A Boat for a Boy

When my new grand-nephew was born last month I was delighted to have an excuse to make my first ever baby quilt. Having held off making anything until he was born to be sure of getting the fabric selection right, it needed to be something relatively quick to make up.

Fortunately I found the perfect pattern in the Spring/ Summer edition of Fresh Quilts. The pattern, by Gudrun Erla, was actually for a wallhanging but I reasoned that it would also be ideal for a baby quilt.

Image of What does the Fox say? from Fresh Quilts Spring/Summer 2014

The original pattern in the magazine shown above was based upon a fabric line of woodland animals so had a fox applique. I have, however, been hoarding a FQ bundle of Thomas Knauer's Seagull Flock fabric for a very long time since I bought it with a Fat Quarter Shop voucher won in a giveaway many moons ago. This was the perfect opportunity to liberate the bundle from my stash cupboard!

The QAYG technique I mentioned in my previous post was a revelation. I took longer to work out the fabric placement than it did to actually make the quilt!

Basically the blocks were pieced into strips and then attached together and quilted to the wadding and backing in one step. I was a bit worried about keeping my lines straight on the diagonal but it worked out fine.

This is how the quilting looks from the back, it is perhaps more minimal than I might otherwise have done but it would be easy to add extra quilting as each strip is added.

The backing fabric had also been lurking in my stash for a while as it was a lucky find in the fabric bins at my local Abakhan store when we lived in Riga. I was delighted when I discovered that I had more than enough of it to back this quilt.

With the seagull theme of the fabric the applique had to be a boat! I shall not embarrass myself by telling you how many times it took for me to get the fusible web applique sails the right way round though :) Let's just say that I was very happy when I finally got it to work!

The stats for the quilt are;

Pattern by Gudrun Erla in Fresh Quilts Spring/Summer 2014
Fabric       Seagull Flock by Thomas Knauer for Andover Fabrics
Size          35" x 43"
Quilting    QAYG


It is what feels like my first for a long time Friday finish too, so I am linking it up to
  Crazy Mom Quilts

New to Me in May

Welcome to this month's link up for

where we celebrate the trying of something new whether it was successful or not!

This month I have had a go at a new method of paper-piecing, well new to me anyway :)

Paper-piecing on stabiliser is certainly something I had never tried before and I am pleased to report that it seems to work!

Well, those points are much neater than anything I have achieved in the past.

I have also been trying out a new to me method of quilting on a quilt for my brand-new great nephew. I read Benta's recent post on her method of quilting as you go and was intrigued, so when I came across a pattern in a magazine for a baby quilt using a similar method I thought that I would give it a go.

The quilt top was pieced in strips, then instead of joining the strips together before layering with the wadding and backing, the strips were placed right sides together on the wadding and backing and stitched with a 0.25" seam. The strips were then pressed open and the next strip joined in the same way. It was a very quick way to put together a quilt top I can tell you.

So quick in fact that the top is pieced and quilted and ready to be bound in less than 2 days, which I realise is not that quick for many of you, but believe me that is very quick for me! It helped that my husband was away and youngest son was at work, so I had the house to myself too :)

So, that's what I have been up to that was New to Me in May. Now it's 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.

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Check out the other links and leave a comment along the way. The emphasis of this link party is to celebrate the trying of something new, whether it works out exactly as planned or not, so a little encouragement here and there would not go amiss! 

The link will remain open until 23.59GMT on May 31st, so you have plenty of time to try something new and link up and join the party :)

An InLinkz Link-up

Don't forget too, there is still time to add your link to the Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew Link Party too!

This month it is over at buttons and paint, you will love what Sian has done with some unwanted ties!

Looking forward to seeing what you have all been trying out this month :)

Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew May Link Party

We finally have sunshine here in the NE of England, so it is hard to think of Christmas projects when the weather is telling me to think of barbecues and picnics, however it is the 18th of the month which means it is time again for

If you are new to the party, let me fill you in on the details. Paula and I decided at the end of last year that Christmas 2014 was going to be different, this time round there would be no late-night sewing sessions or frantic last-minute dashes to the Post Office. This time we were going to work on Christmas and Holiday projects throughout the year so come December we would be so organised we wouldn't know what to do with ourselves :)

We decided to share our plans with our blogging friends and invite them to be organised too, with a monthly Link Party to provide a gentle nudge. In addition, each month we have a giveaway prize for one lucky linker!

This month we have this great mini charm pack of 25th and Pine, a great new line from Basic Grey up for grabs, thanks to the lovely people at the Fat Quarter Shop.

We are delighted to welcome to the party Sian our guest host for May, who blogs with Simi at buttons and paint. Sian is a brilliant recycler and can turn her hand to pretty much anything, so I am really looking forward to seeing what she has created for the May Link Party. Head on over to buttons and paint to link up your own Christmas or Holiday-themed project from this month to be in with a chance of winning that cute mini charm pack.

My own Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew project this month takes all of, ooh ... 5 minutes :) Maybe it is the thought of sunshine or our upcoming trip to France, but I have had wine on my mind lately.

Then again it might have been finding this fabric on sale in my LQS :) Destined to become wine bottle gift bags sometime soon, and to go with the gift bags how about a set of wine glass charms?

You can see the charms more closely here. The charms and the wine glass charm hoops were from Nicole de Bruin's Etsy shop. Nicole has a wonderful selection of charms, these were her cheese and wine collection, but how about these for gifts for quilting friends?

Vintage sewing machine charms, or these great scissor charms?

 You name it, Nicole has a charm for it!

So that's another Christmas gift done and dusted, now it is your turn to show off your holiday makes. Head on over to buttons and paint to link up your projects and be in with a chance of winning that sweet mini charm pack.


As ever we are very grateful to all of our lovely sponsors, who have generously provided a lovely variety of prizes to tempt you.