Tuesday 26 July 2016

Unpacking the mojo

I've had a self enforced break from sewing after we made a rather snap decision to sell our home of 30 years and find a place in the country. This meant converting my sewing room back to a bedroom, for enhanced saleability (I might have just made up that word) and packing away my design wall and all traces of sewing. After renovating and selling whilst working full time I was using the bus commute time to either catch up on sleep or to text and email agents, tradies, lawyers or bankers. No time to sew.


Unpacking the mojo
Anyway I have recently been able to unpack some of the sewing, spread the love throughout the house and finish all of the AWS blocks.

Antique Wedding Sampler
AWS Block #22

Antique Wedding Sampler
AWS Block #21
Sometimes I hand piece and sometimes I piece by machine, sometimes I even combine both techniques in the same block. I like the accuracy of hand piecing so I thought 'why not prep for machine piecing as per hand piecing?' So for this block I drew lines and pinned as I would for hand piecing.



Antique Wedding Sampler quilt

Quite a good result but I'm afraid this block didn't quite pass muster with the G'nT Sisters At 2am (after some wine) the leaves I had drawn myself were thought to resemble "reindeer on steroids" and it was too brown. It has now been renovated and admittedly it does look better now.

Antique Wedding Sampler quilt
AWS Block #12
I've really missed having the design wall, which is currently living with Judy. I do have visitation rights so I was able to lay out all the AWS blocks and get advice on their placement.

Antique Wedding Sampler quilt

Did you notice Judy's AWS on the spare bed? We were lying on top of it (ugg boots and all!) whilst trying different layouts. Now I 'just' need to finish the broderie perse for the outer triangles.

Antique Wedding Sampler quilt Broderie Perse

Last Saturday Judy and I dropped in to Linda's book launch in the Barn last Saturday. We purchased a copy of her new book Treasures from the Barn published by Quiltnania.

Treasures from the Barn quilts
Me, Linda & Judy
It was great seeing Linda and all the original antique quilts that the book is based on,this gave us inspiration for our current and future projects. We were both taken by the Little Boys Britches quilt behind us in the photo above and the first quilt below.

Treasures from the Barn quilts
Little Boys Britches

Treasures from the Barn quilts
Chocolate Mill detail
Treasures from the Barn quilts
Chocolate Mill border detail

Treasures from the Barn quilts
Unfinished block showcasing Linda's precise hand-piecing from Fireworks 


Treasures from the Barn quilts
Brenda's Bounty

Treasures from the Barn quilts

It was also a wonderful thrill to meet Marianne (DreamWeaver) in person. She has been a Dear Jane and design wall inspiration for me.

Treasures from the Barn quilts

And what would a blog post be without a Chester County Criswell block? So I'll finish with Block #24 that I completed last night.




Cheers
Carole