Sew and Tell.

Just a quick post to show you the finished Kaleidoscope quilt. I stayed up until 4am last night working on it (was robbed of an hour due to the switch over to Daylight Savings Time) and then got up this morning at about 8am to finish it off. Needless to say I am now in a zombie like state.



The kaleidoscope block presents so many different style options but rather than having strong, definite circles I wanted a scrappy look so the circular effect is subtle and elusive. I am really pleased with how it looks - but it took a lot of unpicking to get there! First I had that light blue colour that read white to unpick, then I decided to make it bigger (not that that involved any unpicking, just the opposite really) and then I fussy cut a border print that just looked wishy-washy (sorry - there are no photos of that blandness). After unpicking that border I made an emergency trip to Hettie's to buy a navy blue fabric for the new border - I like the way that the dark fabric now frames the quilt.


I enjoyed making this quilt and in particular the challenge of the 45 degree triangle pieced border but I couldn't have done it without my side-kick Frasier. I have a 7" DVD player next to my sewing machine and when I sew I play Frasier to keep me company and now I measure a quilt's complexity by how many seasons I get through while sewing it. This quilt has a rating of 3 and a half Frasier's as it took me through seasons 3, 4, 5 and the first disk of 6.


Until next time,

Shontelle.

Free at Last!!

Yay! Quarantine is O-V-A-H baby! I am off to sewing tonight at Mum's and can't wait to see everyone.

I did however get heaps (how South Australian is that!) done while we were in lock-down. I finished a quilt with this chocolatey goodness (but that is a bit secret squirrel at the moment).

I fininshed this quilt with the Fig and Plum fabric that Mum bought me for Christmas. The photo doesn't really do the fabrics justice, they are so lovely and feminine - I will upload a free pattern for it later in the week:

Despite the quarrantine there was a jail break on Thursday night when I snuck out with Mum to buy this:

I am in love with it already and I haven't even uploaded any music or video yet. I know you shouldn't get attached to inanimate objects but I really do love it. I felt the same way when I got my ipod - I would put it on shuffle and go for a walk around my neighbourhood shamelessly singing out loud to the hits and memories that it would churn out. It always makes my heart feel light when I am listening to it and I guess that's where the feelings of love generate from. Such a delicious object deserves to be cossetted rather than shunted around in the hostile environment that is my handbag - so I made it this:

Now it will always be safe and sound in its special quilted case (tutorial to follow for my fellow obsessives).

And last but not least I made some more journals out of my eclectic stash using a simplified version of Bloom's tutorial. I could have gone crazy and made more but I ran out of journals! I will have to stage another attack on the Big W stationary department.

The Snippets one is mine and I have already started filling it with random ideas for quilting projects - I don't think even Methuselah would have had enough time to make all of the quilts I have in my head.

Ok, off to sewing to bind a mountain of quilts.

Until next time,

Shontelle.