Christmas swap sewing

I'm swap mama again for the MQG Ireland swap group, and we are in the middle of our Christmas swap. Swappers must make a table runner or table topper for their partner, as well as a little Christmas decoration.

I love taking part in swaps! This time around, having to go for surgery shortly after assigning swap partners was more than a little inconvenient, but being at home recovering has allowed me time to catch up a little, particularly as I decided to stick to hand piecing in the main for my design idea. Perfect for working on while sitting on the sofa taking it easy :-)

I played around with quite a few ideas before settling on the idea of a Christmas wreath made from hexies. And a little Christmas tree in the middle to finish it off :-) I really like how this is shaping up. I'm thinking 3 or 4 blocks side by side will look lovely.

After a bit of sewing this afternoon while rewatching The West Wing for the hundredth time, it's looking good so far. Next, it's back to basting the next lot of hexies for the 2nd wreath.

A little Christmas magic

This year I have been really conscious that I haven't made one Christmas themed thing! Not like me, I normally make something to add to the Christmas decorations every year. But the thought of cutting and sewing pretty much anything in the last few weeks has been too much for me.

Happily, the magic of Christmas decided to sprinkle itself in my direction this week. Some intensive treatment with a brilliant physiotherapist in the last 3 weeks has finally had the desired effect and the basic things like walking and moving have been so much easier this week. Yesterday afternoon, I needed a little headspace and felt up to a little sewing. Having swooned over all the triangle quilts out there online this year, I decided to cut some triangles from my Christmas fabric scraps.

It went along suprisingly quickly, and I managed to finish up this cute table runner this morning. Not too big - it fits our living room coffee table perfectly, or we could use on the kitchen table.

It was a bit of a rushed affair - knowing my back had its limits for sitting at the machine, I rattled through the piecing and quilting without much attention to detail - hence, lots of wonky quilting lines, and the most careless ever machine done binding. But, once it is in use and I am not looking at it from 6 inches away, those flaws will fade into the background and I'll just notice the colour and the lovely little triangles!

I hope you all are ready for the big day, and that the kids are almost at fever pitch of excitement waiting for Santa, like mine are!! I'm not sure if I'll be back posting over the festive season, or into January as I want to spend lots of time with my family relaxing before the new baby arrives - and all the mayhem that will bring.

So I'll sign off by wishing you all a lovely, happy and fun Christmas and New Year, and just to say thank you all for your lovely comments, good wishes and friendship this year. I hope that after baby arrives and settles in a bit I will start to get back to my normal self again :-)

Modern Christmas Table Runner swap package - done!

It's a lovely feeling, having your swap package done. Finished in perfect time, and feeling pretty happy with it too. It's always when I'm packing my package up to post off that I remember that I am going to get a package in return from a secret partner...I know that we all comment in the Flickr group and are watching each other's creations but somehow, it never seems real that one of them might be coming to me until I have upheld my part of the bargain!

So, without further ado, here it is, my little Christmas swap package for my secret partner.

I got the quilting finished up after putting the backing on. The long strip is from the fabric I bought for Emily's Christmas charm swap - a happy accident that this fell out of my sewing basket when I was trying to figure out what to do for the back as I had forgotten I had it. The blue fabric is also a Christmas fabric and I think they are good together.

I auditioned a few different fabrics for the binding and did wonder about my red choice as it really brings the red up in the runner. But I hope my partner likes it!

So here it is in all its finished glory - and thank you to everyone for all the lovely comments on in during the making of it. I really like the combination of handquilting and dense machine quilting in the negative space and I hope that my partner does too.

I know some people have asked for a tute for this one, but, honestly, the triangles were an experimental kind of process and I didn't find them easy. With everything going on at the moment in the run up to Christmas, I just don't have the time or the patience to figure them all out again. Nor could I put my family through a 2nd bout of the swearing that accompanied them!! But I will try and do a tute in the New Year for it, as I think it would work really well in non- seasonal fabrics too.

Once I finished hand sewing the binding on last night (yes, handsewing my binding, you read that right, I always handsew for swaps even though I usually machine my quilts) my thoughts turned to my ornament. I had pinned about 20 different inspiration ideas on my Christmas Pinterest board and the one in the top left corner really appealed to me - particularly as it tied in with the trees on the runner.

                                                                       Source: megatropolis.tumblr.com via Sarah on Pinterest

So, I had a little fun running it up. I added some stars at the tops of the trees, and handstitched them down with perle cotton rather than doing it with the machine. I think its pretty and must do a couple for the house here before Christmas - I can see a row of them hanging on my wall! 

I also made my partner a super simple little heart to hang on her tree - I have a few of these on my tree every year and just love them.

So, it is ready for the post office which unfortunately I don't think I will get to tomorrow as I have to travel for work and have to leave earlier than expected in the morning. But it will be there first thing Tuesday and from there it will be a mystery as to how long it takes to get to its destination!

I want to say a huge thanks to Susan who has been a fab and totally inspiring swap mama and has run a brilliant swap. She gathered a great and incredibly talented group of ladies so I really can't wait to see which of the fab runners arrives at my house.

And finally - thanks to everyone for the congratulations on reaching 1000 followers on Google Friend Connect, I'm totally thrilled!! I seem to have roughly the same again through Reader and other feeds. It's still quite amazing to me that so many people like to pop by and look at what I'm making and read my ramblings, but I just love that you do, and I adore when you're interested in chatting too :-) So, well, what else can I say other than I am organising a little giveaway to celebrate so stay tuned in the next couple of weeks!

Also, don't forget to pop by for my block tutorial on Wednesday for the 12 Days of Christmas Sampler QuiltAlong - even if you're not taking part I think it would make a nice little doll quilt type wall hanging or table topper and I promise - it's easy peasy and fun!!

Ok, so I'm linking up as always to some of my absolute favourite linky gatherings - {Sew} Modern Monday, Manic Monday and Fabric Tuesday. Go have a peek for some great inspiration! I'm also entering the runner in this month's Celebrate Colour pool:

Yes, I am officially insane.....

Remember this runner? The one with all the angst about the different dye lots?

The one I asked for your advice on, which you so generously gave. Lots of you! And you all pretty much said the same thing.......leave it as it was.

You know what I actually did?

Yes, you're right. The panels are all the same. I ripped it all back and replaced the fabric with some more from the same dye lot. Mad. I know.

But.

I am so much happier with it now. Despite what everyone said, and knowing that you were all right, and knowing that I would have given the same advice myself, I just. couldn't. love. it. the way it was. Just could not bring myself to do any more work on it. I hated the difference in shades so much it was paralysing me, particularly as it was not consistent throughout the runner, so it just didn't look like it was intentional, and really, there was only one decision to be made then.

That's not to say I didn't appreciate all your advice. Or listen to you, because I actually thought about it a lot. And I normally listen to the sage advice you all give me. But sometimes, you have to do what makes you happy. As Lynne wisely said (thank you Lynne!)

So now, I have a lovely ta-dah moment with my Stepping Stones table runner. I really really am happy with it now. (Can you imagine if I had done all that and then I wasn't?) I know in the photo above, it looks like there is a difference in shade, but that's the way the light is falling. When its down on the table, it looks so much better, I think. And I wanted the focus to be on the charms, and the quilting, which it now is.Here are a few photos from my gloomy grey winter garden this morning. See why I called it Stepping Stones?

This was a very straightforward make, but sometimes they're the best. Let me know if you would like a super quick tute on this one, I'd be happy to write it up. I think it would work great as a Christmas themed runner too. I'm really pleased with how the quilting turned out on this one. I used a light grey Aurifil thread on the front, leaving the charms unquilted so they really pop:

 

I used a lavender Egyptian cotton thread on the back (sorry, I can't write the brand name as its Greek!). Love how the quilting pops on the back too!

 
My first time using both brands of thread and I was very impressed with both, compared to the Gutterman natural cotton which is what I normally use for quilting. Love the stitch definition and how smooth they flowed through my machine. I would say the Egyptian cotton is ever so slightly heavier - very marginally - and will definitely be using again for quilting where I want the quilting to be a feature. I got the Aurifil thread from Janette in River Fabrics, who has recently started stocking them, and the Egyptian cotton from Fi in Threads2000 (Patchwork Delights) and its absolutely great to now have some choice in the thread available to me, and to be able to get those great big spools of cotton, at brilliant prices. I highly recommend checking both of them out!

The grey is Kona Ash - love this fabric so much! I think the charm squares stand out against them - they are all from my charms from Jennifer's Rainbow charm swap.

The back is wide strips of Kona Orange, Ochre, Berry and Aubergine - all from River Fabrics in Co. Down also - Janette has a brill selection of Kona shades. Very bright for my friend who loves this combination of colours!

The binding is an orange fabric I picked up at the K&S show - not sure what it is!

All ready now to be washed and sent off in the post to my friend - hope she likes it!!

Quilt Stats:

Name: Stepping Stones Table Runner
Made For: My good friend
Measures: 50" long x 11.5" wide
Fabric: Kona Solids + various charm squares
Batting: Warm and White
Quilting: Straight line by me
Pattern: Simple squares design by me

I'm linking up this week to {Sew} Modern Monday, Manic Monday and Fabric Tuesday.

WIP Wednesday

Time for a little catch up!

Started this week:
 
This week is all about table runners in my house. I started on two this week - one for the Modern Christmas table runner swap, and one for a gift for my friend. The Christmas one was a bit of an experimental process but I'm really pleased with how its looking and just waiting till the weekend to quilt it. I know now that my partner is going to like this, but need to make a decision on how to quilt it. I could go in the white space with zig zags, which would seem a natural choice, but the trees are cut on slightly different angles so it might be a bit tricky to get it looking right. I'm liking the idea of straight line quilting too. Still pondering this one!

I also pieced and started to quilt a runner for a friend. She is not into crafty stuff really at all so this is a little bit of a reach. I want it to be very modern and understated looking. She loves bright colours, particularly orange and purple, but I don't want it too look traditionally crafty so I went for pops of colour against Ash grey Kona. The squares radiate out from the largest one in the centre towards both ends, getting smaller for each square.

I started to quilt it tonight and really love how the quilting is shaping up.I went for straight lines, with the print squares unquilted. The back is large strips of aubergine, orange, berry and ochre Kona (couldn't get a decent picture) and I'm using some of the lovely lavender coloured Egyptian cotton thread I got from Fi for the quilting on the back.

However, there is a problem. Have you noticed? I used 2 different lots of Kona Ash grey to piece this and there is a minor, minor difference in colour between them. I didn't notice it when I was piecing, it was only when I had it laid out to quilt that I realised it and I hoped the quilting would draw the eye away. I don't know what to do now - whether to continue or to stop, undo it and repiece the strips in. I'm not sure my friend will notice when its all finished, quilted and bound and laid out on the table. I am a bit of a perfectionist about stuff like this and its bothering me a bit to be honest so I would love to hear your honest opinions on it. it. My hubbie thinks I am quite mad to be so exercised about it! I will say that the camera and light exacerbate the difference more than it looks to the naked eye, but I did still spot it. But then, I am always looking much more at the detail than most people would and I know when you're in the process you tend to focus on the detail and the imperfections rather than the big picture. Urrgh. Opinions please!!

In Progress:

The red, pink and aqua quilt is progressing steadily (but no pics!) and I am almost finished cutting the block pieces, another cutting session should see me finished. Once I have finished the cutting, I am confident of moving this along quite quickly.

My Skittles quilt top is on my mind a lot this week, I think I need to start quilting it soon too. I have pretty much decided to largely hand quilt this one, mostly because then I can do it in front of the fire in the evenings :-) So, hoping to start on this soon!

Other Stuff:

I'm off to the Knitting and Stitching show on Thursday and, to my huge excitement, am meeting up with some friends there, not least my blogging buddy Cindy of Fluffy Sheep Quilting who I chat to a lot but have never actually met. Imagine how excited I am to be meeting her in real life!! So, I just can't wait for Thursday morning to roll around to set out to Dublin and hoping that I manage to pick up some lovely fabric too :-)

Ok, so I'm linking up the fab WIP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced - hop over there and check out the fab talent on show!