Exciting!

 Yesterday the lovely team from Sewing With Passion, our local Bernina agents in Invercargill - Pauline and Jenny (and Jenny's hubby Andrew) -  arrived to set up my new Bernina Q20 longarm machine on a Studio frame! So exciting and I only tore myself away from it yesterday evening when a huge thunderstorm hit our town and I rapidly unplugged it all in case of a strike/power surge.

This is a very special treat to myself after Covid scuppered my intention to do a tour of Europe for my 50th birthday this year and I had all the money saved up, so what to do with it?!? (Well, for starters, we had a darn good 'Meet Me in Paris' party here in Edendale in June but that is whole 'nother story!)

I have been free motion quilting on my domestic Elna 720 for many years, and lately have been thinking about how nice it would be to not have to wrestle a quilt under the throat of a domestic machine (even if it does have an eight inch throat to help with that). I don't usually make anything much bigger than a lap or twin-size quilt because of that reason.

So I spent a bit of time at the quilt symposium in Lower Hutt a couple of weeks ago trying out both the table-top Q16 (in two classes that I took - a free-motion class, and a ruler-work class), as well as trying out the Q16 on a frame that Bernina had set up in the merchant's mall.

My ruler work panel - LOVED having a ruler to help with curves.

I was still debating about whether to get a table-top, or a frame, as of course working on the table top is so familiar to me but when I then went to Sewing With Passion in Invercargill after the symposium, to try their frame machine, which had the ruler platform set up on it, THAT sealed the deal - within about 30 seconds of using the ruler on the longarm frame, I was in love!

I have the 5ft Studio frame set up currently, and have got the 5ft extension still boxed up in the garage, ready for when I want/am ready to go bigger!  As part of the deal, the ladies threw in a ruler set and platform for me as a perk - I am very grateful. I haven't broken that open yet, as will first get some practice with simply using the handles and machine.

To start I've grabbed a length of a fabric from my stash that has a lot of lines (curves especially) for my to practice on - it's a fabric I don't really like much so am not precious about using it for practising. I've also got a couple of panels sitting in the cupboard that might be good first projects to try out.

Now, off back to my machine! 

And I will start saving up for Paris for my 60th!

In The Garden FPP project

October overview - five big blocks to go!

Sharing some of the blocks I've done so far for Kirsty Lea's (Quiet Play Designs) In The Garden quiltalong - this was started back in January, with two new block patterns released each month.

I chose to create the 15" pattern for the wreath blocks (there was a 12" option too) as I have not done a lot of Foundation Paper Piecing, so didn't want to be handling too many fiddly/tiny pieces.

This is the 'master plan'.

I pulled all the colours from my stash and chose a mixture of solids and prints; the white solid for the background was purchased as I needed quite a few yards and wanted to make sure it would be all the same.

I started off well, managing to get all the lilies done in January, along with the first two blocks, before school started up again. After that I was a bit time-poor (and/or had some other projects that took priority) so have only got back into making the blocks in the last few weeks.

It was only last week that I remembered I had been given a wool pressing mat for my birthday and what a difference it does make to having well-pressed, crisp lines! It is now a permanent fixture on top of the ironing board for sure.

One of the great things about Kirsty Lea's QAL is that each pattern release also included a bonus pattern, so I've also got eight other FPP projects to try out sometime (one of which is a super cute bird).

Moravian Star Christmas Decoration

 

Right! Has been a while since I added to the blog, so will start with my most recent finish...this Moravian Star that I started at the 2022 Quilting Symposium in Lower Hutt last week.

This is an English paper-pieced decoration - I started it in a class with the lovely Kiwi tutor, Cheryl Katz-Rae of Heartfelt Handmade (Facebook / Instagram) (now my new friend in crafting!) 

I was determined this would be done by Christmas (and not join the pile of UFO projects from the previous two symposiums in 2017 and 2019!)

I took the option to purchase a kit from Cheryl, which she put together with the diamond acrylic template, the paper pieces, the French General fabrics, and the little buttons for embellishment and ribbon for the hanger.

I managed to get six 'flowers' (each one side/face of the final, twelve-sided decoration) completed during the one-day class, then spent another happy day sewing on Monday to finish off the other six and put them altogether. 

The one inch diamonds are definitely the smallest size EPP that I think I would ever want to work with, as quite fiddly, but so effective for this project.  And so tempting to make another to see what it will look like with different fabrics/colours.

Also sharing with everyone at Michelle's (Bolt to Beauty) Beauties Pageant - 

and with Kelly's (My Quilt Infatuation) Needle and Thread Thursday linky party 

and Wendy's (W's Quilts and More) Peacock Party - kia ora!

UPDATE: gifted to my wonderful Teacher Aide, Liz Scott, for Xmas/thank you gift.