It's a family affair!

Today the postman brought great joy in the form of Issue 2 of Quilt Now! Along with the full size pattern sheet there's a square quilting ruler this month.

I've already given you a peek at the Block of the Month project so I won't bore you with that again, but I will show you the blocks for the quilt. Those Art Gallery Fabrics really sing in Dresden fans!

This month Yvonne puts in an appearance too as she has done a reader review!

I also came across this advertisement for the West Country Quilt Show which my sister-in-law is helping to organise. Definitely worth a look for anyone in the area or anyone that doesn't mind travelling to these events!

So, like I said, it's a family affair this month :) Most exciting to me though is that one of my favourite designs to date is featured! Regular visitors will be very familiar with my Sneaky Stars design that I created last year for Justine at Simply Solids to kit for Festival of Quilts. Now I'm delighted that anyone who buys Issue 2 will have access to the pattern too. There were quite a lot of lovely people interested in the pattern last year so I'm hoping that they will still love it and have a go!

It's great to see it photographed and styled by professionals!

For the benefit of those who didn't see my original posts it's works very well in different styles too. Here are 2 others I made last year - The Man Quilt and a quilt for James.

Now I'll leave you all to enjoy the weekend, although I may pop back tomorrow if I can summon the energy to show you a rather lovely charity shop find in the form of a hand-crank Singer! Catch you soon x

Whooping!

It's that time of the month again, where I get to be all excitable over the release of Quilt Now's next issue! The magazine is due to hit UK stores next week but you can get a sneaky preview of this month's Block of the Month, as my free project tutorial is now live on the Quilt Now website.

Catch you soon x

Wafers

As predicted I'm back with a finish! My Wafers cushion goes together in a flash and I'm just a little bit in love with it :) I pulled lots of my current favourite fabrics together for this autumnal piece. There's some Anna Maria Horner, Amy Butler, Denyse Schmidt and Katarina Roccella alongside some other Art Gallery fabrics that came in a scrap pack I bought from Simply Solids. The deep orange solid that I used is a Kona FQ that came in my Fat Quarterly Retreat goodies bag.

I used a lovely rust coloured Aurifil thread to do my usual crazy-straight-line quilting.

Quite by accident I noticed that it produced nice little stars in the solid shapes, an added bonus :) After a little rummage in my fabric cupboard I found the perfect backing fabric from my favourite, Anna Maria Horner :) The colours are much richer in real life, for some reason unknown to me it's all washed out in the photos.

I've uploaded the PDF EPP templates for this project to our Payhip page. They're a bargain (even if I do say so myself) at £1. I've included a colouring sheet so you can see how the blocks fit together and practice your fabric combinations. I'm thrilled that it's already started to sell to some very keen ladies over on Instagram :)

Now I need to go and shackle myself to the sewing machine! Catch you soon x

Oops...

... I'm not sure where time flew to. There has been plenty of sewing going on but as usual not a lot I can share with you just yet but I did think it was about time I showed you the cushion I made for Kay with the mini-cartwheels.

I got busy with my usual crazy-straight-line quilting in a yellow variegated Aurifil thread. I love the texture it adds without detracting too much from the patchwork.

I used one of my favourite Pam Kitty Picnic prints for the back of the cushion.

Before sending it off to Kay I took a photo of it next to the full-size Cartwheels cushion. I love them both :)

I am extremely tempted to revisit the full-size Carthwheels block for a quilt! I may even have dug out a long hoarded stash of Punctuation with this in mind ;) In the meantime I've been working on another EPP design, Wafers. There will be a reveal of that very soon as it's currently awaiting quilting :)
I hope all is good with you. Catch you soon x

Blogiversary winners

Thanks to everyone that entered our blogiversary giveaway! I'll cut to the chase and reveal the winners.
First winner:

Kay, you've won the mini-cartwheels project. I'll contact you shortly, so you just need to decide whether you want it turned into a cushion or a mini quilt :) 

Second winner:

Jusmom1 you are the winner of Yvonne's scrap pack! Perfect given your chosen fabric combination. This little lot will be coming to live with you :) 

Third winner:

Angelia you're the winner of my scrap pack. I've picked out this little lot for you :) 

We'll look forward to seeing what you both do with your scraps :)

Now I'm off to dig out a candle to light this evening. Catch you soon x

A special wall hanging

Hello there!

It's been a long while since I last wrote a post here (when mum had her op) but this time I'm here with a more crafty post.

I made a wall hanging for the WWI Centenary and I was very determined to finish it before the 4th of August (as that was when Britain declared war on Germany 100 years ago). I managed to do so and here is the finished project.

If you want to check out the full blog post click here. It's not up to the fabulous standard of my mum and my nan, but it'd be nice if you'd pop over.

That's all for now from me, I hope to see you very soon.
Jess x