I am still around...

Is anybody still there??  It has been quite a while since my last post and I have no excuses other than being busy with living life!

Life out of the sewing room has been busy with babysitting my nieces (on school holidays since mid December) and when I wasn't doing that I was helping my family with an assortment of things.  At the end of the day I had no energy or motivation left for getting on the computer :(  Instead I would sit on the lounge with Bloglovin app on my phone and admire everyone elses work.

I did manage to squeeze in a few hours here and there for sewing but no where near as much as I'd have liked.

A dear friend, whom I used to work with had a darling little boy last week.  She hadn't found out of the sex of the baby, nice to have a surprise, so I had two quilts ready.  Here is the quilt that I ended up gifting to her.

This pattern can be found at GenerationQ Magazine.

I was really happy with how the three rows of quilting along each side of the chevron made the zig-zags pop.

I also made some burp cloths.  I chose fabrics that didn't scream baby since Mum will be wearing them.  Pattern can be found at Cloud9 fabrics.

And lastly some bibs.  You can find the pattern for these at JCasa Handmade.  I have made these bibs many times and love how they turn out.

As I mentioned previously I also did some sewing in case my friend had a little girl. I love the bibs which were from my scrap collection.

And the Joel Dewberry Notting Hill fabric for a more 'Mum' burp cloth.

I have also made a couple of cot quilt tops from the same scrap collection.  No pink left in the scraps!  Now I just need to find the time to get to the fabric shop to get some batting.

At the beginning of December I decided to have a clean out and organise my fabric collection.  Once I had pulled out all the fabric and had it all over the dining table, plus overflow, I became overwhelmed about how I was going to clean the mess back up again.  Due to a new cupboard built in the dining room I had to reorganise the sewing room to fit the old cupboard in.  I will share a photo of it next post.

Funny thing is though that once I had that cleaned up I ended up pulling out all my scrap fabrics and sorting them as well.  It took over a week to sort it all into ziplock bags according to the size of fabric.  I did small snippets, short strips, long strips and larger pieces.  On the plus it is a lot less daunting to look at the scraps and use them!

A couple of Christmas presents that I hadn't shared yet.

I have another friend who will be having a little boy in the coming months so I have put together a little bib and burp cloth set for her.  I love this fabric which is from the Safari Soiree collection which is from Birch Fabrics.

The quilts aren't the only work in progress I have at the moment.  Not sure what I was thinking starting so many projects without finishing previous ones.

I have made a heap of HSTs which I will be turning into an oversized star quilt as sketched out.

Lastly I have a Noodlehead Super Tote Bag all cut out ready to be sewn.  Again I'm using Joel Dewberry's Notting Hill collection but in the cotton sateen this time.  This is going to be my bag for University so I hope to have this sewn up shortly.

Last week was the start of University with Orientation Days (very daunting) and a glimpse of the heavy workload ahead.  I have spent all weekend completing pre-readings for this weeks lectures.  Thankfully it has been quite interesting!  Hopefully that continues.

Talk to you all again soon.

I am linking to WIP Wednesday and Fabric Tuesday.

Finished up...

Over the past couple of days I have managed to complete a couple of quilts.  I am really happy how they have turned out.

This is the cutest fabric and I love the way the grey/white dot binding frames it.  They grey is more like a purple grey so it works very nicely with the pink.  

The second quilt finished is the Afternoon Tea Delight quilt from the Dessert Roll Quilt book.  The fabrics are mostly Tilda fabrics which were left over from the Marti Michell quilt.

I am linking to Finish It Up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.

Week in review...

It has been another busy week with finishing up a couple of old projects and starting some new.

First up is a really old work in progress that is now finished.  It took so long for no other reason than, there was always something else to get done first.  I started these almost 12 months ago.

Then there are the Dresden Plates which are now hanging on the wall in my sewing room.

The most recent finish for the week is this beautiful Marti Michell BOM quilt.  It came back from the long arm quilter on Thursday afternoon and was straight home so I could add the binding.  I had the binding completed by 9am the next morning.  As you may remember from previous posts I was making this quilt for my dear Nana who is turning 92 this year.  I gave it to her on Friday and she thought it was great!!  I couldn't have been happier :)

At the last moment and because there was fabric left from the backing I made the two pillowcases to match the quilt.

The majority of fabrics in the quilt were Tilda Fabrics which are very pretty and feminine.

I used this cute pale pink gingham for the backing and had a huge rose pattern quilted across the quilt.

Next, I am still working on the quilt using the strips of fabric from the last post.  I was waiting on the white fabric, but as soon as I got that, the top was completed.  Just need to get it basted now.  It is using Folk Tale by Natalie Lymer.

I also made a start on the Afternoon Tea quilt from the Dessert Roll Quilt book.  

I cut the fabric on Monday.

I worked through yesterday and this morning to have the completed front.

I hope to have this basted tomorrow and to start quilting over the weekend.

I am linking to WIP Wednesday and Fabric Tuesday.

Last few weeks, mostly in photos...

Nan's Quilt is now at the long arm quilter being quilted all over with large roses.

The binding is ready to go.

A couple of library bags and pencil cases I made for my Sister to give as Christmas presents.

Another quilt started and basted.

This is for my Sister to give as a gift so she is hand quilting around the circles and I'll finish it off when she is ready.

Another quilt started and ready for binding to be sewn down.

Quilt finished.  Another quilt for my sister to give as a gift.

I got round to making myself something.

Last week I made these to give as Christmas presents for my nieces and a friends little girl.  

I'm a little over purple though.  I thought maybe someone would be pink but all the little girls I know are into purple.

My nieces love these Frixion Pens. You can write with them and they have an eraser for correcting mistakes.  They are also starting to be used with sewing.

One last quilt for my Sister to give as a gift.  All the strips are sewn together ready for sashing.