One secret revealed

Now, as it has reached its new home, I can finally show you:

the scrappy pillowcat.

Another secret (without sneak peeks this time) to be revealed this weekend if everything goes well.

of geese and kites

This was fun:

If you want to see all the 18 (plus 2) block from the Skill Builder Sampler, they're here.
We're half way through and I'm looking forward to the second half.

As for the kites - maybe we should keep them as a curtain?

(it's still going to be a quilt, but I like the stained glass effect)

Today's WIPs and a sneak peek

I'm hoping for a long day with my autumn wonky kites and a circle of geese for Skill Builder Sampler:

As you can see I've just started pulling out scraps for the geese. I still have to decide whether to make them totally scrappy or in just three fabrics plus background.

As for the kites, with the help of my design...ehke... bed I decided on a layout, snapped a photo and stacked each column separately with a label on top. I hope I won't get lost in the middle of sewing all the blocks together, especially that I want to chain piece them.
Do you know any tricks on how to keep track of the layout?

And I'm leaving you with a sneak peek of something I finally made and will hopefully post on Monday :)

Starry Night in Minnesota

I really like how the Starry Night turned out but the Minnesota block is rather wobbly.

And my prize from Lynne's giveaway has just arrived, I can't wait to try it out.

ta-da

So I've sewn myself a skirt:

I still can hardly believe it, but actually it was quite easy with Anna's explanations and hints and photos:

As the fabric is thick flannel, it was a bit harder to gather the skirt and so my gathers are rather less then perfect but I don't mind.
I'm quite proud of the hidden zipper:

(not so proud of forgeting to match the pieces of the skirt back. I had a narrower piece of fabric and had to place the pattern pieces in a different way than indicated in the pattern, so I should have checked it)

Anyway, it enjoyed sewing the skirt and I've learned a lot and I want more.

On my table this evening

Just arrived, guess who is going to be happy.

And a result of Anna's sew-a-long Day 2:


If it works (and if I don't look too awful in it) I have a piece of olive corduroy...

A lot of firsts

First of all, this is the first time I'm joining:

The quilt I want to show you is my freshly finished Australian quilt:

Here are some reasons the quilt is special to me:

• I got the Aboriginal prints from my Australian cousin, who is a quilter and whose quilts were the first quilts I'd ever seen, and whose quilts still remain the only quilts I've seen "live" (apart from those I've made, obviously).
• The design is mine - I know it is very simple but I'm still very happy with it.
(I like the little runaway square)

(And here is a fragment of the back)

• It's the first time I used white fabric in a quilt and I like the crisp feeling it created (I'v taken the photos in warm morning light, so I'm afraid they don't show it so well)
• We're keeping it and it's actually big enough to cover our entire bed

And I learned that if I really want to I can quite successfully baste a quilt in a space that can fit only about 2/3 of it, although I wouldn't really recommend it.

It's the last picture (I promise) and I'm off to admire all the beautiful festival entries.

SBS - caught up finally

I've been rather behind with block 13, i.e. crazy quilt block, but it's finally ready.

Not too crazy, I'm afraid, but still fun to make. I even tried one fancy stitch along some pieces, but since it's in cream thread it's hard to see it.

And let me show you the last three block together: