Comberton Quilters scoop 1st Place at Festival Of Quilts 2023

What's going on in my Pink Studio now?

This Year's Festival was amazing in so many ways:

I don't have the luxury of getting there by coach with the ladies from Elstree any more and the drive to the NEC was wet and wild - more like a November day than early August. But I enjoyed the company of 2 new friends  Janet and Patricia, from the Childswickham group. 

The first thing I saw when I arrived were these 'Sew a Row' quilts that I had made with the Comberton group. Jean Hall led this project at Connecting Threads several years ago, and it was great fun to do it again with a new crowd. 

Liz and Pete Holpin of Pinhole Quilting (UK Handiquilter distributers) had used them to decorate their stand!

Then of course there was our group quilt, a slightly modified version of Edyta Sitar's 'Quilters Patch'. I had won the pattern book in a Connecting Threads raffle a few years back and was so pleased when we decided to do it as a group. I doubt I would have got round to it by myself. I had many of the original fabrics from her Silver Linings collection and so we were quite close to the original. We heard that we had won the group category on the Thursday and Pauline, Marlene (who quilted it so beautifully) and several of the other group members were there to pick up the plaque from Stuart Hillard at the award ceremony. 

I enjoyed the rest of the exhibition with some stunning quilts on display, although seeing pictures online afterwards, I didn't see them all. Mostly I enjoyed meeting up with my chums from Hertfordshire and came home with a pile of tops to finish off.

But perhaps the biggest surprise of the day was that I only made ONE purchase --- and it wasn't even pink!! A hammock to hold the wadding under my frame while I'm quilting.

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Back in April, one of my friends casually mentioned that she had "seen my quilt" in the Forge Mill Needle Museum in Redditch. So I trundled off with my friend Sandra to check it out and was astonished to see 'Scrappy Stars', which I entered into FOQ in 2015, proudly hanging on display. I had sold it to a textile tutor from Coventry,  Jane Cobbett, and it was on loan from her collection, complete with a little blurb I had written about how I made it. I had no idea it was there! 

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So what am I up to now? Well the pile from Birmingham is about finished. Look at these beauties from Val Jefferies!

And this beautiful HAND PIECED (not EPP) Double Wedding Ring by Janet Swallow who didn't want me to quilt feathers on it!!! I might have to make one myself now 😆

On the frame right now is the third quilt I have done for Lindsay, a lovely lady introduced to me by Pinhole Quilting. Here are the first two:

They have both been done in French General and 3 Sisters type fabric palette.

 I often say that quilts speak to me ... well this one was positively SINGING!

Happy Quilting Everyone - Stay safe and keep cheerful! 

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www.englishquilter.co.uk

Outside my comfort zone 

And just a tiny bit of progress on my own projects.

Well I've been so busy since Christmas, I have only just had a couple of days to get a stage further with my medallion project. No pictures yet, though!

Eight quilts off the frame so far this year, including this 'French Braid' I pieced for Mary (which justified a rather rash purchase of a fat quarter bundle at Malvern!)

I got it to her just before she ended up in hospital!

This bold quilt was designed by Judith Gauthier and was pieced by Jan 

(one of Sandy's class in Bushey). 

She used solid colours in Oakshott fabrics,  which were prone to fraying. So she used stabiliser in places, which made the top quite heavy. 

I wanted loft without extra weight, so I chose Soft & Bright polyester wadding. 

I had to resist my usual inclination to do feathers and flowers and curls. It needed geometric lines to bring out the Art Deco style. I changed thread colours to match every fabric so as not to detract from the design.

Outside my comfort zone, but looks lovely on the back!

Before that, I quilted this 'Halo Star' quilt for

 Elizabeth (another of Sandy's students).

Elizabeth sourced most of the fabrics from my collection, so this one was right up my street!

 I've been waiting more than four years to quilt this one, having done one for Sandy and a smaller version for myself. 

It was FUN!!

Then there were these two lovelies from Val and Denise:

Plenty to do as usual, but I'm trying to fit in a Quilt a Long project by Edyta Sitar - I am making myself use some of her beautiful blues!

Happy Quilting Everyone - Stay safe and keep cheerful! 

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www.englishquilter.co.uk

Festival of Fun

Charity Begins At Home 

I started 2022 meaning to post a blog at least every other month. But somehow I just haven't found the time. Much of my quilting has been for charitable causes this year. I undertook this mammoth quilt on behalf of Connecting Threads group in Elstree. Apparently, it was 'inherited' partly completed. 

The appliquéd panels are actually printed, but look very effective and were fun to echo. And the large pieced blocks were interesting designs that I had not come across before. Hopefully it will be auctioned or raffled in aid of NSPCC. 

I went on to do four more charity quilts for Connecting Threads, as Anne Sykes had asked the ladies to do some scrappy blocks and she had been somewhat overwhelmed by the response. It was fun and also a good opportunity for me to try out a few different designs. For example I had never done ‘wood grain’ before. 

Many other colourful quilts have passed through my studio so far this year, as I continue to receive beautiful tops by post, from all my talented friends in Hertfordshire. Here are just a few :

Beautiful teal colour by Jackie - her best yet!

Huge Pretty Liberty fabric quilt by Jean Smith.

This lovely 

Japanese fabric stunner by ‘novice’ Denise Pearson.

Red and grey contrasting - so dramatic. By Jean Hall.

Bubbles on a white background on this very different strip quilt by Val

 

And this was my parting challenge to the ladies of Studio Quilters. I left them with a pile of scrap strip sets, some orphan pinwheels and a background fabric and they turned out this fascinating scrappy quilt top which I have quilted and returned for them to sell for NSPCC.

Now I am just recovering from yesterday’s super Festival of Quilts with a head full of ideas (and a bag full of ‘too pretty to pass by’ PINK fabric). I also met up with all my dear friends from Connecting Threads and Studio Quilters and collected FIVE quilt tops from them before they left on their coach!

 

Phew! That’ll keep me busy for a while.

Happy Quilting Everyone - Stay safe and keep cheerful! 

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www.englishquilter.co.uk

Challenge started

 Happy New Year

 

Well I didn't find time to post a blog before the end of 2021 - so I thought I would start off 2022 as I mean to go on! 

The Quiltathon at Pinhole Quilting in October ended up being a great success. By the end of day 2 we had completed nearly 70 quilts. These were distributed to be given to young people leaving care at special dinners this Christmas. 

I managed six, all with different free motion designs and it was so inspiring. I was in such a groove that I carried on with the last design the next day, and quilted these large 'double  bubbles' on this cool monochrome quilt for Marion.

I delivered my Peter Rabbit quilt for Benjamin, my gorgeous little grandson, who arrived safe and sound in November.

  

 Lots of Fussy cutting of the Peter Rabbit motifs.  

       

Poor little lad is getting the full Beatrix Potter treatment before he gets old enough to object! 😂 But his Mum seemed to like it. 

Here are some of the other lovely quilts I got to work on lately.

Another charming little nursery quilt by Jean Smith. I just love what she does! 

And this is 'I SPY' by Innes at Childswickham Quilters, a local group I have just joined. So much fun to look at while I quilted it.

Last year I told you about the vintage quilt kit I have taken on. so far, I had only managed to sort out all the fabrics by colour, list the numbered shapes and put them in separate bags. That was enough to make me realise what a daunting task this is going to be! 

But today I have started to tackle it. I can now appreciate the problems faced by the original (unknown) sewer when she started it. All the hundreds of shapes are stamped (with their corresponding numbers) onto the various coloured fabrics. Some of them were rather blurry, especially on the dark green and red fabrics and they were difficult to read. The fabric is also very thin and flimsy and was all scrunched up. I doubt whether she had such sharp scissors as I was able to use. 

 

So, I sorted out the right pieces to work on just one flower head. It has taken me all day just to do this.

Some of it is looking a bit aged and I am hoping to be able to give it a gentle wash before I get to quilt it. 

But that could be a few years off yet!

Happy Quilting Everyone - Stay safe and keep cheerful! 

Thank you for visiting my blog and for leaving your comments. Please share on Facebook, Pinterest  etc.

www.englishquilter.co.uk