Helicopter, High Summer and Hexagons

This was probably taken in late spring or early summer judging by the flowers - you don't often see a helicopter hovering just beyond the edge of your section, now do you?   We were living in Roseneath and I think the helicopter was needed to lift the piano when our neighbours moved house.  There was no access down the hill and it was a very long, narrow path up to the road.

I never tired of this view, that's Shelley Bay across the water, Massey Memorial on the point, the edge of Somes Island and Eastbourne in the distance.

I think that belonging to a quilt club [actually I belong to three] is a great way to meet up with like-minded people and it gives a great opportunity to try out patterns you wouldn't normally.  Like this one, I can't remember the name but the quilt I saw was done in batiks and I thought I would give it a go using some of my vintage fabrics.

You can see it has bars of plain, four down and one top and one bottom, with the patterned fabric showing through - so these were the start, but I didn't really like it, so took off the top and bottom bars and used lots more pattern......

The batik I used for sashing shows up quite tan in the photo, but from the close ups you will see lots of different colours -

You can also see more of my beloved vintage fabrics -

You can also appreciate how pleased I was that the batik repeated so many of the colours in the blocks

I call it Vintage High Summer.

Have you read any of the Linley Dodd books?  They were favourites of my granddaughters and I well remember reading one about the cat that caterwauled in the tree - we had fun competing to make the most awful yowling howl - well, today I heard that sound and there was Basil, out on the decking defending his territory from a neighbour's young cat.

The young cat was all bristling tail and twitching whiskers - the noise was so awful, I had to laugh - dear old Basil who hides under the table at sudden noises was being the defender of his kingdom!

Have you ever made a quilt, given it away and not taken a photo of it?  This photo is the best I can do for such a quilt that I want to share -

When I was a member of New Judgeford Golf Club I used to take my stitching with me, something to do in the 19th waiting for my husband to finish socialising........ and one day I was given a large parcel by a friend who said that a friend of hers had been making a quilt, her family didn't like it so she wasn't going to finish it - she even said she would throw it away.  My friend stopped her doing that and said she knew someone who would love it.

She gave me the top about half finished, but most of the "flowers" done so I set to and finished them, I appliqued the top onto plain dark brown and hand quilted it.  The quilting was done after my husband had been diagnosed with prostate cancer, I sat for many hours in hospitals and various waiting rooms.  It was good to have this to work on.  We also attended a group for the caregivers of cancer patients and I finally completed it there.

In the group was a lovely woman who admired the quilt, she had always wanted one, so it gave me immense pleasure to wrap this one up and pass it over to her.  A good outcome for an unwanted quilt.



                       *****************


During the week three people have left fabric at my house, one person put it in the carport by the car door so I couldn't miss it!  So, whoever you are, a great big thank you, I shall be taking it along to the prison in the morning.

The class has several newbies as two others have already gone home, two more due to leave before Christmas.  I have spoken to the Shut-in Stitchers and they are happy for me to show some of their quilts, so to finish this evening, here is a Mile-a-Minute top, queen size, draped over a table at our recent Club meeting.

Persephone {not her real name!] had made several black, white and one other colour quilts during her time with the class and this one used up all the leftovers.

Don't you just love these very worthy quotes from my old diary, "Get a move on, effort must precede reward".


Nice talking to you, thanks for stopping by.

June

Strings, scraps and Nova Scotia

How's this for an idyllic spring day?  Not like today; Windy, Wet Wellington just about describes it.

The photo was taken one day last week as a friend and I sat in the garden enjoying our Devonshire Tea at the Stonestead cafe next door to the Sawmillers Quiltery.  That was one happy flock of chickens - just look at the high stepping rooster, and all the doves in the background.  I shall have to return when the tree is greened up.




My granddaughters were here after school on Monday, I got Amy to hold up some of my quilts so I could share them with you.  And here is the very first Quilt As You Go that I ever did - the introduction is so that you are ready to excuse the less than perfect result!

It is made from strings of Indian cotton - my neighbours did piece work for a shop where they imported the fabric and then made circular skirts etc. the resulting edges, strings and selvedges were put into bags ready to be dumped - until I discovered them.

My friends and I joined the strips into long ropes that we wound into huge balls and then we knitted or crocheted bags and rugs - I still use the shopping bag which is marvellous for vegetables.

Anyway, the quilt -

It is very faded, it was once so vibrant I used it as a Christmas decoration by hanging it over the banister in the foyer of our house in Whitby - folded so you couldn't see the corkscrew of seams on the right!

I joined the squares in the more or less usual way with the seam on the back, then I had to flatten them by hand sewing the seams, and then I covered the seam with some delightful bright pink poly fabric - which again was hand stitched.....

Floyd was taking an interest in the proceedings - I think he was waiting for Amy's toes to reappear!

Now I want to share a holiday snap, from that momentous time I spent in Canada - though my initial contact wasn't good; I flew from England and I phoned from the airport to confirm my reservation but it was the last stop for the bus and by the time I got there they had let my room!  The manager wanted to put me in a motel miles away and got a taxi for me, I protested strongly so it was suggested I settle for a nearby guest house.  The taxi driver was such a nice person, he said he wouldn't be happy for his wife to stay there, so he drove me around and tried a couple of places and got me a bed for the night at "The Cambridge Suites"  a very new place that was not fully open.

The Houseman was also very nice, he did some shopping for me, bread, coffee & milk as it was pretty late by then - luckily I had eaten twice on the flight!

Next morning I rang Air Canada to reconfirm my onward flight and I mentioned the dishonoured reservation, and asked if they had places that were kept for crew - my call was passed to the Supervisor, Bill Shakespeare - I kid you not, I couldn't forget that name, could I?  He was marvellous, I had an apology from the Manager of the first hotel - Bill thought I might not want to go there now, so had confirmed a room for me where I was.  Fabulous place with a microwave which was a great novelty in those days.

The next day my quilting contact picked me up and took me on a tour, we ended up at the Mayflower quilters meeting that evening.  This is the photo taken sometime that day.

My reason for sharing this particular one - I suppose I could have cropped me out of it - is to show the scenery.  Isn't it just lovely - and take note of the little churches -




here is something else I bought to put on my Christmas Cake and remind me of the trip.

Aren't they just such fun!  - Back to quilts -

Another scrap quilt I made was with flannels, mainly squares but also strips and it is extra cosy for this sort of weather -

And here is the back -

I quilted it by hand, using the 'big stitch' technique with embroidery thread.

I have promised myself a day stitching tomorrow, I spent all today at the office so my son will send a text if anything crops up.  Right now it's back to do more hand quilting, while I watch a dvd of "Medium".

I forgot to share a thought last time, I love this one, "Few know how to be idle and innocent."


Nice talking with you, thanks for stopping by and for your comments.
June

Mixed Media, Nova Scotia and retail therapy

This is the flower arrangement at the entrance to the exhibition in Waikanae put on by Kapiti Coast Quilters.

My friend Jann and I finished teaching at the prison, had a tasty lunch at Kaizen in the Pataka complex in Porirua and headed north.  It was a beautiful day, everywhere were signs of spring growth.

Jenny has a full report of the Exhibition plus photos galore so I will content myself with showing you the results of a bit of retail therapy.

I honestly can't remember when I last bought fabric for myself and I have never, never bought a range of any one designer - so, hey if you are going to break the rules, you might as well go the whole nine yards!

I couldn't resist this packet of threads, they will be great for machine quilting some of my tops................

They are Rowan, amybutler - colours hand picked by Amy, so how could I go wrong?

This fabric just appealed and as I said to Jann when she was dithering a bit about buying something, "Be strong - go ahead and buy it"

Actually these fabrics look very much like some of my vintage fabrics so I shall have no difficulty finding fabric to go with them; I think they might need a bit of orange to give them a lift.........

I bought the thread and fabric from the Bernina shop at Raumati - they were one of the merchants at the exhibition.

We then went to the Mixed Media exhibition at the Kapiti Law Gallery where Diana Bahler, a friend from way back, had several pieces on display.  There were also paintings and pottery.

I chose four of Dana's to share with you; she had worked on them at our group meetings fielding a plethora of advice from the rest of us....

This is "Woman Constrained" - the enlargement if you click on it will show more detail, as it will with any of the works.

This is "Written on the Wind".

I find this one very tender and almost sad, "Last Rose" and my personal favourite - "Ice Strata"

Diana has several other pieces in the exhibition, so there is plenty more of her work and the others for you to see.  The Gallery is on the main street, on the left driving north, just before you get to Fibre Flair!
and the exhibition is open until the end of November.

My last blog was about Halifax and my visit there, and I had a lovely email from Linda telling me that the shop Suttles and Seawinds is at Mahone Bay - and it's still there and that the flower on the magnet is the Mayflower and it's the provincial flower of Nova Scotia.  I then just had to have a look among my club badges and found these -

The Mayflower Handquilters - Nova Scotia.  Did you ever swop badges when you went on holiday?

Now for a little quilt - made a lifetime ago, one of the first I pieced on the machine using squares that were given to me by a lovely lady who had a dress shop in Hataitai - you know the kind of small, local shop where the owner could tell at a glance if she had something that would suit you.  Was her name Helen? I can't remember, but she never put me wrong - I used to call in just for a chat, so when I started on my patchworking she happily gave me some scraps -

Caravan Curtains quilt

The pale centre squares are actually tee shirt material and the striped inner border was a most unusual fabric - I once saw it as curtains on a very, very old caravan!  I think it's the only quilt I ever bound with bias binding - because I curved the corners and it is hand quilted; one square at a time - it never occurred to me to join those lines of diagonal quilting!

Nice talking with you, thanks for stopping by
June

Halifax, sew & flip and cats

This is  a little magnet I bought in Halifax, Canada in 1987 - so the chip is understandable - it sits on the side of my fridge and I loop the handle of a little flax kete onto it, in which I put the pencil I need to write my shopping list.

And you need to know this why? I hear you thinking - well it's all to do with the great blogging community; I looked at one of my regular blogs, saw a link that looked interesting and then saw one that was headed something to do with the waterfront in Halifax - so I just had to have a look.

Linda has similar tastes in quilting and the magic connection is Halifax.  Back in 1987 I did a round the world trip to see my brothers and sisters as both our parents had died since my previous visit and then I went onto Canada to stay three weeks with the woman who had been my very Best Friend all through school in England.  We had lost touch after her divorce and then re-connected.  The trip was arranged so that I could have as many stopovers as I wanted, provided I kept going west.

I'll tell you more about it later and I hope to have some photos because I met up with a quilt group in the village of Selsey where I used to live, they gave me an introduction to a quilter in Halifax who gave me one to a quilter in Montreal................

To quilts now, the Four plus three quilt I explained last time is a variation of the Exquisite block, the latter has a sew and flip on opposite corners not just on the one.  This is one I teach in my class, my sample is another flower garden -

Then later I teamed the block with a four patch for this result -

Halifax was the first place I saw antique quilts for sale, I was just blown away - and right at the end of my trip I found THE antique quilt in Toronto, no question I had to have it - three cheers for plastic fantastic.  I will get a photo and show later.

Believe it or not this next photo has a link to Canada too - here is Basil showing his large tail which is the reason for his name, Basil Brush, sitting on the "Tree Skirt" under the Christmas tree -

That is actually a skirt - see the patchwork around the bottom? In those days I was a size 12 which is why I now have found another use for it!  I bought it at Suttles and Seawinds - the most amazing quilt shop in ****Bay - I shall have to look it up.  The shop took up an entire house, upstairs and downstairs - I wonder if it is still there.

Just so Floyd doesn't feel left out, here he is helping himself to a feed when I left the lid open - I had only turned around to fill his plate, but hey, why make do with a little plate when you can have the whole lot!

Here's one of the tops I made when I started sewing again nearly three years after my husband died.  I moved my sewing machine upstairs to the dining room table, got out my scraps and started piecing.  My son called round and was horrified to see me joining lots of tiny little pieces, he was quite sure quilts should be made of big pieces - I had plenty of them, didn't I!

The thing is they were all the bits left over from using five inch squares so I sorted them into similar lengths.  I started with the row four from the right - yes they are tiny.  Here is a detail

As the pattern is a version of Chinese coins, I call it Pounds, shillings and pence - or Lsd for short!

Such excitement in Petone earlier today, a convoy of flag bedecked cars drove along Jackson Street, horns blaring - Samoan supporters were on the move!

The weather here today was so good, you really can't beat Wellington on a good day!  I could have done some gardening, but managed to find enough to do elsewhere.......

I must have known what the thought for today is, "Systematic thinking must precede action."

Thanks for dropping by, good talking to you
June

Billy and classes

I thought you might like a close up of the "man servant", named with gusto but a decided lack of originality - Billy.

You will note that he is very much his own person and quite happily sports an ear-ring!  This 'flower' is actually a bunch of quilting patterns but seemed made for him - and a perfect match to his corrugations! 

He even wears his maker's mark -

I have spent some time in my sewing room these last couple of days trying to find suitable fabric for one of the Shut-in Stitchers.  She made the classic mistake of loving some very distinctive fabric, piecing it to a cot size and now wanting more to enlarge into a single bed size but nowhere can I find any in my stash and there was nothing at the prison either - dark, saturated colours with lots of black, sort of like a batik.  She has made some fabulous scrap quilts so this time it will test her ingenuity to come up with a solution - or we just wait and see what comes along!

The name Kaffe Fassett conjures up beautiful colours and patterns and I believe he visited New Zealand earlier this year.  I was lucky enough to go along to his class the first time he came here.  We received details of the class and the sizes to cut our fabric; I felt his recipe was a bit on the clunky side so cut my pieces smaller, my colour scheme was based on one fabric I liked - I even invited friends who came round during the week before the class to add to the pile from my stash, so I had a good amount to choose from.

Here I am at the class [concentration is making me hunch my shoulders - but I like my haircut!]

The 'starter' fabric is to the left of the deep red nine patch, and here is the finished flimsy, called "Moonlit Garden"

This next quilt top is from my five inch squares class, the smaller version of postcards - as the baby quilt was that I showed recently - and they send me photos of little Amy enjoying floor time on it.

A work in progress, there are always so many flower fabrics among the five inch squares - oh and the belt above the quilt was an Op shop find and my granddaughters love it with all its sequins.

It's called "Butterflies in the garden" and yes, once again a batik ties it all together.

My last show and tell for this evening is one I made from 'starters and enders' joining squares - I just loved the fabric I chose to separate the panels; not a batik this time but dig those crazy patterns.

Sorry I seem to cut off the top which is a repeat of the bottom - and I am sure you will agree I had to call it, "Bordering on the Ridiculous!".

We are heading for an election I think, so maybe we should take note of today's thought - "Those who govern best make the least noise"


Thanks for stopping by, nice chatting with you.
June

Serendipity and Barbie

This flower bed was once full of weeds plus an overgrown Pineapple Sage, it gets very little rain and was something of an eyesore.  Then I spotted this handsome lad at the garden centre at Peka Peka and had to have him!  My visitors arrive at the front door with smiles on their faces.

I had a really full, fun day yesterday.  The teaching at the prison went very well, I think I am getting through about pinning and pressing - with help from an unexpected source.  One of the women who had been, shall I say somewhat reluctant to take advice, suddenly started telling the younger ones to listen to June: "Measure, pin and press!!"

Another of the women who is leaving to return home this week wrote a card of thanks to all the volunteers and people who help with the programme.  She said her Saturday mornings of quilting kept her sane.

So a big thank you to all who support us in so many ways.

We finished by 12.30 so I drove back to Petone to buy a coffee and some lunch before attending the meeting of Capital Quilters, I had some quilts from the prison that I wanted to show at the meeting.  Petone was as usual full of people and I had to go into the back streets to get a park - but it was meant to be, because as I walked to the cafe I saw this sign

So I walked a little further to get a proper look -

No mistaking that face!

So I followed the arrows and went into the building.














It is an absolute treasure trove!  I told you I like looking at girly things, well where to start?

Colleen Scrimshaw was sitting at the desk and we chatted about her collection.  The toys on this side are for sale - see the All Black and the Maori warrior?

Round the far side are for display and drooling over only!  If you are interested in fashion and clothes design, wait until you see the doll of Elizabeth Taylor when she played Cleopatra - the detail in amazing.

Colleen is only generally open at weekends but if you ring her on 04 9700 299, she is more than happy to open up for visitors.  I have no affiliations, just found it by accident - I think she has been open only a few weeks and I very seldom walk down that side street - but I think it is well worth a visit for anyone interested in fabric, sewing and fashion.

The club meeting was such fun, good to catch up with many members I hadn't seen in a while; as usual the display of work was fascinating - such talent these ladies have.  And the speaker is an expert in Baltimore style quilts, her work is beautiful - all in all it was a great day.

Serendipity is the name I gave a quilt I made and which is included in my 5" squares class - this is the basic shape.

You start off with two squares, one four inch and one three inch.  Put the smaller square onto the larger, mark the diagonal and sew - before you sew the second seam, measure from the corner two and a quarter inches and that is where you put the second line to sew on.

This is vital, because you need the resulting small half square triangle to be 2.25 inches so that four of them sewn together will result in a four inch square.

I made a whole stack of these blocks light on dark and vise versa and then I started playing with them.

I decided on the design I wanted to use, and then played with the half square triangles for different borders, until I was happy with the result - which is more than I am with the placement of these little photos to show the whole process!!

Never mind, I am sure you get the idea.








So here is the quilt finished, pieced by me and quilted by Bary Scott who used to have a studio at Te Horo.

I wouldn't call myself a rugby fan, but earlier today - hey, did you remember about the clocks going forward? thank goodness my computer and my iPhone don't wait to be told! - anyway, I wanted to watch a favourite TV show, "Location, Location" and then found myself watching the rugby but quite happily, because I knew the final score. Just as well, because at the start it looked as though it could go either way!

I can't help chuckling at the funny thoughts in this old diary, "Let the shipwrecks of others be your sea-marks"

Thanks for stopping by and for your comments
We'll talk again soon
June