Modern Quilters Ireland Swap

This summer the Modern Quilters Ireland Group closed but there are two activities still ongoing for the rest of the year.  Our summer swap and Modern Irish Bee are the last makes and we are going out with a bang!  The swap item chosen for 2017 was the Goody Binding Kit by Leila's Boutique.  This was a really fun thing to make and not that difficult. 

Yes there is a zip but there is a video and some very clear explanations in the tutorial to make this bit a breeze!  There is a pocket for a scissors another larger pocket for patterns or EPP templates, holder for thread and the zippy pocket for loose bits and pieces. 

 My swap partner likes bright and modern so I made a scrappy plus cover from 1.5" squares from the scrap pile and some ribbon from Fat Quarter Shop.  Found some Tula Pink and managed to get it in!

In return Sandra@sewofcourse made this gorgeous kit for me - love the fox!

 And Bassets!  I love the keyring and the centre Basset is appliqued and is a pocket for some scissors.  More Tula Pink fabric too!

Thanks to Sandra for such a lovely swap item and thanks to all who have taken part in the Modern Quilters Ireland activities over the last 4 years! 

If you want to make one of these for your self the tutorial can be found here.

Linking to the Friday finishes.  Happy weekend everybody!

More Mug Rugs!

IPS Mid West Branch Mug Rug Swap 2015

Things are a bit mug rug crazy around here at the moment.  The Modern Quilters Ireland group are having a Christmas mug rug swap on the theme of relaxing when all the Christmas work is done and our branch of the IPS had a secret mug rug swap for our December meeting.

I received this mug rug from Claire with an extra special touch.   It included a little bag for a cup and a pocket for tea bags! You might know by now that I'm a big tea drinker - Barry's tea specifically (an Irish Breakfast blend) and when we have our Thursday night sewing meet, I bring a cup with my own tea bags!  So this is perfect for me!  Thank you Claire!

Mug rug swap, magazine and handmade tissue holder received as gifts on the night!

I was also gifted a magazine by one of the branch members on the night.  I had given a presentation on modern quilting during our October meeting and a very generous quilter had bought this magazine issue featuring a lot of modern projects and thought of me.  Quilters really are a generous bunch.  We say it over and over again but only because it's true!

For the Modern Quilters Ireland group, I was originally going to go with a cup and space for a biscuit to fit the theme of taking a break but ended up making this little guy.  Quite a few people are doing a Christmas theme as it is a Christmas swap and this little penguin has gone on holidays to the North Pole to see Santa!

Nearly finished for posting this week!

I had intended on the igloo being there in the background but I ran into a little problem and had to rescue this from ending up in the bin!  When drawing my igloo I decided to use an air erasable pen.  Mine has a purple cap on the top.  What I had forgotten is that I also have an embroidery transfer marker with a purple cap and that one, not so erasable.  Guess which one I used?

Realising my mistake after I had quilted it and nothing was fading, a few expletives, a google search, a soak in boiling hot water for 10 minutes, wash in the machine with non-bio detergent and no joy.  Marks were still there.  So bumping into Claire in the Limerick Quilt shop, she suggested heavy stitching over them, so that's what I did.  I free motion quilted in some shade at the bottom of the igloo, added some Christmas lights and then went over the whole thing again in a thicker purple thread!  And then to cheer myself up I added in my favourite red stripey binding (thanks to Jennifer for putting me onto that!) 

The penguin (I'm calling him Larry!) is based on the Greetings From Antarctica pillow projects in the book Pretty in Patchwork Holidays by John Q Adams.  I scaled him down to fit a 6" size and he came together really quickly.  Instead of felt I free motion quilted in the circles of his eyes and the pom pom on his hat!  So this guy is ready for the post, just need to add some chocolate to my parcel!  Hope all the Christmas preparations and holiday cheer is in full swing for you guys.  Can't believe it's only 1 week away! 

Summer Swap Tote Bag - A Finish

This year the Modern Quilters Ireland group had a summer swap. We've been making tote bags for each other, big enough to hold a magazine and room for a crafty project or two!  This is due to be delivered to my swap partner today so I thought I'd share some photos!

My swap partner loves bright happy fabrics and didn't have too many dislikes so I had a lot of free reign in coming up with something that she would like and would be in the spirit of modern quilting.  I knew I wanted to have a nice front to the bag and thought about paper pieced stars.  My original idea was to have 4 snall stars on one side and 1 big one on the back and then I had a rethink.  I thought I might be over complicating things.

Thumbing through some old editions of Quilt Now I spotted Laura Hartrich's Goodnight, Love you bed quilt. I love this quilt and think the clever way of using drunkards path for the heart and letters is really visually interesting.  I chose Noodlehead's Super tote as the basis for the bag as it offered a really lovley big pocket on the front of the bag.  Looking at the maths to make this fit would mean really small drunkards path blocks so I made them all triangles instead!

I pulled from scraps and have fabrics in here from my Lost in London and most recent swoon quilt.  this was so much fun I decided to make a second pocket for the back and appliqued the O and E to make this a bit easier and faster to make.

The super tote pattern has a pocket on one side only but it was really easy to just make 2!  I loved this pattern - it is really well written and once all the interfacing is ironed on it sews together quickly.

I had the idea of quilting in some text to have this say Love...summer holidays, friendship, family, sunshine...  I think I may need to practice quilt writing a little bit more as it was not quite as smooth as I had envisioned!

I wanted the bag to be slouchy and not too stiff so the heart got some gentle wiggling , enough to keep the layers in place!

So here you have it!  My take on a summer tote bag!  There are rumours of an Indian summer so my swap partner may get to use it yet!

Linking up to the Friday Finishes!

A little something extra - a finish & a Giveaway

Did I tell you I broke my machine?  My Husqvarna Viking H600e is a sewing machine with an embroidery module.  Its essentially the same as the Singer Futura XL550 sewing machine that has slightly fancier plastic but with Husqvarna software for the embroidery motifs.  To say that this is a finicky machine is an understatement!

My machine is unnamed; I generally don't name electric items.  At one point I was tempted to call her Heidi the Husky but Hideous Heidi kept popping into my head so often it was better she stay the unnamed one!

Don't let the pretty plastic fool you (she really is a good looking machine though, isn't she?) She can straight stitch with the best of them but ask her to do the fancy work she looks like she is up for, trouble brews. I have cursed more and muttered more and walked away from the machine in a temper more than any other piece of equipment I have ever owned - thanks Unnamed One for that!

The trouble is she really wants to be an embroidery machine and I kept wanting her to be the all purpose sewing /quilting/embroidery machine I thought I had bought.  I have since learned one size  does not fit all. 

Coats on left and Aurifil on right - same 50 weight

Image from Wonder thread Guide

She hates working at full speed (3/4 suits best).

She only likes expensive thread.  Gutermann for embroidery and Aurifil for quilting.

She doesn't like thread fed on the horizontal spool even when using the net so I use a doohickey called a Wonder Thread Guide.

This sits on top of where your spool goes and guides the thread through like a cone stand.  It's designed to eliminate thread breakage when stitching out an embroidery motif.  I leave it on the machine permanently.  It helps but I still get thread breakage, even with the expensive thread and new needles.  Happens mostly when the machine is travelling from one area in the hoop to another.

You get the best value in shipping by buying 2 so I have a spare one if anyone is having issues with thread and wants to try it.  Leave me a comment to enter the giveaway and if there is more than one person who wants this I'll do a random number generator to pick a winner.

Don't get me wrong there is a lot to like about this machine.  It has an automatic bobbin winder, push the lever and she winds herself!  She warns you when you are about to run out of bobbin thread - so handy!  She has a beautiful wide bed and a lovely wide harp space so moving  a quilt around is really easy.  The automatic needle threader is easy to use and works about 80% of the time but the little handle on the side of the machine keeps falling off so useless really! 

The real issue with this machine though, in my humble opinion, after 3 years working with it is this. 

The bobbin tension is a nightmare!  The manual says do not adjust the bobbin and of course I did!  In my defence I had to to get the tension right for free motion quilting (previous post here).  It was working like a dream for about 10 hours and then I guess the bobbin slowly came apart as it got worse and worse.  I did get my quilt finished but ended up with a broken bobbin case at the end.

28 Euro's later - a new bobbin case, some new Gutermann thread and voila!  A perfectly pretty Tula Pink owl all stitched out!

Was this a pain free experience with The Unanamed One?

Nope!  7 thread breaks, a bit of pulling in despite stabiliser and screwing the hoop as tight as I could, 1 curse after first attempt had a massive bobbin jam (jam proof drop in bobbin me a**e) - this came after round 10 of 16 and had to be discarded due to enormous hole ripped when trying to remove said jam proof bobbin, 2 cups of tea to calm down, 3 biscuits as I thought I deserved them after that, and 5 hours later - 1 owl!

It became a needle book (slightly largeish as the owl is about 5" x 8") as an extra to our Summer Tote bag Swap with the Modern Quilters Ireland.  I'm looking forward to sharing my bag with you this Friday as it should be delivered to my swap partner then!

The owl is available from Urban Threads along with the Acacia raccoon and can be bought in a machine or hand embroidery option.

I think it was worth the aggravation but I might just take a break and  do some quilting on my new Janome before sitting back down to The Unnamed One again for a bit just yet!

Modern Quilters Ireland

Today I have a guest post over on Modern Quilters Ireland (MQI) describing OMG -Organic Modern Quilts a variation within the Modern Quilt Aesthetic if you are interested.  

Some of us from MQI got to meet up earlier this month at the opening of first ever Quilt Exhibition:  Happiness.  It's a funny thing meeting people you only know through hashtags and blog names for the first time.  Lots of smiles and shy Hello's but after about 30 seconds its full on happy chart admiring each others work and getting to know each other a bit better!

The venue was St. Patricks Mental Health Services in Dublin and the exhibition is on until the 26th June if you are in the area you still have a chance to go see it.  There are just under 30 quilts and the space is beautiful for them.

Fiona Roche - Be Positive & Irina de Juan - Supernova Starburst (Bee Quilt)

The exhibition was opened by Paula Rafferty and Cindy Coleman.  Cindy's speech along with some more photos is here on her blog Fluffy Sheep Quilting.  It is a lovely speech on the community of online quilters and worth having a read!

Sarah Flynn-Made to Measure & Catherine Fleming - Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Hand quilting by Sarah Flynn

I finally finished my triangle quilt started February 12 months ago!  It was sitting quilted with no binding for such a long time!  All of the quilts really do have a happy feeling to them and I really love Claires Hearts framed with Ric-Rac.  Such a fun quilt!

Ruth Bourke - Good Morning & Claire Lynch - Crazy Hearts

 If you enter the hospital from the main road and come through on the lift, as soon as the doors open you are greeted by Suzanne's minion!  The arms are movable!

Suzanne Pass - Snazzy!

Ana Hutchinson - Energy Spectrum

There were quite a few Bee quilts in the group and we had great fun looking for our blocks in the quilts!

Ruth Bourke - So scrappy too! (Bee Quilt)

Cindy Coleman - Stargazing (Bee quilt)

The use of colour and contrast was amazing and you could sit on the large sofas looking at these beauties for quite a while!

Liz Dunne - Around the World

Paula Rafferty - Colour Blocks

Paula Rafferty - Life Cycle

Tomomi Mc Elwee - Flow

 I hope you enjoyed a look at some of our quilts from our first exhibition!