Hugs and Kisses baby quilt

Created this small cot quilt during the weekend for my lovely workmate, Aleisha Schrader, who is expecting a new baby in May.

She was keen for a black/white/grey/navy/mint mix, in a modern style.

I cut out the fabrics on Friday evening and spent Saturday sewing it all together while watching an episode of Grey's Anatomy and then all ten (half hour) episodes of the new second series of one of my favourite Netflix shows 'Santa Clarita Diet' (starring Drew Barrymore), so it was about an eight hour quilt.

I used an all over, large stipple for the quilting, with a light grey thread on the top and a navy on the back. The dark fabrics are deep blue or charcoal (but look more like black in the photos).

I love these buzzy bees!

Was a pattern on one of my Pinterest to-do boards, shared by Lindsay Conner and Mary Jaracz of Craftbuds and was very easy to put together. I had it all finished by tea-time and will definitely use the pattern again.

It measures 36.5" x 42.5" and is backed by a Riley Blake flannel.  I bought some of the fabrics from Fabric Fixation and used others from my stash.

Sharing with Kelly's Needle and Thread Thursday - hi!

Roadtrip SH8: Lindis Pass

The second mini quilt in my roadtrip series, inspired by our trip down State Highway 8 back in October last year.

This one represents the Lindis Pass, which has a unique grassy, tussocky, hilly landscape filled with power pylons from the hydro dams in the Mackenzie Basin.

I appliqued the landscape, using machine stitching to add textures to represent the different plants and fencelines etc; I hand stitched the long stitches of the pylon - it just needed to be a bit more to the centre seam (but at the time I thought I would be overlocking the edges, however in the end I decided to try a faced backing, which meant I lost a bit more of the side seam than I had planned for).

It's 9"x8" in size.

Linking up to share with Crazy Mom's Friday Night Finish Up! Have a good weekend everyone!

'Trolls' movie - headbands

Was looking for a cool idea for something to sell at a carboot sale...found these on Pinterest!

Spent one evening making the felt flowers, and one evening making the 'hair'.

Sold three on the day; will give the other nine to Ronald McDonald Family Home at Southland Hospital - some little girls staying there, or in the children's ward, might be cheered up by having one!

Here's Jada, one of my customers at last month's school carboot sale:

Roadtrip SH8: Lake Tekapo

Inspired by scenes on our October 2017 road trip from Christchurch to Edendale, mostly travelling along State Highway 8 (after first travelling through Geraldine), I drew up some sketches with a plan to create a series of little art quilts.

I had just attended the 2017 NZ Quilt Symposium and was very motivated by the various classes I took; I could see potential art-quilt or abstract quilts in every landscape.

Lake Tekapo is a beautiful sight in October - gorgeous deep blue water, reflecting the Spring sky, surrounded by mid-Canterbury-brown hills with snow still covering the tops. I can't find the photo I took when I made my husband stop by the side of the road but this photo is similar to  what we saw...

Image source

A bit closer up: I used three blue shades of machine embroidery threads to
stitch in the water, and white thread for the snow.

The motivation to actually make the quilts came in January, from one of my Symposium tutors, Brenda Gael Smith, who is running a Monthly Art Project challenge via Facebook - so I signed up.

My plan: to create small quilts, about 8-9' square in size, using a mixture of piecing, applique, quilting and embellishments.

I really didn't know just what I wanted to do for finishing it off...I considered facing it, and then saw a tutorial for a perle cord thread finish, but have no perle cord to do it with. So I decided to try a serged/overcast edging. Not sure I like it really. I think I might make sure to get some perle cord and then I can try it out, as I do think it looks smart when done like that.

Sharing with my quilting friends at Kelly's Needle and Thread Thursday and Amanda Jean's Finish It Up Friday linky parties. Hi everyone!!