Quilters' Circle - 8th March, 2010

It was the Labour Day public holiday in Melbourne, so of course the house was shut. However, Marie came to our rescue, and generously offered her home for our first March meeting.

Marie showed us this bag she has made since our last meeting:




It is for one of her grandsons, and features a great range of prints specially chosen to appeal to him. Notice that skeleton in the top picture? He glows in the dark!

During the meeting, Marie cut out quite a few rectangles for some cushion covers she has planned. Here's an action shot:



Marilyn brought along a lovely cushion cover she is preparing to quilt, made from a pattern she purchased a while ago. She got the batting ready, and we talked about her options for quilting it. Here it is:


Her mother did the central stitchery, then Marilyn pieced the top; the end result will be a nice family co-production.

Textile Tragic has missed our meetings for the last couple of years, but the public holiday freed her for the afternoon. It was great to have her with us again. She sewed down the binding on a cuddly pink quilt.

That's the back you can see in the photo. The front is of various tactile fabrics such as corduroy and flannel. Very snuggly!

Vireya did a little appliqué on her latest Red Delicious block, and took the opportunity to spread out all the completed blocks. It helped to see how much has been achieved, and how relatively little remains to be done. It was also good to see how the blocks are working together.


The upper left one is in progress, and in fact after the meeting the background of it was completed. The block might even be completed by our next meeting. As you can see there's only one more block after that; the central area will eventually contain a big basket of cherries.

We all missed Joy (belated happy birthday for Sunday, Joy!) and hope she can make it to our next meeting, which will be back at the house on 22nd March.

Quilters' Circle - 22nd February, 2010

Today was our second meeting at the house for February.

We all missed Joy, who couldn't be with us. We hope you'll be back with us next time, Joy!

Remember last time I only showed pictures of one of the bags Marie had made? Here's the two sides of the other one, which she made for a lucky coffee-drinker:


Since our last meeting, Marie has been busy. Here's her latest creation, which we all oo-ed and ah-ed over today:


Everyone wanted to take those cute dogs home!

During the meeting Marie removed all the tacking from the hand-quilted cushion cover she worked on last time, then trimmed off the excess batting and backing:


Marilyn continued sewing down the binding on her quilt. She is also pondering what her next bring-along project might be.

Vireya appliquéd this chilli for the next of her Red Delicious blocks:



It was finished apart from the stem by the end of the meeting.

Our next meeting will be on 8th March, from 1:00 - 3:30. Come and join us if you can, or come back here then to read all about it.

Quilters' Circle - 8th February, 2010

It was our first meeting at the House for the year. Unfortunately Joy and Marilyn couldn't be with us. We hope they'll both be fighting fit soon, and be back with us next time.

We were feeling a bit apprehensive about today's meeting, as we now share the room with another group, and we weren't sure how that would all work.

Leigh brought along this colourful floor-quilt she is making for her grand-daughter:

For quieter times, the back of the quilt is more restful tones. We looked at some photos of her grand-daughter enjoying the bug quilt. Leigh will soon write a post about that herself. She also showed us this coaster she was given:


It is a simple but effective design. If you would like to make some of these yourself, there are instructions available here, and there's also a round version here.

Vireya brought along this top she finished recently:


The pattern is a design called "Leapfrog" by Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville, although because Vireya prefers the metric system she re-engineered the blocks to her own measurements. The next step is to make a backing, then baste the layers. During our meeting, she made some more pentagon shapes.

Marie has completed the top of the miniature version of her dog quilt that she was working on in January:

It is so cute! Marie has managed to find prints of a small enough scale that they can feature even in those tiny squares in the corners of the blocks.

Marie did some hand quilting during the meeting, and she also brought along some bags she made recently. Here's the two sides of one of them:


























I'll post photos of another one in a future report, when I've worked out how to get those photos where I want them.

Our next meeting will be at the house on 22nd February, at 1:00pm. Happy sewing in the meantime!

Quilters' Circle - Meeting times for 2010

Hello to all our loyal readers. The meeting days for the Quilters' Circle have changed this year. Now we will be meeting on the 2nd, 4th and 5th Mondays. The time is unchanged; 1:00pm to 3:30pm.

Thus our first meeting at the House will be on 8th February. Hope to see you then!

Quilters' Circle - 18th January, 2010

Today we had a small gathering at Marie's home. We hope those who couldn't make it will be back with us soon.

Marie has nearly finished this quilt for a special young girl:


The fabrics feature horses and the occasional cowgirl; no cowboys! The quilting design carries through the theme, with the outline of a horseshoe quilted in each block. The blocks are put together in the hidden 9-patch (or disappearing 9-patch) pattern. Marie has even made a matching pillow-case from some of the left-over blocks. It is sure to be loved by the recipient.

Meet Mr. Lion:


Mr. Lion was made for Marie by a friend in 1966. He's in amazingly good shape for his age!

Vireya brought along her most-recently completed Red Delicious block:


Today she made some pentagons with the help of some "handy" clips:


Marie is piecing by hand a quilt for her grandson's teddy-bear. It is a miniature version of the dog quilt she made for him (seen here in last September). Here's the first complete block:

And here's some of the strips Marie has prepared for the blocks:

I don't know why these two pictures are on their sides. There will be twelve blocks in the completed quilt. To give you an idea of the scale, the completed size of the small corner squares will be half an inch. Very cute!

We are not sure when the next Quilters' Circle meeting will be, as late last year we were informed that the meetings at the neighbourhood house might be changing to a different set of Mondays. We are waiting for the house to re-open to confirm just when we will meet. We'll be back again on either the 1st, or the 8th of February. See you then.

Quilters' Circle - 4th January, 2010

The neighbourhood house is closed for holidays at the moment, so an extraordinary meeting of the Quilters' Circle was held today at Joy's home.

Joy served a very elegant afternoon tea, which we enjoyed while looking out over her lovely back garden.


Those pretty cups were among Joy's 21st-birthday presents, and are still making the tea taste better a few years later!

Joy showed us a few of her projects which haven't been to the neighbourhood house. One of them is the centre block for her blue Baltimore Album quilt:

We've seen a few of the smaller blocks before, for example here and here. Won't it be fantastic when all complete?

Some years back, Joy's boys asked her to make a quilt they saw a picture of. Sadly, once it was complete, Joy and the boys were disappointed with the look of it. The boys had the idea to divide up the quilt and turn it into a set of placemats. They did the cutting and unpicking, and Joy added the binding. Thus was a disappointment turned into something well-loved:


Each placemat is for a particular person; the cute pigs (on the left) were for their father, and the cats in the foreground were for their mother.

Marie was quilting the cushion top she was working on late last year. Here's another quilt she completed in 2009, using a pattern known as Hidden, or Disappearing 9-Patch:


It's a very effective design which is quick to make, and is a good way to use novelty fabrics like these.

Vireya stitched down some pentagons which are part of her latest portable project:


This is inspired by a quilt in a recent issue of Down Under Quilts.

In between sewing, afternoon-tea-ing, watching birds visit flowers and the birdbath, and chatting, we looked at some books and magazines:

It was a wonderful afternoon. Thank you Joy, for your hospitality!

We will probably get together once more before the house re-opens for 2010. Come back in a couple of weeks to see what we get up to.

Quilters' Circle - 7th December, 2009

Today was our last meeting at the neighbourhood house for the year. There are lots of pictures to show you!

Joy got into the mood by wearing her Christmas apron:


Joy once won a "best dressed" competition wearing this apron, and she was definitely best dressed today. Unfortunately the flash has not picked up Santa's face - he isn't really faceless. Joy brought along this Scottish-themed cloth to brighten our table:


All the embroidery, and the crocheted trim, were done by Joy. She is multi-talented! As you can see, we had a range of yummy goodies for afternoon tea.

For show-and-tell, Marilyn brought the first quilt she made. She started it about 6 or 7 years ago, after being inspired by our own Textile Tragic, who was a fellow student in a sewing class at the neighbourhood house.


The colours in the quilt all come from the Japanese floral print in the four-patches. This is a great way to create a colour scheme - choose a print you love, then look at the colour dots printed in the selvedge. Choose other fabrics that match those dots, and you are guaranteed that they will all work together.

The top languished for a few years, because Marilyn found it difficult to quilt such a large project. Her sister in Bendigo came to the rescue, and machine-quilted it for her, in time for Marilyn to give the quilt to her mother for her 80th birthday. Since then Marilyn has used the quilt-as-you-go method, which she finds much easier as it doesn't involve manoeuvring the whole quilt through the machine.

Vireya brought her Christmas-wreath wall-hanging:


It is made using an uneven log-cabin block. The pattern was originally from a Burda Moden magazine in the 1990s some time. Vireya saw a photograph of this wall-hanging on the internet, and worked out the design from the photo. Only after completing the quilt did she discover that she actually had the magazine with the pattern in it.

Joy showed us a Christmas angel she has appliquéd:


It looks like the flash has bleached out the angel's face as well, which is a shame because he/she has a very delicate face.

Here's Joy's cute little pumpkin bag:


And here is the amazing "New York Beauty" quilt top Joy has made from all the clothes her daughter left at home:

Sorry about the strange angle, but it is too large to get a good shot of the whole thing. Here it is being held by three people and a table. Notice the amazing range of fabrics, including fine Indian cottons, lamés, velvets, and satins. Ricrac and other braids are applied as embellishments. All the fabric came from Joy's daughter's clothing, except for one which was from the dress Joy wore to her daughter's engagement party, so there are lots of memories stitched into this quilt.

We didn't get much sewing done today - but we did do some textile craft. Marilyn brought along this origami star ornament she made at another patchwork group:


The pattern is from here , but instead of using paper, two layers of fabric are fused together. Marie had prepared enough fabric triangles for us and the office staff to all have a go. Here's an example that isn't quite sitting properly, but will look better once it has been pressed:

Thanks, Marie! We all had fun with that activity. Once you have done it once, it is much easier, so I think I'll be making a few more.

Here's a gift that the teacher of that other patchwork class made for each of the students. It is a cute little holder for needles and a spool of thread.

Closed:

Open:
Isn't that great?

A few cards and gifts were exchanged today:






We had a wonderful afternoon, celebrating a great year of the Quilters' Circle. Although the house will be closed for about five weeks over the Christmas/New Year period, it is likely we will get together in homes during that time, so stay tuned because this may not be the last blog post until February.

To all our regular readers, we wish you a very happy Christmas and a fantastic 2010!