Pages

Wednesday 23 December 2009

Happy Christmas!!!

The binding on the last table runner was stitched down while watching Criminal Minds last night:



My bag is packed, Anton is fed, and all that is left is to do some last tidying up before I head out to my parents for white holidays:




Warm wishes for a very happy Christmas to everyone!!!


Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Tuesday 22 December 2009

Two down, one to go

My table runner production continues. I have finished two more over the last few days. One "romantic, old fashioned kitchen" runner with stars:



The white isn't as white as it appears in the pic, and there is a pale blue floral print on it. I have stippled the background, and done a four-hearts stencil in the centre of the stars. This is a pressie for someone - hope they will like it!

And another one of the "Runner in an Evening" I mentioned earlier my Mum had asked for; the grey/lilac one - and I'm still tempted to keep it *lol*:



The quilting on this one is the same as the first one I made. The third (and for now last) table runner is quilted and the binding is attached, but I have still to stitch it down in the back. I'll show a pic when it's all done.

Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Thursday 17 December 2009

Kjære nissen (Dear Santa)

Sorry for writing this letter in English, but if I don't your friends and helpers at the Fat Quarter Shop won't understand, and if they don't understand they won't pass on my wishes to you. I do apologise for not getting in touch for some time! It is not that I don't believe in you, but as you might have understood I have a very (un)healthy fear of men wearing masks! ...ok, they terrify me! Even your helper in my childhood home - bringing goodies from you - had me diving for cover under the dining table (and this despite I knew he really was the very nice boy next door you had sent over for my benefits). And as your helpers on the street, in shopping centres, in hospitals and everywhere else also cover their faces in plastic and false beards, I shy away.

But since your friends at the FQS have offered to do mail service and no false beards this time, I will crawl out of my hiding place and ask you to please bring me a Mill House Inn Layer Cake by Fig Tree to be made into a quilt of softness and comfort:

Or a Simple Abundance Jelly Roll by Bonnie & Camille for colour and brightness when the darkness of winter takes its toll.


I do promise I have been a very good girl this year! And I will do my best to stay out of mischief for the year to come!
Yours truly, Anne Ida

Wednesday 16 December 2009

Table runner(s)

My Mum has asked me to make a couple of table runners as birthday pressies, and of course I said yes (even knowing I have more than enough to sew at the moment). Two runner tops are on my ironing table at the moment - ready for pressing, layering and quilting. A third table runner for a friend who had a birthday yesterday was finished by this weekend:



The back (love that centre stencil!):



The pattern is "Løper på en kveld" (Runner in an evening) by AnnAKa, from Quiltemagasinet 5/09. The other two table runners I'm working on are the same pattern, one in brownish purples, and one in grey/lavender. Pondering keeping the grey/lavender one *lol* Show pics when they are done!

Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Thursday 10 December 2009

New Year's resolution 2009: reflections

Remember this post? In the beginning of January, Rose and I made a promise to ourselves and each other that for 2009 we were going to make what we love! We figured the UFO's weren't going anywhere, but we solemnly promised we wouldn't add anymore UFO's to the list. 2009 has been all about finishing whatever we wanted to start! So how has this been going? During this year I have started seven quilts (wow, is it really that many?):

1. The Sugar Camp Quilt
For me, this was the reason for the resolution in the first place; a deliberation whether to focus on WISPs and UFOs, or start something new. I hate to admit it, but this one is still at the "flimsy without border" stage - however I do still have hopes to finish it before the year is over! A little discipline!?!

2. Red & White Swap sampler
Wohoo! It was a lot of fun working on this one! The girls had done a fabulous job on the blocks! And I had a ball testing out my collection of quilt stencils and trying out different shapes in free motion quilting. The sign-up for this swap was in Dec. 2008, so not really sure if it should count… but the blocks weren’t sewn and swapped till January 2009, so I’ll let it ;o) FINISHED May 8th!!

3. Nanny Sharon's Picnic Quilt
A Threadbare Creations pattern I totally fell in love with when Rose published it back in October last year. It was a quick, easy and fun quilt to make! FINISHED May 24th!! Just in time for picnic season (it now have some tomato sauce and strawberry stains - shows it has been used *lol* - need a wash!)

4. Mini Bear's Paw
A reaction from doing those large quilts, I decided to make a mini - in four days ;o) FINISHED May 27th!

5. Sol's birthday quilt
This was started at DJ class with Hanne in March. This sampler was an experiment with blocks of different sizes - the smallest 4.5" and the largest12". FINISHED ehh... in time for her birthday July 29th!

6. Sister’s Choice jelly roll quilt
My oldest jelly roll was cut up in September - it was slow progress on this project, I was a bit un-inspired and I was spending my stitching time doing DJ blocks and working on some old WISPs. But this week I made the decision to get it done! I brought the binding to quilt guild last night, and I hand stitched quite a bit. Coming home I figured I was on a roll, so I spent a couple more hours on the sofa with needle and thread. And behold, it's FINISHED December 9th!



It has fleece on the back:



Not sure how much I enjoyed quilting fleece... So it's not very heavily quilted :o)

7. Carolina Christmas
This mystery was started in late November, and we are up to clue 5... I still have a little ways to go on step 4... I'm going to give myself a bit of leeway on this one - it is a huge quilt, and it has lots and lots of piecing... if I can get it finished in January I'll be happy!

Looking at my list of finishes I see I have been quite productive over this year, sewing smaller things in between these quilts. And if I can get the Sugar Camp Quilt finished by the new year - I will give myself a pat on the back and say "good girl" ;o)

Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Sunday 6 December 2009

Sewing Sunday

I'm back after a short but sweet visit to London :o) It was lovely to spend a couple of days with a good friend! She got me a belated birthday pressie, tickets to the theatre - we went to see Terry Pratchett's Nation at the National Theatre in London:

I'd say it's kind of a crossing between the story of Noah, the Gilgamesh Epos, and Robinson Crusoe - encompassing themes of death and nationhood, and some very Terry Pratchett elements, like a talking parrot with some rather naughty comments ;o)
**
I got back late last nigh/early this morning, and had a bit of a sleep in today. Getting up, rain and a dark grey sky greeted me. Not weather to be outdoors! So I have been spending my day with Bernie, finishing up the units for step 3 of Carolina Christmas mystery. All 192 of these strange looking units:
**

**
What on earth will they be used for? I have also a pile of 384 HST units stitched, ready to be pressed and trimmed to 2". These are all cut-offs from the units above, no way I'm throwing out that much fabric - there's the beginning of a whole new quilt here!
**

**
Woohoo! I'll go peek at step 4 now!!!
Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Wednesday 2 December 2009

Carolina Christmas continues

I have been cutting and stitching like mad the last few evenings - and having heaps of fun ;o) Bonnie's mystery has so many little pieces - loving it, but it takes lots of time and my back feels all those hours with Bernie. But step 1 and 2 are all done:



And I have cut all 784 pieces of step 3 - puh! And just barely started piecing...
**


That plaid in front is my Dad's shirt ;o) Six of the sets of 4 are done, but all these pieces are going to take time, especially since I double sew all the seams to get those 2" HSTs Bonnie talks about:



There will be a lot of these little guys - 48 of them so far. I can see a whole new quilt coming along here *lol*. I'm going to London for a couple of days, so I won't be able to get back to these till Sunday at the earliest. Have a great end of week!

Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Sunday 29 November 2009

Weekend quilting

Have you seen that Bonnie have posted part 1 and 2 of the Carolina Christmas mystery? When I saw she had posted the first part on Friday, I just had to start cutting and sewing, and around midnight I was done with the first step:
**

**
Fun, fun, fun!! But I had promised myself (and Rose) that I would quilt my Sister's Choice before doing part 2, and seeing Bonnie had said Sunday... well, Bernie and I have quilted like crazy for a couple of days:
**

**
And now the quilting is done:
**

**
The edges still have to be trimmed, and i have to do the binding, but I figure I will cut the binding and piece that in between all of Bonnie's triangles :o)

My friend Leisha Camden had some visitors from Japan over for a couple of days, and I invited them here for dinner last night - whale stew (yummy!), and home made caramel pudding for dessert (even more yummy!!) - and there is a little left over for me tonight - so today is quilting, not cooking!



Enjoy your first Sunday of Advent!
Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Thursday 26 November 2009

Rose's new pattern "Teen Dreams"

Ok, so you know I love Rose's designs! From time to time she gives me little sneak peeks at them while they are in progress ;o) Today she released her new pattern "Teen Dreams" - congratulations, sweetie! This is a gorgeous, funky quilt and two very pretty cushions in one pattern pack - a great pattern for beginners as well as those who are experienced quilters. I have been grumbling a lot about needing new cushions for my sofa - and when she showed me the cushions for this pattern, I just had to do a little pre-release sewing! So a transformation from this:



Ugh!! To this:



Pretty!! As you might see my flowers are a bit different from the pattern - a consequence of getting Bernie to work before I had a chance of getting my hands on Rose's templates. I have a feeling there might be a red-white-black version of the other as well, sooner or later :o)

Btw, Rose is having a giveaway of two copies of the new pattern - so pop over to Threadbare and leave her a comment!

Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Saturday 21 November 2009

This and that

At long last I have finished my scraps sorting project! Puh - hope it never will be this bad again (so she says now *lol*). I have saved squares 1", 1.5", and 2" (need a new box for that one), and in the tub to the far right are squares and strips 2.5".



Three plastic bags of trash - all of it pieces and strips smaller than 1"! In the scrap box were also some left over binding strips. A while back I read on a blog (sorry, can't remember which one) about saving these on a roll, and use them to bind scrap quilts. So taking the writer's advice I have dutifully pieced mine together and rolled them onto a TP tube, but obviously there were some of an older date in the box - they have now been added to the strips on the roll, but still need pressing in the joints before I can roll it up:



I have started some Xmas presents, not sure how much to show here, since I don't really know who will stop by and have a look ;o) But this is what Bernie and I have been doing today - we're about half finished:



And some mail box goodness - my copy of A Quilter's Holiday arrived today!

Looking forward to spending some time at Elm Creek Manor again - but I'll probably save it for the holidays ;o)

***
Helen Stubbings is having a new pattern out, a lovely quilt called "Life is Beautiful" - and in honor of it she is having a pattern pack giveaway:

Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Tuesday 17 November 2009

It's a mystery

It is a bit of mystery... I have been quilting for over 10 years and never done a mystery quilt! I have watched as mysteries have been solved in blogland, and I have loved a lot of the finished products - whether potholders, table toppers/runners, or quilts. More than once have I thought "Now why didn't I join in and do that?".

Rose and I chatted a bit when Bonnie at Quiltville started the "Double Delight" mystery back in January - Rose went ahead and ended up with a gorgeous quilt, I decided not to do it... How many times have I regretted that decision? So I made a promise to myself and to Rose that the next time Bonnie brought out a mystery, I would join in. Have you seen the announcement? The Carolina Christmas mystery quilt is starting on Friday, November 27th :o)

On a late night of no sleep because of road work (they should have been done by now!!!) I went through my stash and picked out these:



There are lots of smaller pieces here, and I'm not sure how far this is going to get me, but there's more where this came from. The 2.5" strips are from my scrap box! As you can see, except for the red, which I have replaced with blue, I'm going with the same colours as Bonnie. Blue is not a Christmas colour in my book so I'll have to come up with a fitting name for my quilt once I see what becomes of it :o)

Now I know Rose is planning to do this one very scrappy with lots of bits and pieces from old stash, and I know Beth already have her bright and funky fabrics picked out. Anyone else?

Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida
***
Btw. LeKa is having a fabulous giveaway in honor of having more than 30 000 hits on her blog, and passed 200 posts - way to go, girl :o)

Sunday 15 November 2009

New household member

Meet Anton - he is the new member of my household:



He is a very active and very cute little creature I'm sure will bring me lots of smiles in years to come :o) Just look at that adorable little face:


(pic by Leisha Camden)

***
And since this is a quilting blog... this is what I have been doing on the quilty front lately:



Chaos - hopefully soon to be order!! I guess it was plain madness to start sorting through that scrap box, but it didn't look like it would be all that much work! Well, at one point i was wondering if the fabric multiplied while I slept at night, sigh!. What I have done is sorting out all pieces larger than 3", and then cutting everything else into squares of 1", 1.5" and 2". The largest box is for strips and squares 2.5". I even found some orphan blocks in there, they now keep other orphans company in my WISP cupboard. The pic is from when I was about half way, and tere is still a couple of nights intensive work in there before I can see the bottom of the box.

Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Tuesday 10 November 2009

Shopping and sorting

I have been a bad girl and done some kind of heavy shopping. Some increadibly yummy Elm Creek Quilts fabrics by Red Rooster:



Aren't those browns just like a tasty bar of chocolate, and cream on the side? And the strips at the bottom are a dessert roll of Glacé fabrics from Moda.

I have also picked up a pile of patterns from Fig Tree quilts - all of which I some day want to make. The layout of these patterns is beautiful - each one is printed and stapled together like a little booklet:
*


The ones with the heading "Fresh Vintage" are actual booklets, there is the pattern for the quilt on the cover, and a few articles, some yummy recipes, som hints and tips. I have picked fabrics from my stash for a couple of these patterns, so when I have the time... sometime after New Year, perhaps :o)

My Tender Moments quilt is a work in very slow progress, but I have spent some time sorting through the patterns and the blocks I have already made:



They were all crammed together with the fabrics in the archive box (as you see it's stuffed enough with just the fabrics), but are now all in order in a binder, and hopefully it will help me keep track of my progress:



Hope everyone is having an enjoyable and creative week!
Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Friday 6 November 2009

Another small finish

Yes, I have done some quilting on my Sister's Choice, but it's rather heavy, so it have to be done in small portions. In between I have been doing a bit more stitchery. After I finished the little needlebook, I thought back and found I hadn't done any stitchery since the new year! And the last project I worked on was May Britt's Christmas Challenge for 2008 (yikes!!!). I found it half finished in my sewing basket, so what's a girl to do? FINISH IT!!! Now I have a little red and green heart to hang on the bathroom door in December:



I a lovely evening at Butterfly's last night, and I brought some hand sewing with me. Now I know the natural thing to bring would be another DJ block or two, but being in the stitchery mood, I figured, why not do a bit more work on my Tender Moments? I finished one of the little blocks last night (last stitches done on the train home):



Contrary to Rose's patterns I have decided to do the stitcheries in one colour - picking up my blue focus fabric. I hope this will turn out well :o)

Wishing everyone a wonderful weekend!
Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Wednesday 4 November 2009

A small finish

Remember my new year's resolution for 2009? It reads: I'll make what I love... and finish what I start. I solemnly promise I won't add anymore UFO's to my list! 2009 is all about finishing whatever I want to start! Looking at my list of WISPs, there are two quilts I started this year I should finish before we write 2010: the Sugar Camp Quilt and the Sister's Choice. The first is still at the "the blocks are done" stage, and need some serious focusing, but the second should be done in just a few hours work - priority no. 1 over the next evenings!!! I'd also like to finish the Flannel Stars, but this was a project started in 2008 (or was it 2007?), so I won't feel too bad about leaving it for a while ;o)

So even though I have more than enough to keep my fingers busy, I have been needing something I could finish quickly. When I got my hands on the pattern for this little needlebook I just had to make it:
**


Cute, right? It's a Gail Pan design, I used my favorite fabrics from the Cross Country Quilter's collection by RedRooster for the cover and pocket - and some Moda for the lining. I'm very happy with it - and can't wait to start using it :o) See the scissors in the second pic - I got them from my friend K for my birthday - aren't they pretty?

Now back to those quilts! Hopefully I can show a large finish soon.
Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Monday 2 November 2009

Inspiration

Our LQS Kathrine's Quilte Stue sometimes arrange inspiration events, and tonight the talk was by very talented designer Lynette Anderson, visiting all the way from Australia.

She presented a beautiful trunk show, and a power point presentation on her work and inspiration. I did take some pictures at the beginning of the trunk show, but in the end I just let my camera lay still, and just sat back and enjoyed!







I even went home with a door prize! I won a copy of Lynette's new book "Gathering of Crows", and she even signed it for me :o)
**

**
It was a truly inspirational evening, and it was lovely too see so many fellow quilters and quilt bloggers.
Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida

Saturday 31 October 2009

Progress and a mile stone

Can't believe it's been more than a week since my last post. I don't have too much to show, but I have made a little progress on the flannel star quilt:



The sashing and cornerstones are all sewn, and I have started piecing the border.
*_


Not really sure how this border is going to turn out, but I'm an optimist :o)
***
I have reached the 50 block milestone on my DJ - counting the three blocks of this week, my tally is now 51:


_-
Wohoo!! Have a great weekend!!
Hugs and stitches from
Anne Ida