Braid Table Runner

I needed a break from my spinner blocks, and decided to play a bit with my mini Hex 'n More ruler. The pieces for the braid is cut from 1.5" strips from my scrap box. The inner border is a 1" strip, and the outer border is 2.5" wide.

I had myself convinced that I would only need two strips wof for the binding - my mistake! I ended up with a gap of about 2" and had to attach a small piece in between. But I don't think anyone will notice the extra seam

The table runner was started on July 28th and finished on the 29th. The finished runner measures 11"x33", a good size for my kitchen table.

The quilting on it is inspired by this tutorial video by Angela Walters

I still have heaps of practice to do to get my flowers even in shape and spacing, but I'm pleased with the over all look of the runner. 

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Some "Spinner" Progress

Playing with my Spinner blocks this week - hope I can make quite some progress on this project

More blocks are on the go - having heaps of fun with these

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

FNwF - Spinning Nostalgia

Still trying to bust some stash. Over the years I have accumulated quite a collection of pre-cuts. Not sure how old some of the jelly rolls, honey buns etc are... So the other night, after finishing the little Gazebo mat, I pulled out my large Hex 'n More ruler and a jelly roll of Nostalgia by April Cornell and started cutting:

Tonight some of the blocks have started to come together - think this will be a cute one:

Linking up with Cheryll over at Gone stitchin' and Friday Night with Friends. It's so much fun to sew in this virtual bee, knowing that there are people all over the world participating :-) Going blog hopping over the weekend!

 

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Mini Gazebo - Using Some Scraps

Last night while sorting through a box of scraps my Mini Hex'n More ruler turned up. And I just had to play with it for a little while!  So I grabbed my little cutting mat and my small rotary cutter and some tiny scraps and started cutting:

I have been drooling over Jaybird Quilts' Gazebo pattern for a while, and that is what came to mind when I found the mini ruler. The original table topper is made from 2,5" strips and using the large ruler, so I had to down scale it for my little project and my small scraps.

The pattern looks so complicated, but it's actually quite easy do do. It all came together in just a couple of hours. The binding went on this morning - and I'm very pleased with how it turned out! 6" hexagon is the perfect size as a candle mat.

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Slow Sunday Stitching

Over the last week I have made a little bit of progress on my blue and cream epp stars. The six little stars are finished, the large center star is done, and I have started to put them all together

Hopefully I will be able to make a little bit more progress on this project today, and perhaps prepare the triangles to go between the little stars, and the diamonds to go around the edge.

Block #11 of Triangle Gatherings was posted on Friday night, and I managed to put it together between the basting of Park Bench yesterday

My neck is a bit stiff after machine quilting on my Park Bench yesterday, so I'm realizing it will be a very slow progress. There are 15 blocks in the quilt + the dividing diamonds, I'll be happy if I can get one block and one diamonds quilted pr week - this will still mean I should have the quilt ready for summer heat :-)

Also making a little progress on my pink jumper - 1/3 of the first sleeve:

Linking up with Kathy and all the slow Sunday stitchers - pop on over and see what everyone is up to!

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Quilting Park Bench

This morning I crawled on my hands and knees basting my Park Bench quilt. The quilt top measures aprox 63"x88", so it was a tiny bit of a workout getting the layers together.

I bought some bamboo batting a while back and I'm excited  to see how that will turn out in the quilt. For my backing I have a cream and light green toile of a Japanese garden.

This afternoon I have started to quilt it - I'm playing with some free motion motif quilting, hopefully I will do something different in each of the blocks. So it will take me some time to do, but I'm thinking I'll have lots of fun playing with it.

Wishing blogland a great weekend!
Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Return of the Park Bench

Yikes! I knew I have quite a few WISPs and UFOs and that some of them have been laying there for a long time. But as I pulled out my Park Bench blocks this morning I discovered I haven't worked on this quilt since May 2014 - I had no idea it had been so long!

So the goal of the day was to get the top together - and I got it done!!!

Two of the rows were already put together, so starting today I had three rows to go + sewing the five rows together. It has taken me most of the day, and it's far from perfect, but I'm so happy to have the top sewn together. Backing is in my stash, and I think I have batting for it as well. Hopefully I'll have s summer quilt ready by the time the weather gets warm :-)


Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench: Rows 1 and 2

Making oh soooo slow progress putting my Park Bench top together. Two down,
three to go :-)
Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - the first row

My Park Bench quilt top is slowly coming together. I have layed out all my blocks, and done a little shuffling around to distribute the colours to the best to my ability. The firsts row is now pieced together:

And hopefully the rest of them will follow shortly :-)
From a beauiful sunny Sunday in Oslo,
Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - Block 8: Stoll

The final block is Stroll and I just love this one! Notice the similarities to block 7? The only difference is the strip pieced diamond for the star.

And I just love how it makes the star look kind if swirly like a whirly-gig and at the same time has retained it's "star quality". Almost a shame there's only one of this block is required for the quilt ;-)

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - Block 3: Hopscotch...again.. and again!

Seeing the blocks for my Park Bench quilt coming together I have become less and less happy with how my Hopscotch blocks turned out. Remember my previous ones? The contrast isn't all that good, and the stripe fabric makes the blocks look messy. For my second attempt I included a pale pink polkadot and scrappy reds. While these blocks have a cleaner look, the star points are lost and it kind of look like some sort of hexie flower. AND that pink really clashes with all the other fabrics I have used. It didn't look too bad when I auditioned the fabric, but once I put these next to the other blocks it looks flat and out of place

Soooo... I decided to do a third version... And this one I'm quite happy with. However Hopscotch will probably never be my favorite block :-)

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - Block 7: First Date

Starting to see the finish line with the blocks for Park Bench, only one block to go. These First Date blocks were lots of fun to do! There's quite a lot of piecing - 42 pieces pr block - and they came together so smoothly!

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - Blocks 5: Festival and 6: Card Game

I have made a little bit more progress on my Park Bench quilt. These are probably my favorite blocks in the quilt. A lot of piecing and also some frogstitching to get the placement right on the Festival block, love how the triangles intertwine on it.

The Card Game block came together really smoothly, and I just love the look of it! Feeling my fingers itch to make more of these blocks. This is the same block that's in Jaybird Quilts Night Sky quilt... hmmmm... thinking here ;-)

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - Block 4: Sing-along

Sing-along i the fourth block in Jaybird Quilts' Park Bench. Each of them have 48 pieces in it - 30 triangles, 12 diamonds and 6 jewels - a fun block to make, but all those pieces took quite a lot of time to cut. Happy I have the ruler set for this quilt, using the templates in the book would probably have been even more time consuming.

While I was cutting the pieces for Sing-along, I took the time to cut some more pieces. The setting diamonds between the hexagon blocks are all pieced from triangles and half hexagons which would be perfect to use for leaders and enders while piecing the blocks and at the same time make faster progress on the quilt top.

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - Block 3: Hopscotch

Remember playing hopscotch as a child? Block 3 of Jaybird Quilts' Park Bench is named Hopscotch and it kind of reminds me of one of the patterns which we used to play as kids

I remember we played lots on different layouts; there were permanent ones painted on the asfalt in the school yard, and whenever we were out of school and had a piece of chalk available we would draw one.

The six blocks so far layed out together - sorry the lighting is bad

 - having fun with these :-)
Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - Block 2: Ball Game

Tonight block two of Park Bench was cut and pieced together. The pieces come together really smoothly and I'm really enjoying piecing these rather huge blocks!

This block is called Ball Game. I'm not really sure I see where the name for these blocks come from, but they are fun anyways :-)

Thinking maybe I need to include some lighter fabrics...

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - Block 1: Picnic

I had some fun today piecing together the first two blocks of my Park Bench quilt and they came together really smoothly. Both are made from the first blockpattern - Picnic

The quilt has 15 blocks in it, seven of the blocks are repeated to make two, and then there's one extra. The blocks finish 16", which is huge to me who has a comfort zone piecing blocks in the sizes 6" to 9".

I'm very happy with my choice of dark oldfashioned pinks and greens I showed in my previous post, but I do see that I will have to include a bit more value to the to colourways so the blocks will really "pop" - hence the brighter pink in these blocks, and there will be some light lime green in the next block.

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Park Bench - the beginning

While visiting Lapp-Elisa's in February I picked up a pattern booklet I have been drooling over ever since I spotted it on the designer's blog back in October: Park Bench by Julie Hermann of Jaybird Quilts. Spent a little time picking through my shash and fondling whatever fabrics I might use

...look good, huh? And now I'm looking forward to playing some more with my Hex 'n More ruler and the Sidekick ruler :-)

Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida

Quilty days in Lennartsfors

Friday a grup of eager quilters gathered in cars and made their way to Lapp-Elisa's in Lennartsfors.Projects at the ready, sewing machines ready for a few days of pedal to the metal. A glimps of the sewing room while the other girls were out for a bit:

The weather was horrible on our way down, but Saturday morning we got up to a glorious spring sun, so of course we had to enjoy a bit of fresh air.

This was my project for the weekend - a layer cake I have had laying in my stash for a few years, and some lovely grey on black I picked up in Elisabeth's shop. The triangle blocks are made using the Hex 'n More ruler:

With some fleece on the back it will be a perfect lap quilt for chilly days at work.
Hugs and stitches from Anne Ida