F²F³: last ones, and worth the wait!

A surprise squishy arrived the other day.

I wasn’t really expecting anything, so it came as a lovely surprise to realise that it was from Sue of From the Magpie’s Nest, and it was my last F²F³ blocks of the F2F 2018/19 session. Poor Sue has been suffering from an injured shoulder which is taking ages to heal and is cramping her sewing style dreadfully, so I’m very grateful that she made the effort on my behalf.

So, without further ado, here they are:

I love them all, but the last one really tickled me! Sue knows I live in the tropics of North Queensland, Australia, and have just moved to a new and smaller house, so she’s created me a tiny tropical cottage (the sort of thing they call a chattel house in Barbados) with a palm tree outside. Even better, the dark strip at the top is the purple version of a Kaffe Fassett design called Aboriginal Spots. It’s a perfect fit 🙂  I have to decide whether to integrate this into the quilt, or make a special cushion cover out of it, but that will have to wait until I can lay out the blocks out on the design wall and can decide on a layout.

So it’s into the Amethyst & Slate project basket for now.

 

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F²F³: Last but one…

Better late than never, I say…

By which I mean that I finally got round to pressing and photographing these lovelies. They’ve been sitting on my work table at the old house, and I kept forgetting to do it when I was over there packing boxes.

They were made for me by Nanette for my F²F³ month, and are the last but one set. I was finally reminded by poor Nanette’s latest blog post, in which she shows her ScrapHappy work, but also tells us that she’s had dengue fever, very nasty, very tiring and you feel just horrible. So everyone please send Nanette lots of comforting, healing and positive thoughts.

She attached little notes to two of them to explain where the block design came from, and if you click on the photos you can read what she’s written. The third one, without a note, is Anvil, one of her favourite blocks.  I really love all three of them, the colours are beautiful and delicate, and they will work so well with all the others.

Thank you, Nanette, and may you recover quickly and return to health and full creativity very soon.

And now for something completely different

Well, not THAT different. It’s a quilt, after all.

But you haven’t seen this one before. I’m calling it Bougainville Nights (or BougieNights for short). It’s composed of the blocks I received from the previous session of F2F, not the one that finished last month but the one before.

This is the initial layout for the front of the quilt. It’ll probably change again a couple of times, but this seems to be fairly balanced. If you have suggestions for improving the layout, let me know what you think.

Some of the blocks I received are not shown here. I’ll still be using them all, but six are going on the back, and one is going to make the front of a cushion. The ones not shown are either on light backgrounds, or they contain fairly large amounts of yellow or pale orange or pale pink, which read too light and don’t work with the other blocks. They’re all beautiful, but they don’t fit in this version of the front. For the back, I’ll probably have a mainly dark blue background, with these blocks arranged in a left to right pointing chevron. The cushion cover block is gorgeous, but has lots of bright yellow in it which stands out very strongly if used on the front, so I’m going to border it with more yellow to make a feature of it. I’ll use dark blue joining strips and binding it in hot pink and orange. Should be nice and bright!

I have no idea how much time I’ll be able to spend on this over the coming weeks. But it’s been agitating to get out of my head and onto the design wall, so I just had to get that done so the quilt would shut up! I have a feeling my sewing room is going to be fairly low on the priority list in the new house, simply because it’s not ‘necessary’. So I’ll just have to take advantage of what I have now for as long as possible. This’ll be another QAYG project, and each block is small enough to quilt in a short time. I’ll be grabbing half hours here and there, and slowly, it’ll get done.

And now, it’s time to get up and get going. Things to do, boxes to pack.

 

F²F³: three more beauties

I got another squishy this morning 🙂

The package was from Moira, who has sent me three really beautiful blocks for my amethyst and slate colour scheme. Aren’t they lovely? And what gorgeous fabrics and perfect colours. I particularly love the white-on-white pineapple print, perfect for its new tropical setting!

Click on any image to enlarge.

She also sent me a piece of wonderful Kaffe Fassett fabric as a bonus. I love this so much that I’m going to save it for a garment or accessory of some sort, so I can see and enjoy it all the time!

Two more sets of blocks to come and two more of my own to make, and I’ll have the full set. Then, of course, it’ll be time to start planning the quilt. I think this lovely colour scheme is going to be perfect for a quilt for one of our new bedrooms. Hmm… I’ve never tried wool batting, but it would be lovely and cosy for those cooler nights.

And now, back to my packing list!

F²F³: nearly over for another year

And now for something completely different.

February is a short month, and with only one day of it left, I’m doing the final round-up of F²F³, the third round of F²F, a little early. Once again, it’s been a fun block swap with some really beautiful work from everyone. My ‘amethyst and slate’ blocks are destined to become a winter quilt for my own bed (well, OK, as much winter as we ever get here in the tropics). I have a few more still to come in, and I’ll show them as they arrive.

We’ll certainly do this again, and if you’d like to join in next time, be sure and let me know. I’ll be giving advance notice, so all you have to do is drop me an email or comment on the post when it comes out. If you want to know what it’s all about, have a look here.

Meanwhile, I’m sure many of you are already tired of my home renovations and ready for more quilty loveliness. So without further ado, here are Esther’s blocks, which arrived in the mail yesterday. Aren’t they gorgeous? She’s made 4 because she was worried that one of them wasn’t quite right. Thing is, I can’t tell which one that might have been, they’re all so lovely!

I’ll head over and add these to the F2F 2018/19 Gallery, so if you haven’t seen all the blocks before, click on the link and take a look, there’s some impressive work there.

We’ll be back with another session later in the year 🙂

 

 

 

Squishy 3

This morning, the postie brought me another one 🙂

One of the chief charms of the F²F block swap is that when it’s your month, the exciting envelopes and packages just keep coming.  These beauties are from Claire in France, and I really love the fabrics she’s chosen, and the soft colours. I’m the last one on the list, and after 8 months of sending blocks out to other people, it’s just lovely receiving them.

This quilt is going to be lovely. The soft shades of grey and lilac are going to make for a very tranquil and soothing effect. I’ve already started thinking about how it might be quilted.

I really must get on and make a few more blocks for myself!

F²F³: In the home stretch

It’s February, so it must be my turn to receive F²F³ blocks 🙂

We’ve had a great session this time round, and every year we do this block swap I see blocks new to me, skills improved and people falling in love with colours they’d never normally use, in the pursuit of creating three blocks each for all the participants. February concludes this third iteration of the block swap, and yes, I’ll probably be doing it again. It’s too much fun to stop! The start and end date depend on how many participants sign up; the minimum is probably 9 (including me) because that produces a useful final total of blocks, but we can do it with more. If you’re new to F²F (Footsquare Freestyle), hop over to the blogsite I set up for it and take a look at how it works as well as the galleries for this and previous sessions. And if you’d like to join in next time, either drop me an email using the details on the Contact Me page on this blog or leave a comment.

I’ve already received the first three blocks; these beauties were sent to me by Lynn of Tialys. The colour isn’t very accurate, I’m afraid; what looks red is actually a beautiful plum/burgundy, and the background of the bottom block is more lilac than pink. I’m not getting very good natural light just now with all the rain and dark clouds north Queensland is experiencing, and this colour change is an artefact of artificial light.

Below, you’ll also see my first block for myself, just to give F²F participants an idea if you’re looking for inspiration or have yet to go shopping for fabrics 🙂 It’s called Box Kite, and was designed by Angela Pingel, from her book Modern Blocks by C&T Publishing, and I really like it.

I’ll also be making myself a Circle of Geese block like Lynn’s but in a very different colour scheme. Lynn obviously knows me very well to choose that one to make for me, as it’s another one of my favourites!

I’ve decided to make blocks in both light and dark shades of the colours I’ve selected (but not real brights), because I know it can be hard to decide what someone means by a colour description when you’re trying to choose fabrics. That way, there can be a scattering of both, and no ‘wrong’ or ‘right’.

Right, on with the foundation paper piecing and never mind the rain hammering at the windows!