WINNER!!!

WE HAVE A WINNER!

Congratulations to Neralie who is the first person to purchase a quilt related item from my new Ebay Store. She has won a lovely Fat Quarter Stack of six Moda Legacy Fabrics. I hope you have fun with those Neralie.

You can visit my Store by clicking the image at the very top of the left sidebar of my Blog. Or just click here. I have a collection of Moda Pre-Cuts, PNG Billums, Patterns and kits available at very reasonable prices. I am continually adding new items, so visit and keep posted for further lucky chances everyone!

Ann.

Phoenix Mandala

This is my latest finished quilt. I started it end of last year, then got busy with other projects for classes and commissions. I did the studio clean up and then got back to this one. I've had the lovely Asian inspired fabrics for a couple of years now, generously given to me by friend and former student, Cherie. I always had a rail fence/ mandala style design in mind but wanted to work out a different construction method.
I made this using a quilt as you go technique with large blocks, quilted simply in the ditch on my domestic sewing machine. The central medallion was free motion quilted around the phoenix and there's a quarter inch peeper as a fine border around it too.
I used my favourite environmentally friendly 100% bamboo wadding of course.
I'm happy with the result even though I lost interest during the making!










The back was made from left overs and compatible pieces to the front. You can see some of the joining strips. I attached the quilt by machine, but then hand sewed down the joining strips so there were no stitching lines other than quilting on the top.
Finally, the quilt was bound using a quick machine attachment method and a bias tape maker. I always feel a bit guilty about this as it doesn't give the lovely finish of the hand finished binding for shows... but I still feel "quilty" because it's contemporary, really smooth and goes on all in one line of machine stitching!
I will be teaching classes in this quilt.

Hope you like it.

My New African Quillow

This is my new African Quillow. I have these 5 1/2inch African Fabric squares packs for my original African Quilt (you can see it in the side bar) and I wanted to make another project using just the squares combined with another pack of black, white and red squares. I love the red and white Prints Charming fabric and the black and white orchid design batik especially.
I decided step out of my comfort zone (usually in the red sector) and use the blue and purple border print, but I'm still not sure or completely comfortable with the choice...
I used an African Kanga on the back and lovely bamboo wadding so it washed and dried really soft and drapey.

I love this fabric! I bought this in the amazing Hartbeesport Dam Market near Pretoria in South Africa. My daughter and I went there four years ago now to visit my sister who was living in Pretoria at the time. It was a really wonderful experience! Africa holds so much of inspiration to a creative person. The ingenuity and creativity of the people - everywhere you look there is something clever, beautiful, nifty, unexpected that someone has made out of something else. Then there's the scenery, the history, the animals... Anyway, I saw this tablecloth- like length of fabric hanging amongst the other textile treasures in the market an immediately knew "I could do something with that!" It's nearly finished now. I have a fat quarter and a little bit more left over. (Tip: always cut a fat quarter from any significant lengths of fabric and save it in your stash for future projects.)

This is the quilt as I was quilting it, which I did in a simple cross hatch on my domestic sewing machine. I love the riotous jumble of colour and pattern. Then you can see below the final result of the quilt stuffed into its pillow. I used the left over squares from the fabric packs and a bit of the border fabric to make the little cushion top. But I played around with the idea of an unpieced African fabric, same as I used on the back...i didn't have enough fabric so I followed the old quilters' rule of making use of what I did have.
I am making patterns for the quillow and have fabrics ready cut available from my website.
Now it's time to get back to the re-organisation of my studio so I can make more quilts...