Animal Alphabet

My sewing room looks like the jungle these animals came out of. I don't have a free surface in the room after pulling out fabrics to audition. The floor is littered with the paper off the back of the fusibles and I don't have the motivation to clean it up just yet. Maybe when I've finished fusing I'll get to that.
The pattern is Animal Alphabet from Don't Look Now.

I hope these made you smile. They'll come to life when the details are stitched in later.

More about the red and green

I always think of winter as hand quilting season and I usually have some grand plan to do lots of it and it just never seems to work out that way. I haven't done a lot more on the Coxcomb quilt because the marking has been difficult. I should have  marked it before basting but I hate doing that and never have. If only we had professional markers these days.
The background is 1/4" lines and inside the trapunto wreaths, a 3/8" grid is done on the diagonal. The 3/8" grid will be repeated on the outer side of the border to tie it all together.

The rule is that no matter how careful lines are drawn with a ruler, marking will always go astray. I  knew that but did listen to myself?

I bought myself a lifesaving tool which is now one of my favourites. The June Tailor marking grid has slots every 1/2" and I love it.

I've nearly finished marking the whole background and I'll go back and mark the 1/4" lines as I go. I found out it pays to put masking tape on the sides just so that the ruler won't shift as I mark but it's important to remove the tape after a session or it will be hard to get off.

I'm using the Berol hand washable pens that I wrote about here.

If you adore red and green quilts like me, you might be interested to know that a kind blogger has pointed out that the quilt this was based on is listed for sale again. 

when you click on the main photo, you can scroll through close ups of them all. Go here for a look, how big do you think the background grid quilting is on it?

Meanwhile, I'm still plugging away at my vines, it's a slow process. Have you seen Dorothy's? Go have a look, she's doing it in different colours, it's gorgeous.

 Until next time, Janet

Treating myself

I made a bag or two. It's been ages since I had some real quality time on the machine and making bags is such a good way to use up a bit of stash. I promised myself that I'd get back to making the lunch bag from Pink Penguin. I love this free pattern, there are no zips, no hardware and the steps are oh so simple to follow.

The hardest part is stopping at one, it's so much fun thinking of different fabric combinations.

For my second bag, I thought I'd change it a bit and make a bigger size that would accommodate my knitting. It worked out so well by just adding a couple of inches to the height and width and making the handles a little longer. I kept the trim at the top the same width.

There is one change I make to the pattern and that is to overlock or zig zag the side seams of the drawstring cover. If you don't, the seams inside have raw edges.

You can see the size difference when they pose together. You can never have enough bags you know.

We had a glorious break from the wet weather yesterday, it was so sunny and warm that we used the opportunity to go for a drive.

The car pointed itself towards Balmain near Sydney where we stopped to pick up some treats from that Masterchef star, Patissier Adriano Zumbo.
Really we went to treat ourselves to the tarte au fruit de la passion. In English, that's a citrus passion fruit tart which you can see on the platter in the middle. It's to die for, that's all I need to say.
I kinda got carried away and decided to get some other equally famous goodies for the freezer although I'm not sure they'll make it that far. The blueberry and almond tart is not my favourite.

I have been ruined, who knew food could taste this heavenly. Healthy eating plan starts next week.

The  V8

8 layers of vanilla

Vanilla crème chantilly

Toasted vanilla brulee

Vanilla water gel

Vanilla ganache

Vanilla macaron

Vanilla dacquoise

Vanilla chiffon cake

Vanilla almond crunch

The happy birthday

Flourless chocolate biscuit,

chocolate sabayon mou,

ultimate chocolate brownie,

caramel mouse,

milk chocolate chantilly

cocoa nib nougatine with a White chocolate and Passionfruit glaze.

Next stop was to Quiltsmith where I got lost inside the store because I have to look at everything you know. I did get some some green fabrics and this little pile which are for a quilt in my head that is nagging at me. I've been overloaded with inspiration lately and have sewing mojo to spare. Does that happen to you too?

Thankfully, these treats are calorie free.

Despite fighting the urge to start something new, I'm trying to keep the blinkers on and have been nibbling away at this simple hand piecing project. It's nearly a quilt top.

My apologies if I didn't reply to all comments on my last post, some of my emails have disappeared and I can't get them back.

Until next time, thanks for dropping by, Janet