Janome Club January 2011

Heart wreaths on pinwheels

Bag piece



Margaret W's lovely work



It was our Janome sewing day and it was well attended and with lots going on with different members using different machines including embroidery models. Cathy darted about between us all giving advice, demonstrating possibilities and sharing her lovely samples and information on her laptop.
The main business of the day was a runner featuring heart wreaths bonded onto pinwheels with a star forming in the centre cut-out. The star pattern is different according to whether the inner or outer star points are place on the pinwheel seams. You can see this on mine above.
Having already made a runner I am making a bag using fabrics bought at Ardingly yesterday.
I was sharing a table with Margaret W. whose spectacle case made for Ann is shown here and a book cover in progress. Exquisite taste.

Ardingly

Four of us went to the Ardingly Show. Fortified by a pub lunch we set about tackling the traders downstairs and viewing the quilts upstairs. I bought a book which used charm squares to teach beginners the rudiments. I'm not a beginner but I have lots of squares!

Quay Quilters First Quilts 02

Pauline's first quilt

 Pauline's first quilt dates from 1979 and well used it has acquired a beautiful patina of age. Now she is doing a design course based on an old quilt made of tailors samples. The oblongs sport tailors tacks and other big stitches while the round one depicts stylised shears.

Pauline's latest

Pauline's work in progress

Mags' first finished quilt

Mags is a recent member and her first quilt is Japanese folded while Vanessa's is her own design manipulating a block and with fan quilting.

Vanessa's latest

Crab & Winkle Sewing Day

Today the six ox of us met up to work on our group quilt. We'd made stars and laid them out so they didn't jar too much - Much swapping round and standing on chairs! Then we added triangles to complete the blocks. Sadly, two of our members had to leave before lunch hence tha gaps but in a few weeks time we should be ready to assemble the centre.

Scrap Quilt Sensation
The design is taken from Katharine Gurrier's "Scrap Quilt Sensation" a book which delivers  what it says on the tin!

Quay Quilters' first quilts 01

Gillian's

Jean T's

Ann's

We had a lovely meeting tonight where virtually everyone brought in their first quilts and some their most recent projects as well. I learnt our group has been going since 1985 and had its genesis in patchwork and quilting classes in the early 80's. I joined the beginners' class in 1995 and was then admitted to membership the following year. We still run beginners' classes in the year following our biannual show but these are no longer a condition of membership.




Gillian was in the same class of 95 as me so I feel guilty that my efforts are still in block form. I think her quilt was mosly stitched by hand. Jean's beautiful sampler is also hand done in a class with Susie Corke. The hand quilting is dense and exquisite. Ann was in the year after me but I joined her for some of the beginners' classes in order to make yet more blocks. Now Ann works smaller and denser, lots of beautiful highly refined pieces.

Making progress

The U3A Linus quilt is nearing completion. Once the centre was joined and seamed on the back, I have stitched and flipped the borders and have free machine quilted one side.

Awaiting borders

Borders added awaiting final quilting

Bonnie Quilters

We met in Fran's conservatory for for our second session drafting and cutting Farmer's Wife blocks.

http://thefarmerswifequilt.blogspot.com/
Trish is using what I call New England fabrics - dark rich colours in designs reminiscent of the C19th. I am too and my first sets of blocks will be included in a long handsewn ongoing project using blocks from 3" to 9" in 1.5 increments. Later on I might choose a different tack such as 1930's type styles. Mavis is using up scraps in inimitable fashion- her choices seem frightening but the end result is always wonderful.



My blocks



Trish's blocks



Mavis's blocks

                                                                                       Mavis showed a star top (following Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville's clear instructions Quiltville) intended for a dear grandaughter and Fran showed us her very large Galaxy of Stars top (this was our last group project, all following the same outline) based on Katherine Guerrier's "Scrap quilt sensation".  http://www.katharineguerrier.com/
Fran is hanging fire about Farmers Wife because she has other plans in mind but here  are the first pair of blocks from the three of us.

Fran with her Galaxy of Stars top

Mavis's Quiltville quilt for a grandaughter

U3A Linus Quilt

Sandwiches

I have joined the bottom row of "sandwiches" and quilted the others ready to join. It's lovely to handle and quilt these smaller pieces rather than the usual bed size quilts I wrestle with.
The extra backing and wadding is to accomodate stitch and flip borders once the centre has all been completed.

On the home front

I have been making good progress with the U3A charity quilt though am slowed up from time to time by the necessary handsewing down  the back joins before proceeding further. Here are the 9-Patch sashing posts and then sewn sections  ready to sandwich and quilt. Notice these are offset.I always join quilts in this offset fashion.
I love the colours of the Cherrywood fabrics. They all look good in any combination, it seems to me.

More from the Maltings

Here are some quilts from the various group displays that caught my eye. I paid some attention to the strip/string chllenge quilts by Farnham Quilters as this is a style I love and I have lots to use up.



made by Doris Dove




Kathryn Gibbons using old shirts and buttons




Brigitte Gillespie , detail, made using a layercake



Bright Boxes of delight by Margaret Mullery

Made by Lois Bailey

I hope that none of these makers will object to these pictures of their work being shown here. If they do, I'll delete, but in my experience we grass roots qulters like to see our work on display as long as the label is correct.

What a beautiful baby!

JL sewing machine

There were four big door prize raffles, one for each colour ticket. There were 2 tickets drawn before mine but you had to be present and I was so I chose this lovely little sewing machine. Even boxed it was very light to carry under my arm. I left it in the loo just before we set off back but luckily I realised. There was a Janome stall so I asked if it was one of theirs and they said it was made by Janome. I shall take it with me if we travel in Europe and we're house swapping but it will also be for my granddaughter to use when here.

Here she is at this time last year taking turns with her brother to hand crank my Singer. We were making a doll quilt. She's four now.

Farnham Maltings

I went to Farnham Maltings today for a one day annual event where quilt shops sell their sale fabrics downstairs and local quilt groups mount exhibitions and demonstrations upstairs. Downstairs was packed and I left most of my shopping till later in the day. Upstairs was busy but I could enjoy the quilts, watch the demonstrations and purchase some useful handouts.

Helen Deighan's stand



piano cover

 I especially admired the piano cover made by Farnham quilters - quite beautiful and the longarm quilting by Brigitte Gillespie includes treble clef motifs. The piano is in a cafe area and throughfare so the cover will protect the polished surface from finger smudges and objects placed on top and prevent people fingering the lid!

U3A charity quilt

Here are the blocks from the U3A taster day I did. Rail fences can end up looking like swastikas if not careful so I disguised this unforeseen consequence with bondaweb triangles and centre squares on point. I've now finished the sashing pieces and am making 9 patches for the sashing posts.

Quay Quilters New Year Meeting

Pauline's Hidden Wells quilt

Jean's nursery quilt

It was our first meeting after the New Year and various people had been very busy though some whipped their work away so quickly I didn't get a photo. Helen is holding a beautiful "stained glass" applique  quilt which is a present for a friend and Pauline a Hidden Wells quilt started in a workshop with Judi. Jean had made two but I only managed to catch the nursery quilt.

Helen's quilt

Obligation sewing

These are blocks made from  beautiful Cherrywood fabrics on a U3A Patchwork taster day when in a short time we practised 4 techniques ranging from English hand paper piecing to free form rotary cutting. As you can see when a mistake was made we just carried on regardless, no time to stop and there's plenty of time to learn the gentle art of unpicking. I am going to join these blocks with quite wide pieced sashing quilt-as-you-go.

Sewing room activity

I have been checking out my BOM blocks in readiness for the great swap out on Monday and found I had various extra bits cut out so made some spare blocks and also made enough Irish chains for a separate small quilt and some of the framed four patches for an even smaller quilt. I'll put plain setting squares between the Irish chains. I'm going to a redwork class at the Guild AGM and hope to do some simple designs on these.

Twelfth Night

I sewed down the last of the binding on this quilt yesterday so I shall call it Twelfth Night. I'll get round to a label and sleeve later. It is very much a scrap quilt and I still have LOTS of scraps; this quilt and another one I made with the values reversed seem to have made scarcely a dent. My final finish for last year used up the last of the HST's I made for this quilt and I have a smallish top made from yet more. 

The pattern is from Scrap Quilt Sensation by Katherine Guerrier.  http://www.katharineguerrier.com/ 

However, I have had enough of so scrappy quilts for now.

I have been slow off the mark blogging this year as the beginning was spoiled by the death of a favourite Archers character. For the unenlightened The Archers is a 15 minute Radio drama  which has been going for 60 years.  The actor playing the part of the departed had been on it for 27 years. My husband has been listening for 59 years since he was a child   and I for 43 or so and an original cast member is still on the show. You can listen on the Listen Again section of the BBC Radio Four site and there is a weekly omnibus edition. I'm sure the internet was invented so that expats didn't need to have tapes mailed out to them.http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/programmes

It's usually quite boring and that's what people like about it.