Do you remember a certain singer who decided that a symbol would represent him instead of a name? Well that’s how I remembered him after twisting the title of one of his songs. Now that’s what I think of this block. I just kept getting it wrong and the final product is wrong, but I like it the way it is. Nothing to do with the instructions, they were fine, but I have a bad habit of making things late at night when I should go to bed. I am tired and I make mistakes, fortunately it’s not brain surgery!
It was supposed to be Carrie Nation but I completely forgot to add a third purple to the small squares which are supposed to run through the middle, so I played around with the arrangement and made this instead. Not so much Carrie Nation as Frustration!
I was multi-tasking and making more than one block so I could chain piece but things went awry, never mind the end result is going in the final quilt anyway!
Another purple block still to be made yet. Watch this space
What a boring title LOL I hope the blocks aren’t boring though! As usual I used as many different fabrics as I could. Traditionally a churn dash block is made in two fabrics, I used seven but this is a scrap challenge quilt so I only had small amounts of a couple of them. Now they are even smaller!
I love the little mini sawtooth star inside the bigger one. The greens for this block are completely different to the previous one; it’s not until you put them together that you can see how much variety there is in one colour.
Now I have a third green block to make. The flying geese are ready and waiting for the inner block but I haven’t decided which one to do. Angela has a lot of choice over at So Scrappy which you can visit HERE
Books, that is, except it isn’t working out that way. The lure of the bootsale proved too strong last Wednesday and the lure of books even stronger. I wasn’t going to buy any but I saw an interesting looking cover (I know, don’t judge a book etc., etc.) that had no writing on it but looked very old. The minute I opened it I had to have it. Beautiful engravings of birds and animals, foxed in places, but mostly in good condition leapt out at me. I love engraving and one day I want learn it myself.
It is a strangely bound copy of Cassel’s Natural History and there are pages missing and it seems to be various volumes bound together, not always in the right order, but I bought it for the illustrations so none of that matters – and it was only £1.00!
This was followed by three more books; two volumes on Wayside and Woodland Blossoms with lovely colour plates and the British Girls Annual; also only £1.00 each.
The British Girl’s Annual is dated 1918 and is full of stories and poems, plays ‘that can be entirely acted by girls’ and hobbies. It is not all girlish; Doron might be ‘frightfully queeny’, but there are dogfights in the air and cowboys too. The chapter called ‘The Girl’s Own Bookshelf’ has suggestions for the books about cookery, and nursing at home but also art, literature, poetry, science – even a primer of evolution.
British Girls Annual 1918
Dogfight 1918
I thought as I haven’t even unpacked all the books from storage I better get rid of some via EBay as I have bought more – four books bought and four listed. Now let’s hope they sell
I also bought a little sewing box destined to be painted and then to hold my EPP projects as I sit downstairs to do those when I am Slow Sunday Stitching
I’m sure that cat is sticking her tongue out at me!
Catching up with the sawtooth stars, although the alternating blocks are still to be tackled!
We associate pink with girls ( in the West) but it was not always so as this article by Polly Curtis writing for the Guardian, points out;
“Interestingly Goldacre quotes in the same piece newspaper articles from the earlier part of the 20th century in which mothers were encouraged to dress their boys in pink and girls in blue, proof he says that clothing tastes change over time. He writes:
Back in the days when ladies had a home journal (in 1918) the Ladies’ Home Journal wrote: “There has been a great diversity of opinion on the subject, but the generally accepted rule is pink for the boy and blue for the girl. The reason is that pink being a more decided and stronger colour is more suitable for the boy, while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl.”
The Sunday Sentinel in 1914 told American mothers: “If you like the colour note on the little one’s garments, use pink for the boy and blue for the girl, if you are a follower of convention.”
You can find the full article HERE and there are some other interesting points about stereotyping for toy preference.
My mother wasn’t one for sticking to the stereotypes; I almost exclusively wore blue, one of my sisters had a train set and none of us were particularly interested in dolls. My main interest was making them clothes rather than ‘make-believe’ that they were alive.
I think things are actually worse today – Lego is a prime example – once advertised in the 70 and 80s as a toy for children, now it is segregated into ‘boy’ and ‘girl’ sets.
Compare their philosophy and old adverts to the ‘modern’ ones Here A huge step backwards and making 5 year old girls worry about their appearance rather than just playing with toys is a disgrace
Completed three blocks for the RSC15 but not all of them have worked out the way I wanted. Actually they are not even meant to be blue but one light blue and two turquoise. I have one more light blue to do
Here they are, can you spot the mistake 😦
The light blue looks the same as the turquoise ones! – it’s the one on the right of ‘whirling geese’ I think the main problem is the colour of the geese on the outside. Perhaps a little reverse sewing and substitution is called for, like this –
Not sure I like the square in the middle or white geese either! This is the first block that I haven’t really liked much since starting this project so I think it’s best if I put it to one side and carry on with the other colours for now and hope things turn out a bit better!
I had to make this when I was trying to decide the layout of the little fans for ‘Fanfare’. The pieces are so small that a design wall would be ridiculous. Putting them on my drawing board was ok until a breeze blew half of them on the floor, so I had to come up with an alternative and a lightweight mini design board was the answer
Take a piece of polystyrene around 60 x 40 x 2 or 3 cms (or whatever size you want) to use as the core of the board. I was lucky as I had a piece of polystyrene packing in the garage measuring 59cms x 39cms x 2cms.
Draw round it on a piece of scrap cardboard box twice and make a sandwich for extra strength using PVA or white craft glue, as shown in the photo. Weigh it down with heavy books
Once the glue has dried cover with batting which will need to be bigger than the board by about 12cms so that it can wrap around to the back. Use PVA or white craft glue again and spread out evenly. I made a spreader with an offcut of cardboard – it went soggy with use but lasted long enough to finish the board.
You could use different size scraps of polystyrene as long as they are the same thickness as they will be held together by the cardboard. The same applies to the batting, any scraps can be stuck to the cardboard so all those strips cut off after basting can be put to good use – Re-use is better than recycling!
It works fine with EPP projects too when you can’t decide which way round your fussy cut hexagons look best, or which centre to use in your flowers. Looking at the orange flower I decided I need more fabric to make them both!
I also find it useful when I am pressing multiple sections of more than one block when chain piecing. Sometimes they can get mixed up but using the board you can press and replace in the appropriate block with no problems
I have neglected my ‘Little things’ challenge as I have been concentrating on the RSC15 rainbow quilt. I started late and have a lot of catching up to do but thought late last night that I would try to get back to my original challenge.
Sarah Fielke’s little dolly is in red, white and blue and is reminiscent of a rebel flag, hence the name. I didn’t really want one that looked like a flag but the diamond shaped blocks made me think of a trellis so I decided to do a flowery theme. I used some fabrics that have been languishing in my stash forever – which is usually a sign that you don’t like them that much! Two of them originally formed a border for the Botanical Gardens quilt but I removed it as it looked better without them.
A few people have observed that there is no ugly fabric if you cut it small enough. Tonya Riccuci has written an amusing post about the quilt she is making from donated ‘ugly’ fabrics here After making this mini quilt I am inclined to agree as I love them all together. I liked them so much I made a scrappy little border to finish it off which is not on the original quilt – a border goes with a trellis don’t you think?
To carry on with the scrappy mood, encouraged by Angela’s quilt-a-long, I rooted out a little bag of left-over binding and found a yellow stripy one that was perfect to complete this little project
I must say that I didn’t take enough care with my piecing as it was late and it was intended for the cat! She has a habit of visiting me when I am sewing and sitting on the fabrics I am sorting through so I thought a little quilt for her to put on the desk (so that I will have something nice to look at too) might keep her out of the way. It is on the desk now and she has decided to sit on my knee!
A little label on the back to finish off. I never used to label quilts but I think I will go back and label the others too as it is easy to forget the details
There are three orange blocks for this section, yesterday I posted the ‘birds in flight’ block and it’s significance. The two blocks today have no significance other than I wanted something simple.
Firstly, a nine patch made from Happy-go-Lucky candy squares by Bonnie and Camille for Moda. I bought these at The Quilters and Embroiderers Store, Brisbane. Camille Roskelly was giving a talk and I bought her book Simply Retro and a few packs of these candy squares. Loved her talk and the quilts she brought with her!
Secondly, another simple patch which I made up. I don’t think it is an old block, at least I couldn’t find it. I was trying to think of a name. As it is an easy variation of a nine patch I thought Easy Kate but that sounds like it is named after a strumpet ha ha. Kate in the corner sounds like a naughty child so I’ll leave it as a nine-patch variation which sounds boring but accurate
The little flower in the middle is from ‘Sweet Things’ by Holly Holderman for Lake House Dry Goods and has the cutest colour chart on the selvedge of cupcakes instead of the usual dots. Another scrap from a scrap bag bought on EBay
Ode to Autumn; ‘Season of mist and mellow fruitfulness’…John Keats.
September’s colour is orange which is very appropriate for those of us in the Northern hemisphere as the trees will soon start their yearly change of clothes before flinging them off altogether.
The blackberries are ripening in the hedgerow in Essex so last Saturday we took the grand-daughters to the nature reserve to go blackberry picking. We should have taken a walking stick to pull down the highest runners which tantalised us with the choicest berries, even so we still managed to pick about three kilos in a couple of hours. That doesn’t include the ones the girls ate!
There were lots of different plants to see; instructions on which ones to avoid – like deadly nightshade, and birds intent on eating the blackberries that we were picking. When we were nearly finished we came to a fork in the path and I started down the left-hand side but my other half, who knew the woods better then me, called me to go right. How glad I am that we did. As we examined one bush he saw a bird fluttering in a particularly dense patch and realise it was trapped! I couldn’t see it at first and when I did I was sickened to see it hanging upside-down, desperately trying to free itself from the thorns
‘I think it’s leg is broken’ he said.
I cringed as I have seen the translucent broken bones in the leg of another bird years ago and didn’t want to see it again but the bird needed rescuing and taking to the Wildlife trust centre. He pushed the tangled thorny runners aside and I reached in through the briars and put my hand around it’s frail, trembling little body. He snapped off the piece that held the bird so I was able to pull it out.
I couldn’t look as he gently pulled the plant apart to free the bird. As he did so the frantic fluttering stopped and the bird waited motionless in my hand; the quivering of it’s heart the only sign that it was still alive. I ventured a look and was relieved to see that it’s leg wasn’t broken after all.
Once it was free, the bird began to struggle again; we called the girls to come and see but only the oldest was quick enough to see the bird as I opened my hand to let it go. It disappeared in seconds and we were all glad that we had taken the right path!
thecraftyyak 