15 minutes of play, play, play

We went to Sydney on Thursday, and on Friday I awoke to this sunrise.



And I knew it was going to be a good day.

We had breakfast, and I hopped in a cab to Drummoyne. And after several emails between us, I finally got to meet Victoria Findlay Wolfe, who was going to teach us about her 15 minutes of play philosophy as it applies to patchworking.



Victoria started by telling us about the quilts that she'd brought along with her (all the way from New York City!). It was the perfect show and tell. Anyone who knows me well knows that I can't handle a quilt meeting without a show and tell. And here we had it in spades (and buckets).






Victoria took us through a demo of making some "Made-Fabric", which is essentially using your scraps to build and build and build a piece of fabric that you can then cut into a shape or block ... and then you can use the remnants to build your next block. Some people call it crumb quilts, others crazy quilting.



All I knew was that I liked it!



I decided early in the piece that I might like to try a large triangle quilt - like a thousand pyramids arrangment, but perhaps with the made-fabric blocks upside down.



I'd brought along some lengths that I thought might be good for the background, and decided to add some print fabric that I got from an online store a few weeks ago which has an mahoosive print - too big to cut up and made into something small.



Kind of like this. What would you call this? Thousand valleys? Thousand buntings?

Thousand minutes of FUN????

All around me fellow quilters were buzzing along on their sewing machines, cutting strips of fabric and squaring up. Inspiration was everywhere.



This is what my new best friend Chris (who was sitting opposite me) came up with.Hexagons! I love!

And here is the work of some absolute geniuses that were there on the day. I'm so, so sorry I can't remember people's names!







Before the workshop, Victoria had asked that we bring our scraps along. We'd pile them into the middle of the table and just pull out other people's scraps, she said. It was brilliant.  And messy.



I learned a lot during this workshop. One is that although pushed to pick a colour I don't like working with (purple) I still really don't like it (purple). In fact on looking at my blocks, I noticed there is too much (purple) in there and it makes me squeamish. So I'm going back to reds and oranges and yellows and greens.

In fact that night, after the beers I'd had with dinner with my bestie had worn off, I took out my little Elna Lotus, plonked her on the hotel desk, and made two more blocks. The windows to our room were wide open to catch the breeze. I may have woken a few hundred Elizabeth bay residents with the roar of old Elna here, but hey - it was Friday night. They should have been out partying.



See that? More red, less purple.  Much better.



I'm so in love with this way of treating scraps. I think I might be onto a winner here.



So thanks Victoria for sharing so much of yourself, and for travelling so far. I'm glad I met you, and I'm glad I got you onto that Architextures fabric (I am such an enabler).

And thanks to Material Obsession in Drummoyne, especially  Kathy Doughty who thought to bring Victoria out to Australia. It was such a well run day, and the food was fantastic, as were Megan and Cath who looked after us so well. I doubt this will be my last MO workshop - they really are too fantastic to miss.



Gratuitous final sunrise shot from the next morning. Sydney - why do you always look this good this early? Why no bed hair?

My little Elna

Several years ago when my dad started working in the auction field, I asked him to look out for just two things on his travels around Far North Queensland.

1. A 1972 Blythe doll
2. An Elna Lotus sewing machine in working condition

He hasn't come across a Blythe doll yet, but a few years ago I was at the Canberra Quilters quilt show and he called me on my mobile phone. He was at a Salvos in Cairns, he said, and they had an Elna Lotus with a certificate from an electrician saying it was in working condition. And they wanted $40 for it. Did I want it?



I think he ended up paying $30 for it. The intention was always to bring it back to Canberra, clean it up a little, and sell it for a profit, splitting the proceeds. You see Elna Lotus sewing machines, even those made in the 60s, are very popular with quilters. They are light, very portable, sew beautifully, are known as absolute workhorses and are as cute as all get out. And they go for hundreds of dollars.

I did a little sewing on it when I got home but it sounded like a loud boat motor (like the boat motor was in the room next to the machine), and was a bit slow to get going when you pressed the foot pedal. It has a few little chips and scrapes, and a tiny bit of rust has crept in and the chrome on the handwheel has mostly gone (a victim of living in the tropics) but you could hear the mechanics as it sewed and they sounded great (noisy but great), and I thought I had a good little machine which someone else would love to buy.

For years when I mentioned I had an Elna Lotus I had offers from other quilters. LOTS of offers. But I always turned them down. What was wrong with me? I had this sewing machine for the sole purpose of selling it! It was only after the last offer from a very dear friend a few months ago that I realised something.

I actually wanted to keep my little Elna Lotus. Better - I wanted to sew on her. So I had her checked out and serviced by my sewing machine guy. He loved her as much as I did. And he agreed that she was too noisy. So he fixed her, and now she's a lot less noisy, and I probably won't get kicked out of my quilting class in Sydney later this week anymore. Phew.



Isn't she cute? She is so light, and she has the fold down sides for a sewing area. The foot pedal fit perfectly under the arm.







Everything about her is beautiful, and clever. Check out the accessories area at the top of the machine.



And the little thread holder that pops out of the top.



The dials are clean and functional.



I love the brownish yellow glow of the light - none of that harsh blue light in the more modern machines.



I love the spring than comes down to pull the bobbin out.





Best of all, her stitch is perfect. I'm sewing the last three blocks of my second scrappy trip around the world quilt on her. It only feels right to. The smell of sewing machine oil fills the sewing room. You don't get that smell from computerised Berninas.



Did you know that the Elna Lotus was designed by the famous industrial designer Raymond Loewy? He also designed the Shell logo, the interior of the 1975 Air France Concorde, the interior of the Skylab, and  the Studebaker Avanti.


Photo by carphoto

I can see some similarities, can't you?



The Elna Lotus was considered such a siginificant design of the 20th Century that it was included in the colllection at MoMA. I mean, it is pretty special.

I'm so glad I decided to keep her, get her fixed up and start using her. I think we'll have years of fun together.

And Dad? Thanks. I owe you $30.

Concentric circle quilting

Wow.  Just ... wow! Thank you so much for all your beautiful comments on my last post. It was only when the questions starting coming through about the quilting that I realised I had left out one very important bit of information.

How I did it.

I followed a great tutorial over at Blooming Poppies and I recommend you go over there now and check it out.

I used a clear jar to trace the centre circle but in hindsight that jar was a little small, and I should have gone for something bigger (like the food processor bowl recommended in the tutorial), and then worked my way in at the end of the quilting. Be prepared to quilt that centre circle a couple of times - it's awkward! I unpicked it once and did it again until I was happier with it.



I used the guide on my walking foot and was happy for this quilt to have even circles. For the next quilt though I am hoping to mix up the widths a little.

For the commenter who wondered whether I thought they could quilt a very large quilt this way, I say why not? I wouldn't, but I don't quilt anything on my machine bigger than 60 inches. That's a personal preference based on my physical limitations and my unwillingness to spend hundreds of dollars at the physiotherapist. As long as you are prepared to go slow and keep your needle down when you turn the quilt under the machine, anything is possible!

Hope that clears up some of the questions - if it doesn't please ask in the comments and I will endeavour to answer them there.

(Forgive any tardiness though - I have a cracking case of gastro at the moment and I'll be offline for a bit while I recover.)

March is Finishing Month #1

Over the last few months I have become quite adept at starting projects.  Hell - I could start projects for Australia. Finishing - not so much.

Back in February when I started, oh, my millionth project, I decided that March would be all about the finishing. If a quilt was unquilted, I would quilt it. If it was in blocks and just needed to be sewn together before sending to the professional quilter, I would sew it. If there was a skirt cut out and pinned but not sewn together I WOULD FINISH IT.

So here we are, on the 11th of March, and I have just my first finished item to show you. Watch out - it's a doozy.



Last Wednesday night, in a fit of madness, I decided to baste this quilt top (which has been a quilt top for about 2 months).



I pin basted it in about half an hour (WHAT?) so just decided to start quilting it in a concentric circle pattern that night.



And hour and a half later it was done (WHAT?).



By lunchtime the next day (WHAT THE WHAT WHAT?) the binding was hand sewn on (I was quite the sight in the park that day). I showed it at Canberra Quilters that night and I was so damn happy! Even if I felt like I was on quilting meth (which is totes illegal!)



I didn't get it washed until yesterday, though. And I sewed the label on this morning. And we all know a quilt isn't finished until the label is on (I was taught proper). We will ignore the fact I started this quilt in December 2012 and therefore the label is not correct. I doubt in 50 years anyone will care.



I like how in the shade you get to see the piecing and the pattern of the blocks.



But in the sun you get to see the quilting.



This is my favourite block. I think every quilt I make should have this tape measure fabric in it (I surely have enough of it in my stash), and the hexagon fabric by Cam is just extra special to me because she's an extra special lady and I'm lucky to be able to count her as a friend (you should go over to her blog and check out what she's been up to lately).

This quilt is going to hang on the wall in our entry way, but not for a little while. I am in the process of organising the demolition of a wall in there, and hanging this quilt will be the cherry on the cake once the building, plastering and painting is done.

So "March is Finishing Month" has it's first member. Wonder who's next?

Details (edited since the quilting details were a bit confusing)

Pattern: Scrappy Trip Around the World (tutorial by Quiltville)
Size: 48 " x 48 "

Fabric: Scraps, a random Momo jelly roll, and some special pieces in my stash

Quilting: Machine quilted concentric circles with a walking foot, using Aurifil Mako 50/2 thread in off white (2021)

Batting: 100% cotton

Started: 30 January 2012

Finished: 11 March 2013

Convincing others to drink the scrappy, trippy KoolAid *insert evil laugh*

I'm a member of Canberra Quilters, and almost a year ago fellow member Jenny Bowker thought it would be a fab idea to start up a modern quilting interest group. We are lucky enough in the guild to have access to our own rooms, and there are quite a few special interest groups that meet up once a month - art quilters, Japanese fabric fans, row by row quilters, and so on.

Now we regularly have 15-25 quilters join us each month. It's such a fantastic group! Very informal, very inspiring. Lovely smiling faces. Everything a quilting group should be.

Last month I decided to demonstrate the Scrappy Trip Around the World Quiltville technique that I've been banging on endlessly about since January. People brought their sewing machines, their scrappy strips, and got to sewing! 

Some had already started earlier in the month thanks to the fantastic instructions from Quiltville I'd already emailed them.

This is Margrit's quilt. She said she didn't like it too much but we all loved it. I hope we managed to talk her out of that viewpoint by the end of the night!

Judy had done some 1 inch trip around the world blocks! They were amazing!  Such precise piecing.

After I demonstrated fabric placement and how to sew and press and sew and unpick and sew (using the old "here's something I prepared earlier" game), we got to sewing.

This was Gabrielle's block while pressing. Gabrielle had never sewn a 1/4 inch seam before tonight. By the end of the night is was quite clear she was a natural.

Proof that you can use just the one colour in a Scrappy Trip Around the World came with Janet's block. It's all in the placement of the different shades and tones that the variation comes!  Also - Singer Featherweight in amazing condition. Love!

Leah used a jelly roll. I love this block. Especially those flowers.

Yvonne used just some "plain old homespuns".  Nothing plain about these, Yvonne!

And Anieta had some fun with fruity fabrics and colours.

It was such a great night. I realised once again I like showing people how to do this stuff. While I'm not the best quilter, I do like spreading the enthusiasm for different quilting techniques and ideas

And passing round the KoolAid ...