Happy Birthday Rowan

my gorgeous son is 15 today.

Sparrowhawk

This morning I was shaken out of my Monday morning relaxed holiday mood (am off work for two weeks), by a sparrowhawk on the attack.

Earlier while I was watching the birds feeding they all got spooked and flew away, so I had it in my head that there may have been a large bird about.

But it was about half an hour later that the sparrowhawk swooped and pinned down the unfortunate pigeon.

Isn't it an absolutely beautiful bird. I have seen sparrowhawks a few times in the garden, and I know circle of life and all that, but I felt for the pigeon and opened the back door.  The sparrowhawk allowed me to take a few more photos then flew off leaving a stunned pigeon who himself flew off a couple of minutes later.

I was absolutely thrilled to see this.

Anyway this is a sewing blog I think so I am going to share a few photos of our latest speaker at the Northern Ireland Patchwork Guild.

Ann Fleeton   www.annfleeton.com/

A few of her quilts layered on a table.

Her work is exceptional. Each piece she makes conveys a message or tells a story, historical, or modern day. I am really inspired by the meaningful way she works/creates and wish I was more like her in my approach. She is an artist using quilts and stitch as her medium. 

I learnt a lot.

To my sewing room I will go to move onwards and upwards with my girl quilt number 2!

Yeahhhhhhh

Yeahhhhh!!

Also Starring...

Jean

and Honey.

Birds and blackberries

Very nearly finished my madly bright and colourful Drunkards Path quilt. I just have to hand sew the binding to the back and do a bit more free machining in some of the squares.

I can't wait to finish it.

Tomorrow should see it off.

The colours are so bright and saturated, unlike the colours outside at the moment.

I think autumn is the most inspiring season of the year. Crisp days, strong sunlight and the colours of the trees and hedgerows.

Today I walked my dogs up the lane in front of our house.

The two forms on the lane are a cat and a pheasant.

Thankfully the cat didn't stick around, although the pheasant made a quick escape too when it saw me approaching.

So I got in the mood for a bit of bird spotting. 

and blackberry eating.

A joyful, colourful experiment.

Ok, so I know I should be concentrating on my girl quilt, but I have had the urge this week to try and finish my Drunkards Path quilt. All the small circles have been hand stitched in place.

I added a strippy border made from 2 ins strips of the fabrics I used.

I quilted straight lines, as you can kind of see above, but then had the urge to do some free machine quilting within each square.

It's quite nice free quilting within a boundary. In this case a 5 inch square.

I am not sure how this will all look in the end. Straight lines and free machine quilting.

A joyful, colourful experiment!

Oh dear, I have to visit a quilt shop to buy some fabric for the binding! 

Will keep you posted. 

everything but the girl!

I really need to get going with the girl quilt. I don't really know what I do all week but I seem to be going at a  snails pace. I read other quilter's blogs and wonder 'How on earth?' Well I do know what I do all week-- work, keep the house in some kind of order and do things to keep myself happy and healthy. So I shouldn't complain. Anyway if I was to produce a quilt every couple of weeks what would I do with them all? 

On Saturday morning I was at the Northern Ireland Patchwork Guild meeting www.nipg.org.uk/.

Ester Kiely was the guest speaker. She gave us a very interesting talk based on her work to date and the various community arts projects she has participated in.

Some images of her stitched pieces and sketchbook work. Really stunning.

Visit Ester's blog at  

http://esterkiely.blogspot.co.uk/

So today I have been trying to 'age' or soften the print I made last week

I have been experimenting on this print using transfer dyes. Transfer dyes are painted onto paper first then transferred onto fabric with the heat from an iron. They are widely available on line if you google them. I love working with them because there is a certain amount of unpredictability in the end result. You get great effects if you scrunch up your paper first and then paint on the dye. The dye sits in the creases and when you iron on to the fabric the creases appear.as wonderful marks.

The transfer dyed paper has to be 100% dry before ironing onto the fabric. They are made for use on synthetic fabrics (work amazingly well on Evalon). However colourcraft do a solution called Transfix which enables the use of transfer dyes on natural fabrics.

I painted the dye onto a paper doily placed on a piece of paper. Both the doily and the page can then be transferred onto fabric  

So then I started having great fun with doilies!!!!

Using Markal paintstiks The third image is a piece of flat white cotton. It actually looks like there is a doily sitting on it! What a wonderfully wonderful result. 

Wonder how I could use this on the quilt?

  

My last experiment was using a Sharpie pen (permanent marker)

Straight onto white cotton.

Lovely.

I think I have an idea of where I am going now. I am going to use a combination of the transfer dyes, Markal and the doilies to get the aged look I want.

I might have a go on an off white cotton to soften it all rather than the bright white.

The girl is going to have white on her and so she will come forward more against a softer background.

The snails pace will continue in a good way. No stress involved. 

The Merville Girls

Introducing the Merville Girls..........

.

This is Pamela and her wonderful quilt. 

Gail has made a bag.....

...complete with dolly.

Doreen modelling an apron she has made as a gift. 

Ethna's embroidery in progress.

This is a detail of a quilt that Ella has made using curtain and upholstery samples.

Doreen doing an impromptu teaching session.

Rosie with her scrap quilt in progress.

And finally, Pamela again with another of her wonderful creations.

There are a few more members who will appear in the next episode of..

'The Merville Girls'   

We meet on Thursday night for a light hearted sew along, where we chat eat and sew basically.