BLOOMING FANTASY

I was supposed to make this blog post a while ago, but been too busy! 

Remember my blog post from March this year? Well I got to ship the finished quilt to Helen Stubbings, who designed this gorgeous quilt. I was thrilled she liked the result! I did enjoy making this quilt, even if it was a "bumpy road" with lots of things happening in my life during the making of it. 

You can read all about it over at Helen's blog Hugs 'n Kisses :o)

This quilt is a ten part BOM project. You can order it from Helen's shop, or you can ask your local quilt shop to find out if it is available there.

The back looks just like a whole cloth quilt. I guess you know by now I love the McTavishing pattern :o)

This is a collage with all the blocks in the quilt, and I can assure you these blocks were so easy to make using Helen's special paper. It also makes the appliqued pieces "pop", and I love the effect!

 I will make another one, using Helen's fabrics soon. Anyone wants to join me? Let me know! Maybe we'll arrange a sewalong? That would be so fun!

Wish you all a great day :o)
Hugs,
Laila

Long time, no see!

Been such a long time since my previous blog post! Been super busy with moving and redecorating our new home. 

A couple of days before we got the keys to our new home, I had the pleasure of meeting Helen Stubbings. It was so nice to meet her again! She had her lovely daughter Molly to keep her company during her stay in Norway. I was so happy to have them both over, but there was no time for sewing this time since she was only able to spend one day in Trondheim. She was here to do a trunk show for my local quilt guild about her designs and quilts. So many gorgeous projects!!!

I have several of Helen's project in the making, and I can't wait to finish one special quilt. It's the quilt in the previous photo, with white background and japanese scrap fabrics. It's made with a special paper Helen made, and it makes the needleturn applique so easy and fun! It was supposed to be finished and quilted before she came over, but since my youngest have had their turns in hospital this spring and summer and I on top of that bought a house, I just couldn't... A border with more applique is to be made, then I will quilt it and send it back to Helen in Australia. This pattern is a design by Helen, and you can soon order the pattern and the paper templates from her :-)

The morning Helen and Molly where leaving Trondheim we had a nice visit at Quiltegården (my local quilt shop). Time flies when you're having a good time, and I really wish they both could stay longer! Maybe next time ;o)

I haven't been able to do any sewing or quilting for weeks, but lots of painting is done! The living room, kitchen and the kid's rooms are finished. Thanks to lots of help from my dear family! Yesterday I finished my sewing room!!! So excited to get my stuff in, and to put up my longarm machine!!! I've really missed sewing, and I'm ready to have some quality time with needle and thread very soon! Maybe this weekend? Who knows ;o)

I love my new home, and I think I will like it here :o) 

It's Autumn over here, and that means lots of sewing time when the weather is nasty ;o)

Hope to share some sewing stuff with you soon, and I look forward to get time to comment on your blog posts as well!
Happy sewing,
Laila

Something new...again :o)

Had my day off work today, and wanted to start on a project I've had on my mind for a long time. Back in April I attended a weekend class with Gail Pan and Helen Stubbings. Helen did teach some of us her technique to make faux appliquè. She calls it Colorquè. In her book "Faux Appliquè" is the most gorgeous quilt. It's made of nine blocks and a border using this technique. I got to trace four blocks, and I got to add colors to one of the blocks. I think it looks good so far :o)

I've started to stitch the outlines with the thread I bought from Helen when I ordered the color pencils and textile medium from her website Hugs'n Kisses. This will be a project I will be working on during the winter. I'm really looking forward to quilt this one! 

I got some nice mail today too! I ordered the Quick Curve Ruler and a pattern from Lappemor. The ruler and the pattern is made by Jenny, owner of Sew Kind of Wonderful. Jenny has two blogs I've been following for a while, and she is such a great longarm quilter too! I just love the different quilts she's made using this ruler, and I really wanted to make one of these quilts so I could play with "Miss Monster" on it. I love traditional quilts, but I also love the modern quilts, with different quilting patterns. 

I watched Jenny's videos on Youtube, and decided to try the ruler tonight. 

First attempt failed.... I was not paying attention to the size of the pieces. Second attempt was perfect, until I cut the block an inch too small... *sigh*

Lesson learned...

Third attempt did not fail, and I got half a block looking almost perfect  :o) Yep, I'm doing the happy dance :o) I've NEVER pieced a curved seam before, so I'm proud of myself (even if I used such a long time sewing those two seams...).

I'm using white cotton for background, and will use a lot of different scraps/fatquarters I've got stashed. Hope to at least make the other half of the block tomorrow. 

I'm almost finished quilting the panel quilt. I spend too much time wondering and thinking about how to quilt the different spaces. But think I've got some ideas to finish up with. Will post a photo of it in my next blog post. 

Happy sewing,

Laila

More about the weekend class

All of us had such a great time during the weekend. I met a lot of ladies from classes we attended together a while ago, but I also met several of the ladies I know only from Blogland. So nice to meet them in person!

This is some photos of the "busy bees" :o)

Quiltegården had lots of yummy fabrics, notions, patterns and thread we cold buy. I felt like a hoarder after this weekend, but I've got a lot of plans for the yummy stuff that came home with me :o)




Gail wanted to get a photo outside while it was snowing. I think both Gail and Helen liked the snow :o) And I can understand that, it looked pretty nostalgic when the snow was falling outside. Even if us locals wanted less off it ;o)

Unni got to finish her scissor holder, and it looked so pretty! She's such a talented lady, and her hand quilting skills is to die for!

Both me and Unni fell for the project Helen brought, which wasn't on the agenda for this weekend, but she helped us prep the gorgous block with birds and leaves, and did show us how she made it. A couple of the other ladies also wanted to try this, and we loved it! Something different, and most of all so fun!

This is Unni and me, very focused on playing whit the coloring pencils. We laughed a lot about it, since we felt like a couple of kids :o) But we had so much fun! And the result was so pretty!

Somebody joked about making angels in the snow, and when Borghild jumped into the snow and made a snow angel Gail was suddenly jumping in too, and made her snow angel :o)

Of course Helen had to make hers too:-)

Thank you so much Gail and Helen, this was such a nice weekend! Thank you so much for the inspiration you left me! I really hope to see you again :o)

This is how one of my projects look after I finished the stitching around the colored leaves and birds. So pretty!

I'll post more about the progress on the other projects I started this weekend  in my next post :o)

Weekend class with Gail Pan and Helen Stubbings

The weekend class with Gail Pan and Helen Stubbings was such a nice event. I'm so happy that Siw at my local quilt shop, Quiltegården, made this happen! I was so excited to see Gail again, and to meet Helen. They are both lovely ladies, and great teachers.

The weekend started with a trunk show on Friday. Gail and Helen told us about their work and where they find inspiration to make the lovely quilts and project. They brought so many gorgeous projects, and this is some of them:

We also had a "Show and tell" but I didn't take any photos of the lovely projects, but I'll try to come back here and link to the blogs that show some of them :o) I haven't seen any blog with photos of the "Show and tell" yet, but I guess I'm not the only one having a lot of photos to organize after this weekend :o)

We where having two projects from each of our lovely teachers to work on this weekend:

"Sewing Chatelaine" by Helen Stubbings

"Hana's basket" and "Stitch me Happy" by Gail Pan

"My Journal" by Helen Stubbings

I've started on "Sewing Chatelaine", "Hana's basket" and one more project Helen did tell us about. I'll tell more in my next post, I have to edit some more of my photos first :-)