The last OPAM report this year

I have finished only one project in December. I can only show you a little bit of it, since it haven't been delivered to it's new owner yet ;o)

I have finished only 14 projects this year, I made 28 projects last year, so I hope next year will be a year with a lot of finishes.
I really hope Peg and Kris will continue OPAM next year, too. It's been fun to have joined it for the last two years, and sort of a "kick in tha butt" for me ;o)

A big thank you to Peg and Kris for doing all the hard work, I know they've been spending a lot of their time making this possible for us ladies.

I have been busy working on a quilt I have to finish before middle of January. I'm not allowed to show you a sneak peak yet ;o)

I've already made some plans for projects in 2011. New year, a fresh start.

I wish you all a Happy New Year!



Hugs ♥
Laila

Then the Holidays are here, and even if it might be stressful and busy to get prepared for it, I love Christmas. I keep telling myself I did my best this year too, even if I forgot to send several of the already written Christmas cards, didn't get to bake all the Christmas cookies like I use to do every year and I didn't get to make any hand made gifts this year either. But I think what really matters is that I can be with my loved ones and be grateful for the things I got to do. I have wished my friends either by e-mail or to their facebook profile, Merry Christmas, that's sort of an ok substitute for the cards I didn't get to send, right?
I think we sometimes ask too much from ourselves to do "all the right things" and forget to enjoy the small but important moments in our lives... am I wrong?

I wish you all a Merry Christmas, may your Christmas be a warm and cozy one.
Hugs ♥
Laila

Woowhoo! The top is finished!

I'm soooo happy and pretty satisfied, I finished the top of the quilt I've been working on for Quiltegården lately! The "Winter blooms" by Gail Pan. Isn't it gorgeous? I love the colors and the design, and have really enjoyed working on this quilt! I'll deliver it to Siw at Quiltegården tomorrow, and off to quilting it goes :o) I look forward to see it quilted!
All of the fabrics I've used is from Quiltegården, so if you want to make this quilt in the same fabrics just go to their blog and find their e-mail or phone number to order it. The pattern is sold separately, too :o)

I am going to finish a few projects the next days, and also start on a new project. But more about that later ;o)

Some progress :o)

I've been making some progress on the "Winter Blooms" quilt. I was going to finish it this weekend, but that didn't happen... But the night is still young, so I will get some progress before I jump to bed. I think it looks great!


I went downtown to Quiltegården last Friday, and this is the treasures that just had to come home with me:Some gorgeous fabrics, more thread, and a Jelly roll I've already made plans for ;o)
I also get to meet one of the girls I met at Gail and Leanne's class in September 2009.
Berit has a blog too, so pop over to say "Hi" :o) It was so nice to meet her again! You should have seen the lovely Christmas stockings she had made!!! I hope she'll share them on her blog when she gets back home ;o)
We had a great time shopping at Quiltegården, and a cozy lunch afterwards. Sølvi joined us too, and I was so sad when I didn't get to spend more time with the girls. Hope it's not too long till next time :-)

The last time I was teaching my class at Quiltegården, I forgot a bag of my stuff. Among the stuff I left there (I'm a messy head, if you haven't figured that out already...), was the front piece of my version of Gail Pan's bag "Heart of the home backpack". I guess the ones of you who knows me, can see it's a bit typically me, purple and all ;-)
Actually, I started working on the stitchery long ago. I finished it in November 2009, so it's been a WISP for more than a year!
But you can get the idea how it's going to turn out now?


I am going to focus on the "Winter Blooms" quilt now, so I hope to get it finished in a couple of days. Then I will make a few Christmas presents I've got on my mind. Christmas is right around the corner, and not much time left to finish up some stuff...

There is a great Giveaway happening over at Anne Lise's blog, so go pay her a visit :o)

Wish you all a great new week,

I've been busy ;o)

I've been busy lately, but I've had so much fun!
Last week (Thursday) I finished my class at Quiltegården about how to use the 60 degree ruler to make the quilt with cubes. To teach classes is totaly new to me, but with such patient and nice students I had a great time :o) Thank you ladies, and thank you Siw for asking me to do this!
I brought my camera this time, and here is some photos from the last evening :

I missed Hanne-Kristine's quilt, but I'm sure you'll soon see her progress if you check up on her blog :O)

Siw, the owner of Quiltegården, busy - but always helpful and smiling :o)

This is the goodies that came home with me from the shop:


What also came home with me, was a huge pile of gorgeous fabrics and Gail Pan's new pattern called "Winter blooms". I asked Siw if I could help her to make it for her shop. So when it's finished, you'll be able to see it there :o)
I've been having so much fun making the blocks for the quilt, and I'm almost finished with the needleturn appliquè! I'm really looking forward to put the blocks together!
This is the blocks I've finished:


This is the block I prepped this mornig, and I'm almost finished!


Siw at Quiltegården have the bundles of these fabrics ready with the pattern if you would like to make this quilt with these fabrics (most of them are the same ones that Gail used in the original quilt). Anyone wanna join me? Please let me know if you are making this quilt, I would love to see it :o)

I'm having a week off work, and I am spending most of the days just doing things I want to. That's what Holidays are for, right?
I will try to get some Christmas presents done, but also work on other things I've planned to finish. Anyway, I'm just enjoying these pieceful mornings that starts with coffeè and sewing.

Another finish this month

Got to finish another table runner on Monday. It's almost the same as the one in the previous blog post, but if you click on the image, you can see the ric rac's are a little bit different and the laces are in different silver too. Stars on the last one is made in white fabric with silver print. It doesn't show well on the photo, but... This photo shows them both:


Last Wednesday I attended a sew-in together with some other ladies. We met to work on some care quilts. We got a lot of sewing done, and we had a great time :o) Hope to do another sew-in again soon. Guess we'll see some more care quilts finished in a while ;o)
You can follow our progress on this blog: Tepper til St.Olav.

A great weekend :o)

I've had a really great weekend, spending most of the time in my sewing room. Whoowhoo! And I've got a couple of finishes too!!!
I started to make a little toiletry purse on Friday, and it was finished before the evening was over :o) I found a tutorial on this one a while ago on Sissel's blog, and I just had to use my newest fabrics, the London cats. Sooo cute!


I made three similar tops last year, with purple and black fabrics, but never got to finish them. They where ment to become Advent table runners, but Christmas came and I just put them in one of my UFO/WISP bins. Got to quilt two of them this weekend, and made the appliquè and attached binding on to both of them. I finished sewing the binding by hand on one of them, and hope to finish the other one tomorrow. I've made this table runner several times now, I think I made three last year too, but I don't get bored of this pattern. I love these Advent colors, with some silver ric racs and laces :o)

I've been teaching a class at Quiltegården about some of the techniques I used in my Japaneese wallhanging, and last Thursday we had evening nr.2. I can assure you I was really speachless when the ladies had made such progress during the two weeks since the first class night. Some of them had put the pedal to the metal, and finished the top for the quilt, so I could teach them to make the stems on the outher border. Some of the ladies where working on their flower blocks, and they where all so gorgeous! So many different colors, but so beautiful every one of them! I really hope to get to see all of the quilts finished one day. Mine is not finished yet, I still have a lot of hand quilting to do. But I try to do a thread or three, now and then ;o)
With my messy mind I forgot my camera at home (AGAIN!!!), but I asked Hanne-Kristine to shoot some photos, and you can see LOTS of pictures from the class at her blog.
Thanks, Hanne-Kristine :o)

I had a great weekend, even if it came a LOT of snow during the weekend. It's looking like Winter Wonderland outside, and I hope it will look like this when Christmas comes :o) I love a white Christmas. So cozy!
Today I made a lot of cinnamon buns, like I promised the kids, so I got to something nice for others too this weekend ;o)

Wish you all a great new and creative week!

Happy November!

I didn't get to finish any projects for October OPAM, but I really hope to get some projects done for November. One project I'm pretty certain about finishing, is the new table runner I started working on last Friday. Had a day off work, and got to do a lot of sewing between housework and laundry. It's called "Santa's on his way" and it's designed by Lynette Anderson.

I bought the pattern at Quiltegården last Thursday, when I taught a class there. The class was about using the 60 degree ruler to make a quilt with tumbling blocks. You can see my quilt here.

I hope the ladies had a nice evening, I for sure did :o) I forgot to bring my camera, but I will try to remember it for evening nr.2. I'm looking forward to see their quilts coming together :o)

My local quilt guild's monthly meeting is on this Wednesday, and I hoped to finish my table runner till then. Cannot remember the last time I brought something finished to show at our show and tell! Hope my sewing mojo will be back for good soon, got a lot of projects I wanna finish. But when life happends, it's not something you can control... I guess ;o)
I can feel the "Christmas mood" is getting here, so maybe there will be some soft presents for someone this Christmas too. I sure hope so!

I wish you all a great week,
Laila

A small Schnibble

Haven't been much sewing lately, but I finished the small X-rated some days ago :o)
I used Moda's "Pure" fabrics.


My plan was to get it quilted this weekend, but since I've got a pretty troubled neck, I'm not able to do any sewing for some days. Boring....:o(
But I'm looking through books and magazines to get some inspiration. I'm not made for sitting with my hands in my lap for too long. Better than watching all the soape operas on TV ;o)

Wish you all a great weekend,
Laila

Some new blocks

I haven't been able to sew much the last two weeks, been knocked out by some ugly cold that's going around. But I'm finally getting much better, and happy that I'm slowly finding my sewing mojo again :o) Hope it will last for a looong time now!
During these two weeks, I've been spending some time with my laptop, 'googleing', 'facebooking' and visiting blogs. Haven't left so many comments, but really enjoyed some eye candy :o) I finally got to trace some of the stitcheries from Bronwyn Hayes' BOM. It's just so cute! The Catalicious BOM quilt. Go check it out :o)
I had to order some DMC threads to get this started, so I made a call to Quiltegården, and they sent me the ones I needed in the mail :o)


Not much of a progress, but I'll get there :o)



I've been playing with my new fabrics this weekend, and today I finished some more blocks on the Schnibble quilt I am making. I'm working on "Short story", the large one. I just had to order the fabrics from the new Moda line, BLISS. It is gorgeous!!!


I didn't follow the pattern from the book well enough, and the blocks are not the same size as in the original quilt, my blocks turned out a little bit smaller (Because I didn't read the pattern good enough... guess my mind tricked me a bit. Well... that's what I want to think anyway...).

We've had some lovely Autumn weather the last days, and last night the temperatures got below 0!!! Winter will come soon, and then it will be Christmas. I'm not at all prepared for that! But I guess I don't have a choise... Better get to figure out some Christmas presents soon :o)

Wish you all a great and creative week,
Laila

A little bit of this and a little bit of that

I was supposed to write a blog post last weekend, but time just flies...
Last weekend I managed to do a little progress on my Schnibble quilt. My sewing room floor is still occupied with this quilt layout, so I guess I'll have finish it soon...
It's really not so much work left, since all the pieces are already cut out. It's just me, struggling with some "low charged batteries".



I also got to piece together a row of flying geese last weekend. I used it in a class I teached at Quiltegården earlier this week. I made the block for this evening class a while ago, so I didn't need to prepare so much.
It was my very first class, and I was sooo excited!
I've met most of the ladies earlier, and it was so fun with such patient students!

A lovely lady from Seattle, Denice, came by to see what we where up to, and it was fun to have a 'drop-in student' :o)

This is the two half sircles that makes the flying geese sircle:

At the bottom picture, you can see what came home with me from Quiltegården that night :o) Some lovely fabrics, and a Japaneese book with lots of gorgeous patterns!

A couple of weeks back, our furball Fabian got so sick that I had to go to the Vet with him. Poor thing was loaded with fever, and didn't want to eat or drink anything. The Vet thought it was an infection caused by some cat fight he've been through, so we went home with some medicine that should make him well. The medicine didn't show its work until the fourth day, and then he finally got rid of the fever and started drinking some water on his own. Before that I had to feed him water against his will, but I had to so he wouldn't get dehydrated.
He is now gaining some weight and looking shiny and 'himself' again :o)


Like I told you in the previous post, we've got Autumn here now. I took some photos early one morning, and the mist had just left the ground with lots of spider webs loaded with water pearls. You should have seen the sight! It was so special! It almost looked like the webs where frozen!


I also took some photos while me and Hubby went for a walk later that day. The colors haven't changed too much yet, but I will definitely take my camera with me when I go for a walk again soon. It changes so fast!


I wish you all a great weekend, wehter you're sewing or enjoying your weekend outside :o)
Laila

My new quilt and OPAM report

Time flies, and suddenly we have to welcome Autumn here. The leaves are changing colors and they've already started to fall from the trees. I like the Autumn because of the colors, and it's cozy to light lots of candles around me in the evenings. It's a bit cold and it's raining a lot, but that means I can spend more time in my sewing room from now on and not feeling guilty about staying inside more :o)

I've been sewing just a little bit, and I've got only one finish for August OPAM. But I finished my secret quilt, and I'm working on the quilting now :o)

I cannot make up my mind about the quilting, so I can make the cubes stand out as much as possible. but I am quilting in the ditch along the light areas now, and we'll see what I decide for the rest. I haven't used any pattern, so I just designed it myself using the 60 degree ruler.
The quilt is made from fabrics I've already got in my stash, so it feels great to do some stash busting :o) It also have a scrappy look, and I love that!
The quilt will be used to teach a class later this Autumn, and when the class is over the quilt will be delivered to it's new ower, my oldest son. Finally he will get his first quilt!!!

Remember the cupboard me and Hubby worked on earlier this Summer? We finished the painting a while ago, and he also changed the glasses in the doors, with some that looks a bit old and they remind me of quilt blocks ;o) Nice :o)

Guess I'll have to get back to the quilting again :o)

Wish you all a great and creative week,
Laila

A little purse/pencil case

I did finally finish my little make up purse (or maybe I can call it a pencil case?)
I finished this sweet little purse the other day, but haven't got to make any blog posts yet ;o)
So now I've got at least one finished project for OPAM this month :o)

I think it's really cute, and I am going to keep this one. But it was so fun to make, so I know I'll be making some more :o) Perfect for presents!
I did hand piece the blocks on the front, and both back and front are hand quilted. It was a little tricky to sew around the curved edges since I'm not used to sew like this, but the book explained well how to :o) LOTS of great 'how to' photos!
It's a book by Yoko Saito called "Les Lecons de Patchwork" Lecon 1.
It contains a lot of great projects, mostly small ones but also a beautiful larger quilt.

I'm also working on an other Schnibble quilt. I did cut all the pieces this weekend, so it's just sewing for a while now :o)
It's the small X-rate I'm working on, and I'm using the rest of the fabrics from the fabrics I bought a while ago. You know, the "Pure" fabrics. I just love these colors!!!
I'm still waiting for the line of fabric to come in yards, so I can finish my first Schnibble quilt :o)

I've been hand quilting a bit lately too, but it's been hot lately, and it's impossible for me to sit outside in the sun quilting. Swetty fingers are no good!!!
But I look forward to get some more progress on the hand quilting project again soon.

Wish you all a great and creative week,
Laila

Some sewing :o)

I've been hooked on the Schnibble-mania going around. These quilts are sooo fun to make, and they are fast to make too!
I bought the new fabric line called "Pure" at Fatquartershop to make one of these. The only thing is... they don't come in yards yet... But the main part of the quilt is done, and I've cut all the bits for the outer border, so now I just have to wait a while so I can get the light border fabric, backing and fabric for the binding. Really look forward to finish this!
No finishes for July Opam for me, but hopefully I will have some this month. Fingers crossed!


Earlier I told you about working on a secret project. Well here it is. This is a photo during the hand basting, that took more than 8 hours to do... But I got to start on the hand quilting late last night, and I made some progress today too :o)
It's a wallhanging from one of the Japaneese books I've got. I've been planning to make this for some years, and I finally made it!
Guess I'll be using some hours on the hand quilting, but this one is really going to have "the look" I want :o)

A photo before the basting:


I really like the Japaneese fabrics with their special, kind of dusty, color tones. After I learned a few tricks by Yoko Saito when I attended her class, I liked these projects even more.
When I was at Quiltegården a while ago, I bought one of Yoko Saito's books that has some really great projects. One of the projects are a little purse I want to make. Haven't got to finish it yet, but wanted to show you how it looks while I'm working on one of the two sides. I'm not following the pattern, and I made mine with blocks like the ones we learned at Yoko Saito's class. The blocks (I call them Happy blocks) are hand sewn, and I am working on the hand quilting. Almost there ;o) This will be such a cute purse :o) Will try to finish it during the week that comes.

Wish you a great new and creative week, with lots of sewing ;o)
Laila

Cutting some strips

I've been cutting a lot of strips from some of my Japanese fabrics today. I am making some blocks by hand like the ones I learned at the class with Yoko Saito. They are for a project from the book by Yoko Saito, the one I bought at Quiltegården the other day. The project in the book are not made with the same blocks, but I thought I should add a 'personal touch' on it ;o) I'll show a picture later, when I get some progress done.
The strips are made for both regular quilting fabric, and the ones with structure. I really love these taupe ones!
You can see how the blocks looks like, lying next to the strips ;o)

The project is a little toiletry purse, and it's just sooo cute! Look forward to finish the two pieces I need to make for the two sides of it!

A little eye-candy:
This is a flower from my mom's garden. One of the most beautiful flowers I know!
It's called 'Blå valmuesøster' in Norwegian, and it's english name is 'Himalayan blue Poppy'.

Wish you all a great Sunday evening,
Laila

Shopping and some new stuff :o)

Yesterday I went downtown, shopping at Quiltegården. My favorite quilt shop :o) It's been a while since I last time, so it was so good to see Siw again. I did spend a few hours looking at fabrics and stuff, and had a nice chat with Siw over a cup of tea :o) I took a few photos while I was there, and this is just a few yummy ones ;o)

Lots of inspiration, and candy for the eye...
Yummy fabrics, beautiful quilts and LOTS of lovely threads! I love variengated threads, and among several embroidery threads, Siw has got the hand dyed threads from Cottage Garden and the Cosmo Seasons variengated thread from Lecien. There are also a lot of gorgeous ribbons in her shop. Wish I could put the whole shop in a shopping bag and take it home with me :o)






I brought some treasures home with me. A pattern of some gorgeous needle pillows by Leanne Beasley, some fabrics, ribbons, purple (of course purple) variengated thread and a really great book by Yoko Saito.



I just had to trace and start on one of the stitcheries from Leanne's pattern last night. And I also traced two of them for my mum, so finally I got her to try stitching :o)

I haven't got time to do many stitches today, since last night Hubby finished the shelves he was making for me.
The other night he got to put the shelves over my cutting table up on the wall, and yesterday he came home with the shelves he built for me, to have under the cutting table. Now I'm able to organize my strips and pieces in bins so they will be easier to use :o)
I've been working the whole day sorting stuff in my sewing room, so now it's tidy at one corner of the room ;o) Tomorrow I will continue organize the rest of the stuff :o)


These three books came in the mail today, and I cannot wait to make some of the quilts in this books!!! Inpired by Kvilstina, I just had to have the Schnibbles book ;o) And I definitely reccomend all three books!

But first of all, I'm going to make a project from the Yoko Saito book. I'll post a picture when I've got started ;o) Just have to finish tidying the sewing room first :o)

I'm still here!

I've been neglecting my blog for so long, but I've finally got some of the urge for doing some creative work back, and feel like posting some stuff again :o)
I've started on an other 'Precious things' bag. It's nice to enjoy some sewing again!
This one is going to be a gift for a friend of mine ;o)


Some weeks ago, I got three little treasures. It's three gorgeous timbles. I got two of them from my mom from her little trip to Sweden, and one from a kind colleague from work.
I guess this is a start of my timble collection :o)


It's my second week of the Summer Holidays, and so far the weather has not been too good. It's been too many days with rain, so me and Hubby figured we could finally start the painting some of our furniture. It's an old cupboard we got from Hubby's parents about 15yrs ago, and it's not so nice looking anymore. But some paint can really do wonders!


We rubbed the whole thing, and we're painting it white. It will need to be painted with four layers till we get the paint looking nice, and we're done with two already :o) It looks great already! I'm so excited to finsish it, it looks so empty in our living room without it.

I'm off to do some sewing in my sewing room now, so I can get some progress done.
I'm working on the 'secret project', but I'm almost there, and will show you pics when I finish it ;o)



Wish you all a great day, and happy sewing,
Laila