The Quilting Sisters - Carol's Round Robin

Oh my this Round Robin has been sitting at my home for quite some time. Usually I have them out the door as soon as they arrive. I cannot believe I have held this for so long. I did the final 2 rounds. After my first round I just couldn't decide on what I was going to do and I wouldn't or couldn't send it home unfinished. After asking for help from many other quilters I finally worked out what I wanted to do. The black border was an idea from many other quilters and I can see how it has pulled the quilt together.... Thank you to all who helped me work this out.

I am so scared Carol won't like it but I am now happy to send her home. I will add a packet of Tim Tams as an 'Sorry'... that might bribe her....haha

Picture Swap

I have been very busy this month. I have taken my trip around the region to check that we are all stocked up should a disaster occur. Mellie and I took heaps of sewing to do along the way but were so tired each night that we didn't get anything done. This months Guild Block is a 'Crinoline Lady' on point. Mellie realised that hers wasn't so she cut it out into an oval shape and attached it to a soft pink background making it look like a cameo. Clever idea, hers is now on point.



I have mainly been busy sewing Ruth's Picture Swap. 'Snow covered Church with stained Glass windows at Christmas Time'. What a theme...lol. Well I finally got her Church finished, and handed on to the next lady in the swap. I am very happy with the end result.

SCQIS Advent swap

oops .. the bag

SCQIS Advent swap

As I have mentioned before I am in an Advent swap with SCQIS where you parcel up 25 gifts for your Advent Angel and in return you receive 25 gifts. You get to open 1 present a day and the value of this swap is $2-3 with a $15 final gift. I have participated in this swap for several years now and have really enjoyed myself so this year I decided to give one to my girlfriend for christmas. Needless to say I have been very busy making things as 10 items must be handmade. Well I finished my 10th handmade item and my final gift. These mice are suppose to have 'grub roses' along the side but I am not good at making these so I opted for Lazy daisys...
My final gift is the easiest bag I have ever made. I saw a friend with it and really liked it. She put an extra button on hers as she didn't want anyone being able to get into her bag so I did it as well. I am very pleased with it and will now make another to put in my own Advent swap

.

Tumbaweeds - Christi's Round Robin

When I received Chrisit's Round robin, I just loved it. It was in my colours and ones I like working with. I then sat and read what she expected to see on her quilt and who the quilt was for and their likes and dislikes. She said the quilt was for her mother and yellow roses were her favourite flowers. After looking at the quilt I felt the yellow in the centre represented a yellow rose so that was the main focus of my round. I wanted to do pieced roses but I spent 7 hours and ended up with 1 rose so I gave that a miss and went back to my applique. I used fairy frost given to me in a Secret Santa last year and currently my favourite fabric and after rummaging through my stash I can up with the small amount of Japanese Kimino fabric. How excited I was as Christi's mum is Japanese. I still have a brown paw to put in the corner but after that it is finished.

Drink Coasters

Well I have been so busy lately making these 92 drink coasters for Christmas presents that I was sick of making them. I had to push myself for the last 2 sets. I hope the effort is appreciated. Add with the 2 bars of soap we normally get... should make a nice gift...

SCQIS Picture Swap

Today I have been busy, still making the 26 sets of coasters needed for the Christmas Present I stupidly offered to do. I still have 2 more sets to do so I took a break to make my backing for the Picture Swap. I have decided to do Egyptian and Arabian Nights. I will use this block as the centre of a quilt. Might go as a Round robin or do an Egyptian gods theme swap and put them around it... see what happens when it comes home. The backing turned out completely different to what I envisaged.

Tumbaweeds - Christi's Tiger Faces

I have finally finished Christi's Tiger Faces. This was my last block for this swap as I patiently wait for mine to come home. I found this a very taxing block to do as Christi wanted it to be 3D. A lot of hours and work went into the block. Another swap finished. A new one starts.

The Quilting Sisters - round robin

As I said before I have had busy little fingers today and as well as finishing Lorraines Food block I also finished Dianne's Round Robin. I was not in this round but offered to do some so the Robin could go home. I found the RR very green and orange..lol.. what did I do... green and orange. I did the final two rounds. I felt the quilt was too small just adding 1 round. I hope Dianne likes it. I did see this quilt at the 2nd round so it was interesting to receive it for its final round.

No to my suffix puffs.

Tumbaweeds - Aussicans swap

I have had busy little fingers today. Lorraine popped in and visited our lovely ladies in South Australia on Thursday so she is just around the corner from home. I didn't want her arriving home and me still not finished her swap. Well I got stuck into it today and did Gingerbread Men. This is a lovely swap and now finished and ready to go home.

SCQIS Advent swap

For my friend Marell this year I am giving her and Advent swap. This is where you make up a gift of 24 little gifts and 1 larger one. I then sent it to a lady who in return will send Marell a parcel. She then gets to open a present every day until Christmas day. Today I finished the coasters I had made. I joined Mellie to the $2 swap and myself to the $5. The square coasters are for Marelle's swap back and front shown and the 'Allsorts" (6) are for my swap.

QNF Sampler swap

I promised myself that I wouldn't join anymore swaps... Ha! I am addicted. I have just joined a Sampler swap with QNF. This month was 9 patch. I was going to do the same block for everyone than emails went down on where to look for each persons favoutite colours. The birthday list. I don't know about anyone else but I use my Birthday colours to stock my stash with fabrics I don't have and then I get others ideas on differnt fabics. My next Birthday swap I have asked for WOW Batik. I haven't seen any just saw an email about it and thought "Oh yes.. I want that". The US get ranges of fabrics much quicker than us in Australia so what better way to get in first... :-)

For this swap I have used: Blue for Connie; Patriotic for Dom; Brights for Nicki; Asian for Sarah and Red/Brown for Virginia. I really hope they like their blocks.

Rowroundrobin 'Add A Block'

This week I received my Add A Block home. I did the block in the bottom right hand corner and used Dolphins as my themes. I was very happy with the blocks I received... all types of quilting from a Mariner's Compass from Lesley to embroidered dolpins from Sue and another lady not even in the swap. I can't wait to get it together. Shenay my niece whom this is for will just love it.

QNF Wedding block

QNF is running a 'Make a Block' for Pooks wedding. I received the 3 patterns and the 4 fabrics last week. I found making this block a little challenging.. not in the block making but how to wangle the fabric I received to fit the block. Of course you never get enough fabric to do the block as designed. Well I am very happy with how my block turned out but it isn't exactly the same as Quilterscache have the colours.

Butterfly swap

I haven't been doing very much quilting over the past few weeks. That is not to say I don't have things to do. I am currently working on Christi's tiger face. That is taking a while to do. I did finish my 5 butterflies for the Butterfly swap with Swapping to Friendship, Janine is running. Janine lives in my area but on the other size of Wagga Wagga to me. I will be travelling that way in December so will check the road map and see if I can catch up with her.
Here are my butterflies.

Round Robin

Today I have been busy working on Lynne's Round Robin. I thought it looked a little oriental and I wanted to continue with the colour changing theme. I appliqued a lotus flower in the corner and added some pinwheels starting from light and going to dark. I used oriental fabric in the darker pinwheels but I don't have much oriental stash and it is a long way to the fabric shop, so I just used the few I had. I then used a different blue as I went around to add the increase in colour as well. Don't know if I got it correct but I hope Lynne likes it.

Theme Swap

I have just come back from 2 weeks with my beautiful grandson Jet. I got to babysit him for one day while his parents worked and also they had a date out on Saturday, some thing that don't have very often. A little romance...lol... they went and saw Batman at the movies so how romantic was that. I can't believe how well behaved the little guy is. His parents are excellent parents I am so proud of them both, but especially my son as he didn' have a father himself.

On my arrival home, I had heaps of wonderful theme swaps waiting and have spent the weekend just working on them all. Now I am up to date I can get back to my Round Robins.

My first theme is Helen's Sea Life. She used blue and yellow blocks. The blue were for the fishes etc and the yellow was for sand coral etc. As most people had used the blue blocks I went for the yellow and did some coral and starfish.

Then I did Sabrina's Herloom. I did a Pansy as most people love Pansies but in hindsite I should have done a chair or basket of flowers. I wanted to do a fan but thought Lorraine might like to do that so I left it.

Next came Lesley's 'Dress the Ladies'. I decided it being an Olympic year I had better do something Olympic again. You can see I love the Olympics so I did an Australian Netball player.

With the severe storm last night I did Lesley's swap before Ruth's as I didn't want to use the computer with all that horrid lightening. I think it is easier doing a swap for someone you know rather than a stranger. I did a bottle of Champagne for Ruth's '21st Birthday' swap for Christi.

Theme swap

This week I received Themes swaps that were way behind. They were Mysi's Native American and Maude's School Houses.

Fabric Challenge

As part of our row x row swap everyone decided to participate in a Fabic Challenge as well. Well when I got my fabric I was a little apprehensive as I am not a blue person and I thought Blue and Red what a combination. I sat and looked through Quilterscache and came up with a lovely pattern and I was very happy with my end result. No to quilt it.... mmmm... wish I had a long arm.

Row x Row

As usual all swaps come in together. These row x row butterflies don't take very long to do so I got stuck straight into them. The ladies have used the most wonderful fabrics in this swap it has been very interesting to see all the different colours and fabrics used. One more to do and this swap is over.

Add-A-Block

I have finished Pam's cats for her Add-A-Block. I was only going to do one block but gave in and did two... that's me... always do more than I need....:o) I received Lesley's in the mail today as well so once I do her block that is the end of this swap and I will be glad. Not as I expected.

Bounty Belles

I am getting my blocks ready for my next swap. As only 17 ladies signed up Lorraine and I decided to divide a swap between us. We are going to do Calico Garden... I have made up 36 Calico blocks and divided them into 2 sets of 18. I cut the blocks 7" for a finished 6" block. This gives me some cut down leeway for the pulling of the applique. I will add 9 patches to finish the quilt off.

I got this pattern from the book Enduring Grace by Celia Y Oliver.

I have done my first block and 2nd block. Lorraine will do her first two so that each swap the ladies can see our colour scheme.

I now only have to go buy the plastic bag and the swap is ready to post.

Now on to my own swap... Carol-ann's horses.

Tumbaweeds - Round Robin

After finishing both my theme blocks , it was time to get stuck into Cheryl's RR. When I received it from Lesley, I cut of 3 inches of orange fabric to make the quilt more uniformed. I tried a first test and decided that I needed a spacer so I pulled out all my yellow and orange fabrics and mixed and mathed until I came up with a block similar to Cheryl's own. I really like the finished quilt which will now be posted on for its next round.

Tumbaweeds - Aussicans Theme Swap

If it rains it pours. Charlene's Calendar blocks came in this week. I cannot believe that the year has gone so fast and this swap is coming to an end. We had trouble last year finding 12 ladies to participate and this year we have been bombarded. It is so exciting we have 18 ladies in the next swap and their themes are so diversified it is going to be challenging.

Back to Charlene's Calendars. There were only 2 months left. January and November. So I could only think of Thanks-giving for the November in USA and everywhere New year in January. As there were less letters in January that is the way I went.... bad hey!!!

Monday's Quilt Group

This week it was my turn to teach how to make something. I am not very good at this sort of thing but was very pleased when 4 of the ladies cut the pattern out and one lady finished hers on the day. I taught them how to make a Tea Bag Purse. The pattern was sent to me by Dom in QNF. Very generous.

SCQIS - Gorgeous Girls

The mailman brought another swap this week so I have been busy making my block. This swap belongs to Wendy and she is doing Ted E Bear for her son. Wendy mentioned in her booklet that she has a very elaborate embroidery machine and can add details so I have made my block up and enclosed the drawing for Wendy to enhance my block. Ted E Bear has been having a very adventurous life. He has been to the moon, skating, fishing, cuddling his favourite dragon and I have put him in the Olympics. I wanted to reflect our part of the country and there is a lot of white water rafting here so I did him participating in the kayaking at the Olympics.

I started by drawing a picture. The score board is what I have asked Wendy to embroider on the block.

Then putting the background on and finishing off the block.

SCQIS - Gorgous Girls

Another swap arrived on my door step and I really love the blocks the ladies have done. This lady is an economic teacher at the local high school so she chose 'Food' as her theme. As there were only 11 ladies in the swap we all decided to do 2 of the first swaps we received. My first swap was Roselie's teapots. Thank goodness I didn't get to start this one. Bettine did 2 lovely blocks. She did the pumpkin and cheese then Roselie did the applie pie and I went with eggs. I am happy with the eggcup....lol

Row x Row

Well, I have just finished Lori's Row x Row. I really loved her colours. Green/blue + purple. Funny Lori was working on my Rows while I was working on hers. Funny thinking someone half way around the world was sitting at the sewing machine the same as you.

Round Robin - The Quilting sisters

Well I finally got stuck into Carol's Round Robin. As I said before I found this RR very taxing but that is what I love most about these swaps, you really have to think sometimes. I hope she likes what I did. I still have to do the final round and I think I already know what I am doing there so I have to go find the book it is in.

Pin cushion swap

I have been very busy making my pin cushion for the QNF Pin cushion swap. I like the colours of this pin cushion and I hope the lady who receives it likes it as well.