Sunshine, orphan blocks and dyeing

Not that we've seen much of the sun lately so it's good to be reminded.  This was taken by Phil earlier in the year at Hagley Park in Christchurch.

We had a good session at Arohata Prison yesterday, the two newest quilters are happily making pet pads which will be donated to the SPCA shop in Petone; making a small quilt is a great learning tool - for someone who has never quilted before, our language can be difficult to understand and it's good to start on something we know they can finish.  And talking of finishing, I have Tilly's quilt with the binding on, so I can hand stitch it when meeting with my friends, the Jays, on Tuesday.

One of the Jays is working on a whole cloth quilt, her first, so it's not large - but looking fantastic !

Don't you agree?  I have her permission to share this with you - maybe she'll post it on her own blog when it's finished..... hint, hint!

Talk about Pandora's box! I recently started looking through a storage box of orphan blocks and found lots to stir the memories - like these two examples of dyeing fabric -

Over-dyeing was quite popular to get a certain effect, and the attempt with different fabrics shows how some fabrics took the dye much better than others - obviously they are not all cottons but back then you used what you could get :)

The newsagent in Petone was having a sale -

I wonder how many monster kids were sold!!

I've made a good start on the orphan blocks, sorting them and working to get them into compatible sizes,

Lots of class samples and blocks left over from completed quilts, some of them do go back a way....

My goodness, hexagons - I think I had some idea of making placemats with them...

I also found a few drunkard's path blocks, all hand pieced and left over from the three quilts I made using that block - they are less than accurate now that I've decided to machine piece them  - I tried them in the setting of the previous quilts -

Not exactly overmatched are they? I love the aqua circles......

I don't usually go for the regular look but these four will fit well I think - when I've decided what I'm going to do!

If you want to see more photographs of Capital Quilters great exhibition - I only took a very few, check out Lisa or Shirley - they have many great photos.

I've had a lovely day - good me-time - I hope you've managed to get some too, I've been sewing and enjoying watching some very nostalgic DVDs,  the Murder Most English series with Anton Rogers and Christopher Timothy and Lord Peter Wimsey with Ian Carmichael - both filmed in the seventies so it's been fun to come across actors who later became big names.  And most importantly for me right now, no violence .......it's getting so I dread turning on the radio to hear the latest news,

Oh dear, my quote for the day - "So long as there are men there will be wars.  Albert Einstein.  So, I'll add another, "When it is darkest, men see the stars".  Ralph Emerson

or more beautiful sunshine...... [courtesy Phil]

Thanks for stopping by and your feedback, it means a lot.

June