Back to school

I moved back to Durham this weekend to get some work done before term starts next week. Being a university town means that it's eerily quiet around here out of term time but the peace does mean that you end up getting a lot done (the peace and the fact that the bar isn't open!).

I've redesigned my banner (do you like it?) and I've managed to make a start on the quilting of my bear paw quilt.

It's larger than I'm used to (86"x70") and it takes a lot of effort to get it through my little machine but I'm sure it will be worth it in the end. 

I'm the only one in the flat so I've commandeered the kitchen for sewing purposes.

The positives are that I have more space, there's wifi, it's festively decorated with a mixture of Alice in Wonderland and Halloween bunting and the tea and biscuits are only a couple of steps away. On the downside, we live on the ground floor so I have the bored porter lurking outside my window giving me "helpful" advice.

Just before I came back I went to The Fat Quarters and they had 20% off everything! I picked up a jelly roll in Bella neutral colours and started wondering what this quilt would look like with plain paws and a patterned background. It was just too tempting so I bought the jelly roll and some coordinating fabric to have a go.

The fabric is from the Zippity Doo Dah range by Sandy Gervais. Two of the neutrals match the cream and tan confetti pieces perfectly so I can't wait to see how it comes together.

Hiding from the babies

It's amazing what you can do if you set your mind to it (and ignore the fact that you have 2 essays to write!). In the last couple of days I've managed to finish off my bear paw quilt top and piece the back together.

It's all folded up over the banister upstairs while the kids rampage downstairs. Hopefully I'll be able to get it layered up and quilted this evening after they've gone home. The back is made form one of the French General woven fabrics, which is absolutely lovely to touch. It's soft and gloriously silky.

I've also managed to piece together these blocks:

They may look familiar. They're an exact mirror image of the blocks for this quilt. I made a bit of a boo boo while cutting so I ended up with twice as many pieces. The other quilt was sold so I hope I can sell this one on too.

Mad rush over, time to settle in to some sewing

It's been a mad couple of weeks. I've been ill this term so missed a lot of work at university, which I had to get extensions for. That meant that I was working right up until the 23rd December which left very little time to get the Christmas presents all sewn up!

Two straight days at the sewing machine and I managed:

Six coasters on a tea and coffee theme for my dad and step-mum. Dad's a big coffee drinker and Barbara's a big tea drinker so they can have three each.

Two sets of these lovely bright squishy cubes for my step-sister Jenny's new baby and Clare from Clarebears new baby. They are both adorable cuddly boys and I had a lot of fun playing with them.

and - last but not least - Owly the tea cosy made for my mum. Although, he's so adorable I think I'm going to have to make a matching one for myself! 

It just goes to show how much you can do if you put your mind to it and now all that's over with I can settle in for some proper quilting. I hope to get my bear paw quilt finished and layered up and start on my "It's a hoot" jelly roll quilt tomorrow.

Snow day! (or possibly week)

It's snowed heavily here for 4 days so far which means that I can't work on my research project. In hindsight doing a project on soil treatment over the winter in the North of England may not have been the best plan.

It's left me with a lot of time on my hands which has been spent on my laptop in the college bar. I check the Daily Deal on the Missouri Star Quilt Company's site regularly and the other day they had an offer I couldn't turn down:

It's a Jelly roll of It's a Hoot fabrics by MoMo for Moda. The colours are so fun, they really cheered up my grey miserable snow day so I had a play around with my coloured pencils...

...and ordered it, along with a solid white jelly roll. I think it will make a really great quilt! My coloured scribbles attracted a bit of attention in the bar (the American Football players were particularly nosy) and when I explained what I was doing they all wanted a go. This was Ryan's design

Apparently the red block at the bottom has to have pictures of all of us. Not sure he's quite got the hang of quilt design.

Rural Jardin coming together

I finally got a chance to squeeze in a bit of sewing between lectures and coursework and have managed to get all my bear paw blocks stitched together in rows. Here are 4 out of the 5 rows pinned up on my notice board (the fifth didn't fit)

I really like the neutral plain in the background, it goes a long way to offset the busyness of some of the prints. These strips will be sashed together with the same width sashing as the separate blocks and then bordered with a double width strip.

I think the "paws" themselves have come out quite well. They look a little disjointed with the large prints:

But I think they work really well with the smaller, more even prints:

I'm going to leave these up on the board so that I see them constantly, Hopefully that will encourage me to get them finished sooner!

Cramped sewing

One of the problems of living in college accommodation has always been that you have very little space. You have to live, sleep, work and have fun in one tiny little room. It gets a whole lot worse when you try to sew in there as well!

Please excuse the picture quality - mum took the camera on holiday with her to ..... Houston quilt market! I am so incredibly jealous but I couldn't take the time out during term to make the trip with her. At least I'm starting to be able to squeeze some sewing in finally.

To make up for my lack of quilting output, I thought I would start to share some pictures of Durham. This is my view on the way to lectures this morning. I'm studying civil engineering and I think that it's a real shame that I won't ever get to work on a building as beautiful as this:

Durham Cathedral in the Autumn light