A Curious Finish

There have been times over the last couple of days when I have felt like I was assisting in the lambing shed or competing in some sumo wrestling as I tugged the Man with a Curious Nature quilt through the throat of my machine.

I wanted it to have a squishy feel so that it was ideal for snuggling and so I quilted it 'lite' by simply echoing the squares and rectangles. It still took ages as I was continually having to reposition the quilt.  Ideally I would have liked to quilt it more densely.

But it's done...finally, and my first finish of 2013.

It was a surprise for my husband who had no idea I was making anything for him. Zaki and I took it to the riad so that we could surprise him but he had popped out for lunch so we took a few snaps while we were waiting for him.

I'm ashamed to admit that I made the quilt top in April last year! I used lovely Sarah's stained pattern as part of her QAL and Parson Grey's Curious Nature, which I still really love.  At the end of last year, I made the backing using Denyse Schmidt's Four Square (Hope Valley) and some Oakshott striped cottons from the FQ Retreat goodie bag. The binding is Flea Market Fancy.

After signing up to Leanne's FAL (Finishalong), I knew that I wanted this to be one of my first finishes. I love the stained design but I am kind of wishing that I had used a different solid as I'm not really loving the Kona herb which came with the FQs I ordered. However, my husband who is not known for his quilt enthusiasm seems to like it and that's what matters! It definitely has more of a masculine feel but it was fun to do something a little different.

I've  nominated it an early wedding anniversary present for next month - I couldn't keep until February.  I'm like that with surprises!

Quilt Stats
Quilt Front Curious Grey by Parson Grey and Kona Herb solid
Quilt Backing Denyse Schmidt's Hope Valley Four Square and Oakshott Cottons
Binding Denyse Schmidt's Flea Market Fancy Medallion
Size 60" x 72"

Don't Ever Accuse Me of Being a Drama Queen

After a nice weekend with the in-laws celebrating my youngest sister in law's engagement, which involved quite a lot of eating, I had good intentions for today - dusting off my gym card and eating healthily. However, things were thrown a little off course when I had a major run in with the accounts woman at Zaki's pre-school.  I really hate confrontation and usually do anything to avoid it but I was surprised to find myself quickly arguing in French with the rudest woman I have met in a long time.  It's amazing how your language skills improve once fuelled by adrenaline.

Joking aside, she really upset me and it was all I could do to buy the vegetables for lunch and get home whereupon  I 'phoned my husband, burst in to tears and announced we were going back to England! Of course we're not although I may be hatching a plan to return at some point but as it involves winning the lottery or writing a best selling book, it isn't going to be anytime soon.

No visit to the gym.  Healthy eating until the afternoon when I had some chocolate cake.  Comfort eating is my downfall.

I did manage to calm down and make a start on my FAL list and while experiencing a bout of deja vu, basted the stained quilt for a second time...

You can still see the stitch marks from the last quilting so I had more deja vu while starting to quilt it for the second time...

...while wearing these funny quilt grippers - they did sort of grip until they fell off and I temporarily lost them underneath the quilt.  On more than one occasion I worried that I would turn my quilt over and see one of them impaled in the quilting!  Don't buy them - they are flim flam.

I'm hoping to get the quilting finished tomorrow.  The binding is made and so I hope to have my first finish in a day or so!  Now I'm off to work on that plan...lottery, best selling book, Dragon's Den investing in my business, aged reclusive billionairess aunt who I have never met makes me sole beneficiary of her will, tax rebate, premium bond comes up...

WiP Wednesday

Quick quick, it's just about to end! I took advantage of Brenda's amazing 25% off everything coupon (MOVING) 3 times in the last couple of weeks.  Today's the last day to use it so head on over there - it applies to everything and she's just back from quilt market!

After months of buying very little fabric, my stash is looking a little pathetic.  However, before I started anything new, there were a couple of things that needed finishing.  With it feeling decidedly cooler here (it's been raining hard here today) this was the perfect time to buy backing and binding fabric for my man's man quilt.

Like a phoenix from the ashes, I resurrected my Stained Man with a Curious Nature quilt top, which I made back in April, when I joined in very last minute with lovely Sarah's Stained QAL. I used Curious Nature by David Butler aka Parson Grey and Kona Herb. I found I had some of the Kona Herb solid left over and so today I added a 2 and a half inch border round the scrappy border to make it just a little bit bigger and I like it a whole lot more now.

The photos are terrible as it has been really dark all day!

The backing will be Four Square from Hope Valley by Denise Schmidt.  While I love this fabric, it seemed a bit flat as it was so similar in colour to the front.  When I was choosing the fabric, I was looking for something manly and wish that I had gone for a real contrast.  So to liven it up a little, I added some of my striped Oakshott FQs that I received from the Fat Quarter retreat in the summer. The binding will be some Flea Market Fancy.

The backing will still be matchy matchy but more colourful matchy matchy!  So now I just have to wait on the batting which should be here any day.  I've had real problems trying to find batting which will ship to Morocco and when I do it's really pricey. So thank you to my lovely mum for sending me the batting I ordered from here.

Months ago I started a flickr group for projects made using Curious Nature.  It's called I Love a Curious Nature.  If you like this line, hop on over and take a look - there is some gorgeous eye candy! You can preview his new line Seven Wonders here.

Linking up to WiP Wednesday here.

Scrappy Stained Man (Quilt) With a Curious Nature

Ta dah!

Curious Nature by Parson Grey

 Okay, it`s a semi-ta dah moment as this is only the top but I finished up the Stained quilt top today. Sarah did an incredible job with the instructions for 4 different blocks of which multiples were made.  I`m a visual learner and Sarah`s wonderful diagrams enabled me to make this quilt top pretty quickly although I cut for every block, which isn`t very factory production like is it? I`m pretty pleased with the colour placement as I didn`t plan at all - just cut away merrily hoping I would have enough fabric and that the colours would look well spread.

Here it is chilling on the kitchen floor. To make it a little bigger, I added a 5 inch border of the Herb solid (I wish I had gone slightly bigger) and then I just had to add a scrappy border.  You know me - I love a scrappy border...as you can see from my header!

So there you have it. It needs a good press and a lot of threads pulled out. There will be a brief hiatus on this one as I have no batting or backing fabric for it and may take it with me to England next month.  There`s no worry.  It`s hotting up here and as this is for the hubster, he won`t be using it until the end of October at least! Any suggestions for the binding?  I feel it needs a pop.  A manly pop.

I`m waiting on so much post you wouldn`t believe.  Bee blocks, fabric, lovely winnings...the usual.  I did however have a lovely start to the week with a win over at Lynne`s yesterday...

 ...a set of Sew-Ichigo kitchen classics patterns by Kerry and Penny.  Thankfully, I didn`t have to wait long as they plopped into my inbox today!  Thank you so much Lynne, Kerry and Penny. Now I really do have to try out paper piecing....KATY???????

Man With a Stained Nature

Block 1 of the Stained Quilt using Curious Nature

After all this talk of dressmaking and enbroidery, did you think I`d abandoned quilting altogether?

I`m so late to this party, everyone is either stumbling in to a taxi or home and enjoying a hangover but today I hacked in to my Curious Nature FQs and ever so slightly belatedly joined Sarah`s Stained Quilt QAL! She`s very lovely and I`m hoping she`ll still have me.

I`ve been looking for a manly quilt design (is that an oxymoron?) and thought of Sarah`s design.  I had enough Herb solid and FQs and I`ve loved seeing my blogging friends show off their stained quilts.

This is a secret project for my husband.  Well I say secret.  I`ll be able to sew it in front of him, ask him to hold it while I take photos and he`ll still be none the wiser when he`s presented with the finished quilt. He lets me get on with my quilting.  Don`t hold his disinterest incurious attitude against him.  I would much prefer that than him clucking around asking if he can help! My mum will be reading this and thinking to herself, that isn`t going to happen in a million years!

This is the first of Block 1.  There are 3 in total and Block 1 is the largest.

I haven`t really read through all of Sarah`s very thorough instructions yet and haven`t done all the pre-cutting.  I`ve just gone for it.  No zip lock bags or Post Its here! Here`s hoping I don`t regret the planning stage!