Great new wall quilt

Ursula fell in love with a picture in a magazine of a quilt which had instructions for making the quilt.

She bought fabrics from her favourite patchwork shop in colours that were not a bit like the ones in the pattern, but wow!

The patchwork blocks are Log Cabin variations and are so simple.

Here's the top ready for its borders:

Great work, Ursula!

Playing in my studio

Yesterday I put two sides of binding on the big quilt for our car.

We have a full-size double bed in our Hyundai van, because we both have terrible backs and needed an excellent bed for travelling. I used blacks, whites and greys in one of Judy Turner’s tatami mat style designs, and had great fun quilting each rectangle in different quilting designs on my mid-arm quilting frame.

Remember way back when I wrote A moment in Time – about printing on fabric for quilts?

Here's one of the little scrapbook quilts:

I have been experimenting with some new information seen on a video at The Quilt Show recently, and will write some more about my experiments soon.

The quilting's progressing

Kathryn (a student of mine) asked me to quit the coming of age quilt she is giving to a family friend, Teagan.

This is the quilt before quilting:

I have done quite a bit of the quilting, but my lovely new machine has gone to hospital, so I can't finish it at present.

Below is a detail of part of the back, showing some of the vines (signifying the growing of Teagan) I have quilted between the photographs.

Finding the right fabric for the quilt's background spurred me on.

I've decided to go with nine blocks as I first visualised, but they appear and disappear courtesy of the blending of the darkest strips with the background. So blocks they are, but aren't.

The borders are on, and now I am quilting the piece in my head. That's how I am ready to stitch when I sit down at the sewing machine.

What is Club Utopia?

I set up Club Utopia so quilters can connect with one another. Share all their quilting news, questions, tips and techniques.Discuss the latest trends in patchwork and quilting. Make special interest groups such as The Farmer's Wife Sampler Quilt group. You can start fan clubs for your favourite patchwork tool, or sewing machine. The sky's the limit!

What is an online community?

Meeting online with people who have the same interests as you is different from other social communities. You may never meet in person, as you do when you go out to a quilt group, or sporting club.

Connecting using Facebook, or MySpace, lets you find people who are interested in many diverse topics.

Our club is for quilters, and run by the community of quilters that is Club Utopia.

Visit Club Utopia

Started a new wall quilt today

My stepson and his wife were given a fabulous second-hand smoke glass table, round with very heavy smoke steel central leg, and four chairs upholstered in fawn suede.

He hates it! I don't think he knows what a treasure it is.

I have started a wall quilt today in modern style to incorporate the colours in their (rented) home.

They both love black, and Sara has just purchased 20 metres of black suede-look fabric to recover the sofa and chairs we gave them. So I am using blacks, tans and fawns for the quilt.

The design

The quilt will have nine small strip-pieced blocks arranged in three columns. The bottom two rows will be closer to each other, while the top row will be separated from these two.

I will quilt the piece using horizontal slightly wavy lines with no particular spacing, just as the mood takes me.

I need a different, less flowery black for the background, but I can get that after I complete the blocks.

Here's what I've done so far:

I'm working on the rosella quilt again, after a lengthy detour into car quilts and beginner's quilts for patchwork school courses, among other things.

I've completed the design and the free machine embroidery, and the layout is now decided upon.

Read about the quilt so far

My latest course on Jan T's Patchwork School is a scrap quilt course.

Jewel Box Quilt Design

The course shows how to cut and sew this traditional patchwork quilt block, using fast piecing methods, how to calculate fabric requirements for different sized quilts, and twelve block to block straight set quilt layouts and variations.

Today Kathryn prepared the batting and the backing fabric ready to layer and baste her gift quilt for Teagan.

Would you like a gift like this? I know I would!

She has asked me to quilt it for her as she is a beginner at machine quilting, and it's a special gift.