Sew Mama Sew! Giveaway Day

 

Another week, another giveaway! It's December after all! I have put together a little package from my own stash for you today and I hope you like it.

To everyone who is visiting for Sew, Mama, Sew! giveaway day - céad míle fáilte (or, to translate, a huge Irish welcome!) to my little corner of blogland. I hope that you stay and have a look around. This has been the year of quilting for me. I finished my very first quilt on 25th January this year and quickly became obsessed with the whole quilting process. So much so that I have made an average of 1 large quilt a month and lots of minis, table runners, mug rugs and other projects along the way, including jointly hosting the Across the Sea quiltalong with my friend Jennifer. Plus, of course, the 3 quilts that are in my sewing basket waiting to be finished by year end! I love to make colourful, modern quilts - big and small - with gorgeous fabrics and simple, clean design. Here are some of my favourite makes this year:

You'll find more about my finished quilts here. Next year, my plan involves lots of tutes and some quilt patterns so I would love if you came back and visited again when all the madness of the giveaways is over!

Later this week I will be posting a tute for these cute phone/gadget cozies - one for smaller gadgets, one for iPhones. They are super fast, and super easy and you can make them with scraps - perfect, last minute Christmas presents! So do pop back and check it out if you need some gift inspiration!

To all my loyal friends, well, you know how much I love you all :-) But I'll say it again, just so you're sure - you're the BEST!! I love how I have become friends with so  many of you though commenting and chatting via email, and I really, really hope I get to meet lots of you in London in June at the Fat Quarterly retreat, funds and flights permitting (lets talk about that more in the New Year, will we?).

So, let's get to the important parts!  Today's giveaway is all of my own fabric, from my (overflowing) stash baskets. In case you are wondering, my home is smoke free and pet free!

First up, I am giving a way a Fairy Tale Friends honeybun.

 

Nice, right? This honeybun consists of 45 1.5" strips, approx 44" wide. Have a look here for more info.


But that's not all, I'm also including 6 stashbuilding fat quarters. The fabrics are perfect mixer fabrics in a nice range of colours. 

They are, from left to right: Freebird by Momo for Moda, Hideaway by Lauren and Jessi Jung for Moda,  Grand Revival by Tanya Whelan for Free Spirit, Pinfeathers by Carina Gardner for Northcott, Midsummer Magic by Laurie Godin for Northcott, and 1001 Peeps by Lizzy House for Andover.

What do you need to do? I'm keeping this simple... you can have 2 entries. Please leave your email address in your comment in the following format: fairyfacedesigns (at) gmail (dot) com so that I can contact you.

1. Leave a comment telling me where in the world you are spending Christmas/your holidays this year. Mine will be here, at home, just outside Cork city in the very south of Ireland.  (Everyone can enter on this comment, follower or not!)
2. For a bonus entry, let me know if you are a follower, new or old.

Important stuff: I will close the giveaway at 9pm Irish time (GMT) on Friday 16th December. The winner will be drawn using Random Number Generator. Giveaway is open internationally. I will delete duplicate entries. If I cannot get in contact with the winner by Sunday 18th December, I will redraw.

**This giveaway is now closed**

Circa 1934 Winner!

Thanks everyone for entering my giveaway!

Without further ado the winner is.....

 Who is:

Congratulations Nancy Sue, I'll be in touch with you shortly for your details. Thanks so much to Janette over at River Fabrics for sponsoring this great giveaway !

And don't forget to pop back Monday for another great giveaway for the Sew, Mama, Sew! Giveaway day :-)

Help with a Drunkard Christmas ;-)

 
I've been turning over in my mind what to do with the Christmas charms I got from Emily's Christmas charm swap. I didn't need to use them in my table runner and didn't want to leave them there till next year. I have some other projects going on in the background but today I decided to try and start a Christmas quilt for snuggling under during the holidays. I also wanted to try something different to my usual square/straight line patterns and I have a Drunkard's Path die for my Accuquilt Go! Baby. I have been watching some great Drunkard's Path quilts turn up on blogs in the last few months, so decided to go with that.

I do love the Go! Baby. My pieces were cut in double quick time from the charms - and perfectly too. Then I started to piece but it did not go smoothly I must admit. I tried pinning just in the middle and at either end, but could not get my pieces as accurate as I wanted. So I started pinning all the way around and that did help. I also ran into some tension issues on the second half of each curve, I'm not sure if it was just a threading problem or if it was something to do with how I was matching the fabric. Yikes!

I was relieved to see once I pieced the 4 quarter circles together, it did look a little better than I anticipated, thanks to a little easing of the fabrics to get seams matching.  The blue and white one is not great. It seems off centre and the circles are not even, nor are the points matching. The red, green and white one is definitely better, but still not brilliant. When I squared off the block, it is at least presentable rather than disastrous. But I would hate to think that I can't improve on these. One or two like this will not be noticeable in an overall quilt, but a whole quilt of them - no way!

 

So at this stage I'm a little disheartened. Those of you who are experienced Drunkards, any advice? (I'll take advice from experienced drunks too!) Is it a flow thing with the curved piecing? Will practice make it quicker and easier? How can I speed it up because these 2 were VERY slow!! And as you can see above, I have lots of piecing to do.

All drunk and sober words of wisdom very welcome ;-)

PS - Don't forget to pop over to my Circa 1934 giveaway before Friday evening to enter!

Happy Christmas to me!

 
This has been a slightly mixed week for me but has had some true highs.

First up, my lovely Christmas table runner arrived in the post at the end of last week, all the way from Canada. I really love what Anne-Marie did with the circles - and I love how this is not overtly Christmassy and can be used all winter.
 

 

It will go perfectly on my living room coffee table, and blend completely with the colours in my room. She also send some lovely felt Matryoshka decorations which my little lady has already appropriated and I doubt I will see them again!

Thanks so much Anne-Marie, this is just lovely!!

Next, I found out that I had won 2nd place in the Fabric (Home Decor) category of November's Celebrate Color!! Woohooo!!!! I am so thrilled about this. A massive thank you to everone who voted for me, I really appreciate it - you can't imagine how chuffed I am! The prize is a full FQ bundle of the gorgeous Echo fabrics. Now, I think this is a little serendipitous as I purchased some cool-tone FQs in the Black Friday sales, but couldn't get anything close to all of the fabrics. Here is my beautiful little bundle so far:

And this is the full bundle:

(image from Stitched in Color)

Aren't they beautiful? Really love the colour tones and prints, I can't wait to have them in my hand. Now, what shall I do with it all?? You will have to wait and see!

I spent a little time this last few days making an angel costume for my little angel (not), for a special Christmas ceremony that her playschool were taking part in. Thank you Hadley for the pillow case inspiration....

 

I made this using an old pillowcase, and some sparkly fabric and ribbon. The wings came from the pound shop, but she insisted on pink trim on them (not being concerned about the gold/pink clash, clearly). I made a halo out of some ribbon, an old hairband and some gold chenille sticks which are a bit like pipe cleaner-y kinda things that I got in the craft store. Nice, right? Not one of my most tasteful makes I think you'll agree, but fulfilling the brief! When I added up the cost of the wings, the ribbon, the half metre of sparkly fabric and the other bits and pieces I really think I should have just gone to Tesco or somewhere and bought her an angel costume. But she was happy, so that's all that counts, in the end. Even if the sparkly fabric did not like the stitching I used and came away before the end of the church ceremony, ooops! Possibly I should have used a ballpoint needle? Oh well, I'll think about it next year.

Then, I woke up this morning to a surprising and fantastic email from AnneMarie over at Gen X Quilters....saying that I had won her giveaway.....for Electric Quilt 7!!!!!! OMG! I have been visiting the EQ website periodically for about 6 months now, trying (and failing) to justify how I could afford to buy this and I still can't believe I won it! I'm so thrilled - thanks AnneMarie, for a great giveaway. I am really, really looking forward to trying out this software and will definitely let you know how I find it :-)

Enough good news? Well, as you probably know, I have a great giveaway running at the moment for some Circa 1934....pop over now and enter if you haven't already. And, next Monday, there's the Sew, Mama, Sew! giveaway day. I'm still thinking about this one :-) But I suggest you pop back next Monday.  Happy Christmas to me? Happy Christmas to you!!

Circa 1934 Giveaway sponsored by River Fabrics

A couple of weeks ago, I hit the 1000 follower mark on Google Friend Connect, something that I used to see on other people's blogs and dream about last year. I was thinking about it one evening, reading some of your lovely comments congratulating me and decided that really, as I couldn't do this without all your encouragement, suggestions, good advice and friendship, a little celebration was in order! So, I thought about it some more and reckoned that a fun follower appreciation giveaway was the way to go.

My fave fabric enabler, Janette of River Fabrics, very kindly agreed to sponsor this giveaway - and it is FAB!! Those of you who visit me a lot will know how much I love River Fabrics. I love the huge range of beautiful Konas, the gorgeous Aurifil threads, and the fabulous range of fabrics Janette carries - with lots of great designer names, new ranges like Ruby, Cabbages and Roses, Circa 1934 and lots of precuts - check out these fab layer cakes for example.  I love the brilliant service and most of all the fact that I get fabric into my hand 1-2 days after ordering it! I love it even more now, since they have introduced free UK and ROI postage for orders over £49.

So, what's the giveaway - well, this gorgeous bundle of 6 metric FQs of Circa 1934 - one of the coolest range of fabrics out there at the moment. I just love that typewriter key fabric, and the numbers...in fact, I love all of it!

You get 2 chances to win -

1. Pop over to River Fabrics and have a little look around, then come back here and tell me what your fave fabric/product is in a comment.
2. Either sign up for the River Fabrics newsletter OR like River Fabrics on Facebook and let me know which you are doing - or if you already get the newsletter/like the FB page - in a 2nd comment.

The giveaway runs until Friday 9th December at 9pm Irish time. I will draw the winner using Random number generator and announce over the weekend.

This is a follower appreciation giveaway so you must follow FairyFace Designs through GFC/Reader/FB/Twitter to enter. Giveaway is open internationally. I will delete duplicate entries. Please leave your email address in your comment unless you are sure you have one in your profile - if I cannot contact the winner, I will have to re-draw.

Time to make something just for me!

Lately it feels like everything I've made has been leaving my house as quickly as I make it. This is probably a good thing, as otherwise I would have even more "stuff" than I have already - which is far more than I need. But sometimes I feel a little sad that some of the beautiful things I make don't stay here with my family. (That is my New Year's resolution, I know it already!!)

So tonight, despite the fact that I really *should* be working on a quilt, or, even more importantly, an angel costume for E for the weekend, I decided to take a break from that and make something for me. Yay!

A couple of weeks ago, I pinned this lovely little pouch on Pinterest. I was thinking about it for a pressie for my hubbie and he seemed pretty keen although he did insist it would have to be in plain old navy fabric. BORING!

 

                                                                              Source: erinerickson.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Pretty, isn't it? Plus practical.I use headphones quite a bit with my iPhone and they are always loose in my bag, driving me nuts to find. (Hubbie loses his at least once a week which is why he is getting one of these!)

So, tonight, I decided to make some for myself. The tute is great - pity I didn't follow it exactly!! I managed to commit the cardinal sin of pouch making - leaving my zip closed and spent quite a lot of time ripping back my stitching. I also wasn't careful enough in stitching my circle so its not a perfect circle. But, it's for me, so who cares, right?

I used Tilda fabric both outside and inside and all in all, I love it!

No more searching for headphones :-) Now to make a plain one for Himself. Oh - and I might just need to make another for me using this gorgeous Circa 1934 Garbo fabric I got in the post last week from River Fabrics. Just need to buy a matching zipper.

                                                                                          (Image from River Fabrics)

It's all about me, me, me!!!!!!

You know me, I'm never one to passs up an opportunity for a spot of shameless self promotion, right??

So you can imagine how totally thrilled I was to realise I am one of the finalists in November's Celebrate Colour over at Stitched in Colour! Yippee!

The final-making item is my Minimalist Trees Christmas Table Runner which is currently winging it's way to my secret swap partner. This was a pretty make-it-up-as-I-go-along project so I am doubly thrilled!



I would SO appreciate if you would pop over to the voting page and give me your vote - it's in the first category, Home Decor.

Don't forget to vote in the other categories too, there are some great projects there!
Thank you xx