Sunshine at Last!!!!

 Is this summer?  Dare we hope?!!
Tea & muffins were order of the day - as usual!!
The sun was streaming in through the wide open windows - very pleasant for a morning of sewing, or other things.
Chris brought along her trees from Saturday & removed all the paper.  Tedious on your own but quite fun in company!

Janet was putting the finishing touches to her Lynette Anderson quilt for Needle & Thread, to show off he fabrics.

Christmas in May!  At least this might be another project off the UFO list!!

With the sunshine so tempting & the temperature rising, lunch in the garden.  We have to make the most of it!!
Coronation chicken & ham with salad went down very nicely.

I was sorting some of my London fabrics to make a Jubilee Quilt.  Unfortunately the cat decided it was rather a good place to sleep so they became a little muddled!



Another lovely day.  Long may this weather continue!
A wonderful day for Chelsea - lucky Caroline!
Alison, I am sure was making the most of her garden too - hope the delivery/collection happened.

UNTIL NEXT TIME!

Extra! Extra! Tuesday Girls' Saturday Retreat

Today was a special day for the Tuesday Girls as it was our first Retreat Day.

Caroline, Amanda and Chris were the first to arrive followed by myself and Alison.

As usual we started with a cup of tea or coffee, cakes and a chat

  

Alison had a show and tell the fabric is Piece on Earth by Three Sisters from Moda and the pattern is 'Stepping Stones' from the Layer Cake, Jelly Roll and Charm Quilts book by Pam and Nicky Lintott from the Quilt Room.

Amanda was putting the borders on a black, white and turquoise quilt, the design 'Twinkle' comes from the book by Kim Brackett called  Scrap-Basket Sensations. Amanda then continued with the Christmas Trees from a workshop we did last September, adding the sashings and cornerstones.

  

Caroline was reaching the last stages of the 'Log Cabin Stars,' piecing the rows together and adding the borders. 

Chris started the morning by trimming off the excess papers from the foundation pieced Christmas trees from the same workshop that Amanda was doing.  Chris then went on to make the stars for the the Twelve Days of Christmas Mystery Quilt, after several false starts, Chris completed six blocks.   

And then is was back to the Christmas trees, to add the sashings and cornerstones.



 Alison was adding the sashing strips to her quilt 'Stars Around the Garden'



Alison then went on to make the pieced border, which involed cutting 31/2" squares and sewing them together in groups of three.



I was finishing the quilting on the 'Secret Garden' quilt I was making for Needle and Thread and then it was on to make the binding, only to find as I was reaching the end of putting the binding on that I was about six inches short, so knowing I had a little more fabric at home, that was all I could do on this today

I then went on to make some more Granny Squares, using my pink and cream nine patches as leaders and enders.

After lunch from the local coffee shop and with more tea and cake we continued on as we had in the morning.

By late afternoon , with more tea and cake, Caroline had completed the top of her 'Log Cabin Stars' and was making the backing for the quilt.

Amanda had finished the sashing and had added the borders on her 'Christmas Tree' quilt.

Our last thing to do before we made our way home was to help Caroline pin her quilt.

We all thought it was a very successful day and have arrange another day  for later on in the summer.

Sunshine and showers

Count on it banners  -Nancy Halvorsen

Another Tuesday and a trip to the Hampshire countryside for the Surrey girls.
Although it is mid May, summer hasn't really arrived yet. The weather has been very mixed and really quite cold.
So cold in fact, that instead of sitting outside with that first cup of tea as we might have hoped to have been able to do, we were in fact sitting in front of the fire ...yes the fire ...hard to believe that I lit a fire in May.










However the sun did make an appearance at times and the bluebells in the garden are still looking lovely.

After a cup of tea or two and enjoying a chocolate chip and banana muffin we soon got down to work.

Janet was busy sewing the binding on a quilt for Needle and Thread the red certainly made the black and white quilt zing. I think the pattern is from or inspired by a book by Kim Brackett but I will need to check that.We loved the backing fabric, put us all in the mood for a trip to Paris!

Caroline was working on the quilt for her father and it is looking lovely. She got lots sewn together but had unfortunately forgotten the other strips so we will have to wait for a full 'tadah' till later.

I was finishing off the May calendar quilt and so I wasn't so late next month cut out all the pattern for June.

I then joined Amanda in finishing off our Christmas trees - a workshop that we did with Janet last September......hopefully they will be ready for this Christmas.

All of us at some point today had to do some reverse sewing - there was a lot of anguished cries of 'oh, not again' as we discovered another block joined on in the wrong place or pieces sewn in the wrong place or needles jabbed in fingers.....maybe it was the rhubarb crumble to blame? Who knows.
We all had a good day though despite the minor tribulations and put the world to rights over the many cups of tea.

Chris, you were missed ..hope we are back as a 5 very soon....oh yes on Saturday at our very first Tuesday Girls Day Retreat...how exciting...looking forward to that. I wonder what we all mange to achieve during the day?

Till next time.

Made it at last!

There have been many Tuesdays of late when I have been otherwise engaged but today I made it!!! It was wonderful  to see everyone and be a group of 5 again.

Plans had gone awry first thing and I was still changing out of wet weather dog clothes when the first knock sounded at the door! Kettle boiled and we were able to nibble biscuits with our first cup of tea. I had made custard shortbread biscuits which tasted ok given that I had poured the icing sugar into the butter before sieving first!
Cream 4oz butter with 1/3cup icing sugar. Add 1 1/2cups sifted plain flour, 1/3cup custard powder, tsp vanilla essence and mix well. Form into balls and squash with a fork. Bake medium oven about 12 mins.

Alison was continuing her hand quilting which is just lovely - such even stitches!
Amanda was also hand sewing, assembling her hexagons, but I didn't get a photo as she left after lunch.

Janet has been making a sample for the shop to showcase some of the beautiful fabrics in stock. I also took a picture of a second set of blocks that Janet was working on but deleted the picture by mistake!!! Sorry Janet, can you share?

Caroline was busy assembling her stars in log cabin blocks which has grown tremendously since I last saw it. Looking forward to being able to photograph the finished top.

I was finally sewing down the binding on my two block quilt. I started this a while ago at a class Janet held and it has been beautifully quilted by Yvette on her long arm machine.  I'll share a better picture when it's finished properly.

It was great to be back and I hope to make more Tuesdays over the next few weeks

Drip Drip Drip a lot of Rain!

This morning started very grey and wet, as it been raining overnight, but it had eased slightly by the time Caroline and Amanda arrived.

Alison was spending a few days in Scotland with her Mum and Chris was spending the day with her son.   Alison's Mum and Chris' son were celebrating birthdays this week 'Happy Birthday' to both of them.

With the kettle already boiled, as usual we started with a cup of tea, with the tea we had a Sultana Brioche (made by my husband) and chocolate macaroons.

After a second cup of tea and more cake is was decided that we would not do any sewing until after lunch.

For lunch, we had jacked potatoes with tuna and salad and for dessert, apple and apricot crumble with custard.

After lunch, together with another cup of tea,

Caroline continued on with her Log Cabin Star quilt.

Amanda was working out the fabric placement on a Union flag using the London fabric from Makower

I was sorting out a small leaders and enders project I had started at the weekend. (no photo I'm afraid).  I did a show and tell, this small quilt was in Julia's Four Block Challenge at Heather Quilters exhibition the weekend before last.

After another cup of tea (we do drink alot of tea!) it was time for Caroline and Amanda to wind their way home, the weather had improved and there was even a bit of sun shine.

Until next week.

Exhibition Exhibition Exhibition!!!

What a busy week it turned out to be!  Guildford Quilters had their exhibition at Clandon House for the week.

As a member I was on duty a fair bit but decided that on the Tuesday I would go as a visitor with the rest of the Tuesday Girls!!
Unfortunately Caroline could not join us, although as it turned out she was there with her father-in-law.  We missed each other by about 5 minutes.








I put two quilts into the exhibition. This one is a block of the month from Green Mountain at Staines with Paula Doyle, back in about 2007!  The fabrics were provided for the blocks.  Each completed one to be shown, in person, to Paula before we were given the next!
Chris also made this colour way, but with different sashing & borders. Alison also made the quilt using brighter colours.  They all look very different.




This is the "Garden Quilt" which was first prize in the raffle.  It was made by most of the members contributing a block.  We all took part & helped hand quilt it.














This quilt was the second prize, again made by the group & long arm quilted by Isabel Hall.
Unfortunately none of us won either one - we can never have too many quilts!!

This was my other entry, entitled "Spring Awakening".  We had a workshop back in January, where the idea for the pattern was given.  The challenge was to use a piece of green fabric which we were all given.  The title guide was Spring 2012. This is certainly going to bring back memories of the 2012 Exhibition!!


An exhausting but fulfilling week.  Am already looking at projects for the next one!!

Cake, glorious cake and of course some stitching!

A grey and rather cool start to the day did not auger well as I carried all my bits and bobs to the Conservatory early this morning.  It took a while, but soon the room was ready with heaters on, the table set and chocolate cupcakes (plus other yummy offerings)!  The Conservatory was toastie after a while although it was still cool outside, so I kept the heater running for a while longer.  By 10.30, when Alison arrived, the sun was trying hard to break through the lowering clouds.  The kettle was on in minutes of her arrival.   Janet arrived closely on her heels. She was followed by today's honorary member of the group in the form of my daughter who had come to drop her dad's birthday card off. Sadly, once more Chris was unable to join us due to family commitments and Amanda had children to look after.  Both were missed!

Tea, coffee, biscuits (Pecan & Belgian Chocolate from Sainsbury's  along with  Coconut Macaroons )  and chocolate chip muffins covered in the new chocolate Philadelphia with white, milk and dark choc chips placed on top (hubby had some as his birthday cake so couldn't waste them now could I?).  Oh yes! Brownies also were present and soon found just the right spot ( we were waving the white flag after several indulgences) then DD departed for her own home. We quickly were able to settle to the tasks in hand and began to look at Janet's beautiful L'il Twister quilt top in cream and a rich red fabric, then a similar table runner using a Moda Christmas fabric by Basic Grey.  This was done with a much larger Twister ruler, using 10 inch squares. It was gorgeous.  These are for the Heather Quilters show this coming weekend at Collingwood School.

Alison began stitching and appliqueing some of the more 'fiddly' parts of the Dear Jane and Farmer's Wife blocks she was doing.. very pretty but oh so very tiny.  I had spent some of the weekend seeing stars, literally making more than a dozen centres for my Dad's quilt,  also cutting lots of fabric to make the log cabin strips.  I began to stitch these around certain stars... I cannot do random ( a standing joke with the ladies in my group!!) so I have made them in pairs and thus it makes it easier for me to work out placement of blocks.

Lunch was next on the agenda.  I had thought soup, but it morphed into Salmon, salad, hot new potatoes and rustic bread, followed by either Lemon or Blueberry cheesecakes as supplied by Gu.  Sooooooo yummy!  It was just as well as the day became much sunnier and thus warm.  We even managed to throw a few windows open!   We finally roled away from the table... well only long enough to clear it ready for the next sewing session...and of course sup on another cup of tea.  And so, once more, we began to stitch away.  Janet was doing a wonderful selection of random squares in glorious colours for a charity quilt and Alison was stitching away at her Farmer's wife blocks.  We had one of those afternoons where nothing seemed to be cut correctly or was the 'right' size.  Very annoying, although we did have a laughter filled session over it... we have all been there and done that at some time. 

Apologies, for some reason this last photo will not rotate and stay rotated! 



My neighbour, Sarah came in for a cuppa just as Janet and Alison were packing up to go... but was assured it wasn't her frightening them off!  I waved them off and then returned to share another cup of tea, but just couldn't encourage / force another cake down if I had tried!  LOL.

Until next time...