WIP or UFO!

WIP or UFO whatever you like to call it. I have many of them to try and get them done this year. A year of finishing. I know it's a great last word, but since New Year I have finished and hand quilted a small quilt. I'm working on another hand quilting project and I am almost half way on that. I also finished piecing a quilt top I started last Christmas and I finished some small stitching eco-hearts. It's working well and I'm motivated to keep-up. 

I'm a quilter at heart. I started as a sane quilter, but after 10 years of quilting I started to branch out into other forms of textile creations. Having that basic quilting and stitching skill help me along nicely in every stitching project I have done. I haven't bought quilting fabric for many years now. The quilts that I made lately are made from fabric in my stash. I used Mr Notjustnat's business shirts when the trend of shirting fabric comes in. I have never been one to follow quilt patterns to the 'T'. I'm a quilter outside of that 1/4", but I'm enjoying it. These days the Gee's Bend quilts are drawing my attention. I like making do and improvising so "made fabric" really attracts my attention. Of course natural dyeing is my other love!

We make a lot of road trips to visit our grandkids that live 800 kilometers away. I get a lot of hand stitching done on those trips. Last year I randomly stitched some heart shapes. It was really fun not having any pre-planned patterns. The hearts are stuffed and ready for Valentine's Day this year. Another tick for the finished! 

I got inspired by a quilt in the American Patchwork and Quilting magazine issue ... 2012. I gathered the fabric and made a few blocks of the Candy Cane quilt early in 2013. It has been sitting on the sewing table starring at me ever since. It's a simple quilt, but unfortunately it doesn't make itself! Another tick for the finished. Big stitch quilting, I'm thinking!

  

Still had the shirting fabric left over from the Candy cane quilt when I saw LeeAnn from Nifty Quilts make the reproduction Courthouse steps quilt in Gee's Bend style. All LeeAnn quilts are very inspiring so I thought I would quickly whip one up. That wasn't a tick of finish, but a tick of start!

Lucky find: A full set of D.M.C. Library, cross stitch and hand embroidery pattern books in full colour. Printed in France in early 19th century. I already had one of them that my DMIL gave me 25 years ago. I was hoping that one day I would use some of the patterns from the book. Now I have a full set of them I really need to use them! I found them at my local op-shop. I like sharing my lucky finds with you so I will keep this section going at the end of a post.

Well, I can't end without wishing you all a Happy Chinese New Year [31 January]. It is the  year of the wooden horse in the Chinese calendar. I came across this interesting reading about the year of the horse here. If you were born in other animal year click here and choose the right animal for the year you were born in conjunction with the horse year. Each of the animal years is displayed with the western calendar year. The Chinese calendar cycle goes for 12 years.

Until next time

Nat