Carolyn Forster's Quilting-On-The-Go

 I was spurred on to finish this which has been on my floor all week.

It sort of makes me think about how the bits of colour are highlighted when the snow comes.

Rather than everything being white, you notice the colours you can see more.

After last weeks excitement of being talked about on a podcast, some of you might like to know that I will be talking in person next week on Mark Lipinski's radio show, 'Creative Mojo' !!!! Check it out over here.

I am going to be talking about the new Utility Quilting book. 

Mark always has so much energy, I feel sure I will feel it from across the Pond! I need to focus on the time difference though, to make sure I am not in my PJ's when the big moment comes!

(And Nicky , that is all I have to say!)

At the end of February there will be more great stuff to hear about the book, but not from me. Yes, I am sorting a small Blog Tour, so you can hear what some other people have to say about the book!

Hang in  there!

In the meantime go over to Barbara's blog to see how she is getting on with stitching the Court House Step quilt from the book! Great Job Barbara!

Thanks to Victoria over at Bumblebeans for telling me about the podcasts from Canton Village Quiltworks. She is always so on the ball!

She told me of this one, as they were talking and mentioned my book! It is great to hear it being spoken about by such authoritative people.

I have talked about Generation Q before, and if you want to see their great on line blog/magazine, pop over here.

They update daily so you won't be bored!

And as you can't have post with out a picture, here is my Big Baskets quilt out in the garden!

Had busy few days at the Ardingly Quilt show! So many people to see and chat with whilst I sat in my little booth. Thanks for coming by everyone.

And thanks for all of the wonderful comments about the new book. It will be available from The Quilt Room, Dorking and Kaleidoscope, Glasgow. Both do a brilliant mail order service, so it is easy to get your own copy of Utility Quilting!

I also met some lovely ladies who I had bumped into in Houston last autumn. This time they (Jane, Linda and Emma), were running their lovely fabric stall at the show, and I was thrilled to see they had fabrics by Mary Fisher and Marcia Derse.

I love those two designers, but no one that I knew of (until now) had the fabrics for sale in the UK. So if you want to splash out on this great fabric (like I did!!), pop over to www.finstallfabrics.com.

I choose these Mary Fisher Fabrics:

And these Marcia Derse:

And from an old favourite, Fabrics Galore, I had these:

So probably I should get down to some sewing now don't you think!

Have a productive sewing week!

Teaching for 2012 kicked off with a great start this last weekend with ladies at Three Bridges, Crawley stitching 'Japanese Bag of Squares'. A busy day, with most ladies stitching all four bags – Well done!

This Wednesday 'Start with Stars' begins at The Quilt Room Dorking. And to get you in the mood for that, this is what the ladies from the course at the end of 2011 made:

Well done Ladies!

And on Friday, the Spring Quilt Show is at Ardingly. So come and say 'Hi!'

What a great quilting start to 2012!

I am loving all the quilts I see over the internet that are quilted and finished with ties and Big stitches!

I used linen thread with  'wine glass' (actually a saucepan lid in this case!) and stitch in the ditch quilt designs for this Australian bush quilt:

Have a look here at some other great quilts:

Posie Gets Cosy

Molly Flanders

Anna Maria Horner

Blue Elephant stitches, and 

Sew Create it.

These methods of finishing quilts have always worked for me. One of my first quilts was Big stitch and Tied with stranded embroidery floss through 4oz polyester wadding, and it's still looking good!

This old quilt I find inspiring:

This is what I did on my stretched Hexagons:

Have a look here for some more ideas!

Get those quilts quilted!!!

I have been looking at so many posts about what everyone has made over the last year, that I feel slightly inadequate!

Although I start lots of things, not all of them get finished in the same year. This quilt, which I finished over the New Year, was started in 2010!

On the floor in my room:

The pattern for the applique is a Ruby McKim. The blocks are about 18in.

Out in the garden:

I quilted it with Elbow Quilting:

Flapped in the wind, there actually a nice Denyse Schmidt print in the centre of the back that is hidden here!

Have you seen who will be at the quilt show in Nantes this April……Kathy from Material Obsession!

I am planning on going to the show this year, so this is an added treat!

I must start saving my pennies now!

Well day two of 2012 has given us some lovely sunshine, so despite the mud under foot (due to day one of 2012 being grey and wet), I ventured out to get some shots of things I have been stitching.

Today it is the turn of the Squares and Diamonds quilt that I have made from the new line from Moda, 'A Stitch in Color' by Malka Dubrawsky.

Enjoy!

It spent a long time in this state on the floor of my sewing room:

But happily now looks like this:

As is my way with these sorts of designs, I am keeping the wavy edge. It will be a pain to bind, but worth it!

The black fabric is 'Heath' from Alexander Henry and of the Moda fabric I used a bundle of fat eighths:

So at the moment this is a flimsy, waiting to be quilted. I wonder if that will take me until next year!?

Good wishes for your stitching for 2012!

Well at this busy time of year I have spent a few moments winding down, and treating myself to a little something that I could quite happily be sewing with in the New Year!

This twinlkly little bundle of fabric came from HERE, and were created by the lovely and talented Karen over at Blueberry Park! So yummy, Thanks, Karen!

In the meantime though we will be taking  a break over the holidays and I hope to see you all in the New Year!

If you would like something to browse through, those of you who are waiting for 'Utility Quilting' to wend its way to the UK, have a look here.

Don't forget to find time for some relaxing stitching! And, yes, Bosco is thinking hard about that design on the floor!

I am often inspired by old quilts and I saw a basket quilt, made with only nine blocks, on 'an online auction house' recently that was no exception.

It had a cheddar/gold background, and quite strongly coloured baskets. The blocks I reckoned were about 20", so nine of them makes a sizeable lap quilt.

So I set to. I raided my fabric stash for a selection of the backgrounds and the baskets. I came unstuck with anything that worked for the basket handles, and brought 1m of fabric to cut those from.

Rough layout, baskets with no handles yet!

Then I had some help:

The edge of the basket closest is my favourite, made from a Heather Ross fabric and something from Quilt Gate.

With handles and a border:

When the weather gets brighter I hope to get some outdoor shots of this, as I can hang it on the clothes line then. I might hope to add that it will be quilted too, but I fear this is a top that now 'out of my system' will need time to mature before I have time to quilt it!

Take a look at the side bar today as I have revamped my favourites!

Well, the Squares and Diamonds quilt had a bit of a set back this week.

I got muddled up with the rows, and mistakenly unpicked about half of the quilt thinking I had the wrong rows stitched!! I know, don't go there!

Back on track now though, phew!

So in need of a little light relief from that muddle, I started sewing a couple of little Christmas gifts for two friends who I work with when I teach at The Quilt Room. They know (and now you will too), that I love the Japanese patchwork and bag books.

This is my shelf:

And I have been boring them with my stitching of this bag (from the cover of this book) for a few weeks now:

And now I have finally sussed it out, I thought it only right that they be the recipients of the much discussed bag!

It is a deceptively simple idea, as lots of Japanese bags that I like, seem to be. Two rectangles of different fabric give the bag it's outside. 

Which you line, and then each side turns into the handle and closure:

And in a flowery mode:

So there you go! All's well in the end, and now I am back to the Squares and Diamonds quilt!

The ISBN of the book, for those of you who are interested, is : 978-4-579-10979-1.