New quilt top, socks and a pheasant story

 

The strings in the wind have grown into a quilt top. I took your advice and kept the other colours to a minimum. Next step is to find a free floor space to make the layers, and quilt it. Luckily this is not a very large quilt.

 

A new pair of Train socks, this time for the Red Cross. I have knitted at least one pair per month for the Järvenpää babies as well, but I often forget to take a picture before giving them away. Anyway, they all look the same, just different yarns. Here I used two little rest balls of baby sock wool. One pair only takes 38 g  of yarn.

One day I happened to look at the little rock just outside our yard, and I noticed someone had brought a mossy stone on top of the rock.

I looked closer (through the camera lens) and saw that it was a pheasant cock fast asleep!

 

He must have heard me or felt that I was watching, because he opened his eyes...

... and stood up, looking around as if to see if anyone noticed ...

... and then he stretched his neck and let everyone hear his "song", flapping his wings.

"What, no applause?"

 

Some days later I caught him hammering our cellar window, where his rival and enemy is lurking every time he comes to check. He also fights back, every time!

 

We were just 15 inches apart, only separated by a dirty window. I think I need to tape a newspaper on the glass to make the mirror image disappear.

 

 

Strings in the wind

Earlier this year Stephanie of Loft Creations challenged her readers to use up their strings and make string block projects without a deadline or any other rules. Finally I have started my own new quilt, using the free String-X pattern from Quiltville. As it was a sunny day, I arranged my 15 first blocks outdoors on the terrace floor. I snapped this photo and was just going to turn the last block the other way...

 

 

...when the wind came and scattered all my blocks around! I have my strings assorted according to colour in 6 boxes, and tomorrow I'm going to add one or two colours to my sewing table and maybe put the blue box aside for a while.

 

At last I got a picture of my favourite little friend, the robin. They come to eat at the bird feeder now that we have peeled sunflower seeds there. Their tiny beaks are not meant for hard food, and as insects are still hiding from the cold(ish) weather, the seeds will do them good. Our feeder is like a building site canteen for most of our little birds who are busy trying to find a place and building their nest and charming their partner. Fast food is a time-saving option!

The swans are back too, I saw them from the school window last week when I was having my last Tunisian crochet class and they were having an evening flight to the pond by the school. I will share my crochet project when it's finished.

Happy Scrappy Spring finished

Last Spring I started the Happy Scrappy Spring quilt Kaaren of The Painted Quilt designed and offered as a free BOM. Actually it was the whole Row of the Month, with pieced blocks and some stitcheries. I made the stitcheries in red, and used, as usual, mostly recycled fabrics for the blocks.

For the wool appliqué I had to buy some wonderful wool felt, and that kept me from finishing this quilt right the way.

I really enjoyed the new(ish) for me experience of wool appliqué. It feels great when you notice you can easily make it look good!

 

The third row was the most work, five stitcheries including this big one for the centre.

 

Spring is also Easter, so the quilt has lots of bunnies, eggs and egg baskets.

 

 

Wool felt appliqué flowers, carrots and birds.

 

 

The little bunny with a kite is one of my favourites.

So is this little chick in her wellies and umbrella. Notice the tiny Easter eggs on the left.

I left out a dozen or so leaping bunnies on the checkerboard rows between the stitched blocks. In February I finally sandwiched the quilt, in March I machine quilted it and just this last week hand sewed the binding and a hanging sleeve.

 

Here the finished quilt is hanging in Villa Cooper, waiting for buyers. With Kaaren's  kind consent, my Happy Scrappy Spring quilt will be (hopefully) sold to raise money for the New Children's Hospital 2017 project.

 

 

It says so on the label here too:

 

 

In the Summer the Villa Cooper people will have an exhibition with the theme "Birds", also for the New Children's Hospital 2017 project. Our members are invited to make their own projects under the theme, using their favourite technique, and to donate the products to be sold at Villa Cooper. 100 % of the money raised will go to the hospital project.

 

First quilt finish of the year

This winter has not felt like a real winter because of the lack of snow. Maybe that's why I have been knitting winter things like socks and mittens instead of sewing quilts. Anyway, I started sewing some scraps together in January:



 

and today the String Beans quilt is finally finished. This is one of Stephanie's patterns, easy to follow and accurate as always.

 

 

I needed to adjust my borders to the width of my backing and batting. Stephanie's original quilt was a lap size 52" x 62". As I made this quilt for the local nursing home, I wanted it to be comfortable for someone who likes a nap on the bed, keeping warm from neck to toe. I added 11 beans, one row for the width and another for the length. The backing is bright red flannel. I think it is shining through in this picture. I'm so glad it didn't stain the white when I washed the finished quilt this morning! Of course I had prewashed the backing separately before using it.

 

 

The binding is the same pink fabric as I used for the sashings, something from my sister's stash she generously dumped in my boxes. All the other fabrics are from my stash, recycled shirts or rest bits from old projects, and the white background comes from the edge parts of old sheets. I like to follow the tradition of making patchwork of used fabric and adding leftover scraps for spicing so nothing is wasted.