Tara Tuesdays – Part Ten
Posted on 19 June 2012
Tara - I love your blogs about your travels as you're so enthusiastic about your trips and always take great photos! Will look forward to the next one and in the meantime I love the fact that I can see how the patchwork blanket turned out after you used my Accuquilt cutter, takes 2 minutes to cut all the squares and 6 months to sew lol, pmsl and all that jazz!
Oops upside your head!
I thought it probably sensible, and more importantly so as not to upset the boss, that this week I should write about some of the things I have been making lately to include a little show and tell. I expect you are all bored by my holiday escapades although I do still have some more to share with you on that….sorry!
Anyway, back to my craft stuff. For some time now I have been knitting squares using mainly alpaca and Rooster DK yarns and once I have enough (100 I think) I plan to sew them all together and then back with some fabric for a snuggly cosy blanket. Here are some of my favourite squares made so far:
Patterns have been taken from “200 knitted blocks” by Jan Eaton and “201 knitting, motifs, blocks, projects & ideas” by my Teacher Nicki Trench. My aunt gave me the idea to make a blanket as she is doing something similar and she also bought be the knitted blocks book too. This is my ongoing project which I will get done as and when, what is nice about it is you can just pick it up when you feel like it and it doesn’t take too long to knock up a square or two! It has also been a great opportunity for me to practice different patterns, cable & slip stitch as well as decreasing and increasing! Since writing I have changed my mind again on this and think the squares knitted using the DK yarn will probably be better as a cushion cover as they are a different size to the alpaca squares, so still more to knit me thinks!
I have a stall at my Village Summer Fair in July and as I have had a bit of spare time on my hands recently I made these cushions which I hope to sell.
I used 16 inch pads and quite like the quartered patchwork look. Some of the fabrics are from a donated bag of remnants from Em and the red cushion is Cath Kidston and some other fabrics I already had.
The bird and flower appliqued cushion is my own creation but I was inspired by my teachers latest book "A passion for quilting" and I used her templates to make this. I have other stock for sale and as there are four of us in my gang, all of our creations will be on our stall.
In a moment of weakness I offered to make two of my dear friends a patchwork blanket for their Christmas gift (last year I hasten to add!) I did say to them at the time that there was no chance that it would be ready in time for Crimbo; however last week (only six months late) I finally finished it! My friend Uta picked out the majority of the fabrics from my stash and also provided her own fleecy blanket for me to back onto. However, as with most sewing projects, it needed altering so I had to use more squares than originally envisaged. One Monday night at our weekly get together before Crimbo, Em kindly brought her Accuquilt machine along for me to use to cut the squares which helped enormously! I eventually got round to sewing three of the lines together but then left it until this week where I managed to complete the whole thing. Dave (Uta’s partner) has contributed to the blanket by donating a couple of his shirts, as have hubby and I! I was really pleased with how it turned out. Both Dave and and even my bears seemed to like it, so much so, they fancied a bit of “Oops upside your head!” Commissions considered if anyone is interested....
Until next time……….
