Liebster award!

Thank you to Di @ Willowbeck Designs for awarding me the Liebster Award! 

So, what is the Liebster Blog Award? The Liebster award (German for favourite) is for bloggers with 200 followers or less. As a recipient of the award, you have the chance to thank and link back to the blogger who gave it to you as well as pass it along to five other deserving blogs.

I would like to pass the Liebster Award onto...

Sheila at Bluepatch Quilter
Catherine at Sew Wonderful Life
David at Lost Threads
Sarah at Narcoleptic in a cupboard 
a quilt, maybe 

Now, I know at least some of you on that list have had this before, and some of you may have more than 200 followers but I just can't work it our from your blog, and at least one of you I have no idea how to email you to tell you, but I'm hoping it's the thought that counts!  I think all your blogs are great!

Sunny days

The sun has been out this weekend so hubby and I made sure we got out in it- we are very lucky to have all this pretty much on our doorstep...

I have also been getting down to some quilting too.  This weekend's achievement is that the big quilt is now all quilted, and the binding is machined on, just need to hand stitch round it all on the back and the job is done!
  

Quilting has begun!

I've finally taken the plunge and started quilting!  To keep it straightforward I've gone for a basic 2" grid going between the seems of the piecing rather than trying to hit them and follow them.

I've started in the middle and reckon I'm about a quarter or a third of the way through the quilting.

The thread I'm using is YLI variegated kyoto garden, a lovely mix of yellow, green and fresh blue tones.  On the back I'm using a dusky blue shade of gutermann thread which matchs the backing fabric.

Only two more Wednesday classes to go and I'm aiming to have it finished! 

Ground colour

The colours of spring are brilliant.  This is the beautiful crocus display on show in one of our local parks this time of year...

...looking forward to the daffodils next!  And of course the bluebells in the woods in May.

Borders on hearts

As well as a lot of tacking I have also managed to get the borders on my little hearts quilt which I started making at Sheila's workshop last month...

...now I just need to fill the two empty squares before I layer up and quilt it!

Layering up

It's been longer that I'd hoped since my last post again, but progress has been made on a number of fronts.  First of all I got a new camera to replace the one I broke the other week, so pictures are easily taken once more!  Second of all I have finished putting together both sides of the quilt and have layered them up!  Pins are everywhere and about two thirds of the tacking stitches that I think I need are in...

 

Overall the quilt top is beginning to look rather wrinkled now the pins and tacking is going in...

And on the back I decided to go symetrical and add the matching strip of plaid fabrics to the panel for the back.

Tacking is taking me a bit longer than I thought, so I won't get on to quilting this weekend.  Wednesday is class day again, so I'll be making up my binding then I think so I'll be all organised for when the quilting is done.  I've not decided exactly what to use for the binding though.  I have more of the backing material, or I could use the plaids and other colourful bits and pieces I have left over from making the quilt top.  I think I'm leaning to the later option just now.  What do you think?

Class quilt progress

It's been a while since I last blogged for two reasons - the first being that I fell on the stairs at home and broke my camera in the process, so a bit more difficult than usual to take photos.  My husband has come to the rescue with the camera on his phone to let me post today!  The second reason is that I haven't got much quilting done recently, but this morning finally I did move on my class project a bit...

My class quilt top is all pieced now, except for the final 2.5" white border.  I'm a little unsure about putting it on as I'm not totally happy that the top is flat enough - perhaps I need to unpick and redo a couple of seams?  My other thought was that I could always quilt this much on to the full sized wadding and backing, and then add the white border last just before binding.  Not sure what to do....

And while I've been working out what to do next with the top I have also pieced together some scraps left over from making the front...

I'm not going to cover the full back of my quilt with scraps, but I plan to add this strip off centre to the backing material.  I was going to add them as blocks randomly throughout the backing material, but Sheila suggested putting them together in a strip.  The strip option has been more manageable, probably more economical on the backing fabric and I think will make a rather nice feature.  I was a bit worried that it might create extra bumps where seams meet that could interfere with my quilting, but after being encouraged I'm going to go for it anyway.

Seeing the pieced strip now in these photos I wonder if I should add another strip of the yellow, blue and green plaids down the other long side to mirror the one there already and to make a bit of a frame for the blocks?  I never thought I'd come up with so many questions when I started the quilt as I had a pretty detailed pattern to follow, but the project seems to be developing a character of its own now!  Hopefully I'll get the backing finished at class on Wednesday night and work out what my next steps should be after that.