Geheim project op zondag / A little secret sewing on Sunday

Secret sewing: on its way to the recipient, but will be revealed in a few days.

Dit is wat anders; meestal schrif ik niet in het Nederlands, maar alleen in het Engels. Maar vandaag  heb ik er een goede reden voor.

Unusually for me I'm writing my blog post in Dutch as well as English today. I have a good reason to do so: I read this week on Instagram that Merel van Looi, owner of the Quiltshop Birdblocks in Amsterdam is seriously ill. She has posted about her illness herself on Instagram: @merel_birdblocks.

Ik las namelijk van de week op Instagram dat Merel van Looi, eigenaresse van de quiltwinkel Birdblocks in Amsterdam (en die blogt als Mrs. Scissors) ernstig ziek is geweest. Je kunt in haar eigen woorden erover lezen op Instagram @merel_ birdblocks.

Lente in Zuid Holland / Spring in Zuid Holland

In de quilting blogging wereld zijn er een paar projecten gaande om Merel op te vrolijken: een gemeenschappelijke quilt vanuit America onder leiding van Hillary, die blogt op entropyalwayswins en daar kun je er meer over lezen. Maar ook vanuit Nederland heeft Marga Pieper die blogt als MarPie een oproep gedaan voor vlaggetjes om Merels ziekenhuiskamer op te vrolijken. Daar was ik vanmiddag mee bezig.

 There are several initiatives from the quilting community to cheer Merel up: Hillary, who blogs at entropyalwayswins (Instagram: @enropyalwayswins)has started a project to make a quilt for Merel. You can read about this initiative, both on Instagram and on her blog. Also in The Netherlands, Marga Pieper, who blogs as MarPie has appealed for bunting to decorate Merel's hospital room. You can read more about it on her site

If you'd like to do your bit towards cheering Merel up, read Marga's post and set to using those scraps! If you live outside Europe, maybe Hillary's project appeals more to you. You can always contribute to both; it's up to you!

Als jij wilt helpen Merel op te vrolijken, lees de post van Marga, en zet dan je lapjes er voor in! Als je buiten Europa woont is Hillary's initiatief misschien meer voor jou. Maar je kunt natuurlijk allebei doen! De keuze is aan jou!

In a couple of days I'll show more,

Over een paar dagen laat ik meer hierover zien.

Happy sewing

Marly.

RSC 16: April is the orange month; paper piecing

Firstly a big thank you to everyone who gave me advice on paper piecing last week. the consensus seems to be: "Don't worry too much about the grain, especially on the smaller pieces. Just keep the paper on as long as possible." The block hasn't progressed much over the last few days, but, following your advice I finished the remaining three quarters of the block on Sunday, doing more than on Thursday and Friday together! I used as much of the mis-cuts as possible and what was left went into a Quilty 365 circle (see my post of yesterday)

Each month Angela at Soscrappy gives a rainbow colour of the month, and this month's colour is orange. She also gives instructions for sampler blocks, but this year I have decided not to make the sampler, but to make at least one pair of bear paw blocks in each colour. Last month I made four purple blocks, but who knows how many orange blocks I'll come up with!

As yet, however, I've barely made a start.

2" orange strips ready to incorporate in the bear paw blocks

I've just pulled the orange strips from the 2" strip bag, but there are plenty more larger orange scraps and FQ's. When I have two blocks completed I'll try combining them with my two brown blocks, thereby fulfilling this month's colour instruction: orange with brown or black. It'll be more than a hint of brown though!

I'm linking to 

Click on the button above to see more orange loveliness, and some purple.

Happy sewing

Marly.

More Quilty circles

Audrey at Quilty Folk started a project towards the end of last year to appliqué a circle onto a square each day. At the end of the year you have 365 (or, actually 366 this year) squares with a circle: Quilty 365.
I have, contrary to my own expectations, managed to stick to it for three months since I started on 1 January. I find it addictive, and my needle turn appliqué has improved no end!
Here are my March blocks:

The squares are all solid fabric and measure 4.5"; most of the circles measure 3" in diameter, but there are a couple of slightly larger circles on special days. It depends on how much time I have whether or not I piece the circle from scraps, some of which are really small.

circle 88: Monday 28 March 2016, made of the results of cutting mistakes of a very frustrating paper-pieced Farmer's Wife block which I posted about on Saturday. Every cloud has a silver lining!

I have now made 92 circles (that includes today's) and this quilt promises to be enormous!

You can still join in this project; there is no particular starting date. The only rule is to make 365 circle blocks in one year.

I'm linking up to 

so click on the button and see more appliqué circles, some of which are really spectacular. Maybe you'll feel inspired to sew along with us.

Happy sewing

Marly

RSC 16 Still March: more purple!

Each month Angela at Soscrappy posts a colour and many quilters use their scraps of that colour throughout the month. This year March's colour is purple. Angela also posts patterns for a sampler, but, after two years of Rainbow Samplers, I'm taking a year off the sampler, and making my own rainbow quilt of bear paw blocks.

I made two more purple blocks this last week,
 

to add to the ones I made the week before.

Furthermore, I've been struggling with paper piecing one of the blocks in the 1930's Farmer's Wife, which I'm making along with a group of other (much better!) quilters at my LQS, QuiltersPalet in The Hague. I've wasted so much fabric trying to keep the outside edges of the block straight on the fabric grain. I wonder if it's really necessary when I'm stitching to paper anyway. What do you think? Keep the edges on the straight of grain at all costs, or not?

I've also managed to appliqué a circle each day for the Quilty 365 project. It's becoming difficult to find fabrics I haven't used already. I'll be posting more about this project next Friday.

This weekend I'll be linking up to

  and to 

For more scrappy fun click the buttons above on Saturday and Sunday respectively.

Happy sewing

Marly.

Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2016; March is purple.

Each month Angela at Soscrappy gives a rainbow colour of the month, and this month's colour is purple. She also gives instructions for sampler blocks, but this year I have decided not to make the sampler, but to make at least one pair of bear paw blocks in each colour.

two purple bear paws in among the bamboo - must be pandas!

More purple this month, and with a hint of  orange and some yellow!

To see much more creative purpleness click on the button

 

Happy sewing

Marly.

Wandering camera: February Collection

Soma at Whims and Fancies is holding a photo link up: The Wandering Camera. The idea is to take a photo each day and to share the photos once a month. I love the idea, but even in the shortest month of the year I didn't manage my photo-a-day.

I'm afraid my camera didn't wander very much in February. No valid reasons.

I missed last month's link up because I was away for a long weekend in Maastricht, in the south of The Netherlands. In Maastricht I had my only opportunity to use my good camera; the weather was so dull that all the photos there are at ISO 400, except the two indoor which are at 800.

But first some photos around my flat:

5 February

1. Two Delft blue "commemoration" dishes: 

- the top is the real thing - hand-painted - presented to my father-in-law 

by his employer on his 25th anniversary at the company,

- below is kitsch, a transfer-ware imitation, for tourists!

2.  Planter in front of the floor-to-ceiling window in my living room

3.  jars of tea lined up on top of the fridge

In Maastricht where we stayed in a hotel which was formally a manor house

6 February

 1.  a patchwork of tiles in the main hall

2.  the main hall (who chose those lamps to match the room?!!)

3.  The main railway line crosses the end of the hotel/manor house drive

4.  a stand of trees in the park

7 February

1.  black fungus on a fallen tree trunk

2.  the host tree trunk, also hosting moss, ivy, lichens and small creatures

3.  fungus growing near the base of a living tree

4.  possibly the same variety of fungus but growing about 5ft. from the ground on another tree. I loved the colour of the lichens also hosted by this tree.

All the fungus was growing well because of the unusually high temperatures that weekend (10 deg Celsius) and the high humidity (it was raining most of the time). My last photo is of unusually early flowers:

7 February

I took more photos with the camera in my phone.

6 February

Clockwise from top left

1.  part of Carnival procession

2.  City Hall with the carnival flags

3.  Street art

4. More street art: market vendor adorned for carnival

5.  Shop in the old city centre

6.   Our Lady, Star of the Sea, in the Church of the same name

Back home!

Local photos from left to right:

16 February: the route homewards at lunchtime

17 February: Tree in bloom near another tram stop

 25 February: SNOW! but it didn't come to anything!

I made these collages with PicMonkey free photo software. I'm still discovering how to use it, but you may have noticed some progression. I just have to work out how to make the watermark less intrusive.

I'm linking to

click on the image to see more photos taken in February.

Happy snapping

Marly.

Brown Saturday and Some Improv Circles

The colour chosen by Angela at Soscrappy for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge (see button on the right) this month was brown. I made two more bear's paw blocks,

brown bear's paws framed by black and white squares

February has not been my most productive quilting month; I was away from home for a few days, and then my machine was away for maintenance for a whole week.

Nevertheless I managed a needle-turned circle every day for the Quilty 365 project (see button on the right),

February circles up to 26th, in chronological order

including some brown ones:

My inspiration comes from my scrap bucket, I just root around until I find a suitable piece. The bigger pieces have gone, so now I'm piecing the circles and am quite amazed at the resulting combinations! This project is becoming more improvised as it progresses, and I don't always take account of the grain of the fabric. 

I'm following the advice of Kaya and Ann at the Ad Hoc Improv Quilters (see button on the right), although I could be more ad hoc; my squares are all exactly 4.5 inches square! I'm going improv one step at a time, and these circles are, for now the perfect project.

randomly pieced circles

 I'm still using solids for the background squares and am pleased with the result. 

There were two family birthdays this month, celebrated by a larger circle:

confetti and snow

The first was Carnival weekend, hence the confetti , and the second birthday boy was skiing in the Alps, so I used the nearest I had to a snow scene. I must admit to cutting into a new FQ for the snow!


Update 1 March

Here are the last three February circles:

I  am linking up to 

       

Click on the images to see more photos.

Happy sewing

Marly.