a nice store, a bit more country than I tend to be, but I can always seem to find something to buy there LOL. It is the only quilt shop I can make it to over lunch when I'm at work.

Thanks for the comments about Sheba. She is doing better, but still has a way to go.

Sick cat

Woke up yesterday morning to find that I have one sick cat. This is my oldest cat, Sheba, we think she is thirteen, I picked her up at the local shelter 11 years ago, along with her 3 week old kitten (Max). She has been to the vet, and has been tested, a lot of the worse things have been ruled out, she is going back again tomorrow for more tests. She should be OK, but this has been quite stressful. She has a very sweat nature, but at the moment she just wants to be left alone.

Stack'n'whack quilting

Made the most of DH being away for the weekend, and started quilting my stack'n'whack quilt.

This is the third one I have made, used a different pattern than the other two. The small guild I belong to was doing this as a group, and I had the main fabric in my stash. I have quite a small stash by quilting standards, so just the fact that I had the fabric to do it, and it wasn't earmarked for anything else, was a sign that this was the project it was destined for. I will only have small scraps left by the time I do the binding.

I was surprised at how far I got on it. I stitched in the ditch around the stars in the center,

and filled the background in with free-motion leaves. I am pleased with how they turned out. I think this worked well with the soft leaves in the fabric. The best part was how easy they were. Here is a close up of some of the leaf quilting, hopefully you can see it in the photo.

I am not very confident when it comes to doing the quilting, although I am getting better at it. This was quite fun today. Now I just have the boarder left to quilt. Not sure what I am going to do in there. Was thinking about doing leaves, before I did them in the background. I still might :)

Did have something happen that I have not seen before, just finished winding a bobbin, and was taking it off the bobbin winder, when the bobbin snapped in half, and the thread went every where. Looked like a mat of hair. So it may be time to pick up some more bobbins.

I am hoping to finish the quilting on the boarder, and have the binding put on this week, as next weekend I need to pack up the sewing room, as we are having new flooring put in the basement. Hope I have time, as this is a busy week for me. Will kept you posted on how far I get. You never know I may get distracted again. LOL