Finally... A Very Hungry Caterpillar!

I'm on a roll... this is the third quilt I've finished in the last three and a bit weeks!  I will be honest and say that the sandwiching, quilting and binding was all I had to do on the last two, but they still take time.  I'm relatively new to free motion quilting and as I'm using my home sewing machine it is a focused effort.

So here we go:

'A Very Hungry Caterpillar' Quilt.  Fabrics by Eric Carle from Andover Fabrics

K loves the Very Hungry Caterpillar book and can almost read it by herself.  She just gets caught up on the food names!  She will love sharing this quilt with others - I can see it visiting Playcentre and Preschool.

I started this quilt at least three years ago.  It is from a pattern in an 'Australian Patchwork and Stitching' (Volume 9, Number 4) that you might still find around (there is one on 'Trade Me' today but that is only good for New Zealanders).  The pattern was available singularly but I can't track one of those down as I borrowed the one I used from a friend.  The fabrics are still widely available.  I found them still sold at several online shops.  I did make this from a kit.

I used the same butterfly template (as my 'Papillon' quilt) to quilt single butterflies joined by long wandering wiggles.  I used a Mettler variegated thread on the top and white on the backing.  I marked the quilting lines on the backing and worked from that side.  My tension was really tricky to get right and I'm not completely happy with it - from the backing (white) side you can see lots of small dots from the variegated thread.  Otherwise I am very happy with my work, especially as once marked it only took a couple of hours to do.

I'm also getting much better at my bindings and am especially pleased with my corners on this quilt.

As I was out in the garden taking pictures of my quilt here is a gorgeous, huge, 'Mt Fuji' (we think) cherry tree in blossom.  It is right outside my sewing room (that is the square window in the centre).

K has a swing under this tree, but it is hung up higher to avoid the lawn mower - and you can also see my (or K's) quilt in the bottom pic.  We think the tree is at least 60 years old.

I'm linking up again to 'Finish it up Friday' on 'Crazy Mom Quilts' as well as 'FMQ Friday' on 'The Free Motion Quilting Project'.

Some Knitting - and a pattern to share!

I have had some time to finish off some knitting projects recently.

Firstly these finger-less mittens:

I used Knitsch Sock Yarn in 'Caboose'.

Sorry but these pictures aren't great:

I developed the pattern myself but I'm not completely happy with how it was made.  I really like the lace pattern so will try to make another pair and then write it up as a pattern.

However I have finally found the 'man-cowl' I made for dear H's birthday recently not being worn so have snapped a quick picture of it...

This isn't a great picture either - and the cowl/scarf has been so well worn that it is pilling like mad.  H has worn it almost constantly in our early spring days.  He's outside all day on the farm and even when on the tractor or other vehicle he is at the mercy of the weather.  I'm very chuffed as it is the first item I've ever knitted for him - and will make a great gift for a few other farming males in our family.

So I now have a 'rough' pattern for this:

I used a 50g ball of 8ply (Double Knit) woolyarn - it was on sale at a local shop and had a very torn label.  I think it has some lambswool in it - perhaps that is why it has pilled easily.
I also knitted with 4mm (US6; UK8) circular needles.  You will need to use the 'magic loop method' but there won't need to be much of a loop if the needle circumference is similar to the cowl size.  In the above picture it is knitted from the bottom up to the top, so there are no joins and you only have to thread in the ends.

My finished cowl is 23"/58cm around (twice the above picture's width).  This means that the tension would be about 16 stitches per 4"/10cm.  You don't need to be exact as this item will stretch with use.

Cast on 90 stitches using the 'Long Tail Cast On' method or another stretchy method.  I like this as it gives an edge similar to a bind off.

Join stitches into a loop then:

Knit 1 row
*Purl 2 rows
Knit 2 rows
Continue from * until desired length has been reached and/or wool is nearly finished.  It is preferable to finish with 1 knit row before binding off.
The cowl needs to be at least 5" (12.5cm) deep, but I advise making it longer if you can, so 75g of  yarn might be more useful.
Bind off using a stretchy method - I did a standard bind off with a larger needle.  Otherwise use a method such as 'Suspended Bind Off'.
Sew in ends and enjoy.

I made a similar cowl for my four year old daughter and know that there is less chance of an end getting caught and pulling on her neck compared to a normal scarf.

Almost blown away... and a quilt to share

At the top of my to-do list has been a quilt for my mother - and five days ago I finally finished it.  I went out on Monday and took photos, then on Tuesday we had the strongest winds I've ever known - I think they were the worst in forty years.  Canterbury, NZ, is known for strong north-west winds that come over the Southern Alps and gust across the plains.  Luckily no-one was hurt and most of the damage is to trees,  power lines and irrigators - and so we have had no electricity for three days.

Everything is now back to normal - and we were lucky we had a generator, a log-burner and gravity fed water in the meantime.  K even enjoyed running around with torches and getting to see almost as many candles as a birthday party.

So... here is the latest quilt I have finished.

It is made with a jelly-roll of 'Petite Odile' by French General.  I had seen a picture of a quilt made like this then tracked down this tutorial on how to do it.

I really free motion quilted it using this fantastic tutorial from Oh Fransson! and although I have certainly not made the most even shapes, they look quite good as a whole.  I did 'stitch-in-the-ditch' between each 6" square to add extra stability.  The size of my squares was on the big side for quilting like this - but it worked.

Once again I've had great fun taking photos in my garden -

 

 You can almost see in this picture (above) that I backed the quilt with some more of this FG fabric and used the same fabric for the binding.

So 'Happy Belated Birthday' Mum... I hope you enjoy your quilt... I'm looking forward to giving it to you in a month's time.

Here are two pictures of the damage the wind this week did to trees...

...this is a large cedar that fell in the garden - luckily I was wanting it down anyway - and it fell in exactly the right place, avoiding the rhododendrons around it.

... and this is a plantation near us - that was a whole block of trees, once.

I'm going to try linking this all up with 'finish it up Friday' on 'Crazy Mom Quilts'.  My first time trying this - we'll see if it works.  :-)

Spring Sewing

K and I have started thinking about new clothes for the warmer seasons.  She wants dresses - and I want colour.  Here are some of our early plans:

A pair of Colette 'Clover' pants for myself in a 'greywacke' cotton with a slight amount of lycra.

A Colette 'Jasmine' blouse in this cotton/lycra 'coolio' fabric that I got for $5/metre.  Yeah!  I got these patterns from 'pinkchalkfabrics.com' when they had a 20% sale and their postage for patterns is also very reasonable.

 A selection of Lisette cottons from Spotlight for Christmas gifts for little nieces.  Love the colours!

An orange reproduction quilting-weight fabric with tiny bows - I'll make a dress for K - but I'm not sure which one yet.  Either the badminton outfit as a dress, or the croquet dress.  What do you think?

And I have to make another Ice-cream dress - this time using the pink ice-lolly print from the Lisette range and a contrast colour.  I've already made this pattern six times - but it is such a lovely summer outfit.

Some gorgeous bamboo/cotton knit to make a slip for myself and singlets/slips for K.

For a loose blouse/shirt for myself.

And I have this silk with a green base that I purchased from 'The Fabric Store' in Dunedin when it was 'Global Fabrics'.  This chain of New Zealand fabric shops has spread to Australia and I see they are opening in Los Angeles soon.  Lucky them!  I'm looking forward to the re-opening of their Christchurch store sometime soon - it has been closed since the February 2011 earthquake.

I am lucky living near Christchurch and having access to some good fabric shops - my current favourite is Harald's in Birmingham drive - a very old-school retailer with great service.  I've picked up some great bargains there.  

Clothing fabric in New Zealand is reasonable - I can usually get good quality cotton - knit or otherwise for about half the price (or less) per metre than I would pay for quilting fabric.  I would never sew garments with quilting fabric I've paid the usual $28/metre for... it's just uneconomic.  Spotlight always has bargains - and a good selection - but I've got my best deals from shops that have random rolls of fabric.  You have to look through the 'trash' to find the treasure.

Oliver + S Sewing 21- 40

To continue on with my counting here are the next twenty O+S items I have made:

21. Swingset skirt in chambray (not fully lined) with pink ric-rac trim- pic here
22. Swingset top in plain pink (pic to come in summer for these)
23. Sand-box pants in grey cord with pink trim
    
24. Bubble dress in yellow with white spot
    
25. Jump-rope dress (view B) in chambray with red top-stitching
26. Jump-rope dress as top in pink voile
    
27. Puppet show shorts in brown drill
    
28. Class Picnic blouse in pink voile (see above)
29. Ice-cream dress for 5 year old niece
    
30. Ice-cream dress for 4 year old niece (yes, that's K)
    
    
31. Ice-cream dress for 3 year old niece
32. Ice-cream dress for 2 year old niece
    
33. Ice-cream top in Cape Ann fabric
    
34. Music Class blouse with long sleeves in white on white fabric
    
35. Hopscotch top as night-gown - here
36. Nature Walk pants in grey knit
37. Nature Walk pants in mauve knit
38. Lazy Days skirt in cream with children and red trim 
    
39. Lazy Days skirt in blue cord with babushkas and green trim
40. Music Box dress in brown - here
41. and more to come... see future post... :-)

Table Runner

Our Playcentre is fundraising with a Housie night and are on the hunt for prizes.  I volunteered to make something and this is what I produced:

 I'll make this picture bigger so you can see the fabrics and simple walking foot quilting.

It is basically the 'Tasty Table Runner' from Jaybird quilts.  I took out the borders because I wanted to keep the project relatively simple.  The fabric is a mixture - with the same backing as my Papillon quilt from two posts ago.

It took a while to cut out - I used my new Hex N More ruler - but quick to sew up - it just pays to have two strips going at the same time, or make two runners and have four strips!

Oh - an update on the hens - we're now getting four eggs a day!  Omelettes are back on the menu!

Patty and the Cake

We had some birthdays over the weekend.  My dear H was forty and this was the cake K and I made for him:

It was a very simple chocolate cake made in two tins - one circular (with hole) and the other in a square tin that got cut into segments for the '4'.  I started icing the whole thing - but should have done just the top for all.  The fences are made with pretzel sticks and the cereal for the hen and tractor is lemon jelly crystals and chocolate hail.  K had great fun placing all the elements - I just had to cover up all her changes!

I knitted him a tubular scarf in a soft brown wool - and he's been wearing it.  No photos though, that would be asking a bit much.  I must post a picture of just it and the very simple pattern I used.

We have another pet lamb - Patty (a boy, but very nice to 'pat').  He's not quite a week old, so much smaller than Daniel and George who are getting very large and rough.  Patty can get out through the gap in the fence so he comes and helps me as I'm weeding the vege garden.  K loves giving him cuddles too!

Yes, that's me.  I'm not hurting him - he's just straining to suck my fingers thinking they have milk!

You'll see a new jersey I've finished in that picture.  It's one I've heavily adapted from another.  I knitted it all in one piece using the contiguous method by Susie Myers.  It's in an alpaca/wool 8ply mix which I only had five balls of.  So it required quite a bit of juggling to get it all out - but I did!  I plan to make another and fine tune my pattern for others... maybe I'll publish it??

 It's a bit hard to show the shoulders from the front - hopefully this back shot will be better.

The sizing will take some working but I really enjoyed knitting it all in one piece.  A cinch to finish off!