Author's Album Blocks

Hard to believe it's been way over a week since my last post - main reason: I haven't sewn a stitch in ages, and those pictures I talked about in my previous post I still haven't sorted through. But I thought I'd share some signature blocks I worked on this summer, and who are now traveling around the world:



These are blocks for a swap with the SBS-and-other-Elm-Creek-Quilts yahoo group from a pattern in Jennifer Chiaverini's pattern book More Elm Creek Quilts.. They were very fiddly to get to the right size, and some of them are a hair off, but I hope the girls won't have any trouble sewing the block they receive into their quilts. The stipulation was 8" blocks made using Kona Cotton Cream and a Civil War reproduction of choice. I used a fabric from Windham's Gettysburg Civil War VIII line.



Debbie, who is the swap hostess, kindly shared a picture of the blocks she received from all who participated before she sent them out. Since the blocks are still en-route between the US and Norway, I have "borrowed" her pic to share. Looks great doesn't it? This will be a very pretty quilt! Can hardly wait for my block package to arrive :-)

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Akershus castle by night

Culture night in Oslo tonight and we have had a lovely time starting at farmer's market, seeing the palace chapel, the annual autumn art exhibition, a short fjord cruise, hot chocolate at the peace center and fireworks at the warf. I'll sort through my pictures and share some of my impressions one of these days. This is the last picture I was able to take before power ran out on my camera, and since this camera really doesn't perform well in dim light, I'm positively surprised. And the white "blob" is actually the moon :-)

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

Bogstad gård

As mentioned in my previous post I thought I'd share some of the pictures I took at Bogstad gård. It is a beautiful and historic site and well worth a visit if you are in Oslo. They offer tours of the manor house during the summer, but we didn't go inside this time.



In the years from mid 1600s to the mid 1900s Bogstad was the center of a large corporation, consisting of thousands of acres of wood, three blast furnaces, many sawmills and other businesses. The manor house was the family home, while it was the administration center and entertainment facilities for the company.



The owners were central in Norwegian politics, among them Peder Anker, the first Norwegian prime minister after the end of the union with Denmark in 1814, and his son in-law count Herman Wedel-Jarlsberg.



Leisha beside the courtyard fountain



Bogstad surrounded by one of our oldest English landscape parks, this is today a popular recreation area



Some of the younger maple trees has started to turn yellow



The last of the summer flowers

These were quite small, and such a lovely shade of purple

*

We walked back to the tube station rather than wait for the buss, and turning back when we had walked a bit around the lake this was our view

A lovely place to visit :-)
Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Saturday inspiration

Yesterday was a beautiful warm and sunny day here in Oslo, and my friend Leisha and I spent the day at the beautiful and historic Bogstad Manor. Our main reason for going was to see this:

Kirsti Hovland is such a talented fabric artist! The exhibition covers the development of writing from stone age to modern computer age. She has dyed and printed most of the fabrics herself to get the look of stone, wood and metal, and the execution of the quilts are so wonderful! She has also If you live within traveling distance of Bogstad, you should definitely go have a look! There is so much to look at, but here's a peek at my favorite pieces. 

This is a series of six small quilts showing the timeline she has covered - and it was so beautiful,and detailed 

This quilt was inspired by the petroglyphs in the area around Alta in Northern Norway (see the northern light in the borders?) - and one of my two top favorites 

Bronze age - love the combination of those strict lines in the piecing and the soft contours of the appliqué

This is the quilt I kept going back to - I have always had a soft spot for the Thousands of Pyramids pattern (never sewed it, though!), and I just loved the combination of an easily recognizable quilt pattern with the older Futhark (rune alphabet) appliqued as a border. And I love those little bursts of colured pieces of fabric in the binding 

Here's a quilt that probably don't need an explanation - isn't it amazing how easily recognizable the stem of a viking ship is? And I love the combination of the "wood carving" cable and the younger Futhark in the borders

Medieval writing on vellum - you can just feel the texture of it :-)

A jump to more modern time - isn't this one fun? - newspapers on news print

And this contemporary series in black/grey/green - so much fun

I say it again - if you can go see this, DO! It's open for another week. I also took lots of pictures at the manor and farm - will share those in my next post :-) Wishing everyone a wonderful Sunday!

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

"Elm Creek stuff"

The SBS-And-Other-Elm-Creek-Quilts yahoo group is starting up another quilt-along from Jennifer Chiaverini's pattern book More Elm Creek Quilts. This time around we are doing Mill Girls



This is another great quilt to clear up in your scrap box, so if you want to join in the fun, get your hands on the book and pop over to the yahoo-group and sign up :-) The starting date is October 14th and we will officially keep going for 9 weeks, but of course you can sew at your own speed.

Mary is having a wonderful giveaway on her blog - so if you want a chance to win a copy of the two upcoming Elm Creek books (one novel one pattern book), pop over to Mary's blog Quiltin' Grandma

Wishing everyone a great weekend!

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Christmas Greetings From Elm Creek Manor - September

This weekend I finally found some time to sit down at the sewing machine and finished up some swap blocks (I'll share those later), and I managed to get this month's block of our BOM Christmas Greetings from Elm Creek Manor done - this is Star of Bethlehem:

Anyone remembering the block for April (or scroll down to the next picture *lol*) will see this has the same construction as the Star of the Magi block - but I had some trouble getting this one together - for some reason the points didn't want to line up properly, it turned out a tad on the large side, and there are some strange pressing lines. But at one point I had to say enough is enough, and this was the best it would be, and hopefully I can adjust the setting for the blocks to compensate for the bit it is off size. 

And once I was at it I just had to pull the other blocks out of the drawer and lay them out together just to see what they looked like

Can't believe we're half way though this BOM already - seems like we started just last week!

Happy week, everyone!
Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Still here...

Just been busy doing other things than spending time with Bernie. So till I have something quilty to show, please enjoy this pic of evening at the parking lot at the Nordic Ark ;-)
Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida