Is it spring? For the purposes of this blog post it is, or maybe I am getting ahead for Christmas. I have had this charm pack of fabric for quite a while. It is Ambleside by Moda fabrics. A nice light spring time fabric, little ditsy gentle flowers. Don't be misled by that. Spring flowers look teeny tiny and fragile but when you think of it ..... they survive the cold, the wet, the freezing. These little flowers aren't cutsey at all, they are really little feisty characters, battening down the hatches.
Ambleside is a village in the Lake District, England. I love the Lake District, we used to drop off there for a few days on our way to Oxford. The scenery is spectacular, mountains, fells (small mountains) and lakes. It is the sort of place that makes you come over all poetic and creative, which is funny enough, as lots of poets hailed from those parts. William Wordsworth didn't live in Ambleside, but near enough. It is impossible to drive through the area and not find yourself dredging up long forgotten snatches of poetry from The Prelude.
"And as I rose upon the stroke, my boat
went heaving through the water like a swan
when, from behind that craggy steep till then
the horizon's bound, a huge peak, black and huge,
as if with voluntary power instinct,
upreared his head"
I can't claim to have remembered it all, but Miss Lester, my old English teacher should be proud of me. When I am old, sitting in my armchair, I shall be able to recite reams of poetry but not know what I had for breakfast!
Anyhows, I have had this charm pack for a while. In fact, I was sure I had two of them. After I pulled the house apart, a few times, I remember giving it away. Somebody was short some squares, and what goes around comes around, so I sent them mine. Always the way! My scrapbooking tutor always says, its never lost what a friend gains. I just wish I had held on to a few!
I needed something easy to get back into the quilting after the last few finishes. This fits the bill. I pulled out a few similar fabrics and we managed ok. The blocks are 5" and I am aiming for about a 40" width quilt. A small lap quilt.
I thought this spot would make a gentle border. I measured and it was all A ok. We went to Philadelphia for a week, and on return, I headed for the border, and cut it evenly in 4 straight lines. A nagging feeling was nudging me in the back. Yes, the fabric was double length. I had needed to cut it in 2 straight lines. Grrrr. I am now on the hunt for a contrasting or toning fabric to unite the two matching strips of border. Measure twice. Cut once.
I have some nice peach kona, but it is not a length cut, much of my kona fabric is fq rather than width of fabric. I am going to leave it for a little and see what springs to mind. Apologies, I don't seem to have taken any photos of the flimsy to this point! That shows I have been below par and muddleheaded. I can substitute the black and white photo I took to check the balance.
I was having such a good hoke, looking for fabric in the deep depths of stash, and I found a similar charm pack of Christmas fabrics.
This was a gift, I am sorry I can't remember who from, but thank you. It is not quite a full pack, so again a little additional fabric is needed. I have a William Morris tonal charm pack which actually tones. But ... if I borrow from it, the whole cycle starts again. I think these cheeky gnomes work with the soft colours too. It was fun pairing these off completely at random. For not it will sit too, and hopefully I'll have a Christmas quilt too.
I apologise if I didn't reply to your comment on my last blog post, or indeed haven't been to visit you recently. I have been a bit under the weather the last couple of weeks. The old breathing has been a bit erratic the last few weeks, and as we all know, breathing is pretty essential. A lot of sleeping, a lot of sleeping, a fair bit of tv and a course of steroids and I am well on the mend. That's why this charm pack sewing just fit the bill.
Whatever you are doing these days, I hope you are well, and enjoying your crafting.
Helen x
Ambleside is a village in the Lake District, England. I love the Lake District, we used to drop off there for a few days on our way to Oxford. The scenery is spectacular, mountains, fells (small mountains) and lakes. It is the sort of place that makes you come over all poetic and creative, which is funny enough, as lots of poets hailed from those parts. William Wordsworth didn't live in Ambleside, but near enough. It is impossible to drive through the area and not find yourself dredging up long forgotten snatches of poetry from The Prelude.
"And as I rose upon the stroke, my boat
went heaving through the water like a swan
when, from behind that craggy steep till then
the horizon's bound, a huge peak, black and huge,
as if with voluntary power instinct,
upreared his head"
I can't claim to have remembered it all, but Miss Lester, my old English teacher should be proud of me. When I am old, sitting in my armchair, I shall be able to recite reams of poetry but not know what I had for breakfast!
Anyhows, I have had this charm pack for a while. In fact, I was sure I had two of them. After I pulled the house apart, a few times, I remember giving it away. Somebody was short some squares, and what goes around comes around, so I sent them mine. Always the way! My scrapbooking tutor always says, its never lost what a friend gains. I just wish I had held on to a few!
I needed something easy to get back into the quilting after the last few finishes. This fits the bill. I pulled out a few similar fabrics and we managed ok. The blocks are 5" and I am aiming for about a 40" width quilt. A small lap quilt.
I thought this spot would make a gentle border. I measured and it was all A ok. We went to Philadelphia for a week, and on return, I headed for the border, and cut it evenly in 4 straight lines. A nagging feeling was nudging me in the back. Yes, the fabric was double length. I had needed to cut it in 2 straight lines. Grrrr. I am now on the hunt for a contrasting or toning fabric to unite the two matching strips of border. Measure twice. Cut once.
I have some nice peach kona, but it is not a length cut, much of my kona fabric is fq rather than width of fabric. I am going to leave it for a little and see what springs to mind. Apologies, I don't seem to have taken any photos of the flimsy to this point! That shows I have been below par and muddleheaded. I can substitute the black and white photo I took to check the balance.
now, wasn't that exciting!
I was having such a good hoke, looking for fabric in the deep depths of stash, and I found a similar charm pack of Christmas fabrics.
This was a gift, I am sorry I can't remember who from, but thank you. It is not quite a full pack, so again a little additional fabric is needed. I have a William Morris tonal charm pack which actually tones. But ... if I borrow from it, the whole cycle starts again. I think these cheeky gnomes work with the soft colours too. It was fun pairing these off completely at random. For not it will sit too, and hopefully I'll have a Christmas quilt too.
I apologise if I didn't reply to your comment on my last blog post, or indeed haven't been to visit you recently. I have been a bit under the weather the last couple of weeks. The old breathing has been a bit erratic the last few weeks, and as we all know, breathing is pretty essential. A lot of sleeping, a lot of sleeping, a fair bit of tv and a course of steroids and I am well on the mend. That's why this charm pack sewing just fit the bill.
Whatever you are doing these days, I hope you are well, and enjoying your crafting.
Helen x
Hope your on the road to recovery. Those charm quilts will be cute.
ReplyDeleteI hope you continue to rest and recover. Those little charmies are very nice, and the perfect project to work on as you work your way back to full health! Measure twice, cut once; I have said that to myself often (and I still make miscuts!). Enjoy the process of making these two pretty quilts!
ReplyDeleteHope you feel better soon Helen!
ReplyDeleteLovely patchwork! Hope you feel better soon and get plenty of rest Helen xx
ReplyDeleteHi Helen! I hope you are feeling better now - steroids and lots of sleep sounds like just the ticket you needed. You probably picked up a big from traveling. I hope you had a good time in Philly. I love quick and easy projects like these with some charm packs. ~smile~ Roseanne
ReplyDeleteThe heck with a jelly roll today I want to work with charms! I love both of these and what you said about ‘having a hoke through the stash’ (LOVE that expression, haven’t heard of it before but I’m going to keep it in my repertoire from you my friend) is so true about how I feel when I have a hoke through my own! It’s lovely but also evokes a bit of guilt at its size (I’m good at evoking guil...and rhyming, and with your Wordsworth reference I can feel a poem coming on with evoke and hoke but I digress as per usual) Anywho. Glad you’re starting to feel better; honestly every time we fly of late we get some respiratory sickness. And I was just in Ambleside and Grasmere where Wordsworth is buried! It’s such stunning lovely country. Your ability to quote is also stunning and lovely, something I don’t have as we only ever had to memorize Hamlet’s soliloquy and it is mostly gone!
ReplyDeleteI hope you can continue to rest up and are soon fully recovered. I don't know any Wordsworth but can still recite chunks of Henry IV part 1 that I had to learn for O levels. All the useful stuff (like maths) I forget, but random poetry, that's still in my head.
ReplyDelete