Bloggers` Quilt Festival Fall 2011

I`m so happy to be participating in the Fall Bloggers` Quilt Festival being hosted over at Amy`s Creative Side!  Hi to anyone visiting for the first time - you are very welcome so take a look round and I`d love you to leave a comment if you have time!

My entry is the Marrakech Rose Quilt, which I only finished a couple of weeks ago.  I hope my regular followers will bear with me but this quilt is special to me and I love it very much.

It`s big and it`s bold and I`ve always known that it wouldn`t be everyone`s choice but it was heavily influenced by the city which is my home, and which gave it its name - Marrakech in Morocco.  Perched on the north western tip of Africa, Morocco is a hot, noisy and colourful place and the city of Marrakech is no exception.  Like my quilt, you`ll either love it or hate it.  There`s no room for indifference here.

I`ve been quilting for a couple of years now and I started this quilt back in the spring as a quilt to cheer up our bedroom. It was the third quilt I started and the fourth quilt I finished and the first for us. I love to use colours clashing together. Because of the light here, bold and colourful quilts really work. My husband says he loves it but it`s not really a man quilt is it?

I hand pieced the sections as when I started it I had no working sewing machine. That all changed a few weeks ago when I got a lovely new Janome with a walking foot.  I straight line quilted it with a square spiral in the central block leaving a puffy space in the centre. For the other concentric squares, I echo quilted and I like the effect it gives to the backing too.

Here are its stats.

Started in March 2011

Finished in October 2011

Hand pieced

Machine quilted

Fabrics for the top are Kaffe Fasset, Amy Butler, Jennifer Paganelli, Anthology and Alexander Henry

Backing fabric is Songbird in Lime by Diane Kappa

Binding is Heirloom by Joel Dewberry

Made for my husband and me

A huge thank you to Amy for hosting this amazing event where we can see so many beautiful quilts laid out in all their glory just like a regular quilt festival.  So go visit and see the amazing creations being exhibited.

A Thursday Finish, A List & A Spot of Housekeeping

My poor mum who has been here for the last couple of weeks has been horribly sick since last Friday.  She`s been up and down but really quite poorly and there have been trips to the doc, laboratories for blood tests and mild suspicion of Typhoid panics but it looks like it is just a virus.  Thanks for all the well wishes.  It looks like she is on the mend and will return home to blighty on Saturday as planned.

With my mum sick and unable to get out and about, I did a spot of sewing and have a finish. There`s one quilt I`ve been wanting to tick off my mental checklist for quite a while and it is the Marrakech Rose quilt.  It`s one I`m really pleased with, and here it is.

The fabrics for the top are from centre outward - Kaffe Fasset,  Amy Butler, Jennifer Paganelli, Anthology, Alexander Henry and back to Amy Butler and Kaffe Fasset.

For the backing, I used Songbird in Lime from Bonjour by Diane Kappa and for the binding I used two fat quarters of my new Heirloom by Joel Dewberry.

I straight line quilted it.

and I`m very happy. Have I said that before? The design is based on Jane Brocket`s Russian Shawl quilt from her lovely and eye candy ridden book, The Gentle Art of Quilt-Making. I have always found Jane Brocket hugely inspiring as her quilts are big, bold and fun and she always emphasizes that the quilt doesn`t have to be perfect and that we should enjoy our quilts. I like that philosophy.

It`s lovely that exactly 2 years after taking up quilting, I`ve finished my 4th quilt - hmm, an average of one every six months - not a great average but one I hope to improve on. So I can tick it off the mental list and the list I`ve drawn up for Sarah`s Winter Stiching, which I`m linking up to.  The idea is to write down a list of what you hope to accomplish sewing-wise between now and next spring.  The idea being that what`s written down gets done. I`m not one for lists and it frequently gets me into trouble but here goes.

Quilts, QALs and Community Blocks*

finish the Marrakech Rose quilt

quilt and bind Deborah`s Union Jack quilt

make a quilt for my mum`s 70th birthday 

make a quilt for Baby Landen arriving next month all being well

finish blocks, piece, baste, quilt and bind Red City Quilt for the Duo QAL

commit to theDrunkard`s Path QAL

keep up with the Bloggers BOM

make monthly blocks for Bee Blessed and Quilting for Kids

Swaps &BeeS
make the final cut for The Scrappy Swap 2011
make a goodie for The Scrappy Swap 2011
make a tablerunner for The Modern Christmas Tablerunner Swap
make blocks for The 4x5 Modern Quilt Bee

Other Stuff
learn how to free motion quilt
finish Zaki`s rocket PJs using Susan`s `ugly` fabric
learn how to applique
learn how to piece curves

*last edited 6 November 2011

Have I forgotten anything?  Quite possibly.  I`m so excited to be starting on some new projects using some lovely stash. I`m linking up with Sarah at Fairyface Designs. Head over there and see what amazingly talented and creative people are planning for the next few months.

 

I`m sorry if you have tried to get hold of me by email and found I`m a no-reply blogger.  Thank you to everyone who writes and tells me that I`m one.  You see, I`m not meant to be.  I never edit my profile, my email address is listed and I`ve ticked the box but Blogger likes to randomly make me a NRB.  It`s highly frustrating as it`s completely random.  It`s a bit like a ferocious doctor`s receptionist (apologies to any doctor`s receptionists who are reading this post) - sometimes she`ll let you through, sometimes she won`t.  If anyone else has had this problem, do let me know what you did to remedy the problem.

Our Creative Spaces

There`s not much to share with you in my creative space this week as we are about to start our packing to move house.  But just when I`d forgotten about it, this lovely fabric from Hawthorne Threads arrived today...

Diane Kappa, Bonjour, Songbird in Lime

Songbird in Lime detail

It`s called Songbird in Lime by Diane Kappa and it will provide a fresh and zesty backing to the Marrakech Rose quilt...when I unearth the sewing machine from packing....whenever that may be...

Hawthorne Threads were recommended to me by my lovely blogging friend Di of Random Thoughts Do or `Di` and I couldn`t be happier.  They have a beautiful selection of fabric at great prices (I paid $7.25 a metre), they dispatched the same day and the package arrived a week later (USA to Morocco).

Linking up again with Our Creative Spaces.  Head over there to see talented people making lovely things.