Floating up up and away!

Welcome to another TGIFF, the link party that celebrates that lovely feeling of a finished project!


My finish for this week has been a long time in the making, as regular readers will know :)

So, a drum roll please - I have finally finished my Sunday Morning Quilts Bee quilt, Up, up and Away!!!

And here it is!

I backed the triangle strip front with the last of the cotton yardage that I bought in the bedding factory shop in Latvia, which you can see in the photo below.

It was the perfect backing for such a multi-coloured quilt, I found some turquoise fabric printed with triangles in my LQS, so that naturally found its'  way into my basket for the binding.

In the book this quilt was quilted with straight lines across the quilt, but as my points weren't exactly perfect that wouldn't have been quite as straightforward as it sounded :) So, I chose to randomly quilt swirls to remind me of kite strings.

It seemed like a good idea at the time, but one broken needle later and six snapped threads I wasn't quite so sure.

Still, another Bee quilt finished only 2 more to go before all of my Bee commitments are complete.

Now it is your turn to link up your finishes and celebrate with your fellow quilters. Check out the other linkers too, a little bit of applause is always welcome and add the TGIFF link/button (on the sidebar) to your post and spread the celebrations!

An InLinkz Link-up

Making the Links - New to Me in April

Welcome to another New to Me Link Party!

Where we celebrate the trying of something new whether it has been a success or not :)

This month I have been co-hosting the TGIFF link party for the first time.

 

My fellow hosts Leanne, Laura and M-R and I divided up the year and will each co-host the TGIFF link party for three months of the year. As you can see I have eased myself into it by waiting until April for my first co-hosting stint! 

The theory behind my participation is that it might spur me on to actually finishing some of the many projects lurking in my cupboards. We shall see how well that works out :)

This month I also received my first ever purchase from Massdrop, this gorgeous Big Bear, Little Bear FQ bundle. I know that I am pretty late to the game with Massdrop, but I have to say that I was really impressed with the service, and will definitely be using it again. I expected the delivery to the UK to mean weeks of waiting but it was surprisingly quick and, needless to say, very attractively priced :)

So, that is my New to Me's this month, now it is your turn. As ever please help to spread the word by linking back to this post in your post and/or adding the blog button to your sidebar.






Check out the other links too and, maybe, leave an encouraging comment along the way. The emphasis of this link party is to celebrate the trying so a little encouragement here and there would not go amiss! 
The link will remain open until 23.59GMT on April 30th, so you have some time yet to try something new and link up and join the party :)




If your New to Me involves some Christmas or Holiday crafting don't forget to link it up to this month's Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew Link Party here

 

You could win a kit to make these lovely tapestry brooches from

Looking forward to seeing your New to Me's this month!

An InLinkz Link-up

Introducing Tina Francis Tapestry

This month's sponsor of the Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew Giveaway is Tina Francis of Tina Francis Tapestry

I first came across Tina's lovely tapestry in an article in Stitch, the magazine of the Embroiderers Guild, and didn't waste any time in stitching up several of her delightful tapestry brooches.

I am always interested in knowing the background of the businesses that I deal with, and I thought that you might be too, so here is Tina's story.

"After winning a box of embroidery transfers in an auction Tina opened it to find it contained a whole

womans life in knitting and stitching patterns. From the most fashionable cardigan of 1959 to baby

matinee jackets, school uniforms and curtain patterns right through to more modern baby patterns

for her grandchildren, Tina realise that this unknown woman was a true artist who had spent her

lifetime stitching love. This sparked an interest in other “home crafts” tapestry appealed because it

combined two of Tinas loves, printing and texture so after learning how to stitch by completing

unfinished tapestrys from secondhand shops she decided to design her own and stitch on the

shoulders of the unknown women whose art had inspired her.

Tina has a range of both printed and counted tapestry kits, her patterns are very geometric and

modern and can be used for tapestry needlepoint, cross stitch and rug making. Someone has used

them for knitting but don’t ask Tina how!! 

Wool is the most expensive part of any kit and as the industry standard is to add 30% more wool than is required Tina realised that she was adding to the wool stash mountain and so created a set of patterns called “Use Your Stash”, each pattern uses less than 10 metres of each wool colour, you do not need to be a colour mixer to get great results as Tina has already ensured a perfect result every time through pattern placement.

Still not satisfied with ensuring the stash mountain is decreased Tina has now designed two sets of

brooch patterns which will ensure that even your smallest amounts of wool are used! For the brooch

patterns you need no more than a metre of each wool colour (and usually no more than 50 cm!). A

good design is scaleable and so if you prefer a larger count canvas the design will look just as good.

“Whilst the design will always be mine the art belongs to the stitcher the same as it belonged to the

woman whose life I now hold in the old chocolate box full of patterns”

Thanks Tina, what a fascinating story!

Don't forget to link up your Christmas and Holiday makes at this month's Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew Link Party if you want to be in with a chance of winning your own Tina France Tapestry brooch kit.