Sunday Stash #25

Phew it's been a busy few weeks which haven't left much time for sewing or blogging. I have at least cut out and labelled the pieces for Lella Boutique's Social Butterfly but haven't got any farther than this.

My first stash purchase was an extra fat quarter of the navy floral pattern from Melly and Me's Flutterberry as I stupidly miscut the original fat quarter. My miscut meant I couldn't get the 4 4.5" x 6.5" pieces i needed, hence the extra fat quarter. Still the remainder goes in the stash!

Also delivered this week was a fat eighth bundle of Canyon by Kate Spain for Moda. 

I haven't worked with fat eighths before but whenever I use a fat quarter bundle I always seem to have loads left over. Hopefully that won't happen with a fat eighth. 

I also received a fat quarter bundle of Handcrafted 2 by Alison Glass from Massdrop. 

I purchased two extra panels in black and white to go with and I'm not sure I could cut into them.

They may languish in my Alison Glass drawer for some time. Speaking of which, the drawer is now very full.

I'm  off to Vermont at the end of this week and Naomi the Janome is off for a service at the same time. Is that the sewing machine equivalent of a spa? If so, she deserves it! 

Happy Sunday sewing!

Sunday Stash #22

There may have been one or two purchases this week. Ahem.

First up, my next Frivol tin had arrived and its Paisley and Polka Dots by Minick and Simpson. 

Whilst I'm a big fan of red, blue and white colour schemes and polka dots, the busy paisley prints would normally have dissuaded me form buying this so its good I've been pushed out of my comfort zone.

Next, some yardage of Flutterberry by Melly and Me for Riley Blake. 

This, along with more fabric yet to arrive, is going to be a Bella Boutique "Social Butterfly" quilt for a little newborn girl. Not much I can do until the rest of the fabric turns up! The cream is the backing and the pink is the border and binding.

Next a quick trip to Oz for Jen Kingwell's Steam Punk pattern and some awesome templates from Sunset Seams that arrived super fast. Just over a week for something that travelled half way around the world. Wow!

More patterns, this time by Elizabeth Hartwell and Kate Spain.

Back to fabric and a fat quarter bundle of Pie Making Day by Brenda Ratliffe for RJR. This will go nicely with the Lacuna modern sampler pattern I have (which I think is also by Brenda?).

A layer cake of Modern Background by Zen Chic for Moda

And fat quarter bundles of Imprint by Katarina Roccella for Art Gallery Fabrics finishes things off. 

I was thinking about using the Imprint for the Hazel Hedgehog pattern but I'm now worried that the spikes of Hazel might get lost in the print. Ah well, I'll just have to buy more fabric!

My motto is: if you're good all the time, people aren't impressed when you behave. 

Pattern matching: Playing peek-a-boo with seams

As I was sewing the drunkards path blocks for my secret project and the quilt was gradually getting bigger, it occurred to me that anything over 44" wide meant a pieced back. It eventually ended up 47" by 52" even without the two inch overage. Drat.

And with the cute Melly and Me Wildflower Meadow print I'd chosen, I would either have to put a really skinny pieced strip in the middle of the two halves or pattern match along a centre seam.

Eek. I've never pattern matched before.

I read a few blogger guides and had a go. Apart from a moment of panic when I thought I didn't have any fabric glue (anyone know what the equivalent of Elmers glue in the UK is?) it went fairly smoothly. I won't attempt to set out the full process here as there are so many excellent tutorials already available. My only advice would be to check your repeat occurrence (ie how often the pattern repeats itself horizontally and vertically) so that you know how much potential overlap (and therefore wastage) your likely to have. You'll need to factor this in to your yardage calculation.

I won't claim that I matched the seams perfectly; there's at least one flower and a bull rush that is slightly askew.

And let's not play the game of "oh gosh, where can that seam be?". It's right there, stonkingly  obvious. See it? Of course you do.

But once it's pressed and quilted over, I'm hoping the tiny recipient will forgive any flaws.

Imperfectly finished is better then perfectly unfinished, right?

Sunday Stash #8

Another feast week of fabric has come and gone.

First a layer cake of Wee Ones flannels by Tim and Beck for Moda.

I bought the layer cake from Carogojo who included a skinny coordinating fat quarter for free! If you are making a quilt which needs binding, having a free skinny quarter would be a life saver. I confess my project (already cut out) doesn't require binding so this little beauty will be going in my stash.

The backing and binding of my new secret project arrived from Sew Hot. 

How ridiculously cute is this Wildflower Meadow print by Melly and Me for Riley Blake?! I also bought some mint green stripe from Daysail by Bonnie and Camille for Moda. I've never done stripy binding before so this could be interesting...

Next up, my fat quarter bundle of Sun Print Alison Glass arrived from Mass Drop arrived. 

Gotta love Mass Drop - any customs charges were already paid so it zoomed over to me! No idea what I'm going to do with it but it's in my stash so no "non-buyers regret" for me!

Speaking of non-buyers regret, my FQ bundle of Shimmer by Jennifer Sampou for Robert Kaufman also arrived. 

It's not quite a complete bundle as the lovely people at The Quilter's Studio had sold out of some fabrics but I understand Jennifer is to add to the collection this year. So I might be able to supplement my stash with some coordinating fabric.

Happy Sunday sewing!