26/02/2009 by Erica.

The evenings are noticeably lighter now, and although its not exactly warm it is a lot warmer than a couple of weeks ago when we had all that snow! Which means that it is finally starting to feel like spring. Does everyone feel inspired to sew by the mere sight of the spring bulbs coming into flower? I certainly do, and not just to use bright colours. I have been working in browns and greys, trying to represent tree rings and bark - mostly I just feel the need to create something. Just like the birds I suppose!I have finished a wall hanging that has been waiting about two years, mainly for my skills to improve I think! It is taken from a David Hockney print ‘Above and Beyond’, I found the image on the web, cut it into six pieces and each member of Loose Threads made one section. I sewed them together, added a border and quilted. I am thrilled with it and would like to enter it into competition but I need to check out the legal position - it is a copy and not simply ‘inspired by’ Hockney’s original picture - although obviously very different. Any information on this would be gratefully received! I hope to get a picture of it on the site soon.

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13/02/2009 by Kevin.

As an ‘outsider’ to the patch world – I am totally amazed about how the perception of patchwork is so different to the reality.  The public perception of patchworking is a woman sitting in a rocking chair, cutting up old shirts and sheets with scissors and sewing them together to eventually make a quilt.  How different it is in reality.  The low-tech impression is much more high-tech.

Take the old shirts and scraps used as a basis for the quilts.  I wish it was the same in the new world.   However, rather than oddments and scraps, it seems my wife spends a fortune on by purchasing ‘fat quarters’ of exotic patterned fabrics. (Fat quarters are quarters that are square, rather than a running quarter metre off-cuts).  In reality even these seem to be the cheaper option, since sometimes the material is hand dyed.  And although there seems to be a large variety of different ways of doing this, most seem to involve a large purchase of plastic buckets, various dyes and other specialist material, that then seem to fill up our kitchen and garage. If this wasn’t enough – each time a new technique is used, not only does it require the purchase of more buckets, etc – but normally involves going off to some specialist place for a training day, and also the purchase of a book.

I suspect even on material cost alone – you would be far better off just buying a completed quilt – when all the associated cost are taken into account I think people would be very frightened with the real total.  I certainly am.

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08/02/2009 by Erica.

I was thinking that I had not done very much this week so I decided to review - and I have done loads! It started last weekend when I taught a workshop on Contemporary Approaches to Hand Quilting to Tove Quilters. I did a workshop on traditional hand quilting for them last year but contemporary approaches really lets people’s imaginations start to run. Much as I love traditional hand quilting, many people find it hard - the rocking, the evenness - whereas thicker threads and bigger needles and almost no rules means everyone can find a way to suit them. It was very satisfying for me and I got some very positive feedback.

This week I had my boys at home on three days as the school was closed, but I still manged to finish no less than three projects! The first was just a row for Potter Patchers Row Robin project - I pieced some stars, not my usual sort of technique but I was pleased with the result. The next project was the January challenge for Loose Threads - Under the Ice - using lovely blue and turquoise sheers on lutrador. I had lots of samples which worked beautifully. Unfortunately when I used my technique on the bigger piece it looked like the frilly waterproof knickers that baby girls used to wear over their nappies! Back to the drawing board, a new technique and it is done, remarkably quickly - I work well under pressure.

Finally I finished a double bed sized kaleidoscope quilt that I started in November 2007 at an Edwina MacKinnon workshop. It is hand quilted (traditional style), I used blue and brown batiks and wool wadding that was a joy to stitch. As I always bind my quilts as early as possible - always way before the quilting is finished - over a year of quilting seems to finish with a quiet sigh rather than a fanfare of stitching the binding. But I shall take it to Show and Tell at Hexagon Quilters which is on 19 February. The speaker is Jan Hassard and I am going to her workshop as well - one big quilt finishes, another starts? We’ll see….

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06/02/2009 by Anna.

Having spent all morning carefully cutting out my pieces for a very complex basket design, my husband looks over my shoulder to point out that i have done part of it wrong! of-course he is right!

Half triangles and quarter triangles are driving me up the wall,  i will think twice before using triangles and admire the work of others so much more!

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05/02/2009 by Kevin.

Anna seems to give very high level statements about what she does with very little detail - more like bullet points of what she is doing. I have got used to clothing terms during the year and can quite happily talk about blocks, bias, etc.  Now of course patchwork has another realm of terms.So in Anna’s catching up on course work, I can illustrate what I have learnt from her working.  Anna has been working with half squares and quarter squares.  From a mathematician’s point of view - they are the same - both are right angled triangles with 45 degree angles, it is just a matter of size. Of course this is not mathematics this is the world of patchwork. So instead of the logical approach you need to remember that these are fabric - and fabric is not an even material.  It has a grain (or weave direction as I would see it- going across and along the length of fabric).  It appears in patchowork world - on quarter squares the two equal sides (non hypotenuse side) runs across the grain, while on the half square, the hypotenuse runs diagonal to the grain.  (Or to think of it another way if you cut a square of material out logically (sides along the grain) then if you cut it diagonally you get a half square (and hypotenuse is diagonal to the grain) if ou cut it into 4 (across the diagonals) you have guarter triangles - the hypotenuse along the grain)So you see, unfortunately when you are not even in the world of patch you still have to still an listen to all this  - and I do listen.

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04/02/2009 by Debbie.

February 16th Heather Hunter is talking about Handmade Artists’ Books in the Age Concern Room Community Centre, Meudon Avenue, Farnborough, GU14 7LE. 7.15pm for 7.45pm £4.50

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04/02/2009 by Debbie.

Yes Girls, I am still Alive & Kicking.  In all this snow I have been working on the Village Green Quilters Block of the Month project so I will have a quilt by the end of the year.  I have also been busy working on a quilt for my parent’s Golden Wedding which is a simple log cabin in browns and creams more for expediency than anything else.  I am having it Long Arm Quilted.

I have a very important deadline for work for the end of February so the sewing has had to be simple for relaxation rather than anything too challenging at the moment.

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03/02/2009 by Anna.

Been snowed in has it advantages, today i finished a wedding dress thats been hanging around for far to long, also i have been very busy doing my C&G homework on block piecing. With very project that gets ticked off, new ones are planed in my head or sometimes even written down such as my C&G wall hanging and a joint quilt with Erica for the festival of quilts.

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01/02/2009 by Erica.

Doughtys annual visit to Charvil Village Hall is on 16 February 2009 at Charvil Village Hall.   I can rarely make it as it is always half term week and I take the children to visit my Mum in Wales, but it is an excellent event with loads of fabric, and refreshments organised by Meadow Quilters.  Its open 10.30 to 2.30.

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