Wednesday, February 28, 2018

Online viewer's choice - Kona Colour Challenge, MQG Tasmania

You can vote online for your favourite quilt as Viewer's Choice in the Modern Quilt Guild of Tasmania's Kona Colour Challenge 2017.  The Kona Colour of the Year for 2017 was Flamingo, featured in each quilt.

The judged competition winners were announced on 28 February 2018, and you can have your say - deadline for voting is 12 noon on Thursday 8th March 2018.

Entries were received from around Australia, and the online exhibition includes artists' details and a short statement about each quilt.

Voting is on Facebook, and you must vote on the original MQGTasmania post (28 February) for your vote to be counted.

Well worth a look whether you cast a vote or just enjoy the quilts.

Tuesday, February 27, 2018

Community quilts 2018 (1) - February sewing day

 First monthly community sewing day for the year - a great roll up, and lots of work done!

The first order of business was to go through the two large tubs of donated blocks, fabric and a number of finished and partially finished quilt tops that had turned up quite unexpectedly, from four different sources, over the summer break. The aim was just to see what there was, and to make some initial decisions about what we could use, and what needed to go elsewhere, and then to pack it away to be worked on when time permitted. But by the end of the day, almost everything had been claimed by someone who was willing to work towards a finished quilt right now, and Daphne had joined a set of blocks together into a top that she wanted to add just a border or two to improve the proportions!

Top left is a large quilt top, beautifully made from gorgeous
fabrics - we have decided to finish it as a raffle quilt for our next
Biggest Morning Tea to support the Cancer Council. The other
three blocks are made from a Chris Jurd patten, Squaredance,
again from lovely fabrics, and beautifully made by foundation
 paper piecing.  No final decision on their future yet, but ideas
are percolating.

A small selection if the many, many blocks donated by a friend
of a friend who teaches patchwork in Andamooka in outback
South Australia, and sometimes has samples and offcuts leftover,
and cannot bear to just throw them out. They've nearly all
found a new maker, and are well on their way to being quilts,
mostly of a scrappy variety.

Nine blocks joined together, whose maker ran out of puff
with it - she generously included some fabric that might
be a border as well. Julie is onto it.

Daphne is well on the way to a complete lap-quilt top,
having joined together the border blocks from a another
project that drove its original maker to distraction.

Susan gathered up some community stash fabrics to add borders
 to the centre of the same quilt whose border blocks Daphne
rescued. That indistinct chartreuse fabric is one of the most useful
'neutrals' in our stash - we always try to keep a similar one on hand.
And a couple of days later Susan had already replaced
four fabric pieces that just didn't look comfortable with
the other, and added to borders for a a second lap-sized
quilt rescue.
Then it was down to our usual program of advancing the quilts we thought we were working on, including quite a lot of pin-basting ... there would have been more, but someone forgot to bring the already prepared backing, and someone else escaped before a photo could be taken. We'll catch up with both of them eventually.

Hilary ran this modern top up during the break, and will machine
quilt it herself. It provided Pat's stretching exercise for the day.
Julie made some pretty pink 'In a Whirl' blocks from
Miriam's online tutorial. The rogue block that sewed itself
 together without consulting the pattern is staying there as is.
Margaret K makes children's quilt tops faster than we can
finish them, and they are all fantastic. We eventually get there.
Hilary's 2017 end-of-year challenge quilt appeared for basting
on the Thursday sewing day, and she was seen to be sewing the
binding down the following Tuesday, setting the bar quite high!
Sue C came prepared to piece the back for her 'Plus' quilt,
as her task for the day. She made a very precisely measured
ladder to compliment the fire chief fabric.
All the + signs.

Saturday, February 24, 2018

Bags, bags, bags ...

We can do a good line in bags, as well as quilts ...

No-one does Liberty and linen like Janice
- and perfect little clamshells.
Robyn B was a bit hesitant about the fabrics she'd
brought at the start of our SewMiriam workshop ...
... but they went together beautifully, and positively glow.
Robyn L has made some of her magic crochet bags for
the craft stall at our Quilt Show - it folds into a little pouch
at the base to take up no room at all in your pocket or handbag.
And they are in beautiful colours.

Jenn's clever Inside-Outside pouch, made from Aneela Hooey's
pattern intrigued. The pattern is available to buy individually,
and there are several more in Stitched Sewing Organisers,
published by C and T in 2017. 
The clear outer pockets are made with vinyl sold for tablecloths
by Spotlight.. The interior has more pockets and is very roomy.
The thread rainbow is not included.

Friday, February 23, 2018

QuiltCon 2018 - award winners

The very big news in quilting today is The opening of QuiltCon 2018, the international modern quilt show in Pasadena, California.

Award winners have been announced - congratulations to Stephanie Skardal for her Best in Show quilt, 'Going Up' and to all the award winners, including two members of Sydney Modern Quilt Guild: Tara Glastonbury, first in Handwork with her 'Blue Giant' and Kathy Thorncraft, third fin Small Quilts with her 'Digital Offcuts'.

The Modern Quilt Guild has posted pictures of all the winners here.

Many, many pictures of brilliant modern quilts are on Instagram at #quiltcon.

Thursday, February 22, 2018

How to use Instagram - an easy guide

There is a lot of quilting action on Instagram. The app is primarily a photo-sharing platform, so it lends itself to sharing finished quilts, works in progress, publishing flyers about events, designers and manufacturers, shops displaying new stock and sales, and forming online 'groups' who are working on similar projects, so you can see what others are doing.

Several of our members are active Instagram users, some are quietly watching from the sidelines.and some are interested but don't know what it's all about yet. We are happy to share our experience hands-on, but here is an easy guide from CheatSheet, that will help you get started, in the absence of a 15 year old who can be your personal tutor. It begins with links for downloading the app appropriate for your device, and takes you step-by-step through the easy process of becoming an active Instagram-er.

You can follow us on Instagram here, at Fairholme Quilters.



Wednesday, February 21, 2018

Show and tell

Spots are very popular with quilters - our local quilt shop has
two large shelves of bolts of spots right at their large cutting
counters - and they pretty much all go together. Lynette found
a pile of spotty squares from the community stash and added
to it from her own considerable supplies, including the fresh
white background, to make this fun zingy community quilt top
that is going to make someone very happy.
Julie started early on a quilt for a grea grandchild expected last year - she didn't know if it would be boy or a girl, but she took a punt on pink, and planned to donate it to community quilts and start again if it was a little boy. When Sophie arrived, great-grandma won the bet!
Detail of baby Sophie's quilt, beautifully long-arm quilted by Yvette

Yvette delivered three quilts last week, prompting lots of
binding activity this week. This one is for Jill's son who asked
for 'toucans and circles' - Yvette quilted in circles and loops.
Yvette's third delivery was for Pat, whose sister gave her a
large bundle of oriental fabrics that she didn't think she would
use. Pat made log cabins (one of her favourite blocks),
and is planning to give the quilt back to her sister.

Elaine W took the few left-over blocks from another 'finishing
for someone else' project, and put them together for her 2017
end-of-year challenge. An unintentional secondary diagonal
pattern has emerged from her serendipitous placement of the
darker pieces. Lovely to see it finished for our 2018
community collection.
Lynette has been in 'finishing off' mode for s few weeks
(there will be some more to see in our next community quilts post).
A collection of loose blocks came to us via Janet, and was obviously
made some time ago. Lynette has set half of them against a background
of a fresh navy spot on white, breathing new life into them. Late last
year Lynette made the first quilt from the original set of 18 blocks,
already in use by a resident of a dementia care centre.

Tuesday, February 20, 2018

Event page for Fairholme Quilt Show 2018

We have posted a Facebook event page for our 2018 Quilt Show. It is an easy way to share information about the show - just click on the 'share' button to share it to your own Facebook timeline. Or you can email the link to friends: www.facebook.com/events/159761541347664/

Note that there is a button to a location map for the venue, Thornleigh Community Centre, as well.

Further information will be added over the next six weeks leading up to the show, so do check back from time to time. Please feel free to share as widely as you can.


We look forward to seeing you at the show!



Friday, February 16, 2018

More commentary and photos from Tokyo

If you enjoyed out first link to photos from the recent Tokyo International Quilt Festival, you might be interested in these too, each well illustrated.

  • Susan Briscoe's post  Your private view of Tokyo, on her blog, Sashiko and Other Stitching. Thanks to Lisa Walton for this link.
  • Rita Hodge, of Red Pepper Quilts has shared photos and her thoughts in two posts, here and here

Monday, February 12, 2018

Back to regular show and tell (2)

'Whimsy' is a Judy Newman design, hand pieced by Nerida.
The soft turquoise background fabric ties it all together,
anchored by the whimsical stripey block corners. 
So many lovely fabrics and vintage linens. Nerida plans to hand
quilt this beauty over the winter, so we hope to see a lot more of it then.


Jenn is ignoring summer, and hand-quilting her 'Meadow' quilt,
made during and after a 2015 workshop with designer Lizzie House.
Such gorgeous colours. The pattern can only be purchased
as part of the class.

Hilary made this bright, geometric quilt top over the
summer, and is planning to machine quilt it herself.
Daphne brought in her red and white blocks so we could
check on progress - they are just 6" ! She might have had a
buy a little red fabric, and the white is shorting left from a
wedding outfit she made for her grandson.
Yvette's red and white version of the 'Farmers Wife' quilt, seen here,
was Daphne's inspiration, and she immediately bought the book.

Saturday, February 10, 2018

Back to regular programming - show and tell (1)


Linda teaches beginners' patchwork classes at a quilt shop,
and is just about finished a new sample quilt in blues and greens.
She has free-motion-quilted it with a simple design of wavy
vertical lines, broken up with clusters of 'pebbles'
Miriam nearly always has a large quilt in the making,
and this summer was no exception. 'Just a few scraps'
made into hour glass blocks round a Dresden medallion ... 

the pattern is 'Into the Woods', by Judy Newman.
Nerida gifted the pretty pink cross stitch print used as the 
background and outer border. Just gorgeous!

More pink - Sue H has three 'I Spy' quillows to finish off that didn't
quite make their Christmas deadlines.

Their three year old owners won't mind - they'll be too busy 
trying to find everything.

Friday, February 9, 2018

Avalon Quilters 2018 Exhibition - 9 and 10 March


Raffle Quilt: 1930s vintage quilt 'Touching Stars', hand quilted by members.
Proceeds to Mitochondrial Disease Foundation
Quilts and other quality handmade items for sale
Entry $5
Enquiries: Anne 0401 335 737
The finished raffle quilt can be seen on the Avalon Quilters Instagram account.

Thursday, February 8, 2018

Show and tell - more summer sewing (2)

 Dawn and Julie are both prolific quilters, so it was not a great surprise that within the first couple of weeks after our long summer break, they had nine (!) quilts to show us between them - two of Julie's are in the previous post.

Dawn 1: Miriam's tutorial for her 'In a Whirl' quilt has
been very popular, and as a keeper and user of scraps,
Dawn has been one of its early adopters. This is her
third version, all finished.

Dawn 2: A classic Irish chain, made from fabrics cut by
 a quilter who is now in aged care, and to be returned
to her as a finished quilt - a living instance of
#thekindnessofquilters

Dawn 3: All sorts of building and electrical prints
from the community stash - quilted by Yvette.

Dawn 4: More from the community stash, including
a lovely big panel to delight someone who like diggers
and trucks and big building. Also quilted by Yvette.

Dawn 5: Much of this subtly rich fabric came from
Georgie's pre-moving de stash, put to excellent use.
Dragonflies and deep blues for Julie's
grandson's 30th birthday.
Julie's fresh, crisp machine appliqued and embroidered quilt.
The yellow border and the blue striped sashing are on point
for a summery feel.

Tuesday, February 6, 2018

Two little quilts, and 'Days for Girls'

Our 2017 end-of-year challenge has been a great success (as they usually are) - it has helped us to move on some projects that we were so not going to finish ourselves, stimulated creativity in those who took on each ufo, and produced nearly thirty useful and beautiful finishes. There were no rules about what was to be made, and the makers were free to use them or gift them however they wished. Some of them are being used in our homes, some have been gifts for others, and a number have been passed on to others through various community projects, including our own that we often post about here.

You can see in this post how Margaret made bags from donated blocks that were sold at a local church market to support children in the Solomon Islands.

Julie made two quilts from just a few blocks collected from the abandoned ufo pile back in October, that Yvette has generously quilted on her new longarm machine. She has decided to donate them to a fundraiser organised by her Rotary Club, to support the Days for Girls project internationally (click on the 'about us' tab on the linked page to see a short video of what they can achieve). We did not actually imagine that our fun challenge that rounds out our quilting year might have such a reach, but the making of these two little quilts will help to change the lives of girls somewhere in the developing world.