Sheep in a Meadow Quilt Finished and Photographed

I told Lucas I would finish his quilt in 2018 and I did. I stitched the last of the binding on on the 31st of December, so he could take his quilt and cuddle into the New Year.

Sheep in the backyard!

The colours make me smile!

Bunny

Fleur

Captain Slow

Daisy (Madeliefje)

Amadeus

Buttercup (Boterbloempje)

Frosty

Little Bow Tie (Strikje)

The pattern for the sheep is from Farm Girl Vintage, by Lori Holt of Bee In My Bonnet. It's a really fun book, with 45 blocks, both pictorial and abstract or traditional. The instructions are really easy to follow and every block can be sewn at 6 inches of 12 inches finished size. What I really love about the book is the second section, with lots of setting options and different ideas of what to make with the blocks. The photographs are so lovely, it's just a nice book to leaf through, even when you don't want to sew anything. I'm really itching to buy Lori's newest book, Vintage Christmas, as well!

"What do you love most about your quilt, Lucas?" "How soft it is!"

I got Farm Girl Vintage for my birthday last year and immediately made a sheep block, without any real plan. And then the herd grew and grew and it became a quilt. I found a coupon at the Fairy Tailors in Tervuren that was perfect for a prairie point picket fence, a 100% cotton fleece that makes a wonderful backing and makes batting unnecessary, and free motion quilted it with stars and zig zags in the sashing and borders and just outlines of the sheep.

Chunky colourful scrappy binding.

I added a chunky scrappy binding which I absolutely adore, and a sweet label in the corner.

For my sweet Lucas, from mum.

And most important of all: Lucas loves it! He names the sheep before going to sleep and puts the quilt under his duvet, so he can snuggle against the fleece. And when he's sad, he hides under it for a good cry. He's a bit ill now, with a bad ear infection, so he uses it for comfort.

He's so cute!

Update on my sewing machine. I'm still ill today, so I had my husband drive me to the shop to fetch my machine after it had been serviced. I got home, tried it, and it didn't work! Ever since I got it, there have been problems with sinking and raising the feed dogs. When I took it in to be serviced the were stuck in the up position. When I got it back this morning I could sink the feed dogs without problems, but now they are stuck in the sunken position, no amount of moving the lever up and down will bring them up! So frustrating! So I took a nap while my husband took the machine back to the shop. I guess I'll be installing my old Singer to sew on while my fancy new machine is gone, and will just have to be patient before I can do any more free motion quilting.

Pickle Dish ... Yet Another Project

On the 26th of December I went shopping in Mechelen with my husband, while my parents took the kids to Technopolis.
I was fun to walk through the park together, shop for clothes for him, eat at Le Pain Quotidien and talk a bit without kids interrupting.
In a thrift shop I found a very pretty quilting book by Kaffe Fasset. It's in perfect condition and was only 4 euros, so I bought it, a little treat for me!

I really like the quilt on the cover, so I made two blocks, just to try it out. And I think I feel a complete quilt coming on!

pinks

teal

green

a bit of orange

I decided to go with a broader colour pallet than the quilt in the book. I had already picked colours to possibly make a quilt for my mum with, and I want to use those for this quilt: pink, orange, teal and green.

All my fabrics ... so far...

The background fabric is also a thrift store find, an old duvet cover.

If my mum likes it, this will be hers. But there is a distinct possibility it's too busy and bright for her. She keeps asking for a quilt to cover the tears in her comfy sofa, and I really want to make her one, but agreeing on a design and colour scheme is difficult. She wants something simple and beige. I agree that since it's main function will be to cover the tears, and for people to sit on, it shouldn't be too loud, but beige ... is not my thing... . So we sort of agreed I'd just make a pretty quilt, something I like and might fit the bill. Then we can "audition" it on the couch, and if she doesn't like it, I keep it and make another. I'm not sure this is a good plan. I'm a very slow quilter and she is quite picky, so it may take years before a quilt actually lands on that sofa!

Some Quick Christmas Quilting

Just for fun, and to relax a little after a stressful night, I made a little Christmas quilt ornament. I used this super easy tutorial by from A Quilting Life. I especially like the picture with all the cut fabric plus dimensions. That makes it so much easier to see what's going on than just a list in print of the cutting instructions. Anyway, that one micro quilt was so much fun, I just made another 3 today. i plan to use them as gift tags.

Three classic colour schemes, one frosty tree.

Pile of Christmassy goodness.

I still have to close the opening, and quilt my ornaments, but they are already pretty!

I had to take photos on the kitchen counter, it's the only place with proper light ... winter time...

I love doing a little quilty project like this on my sewing machine. It's so homely and heals the soul...

Some stuff I've been making over the last few months:

We had lovely warm weather well into autumn so my dahlia and annuals kept blooming for longer than usual. It was my first year growing zinnias and I loved them. They are bright and cheerful, and they keep for over a week in a vase.

A last bouquet from the garden.

The zinnias were still going strong at the beginning of November.

I love the combination with Verbena bonariensis and dahlias.

Rich burgundy, lovely late summer colour.

 I've been doing some more sewing with my daughter Marieke. She designed this quilt a whole while back. Maybe it's a bit too much work for a first big project, but the end result will be beautiful. The log cabins are a bit wonky, but I managed to square up the blocks and assemble the quilt top. This morning we discussed option for the borders. Maybe we'll finish it this Christmas break?

Log cabin heart.

The designer and co-creator, Marieke.

 Then I made these pillow cases. A long time ago, I made four winter pillow cases, with a nice photo print fabric and a crochet border. Some time after that I bought some autumn photo print fabric and put it in my stash... for ages! It was an impulse buy and I don't really like the fabric, so I didn't feel like sewing anything from it. Then in 2017 I bought some iron-on woodland creature, which are just so lovely and pretty, and put them in my sewing cupboard ... for ages! And this autumn I finally decided I WOULD use the ugly fabric! So I bought some solid and some really pretty fabric and made some lovely pillow cases. I actually like them, despite the ugly fabric, and the kids love their little woodland friends. I only took pictures of two pillow cases, maybe I'll get round to photographing the other two and adding them in here some day, but probably not :-).

I made some autumn pillow cases.

I made four in total, one for each of my children.

Everyone got a different woodland creature.

 I made this pencil case for my daughter Marieke. She had an Hello Kitty pencil case with a broken zip. Her request was to fox the zip, but it was simpler to just dismantle the case and recuperate the fabric in a new case. I used this pattern by Caroline from Sew Can She. It is not the easiest to sew (a bit fidgety), but very easy to understand the construction (no turning or sewing inside out lining, or stuff like that). I found perfect pink for the zipper tape and a cute bow tie fabric for the lining in my stash. I used a decorative stitch to attach the zipper to the case. She loves it, so I am a happy mom. I made another for a friend of hers, but forgot to take pictures.

And finally, this is a project I finished just yesterday: a pretty Christmas pillow. It matches the advent calendar I made last year. I actually pieced it in January this year, because we needed a small pieced project to practice machine quilting on a course I took in March. It was quilted in March, and then lay waiting to be finished until last week. I had even cut the backing fabric and the binding, so it was an easy project to pick up and finish last Friday morning, when I had a free morning, happily spent machine quilting Lucas' sheep quilt and finishing the machine sewing on this pillow case. I finished hand sewing the binding yesterday morning. I' m very pleased with how it turned out.

Pretty pillow.

I'm quite proud of my FMQ feathers.

Christmas ambience in the sofa.

 And this is the fabric I picked for my next project. My mum has asked me to make throws for her scruffy sofa's, and I think these colours will look nice. I'm not sure I have enough fabric, however. I'm thinking I'll just start making flying geese blocks and see how big a quilt I can make. I like this colour combination, too, so if it's too small, it can be a throw, and I have to buy more fabric for my mum's quilts.

Anticipation ...

Fourth of July Quilt

I finished quilting and binding my lone star quilt. It wasn't on the fourth (more like the seventh, I think), but close enough to call this blue, white and red starry quilt "Fourth of July". I always think patriotic (US) quilts are pretty, but being a Belgian, I can't really make a Belgian version.

Machine quilted and bound

For starters Belgian are not really into flag waving the way Americans seem to be. I'm not going to even try and explain Belgian politics (because, quite frankly, I don't understand them), but decorating my house with the flag would make me appear a royalist/monarchist. But more importantly, our flag is red, yellow and black, and I don't think I'll ever make a red/yellow/black quilt.

Looks lovely in the prairie that our backyard is, after two months of no rain (very, very rare in a Belgian summer!).

I didn't plan to make an American patriotic quilt, I just decided to cut up 6 of my husband old shirts and combine them with an old duvet cover to try this pattern I've been wanting to make for a long time, but didn't want to buy fabric for in case it ended as a big mess. I used a tutorial I found on Pinterest to help me with the cutting and piecing.

A closer look at the machine quilting and the twisted ribbon border. This is before binding and washing. One big advantage of using old fabric: no worries about the red bleeding into the white!

The seams are not well matched at all (no close-ups of unmatched seams!), but the whole thing lies flat and looks good, which is what counts. I then machine quilted it. I went a bit crazy on the diamonds of the star, trying all kind of patterns. I also started doing a dense seashell design on the red background. Then I realized that 1. this would take ages, and 2. the dense quilting makes the quilt stiff, and I wanted to keep the softness of the duvet cover, which has been washed so often it's a bit downy. So I finished with a very open spiral, which took me just a few hours. I did the binding by machine, which is messy (so no close-ups of that either!), but it's finished and I love it!

Done! Finishes at 61' (155 cm) square, ideal for a fourth of July picnic, or a lap quilt.

I really like the twisted ribbon border. I used a tutorial on YouTube for that. I chose not to have it go round the whole star because 1. I wasn't sure I'd have enough dark and light blue fabric, and 2. it saved me a lot of calculating to get the border to match up at the corners it looks really pretty that way!

I have a tall husband, great for holding quilts :-).

 Now I'm going to tackle my Splendid Sampler ... will I finish it in 2018?

The binding is made from the same fabric as the center star.

More creative therapy, much needed...

I've been back at work for two month now, and unfortunately not much has changed. I'm living on adrenaline and hope, but this Friday I'm in desperate need of some quilty therapy...

Here is what keeps me sane:

My colourful hexies.

 I started these a few weeks ago. There is no fixed plan, I just enjoy picking colours, glue basting and piecing by hand. It's a slow, meditative proces. It calms me down, makes the palpitations go away, brings me joy.

A mother-daughter project.

Marieke embroidered the center panel, we picked the fabrics together and I pieced and quilted a cushion cover for her. She is very proud to have in her "room". (she shares with her brothers, but has a corner with her own shelves, little desk and even a beanbag. She is very happy with it.

First free motion quilting adventures!

Somewhere in January I decided that I needed to learn free motion quilting. I want to finish more quilts, and buy more fabric without guilt! Plus hand quilting gives me tendonitis (in combination with playing the clarinet, which takes precedence, that's just the way it is).
So I enrolled for a FMQ class with Monique De Canne in De Potterije, in Lokeren, bought a new sewing machine (Pfaff Ambition 1.0) and booked a hotel room.
What with a job and four kids, I don't get out much, and I thoroughly enjoyed my three day getaway. I went jogging along the Durme, sewed most of the day, in the company of seven lovely ladies, had a nice dinner and felt just a little bit lonely at the end of the day. It was fun to learn so much and to practice the skills immediately. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I learned in those three days. It was also so much fun to meet other quilters. Quilting is not a very popular thing in Belgium. Most people just give you an empty stare when you tell them you quilt, so this was fun, talking to other enthusiasts. Now some pictures:

Some of my practice swatches from the fmq class

Fillers and feathers

I'm also quilting along with the #freemotionchallenge by Angela Walters.

When I got home I put my skills to good use on this pillow case.

Very proud of my feathers!

I can fit them in just about any shape, so versatile!

Then I pieced this placemat.

I bought the fabric at the Potterije.

The almost plain purple panel gives me an opportunity to practice free motion quilting, ...

... but it doesn't stand out to much on the dark fabric.

A feathered heart. The squiggles inside should have been smaller, for more contrast.

I orange peeled the border squares.

I love this lamb fabric!

And they go perfectly with my great grandmother's tableware.

I intend to make six, one for each member of the family. The plan was to have them finished by Easter, but I don't think that is going to happen :-)

Then I practiced all kinds of filler on this quilt.

It's a disappearing nine patch, with fabrics from the Acorn Trail collection by Taegan White.

I started free motion quilting it with my old machine, but that was so discouraging. Now with the new machine which has an embroidery foot, I'm really getting into the the fmq groove!

And I'm quilting my lone star!

The red diamonds get a point to point pattern, inspired by Angela Walters.

And simple feathers in the white diamonds

"Straightish" lines work well from a distance, I assure you! ;-)

I'm having soooo much fun with my new skill set! I'm already planning and cutting more quilts, so I can do more free motion quilting. I'm think of including bigger negative spaces and borders, to do some fancy quilting in!