Bees and WIP's

Midsummer's Eve is a big celebration in Latvia so when I was looking for inspiration for my first block in the Star of Africa Bee for June, it seemed ideal to try and think of something that might represent the holiday. The celebrations associated with Midsummer have their roots in pagan times, so revolve around being in the country and include such things as washing your face in the morning dew (apparently good for the skin, but I have yet to try it!) and eating a special cheese containing caraway seeds (much more my style).

During the festivities, which involve lots of singing and dancing, young girls wear national costume and flower garlands in their hair. The celebrations also involve leaping over fires and drinking beer, as you can imagine very painful injuries are not uncommon! You can see photos of the costumes here

I decided to make my first Bee block a representation of these flower garlands using EPP hexagons to represent the garland. We were asked to make an 8.5" block so the garland was necessarily small, next time I think I might try a Dresden plate block as I have just bought an Ez-Dresden ruler and can't wait to try it out:)

I am waiting to find out whether we should add a signature to our blocks before sending this off.

As I was in the mood for Bee blocks I decided to get the July blocks for the Sunday Morning Quilts Bee sorted too. This month the colour for the blocks is blue, which I was fairly sure I had plenty of scraps in, and it turned out I was right.

Although these blocks are very straightforward to do, they seem to take me much longer than they should and I have now realised why!

This very untidy bag is what I plough through every time I am looking for scraps! I really need to do something with them, so I am looking for ideas. How do you organise your scraps so that you don't spend more time than you need to looking for that piece of brown fabric that you know is there somewhere?

Don't forget to check out tomorrow's posts in the Lets Get Acquainted Blog Hop from Sarah  and Catherine

As it is Wednesday again, here's how my current project list looks
Completed projects

• Shades of Green, Fleur Bleu, Checkered Heart, Orange and Reindeer cushions
• Orphan Block needle roll, Pieced Arc Tea towel, Purse and Padded Hangers Tutorial
• Sunflower and Sew Happy QAL quilt
• Play mini-quilt challenge quilt 
• Patchwork Block Bag  
• Dragon Bag

Ongoing

• 6 blocks of In Color Order HST BOM 
• (Almost) Irish Chain quilt basted
• 8 Zakka-style SAL projects completed
• First border of teatime quilt completed
• 5 blocks of NY Beauty QAL completed and fabric cut for remaining 5 blocks
• 12 blocks of Craftsy BOM completed (on schedule)  
• Yellow rainbow cushion waiting to be appliqued 
• In the Bag Ugly Fabric challenge fabrics arrived waiting for inspiration!
• 4 Summer Quilt Bee blocks completed
• 1 Star of Africa Bee block completed

Waiting

• Indigo and violet rainbow cushions
• Last block of Sampler quilt
• Amy Butler bag
• Bag Making Bible Fashionista Bag
• Christmas mini quilts 

At long last my waiting list is getting smaller! Hope you are having a productive week too.

Happy July 4th too!

Linking up to WIP Wednesday

Bee Blocks, Blog Hops and Blustery mugrugs

A few weeks ago the project for the Zakka-style SAL was a Rain Cloud mug rug, which involved a bit of needleturn applique and some embroidery. I enjoyed the project so much that when I had finished my Rain Cloud I decided to make a whole set of mugrugs based upon weather symbols, and last night I finished the last of the 6 mugrugs.

I had great fun deciding upon which symbols to use and then working out what was needed to recreate them in fabric. You can probably tell that the wind symbol was the most fun to do!

In the last 24 hours we have had three of the weather types - bright sunshine, clouds and sun and heavy rain, so, hopefully, that will be it for the time being.

This week's Zakka-style SAL project is a water bottle holder, which will be perfect for taking to Zumba classes when I am back home. I have transferred the embroidery pattern for the handwarmers from a couple of weeks ago but with the warm weather we have been having recently have had no inspiration to actually make them!

Having sent off my blocks for the Sunday Morning Quilt Bee  I have been anxiously checking our postbox for my first ever Quilt Bee blocks.

They arrived this morning and they are lovely, thanks Jan! Time to get cracking on my blue blocks for the July round.

Today, Lynne at  Lily's Quilts has asked bloggers who contributed to her quilts for Siblings Together to write about their input as part of the 100 Quilts for Kids Blog Hop. As you probably know the Siblings Together charity provides an opportunity for children in care, who have been separated from their siblings, to get together in a comfortable, friendly environment. With three grown-up sons, who have always enjoyed spending time together, it is not difficult to work out my motivation for wanting to contribute towards the quilts Lynne was asked to provide. The quilts were for the children attending a summer camp later this month. Living in Latvia it was not practical to volunteer to provide a whole quilt, but, fortunately, some very generous ladies volunteered to put together blocks provided to them. My initial intention was to send 4 blocks, but as you can see I so enjoyed putting these together that I ended up sending 20!

The lovely Judith at Needles and Lemons received so many blocks that she was able to piece together 4 quilts, check out  her post to see the quilts and read about all of the contributors of fabric, wadding, etc who helped to make it happen. I very much enjoyed being part of this initiative, which has highlighted for me all that is wonderful about blogging and quilters :)

Lynn's post about the Sibling Together Quilts is part of the 100 Quilts for Kids Blog Hop. This is what Lynn has to say about the Blog Hop - 

"the idea of 100 Quilts for Kids is simple: Make a quilt or 2. Donate it to a child in need, locally if you can.  Enjoy a blog hop that runs from July 2-September 25, 2012, complete with inspiration and mini prizes.  Join in on a 100 Quilts for Kids Quilt Along (Kick-off post on July 15 at Swim, Bike, Quilt).  Have a chance to win great prizes from sponsors, including Moda, Fat Quarter Shop, Westwood Acres, Rowan , Free Spirit, and Ty Pennington Impressions, among others that will shortly be announced."  

And speaking of Blog Hops don't forget this week's posts in the Let's Get Acquainted Blog Hop


July 3

Di from Willowbeck Designs

Jennifer from Knotted Thread

July 5

Sarah from Sarah Lou

Catherine from Knotted Cotton

Hope you have all had a great weekend.

Linking up to Manic Monday

A jumble of June projects

I am beginning to like putting together a Mosaic at the end of each month, when I think I haven't actually finished much in a month it is a pleasant surprise to find that, actually, I have been busier than I thought!

The makes this month are a motley selection, and probably a good indication of my "butterfly" tendencies of flitting from one project to another :)

Lots of little projects have fitted in with the travelling we have been doing recently, so portable projects like the crochet flowers and Dorset buttons have fitted the bill. I am most pleased with finishing the Campervan doorstop as it has been many months in the making, it is just a pity that the reason for making it, for youngest son's flat at University, has now disappeared with his graduation a couple of weeks ago! Still, a finish is a finish.

We have no travel plans for the next few weeks, so I am hoping to get stuck into some bigger projects and maybe even finish off the NY Beauty QAL blocks that are haunting the cupboard!

If you have missed any posts in the Let's Get Acquainted Blog Hop check out the great tutorials here This week's posts in the Blog Hop will be from:

July 3

Di from Willowbeck Designs

Jennifer from Knotted Thread

July 5

Sarah from Sarah Lou

Catherine from Knotted Cotton

 

I have seen sneak peeks of a couple of the projects being lined up and can't wait to see them revealed in all their glory. My post for the Blog Hop is due at the end of the month so I need to get cracking on my post and project for that too, so the NYB blocks might not see the light of day after all :)

Linking up to Fresh Sewing Day

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