A Beautiful Long Weekend

Greetings!

    This past weekend I enjoyed an extended long weekend....which was AMAZING! Not much sewing got done this weekend...oh well there is always tomorrow! Have I ever mentioned what a good procrastinator I am? I should have been working on sewing samples but I just couldn't resist enjoying the sun! I have family visiting from Germany so we enjoyed our local  beaches. We really do live in the most incredible part of the world. 

I guess I best get working on those samples! Have a great day.

Machine Embroidery Fun

Hi all

    Hope you are all staying cool in this hot weather! I love the sun but anything over about 23 degrees just about does it for me!

   This last week I have started to work on our fall class schedule and trying to decide what fun things we will be doing. For some of my ladies we will begin to work on The Gypsy Embroidered Quilt. I have just 3 more borders to complete. It is coming out AMAZING! This quilt is really a work of art and for me personally it has given me so many more skills. I learned so much and have had to really use all my skills and learn many along the way.

   Last Saturday we had an Embroidery Machine Blitz. We were making a fun little quilt and all the ladies had so much fun. Here are a few pictures for you to enjoy!

Never enough thread!

Theresa's Appliqued Dog. This is her very first embroidery project!

Della's Super heroes!

Della loves her Designer Ruby and her Magnetic Hoop!

Lynne's animal crackers starting to come together!

   I am also really excited to start our new Row by Row Quilt. There is a group of about 12 ladies and myself who will be making Quilty Fun by Lori Holt. I just love this quilt and am so looking forward to it. I will be starting mine hopefully this weekend....I work out the kinks! Everyone else will be starting theirs in September.

Book available in store!

There are 2 options for layout. The one shown above and the second below. I love the scrappy look so I will be making the second option. The class is half and half divided!

Well in BC we are enjoying a long weekend so I will sign off now. Enjoy the weekend! 

A little show and tell

Hi all

     It has been far to long since my last post! I know you all will understand when I say time just gets away from me.

     This summer I have been teaching a lot and then trying to stay ahead of samples that have deadlines!  So far not too bad.

     Here are few pictures of a classes I had in July.

Strawberry Social By Pattern Basket

Great Granny Square By Lori Holt

Animal Cracker Quilt- Machine Embroidery Applique

We have also received some of our new fall yarns....can't wait to make new projects from these!

Hush Soft metallic lace yarn

Mirage- Diamond Luxury collection

Malabrigo Rios

Diamond Select- Marvel

   This summer I booked all Halloween projects in July and Christmas In August. I have just a couple things to finish and then I will be all caught up.Well until fall classes start anyway! 

   We are about 2 months away from our cruise to Hawaii as well so that has me really excited to get organized and get all my sampling done for the fall!

Have a great weekend, Natasha

Hexie Mug Rug

Greetings!

Last week we had a fun class of making a Hexagon Mug Rugs. They all turned out so darn cute I just had to share them with you. At the end of the show and tell I have a YouTube video from Creative Grids; the maker of the Hexagon Trim Tool! Enjoy. 

This ruler is so easy to use, fun and really addictive!

Have a wonderful day full of quilting and sewing fun!

Creative Grids® CGRJAW4- Hexagon Trim Tool

Quilt Show

Greetings all!

Well we survived. The quilt show was a great success. Well done to all the volunteers and coordinators, it is a very large undertaking! Congrats to you all.

The Cloth Castle sponsored 2 large door prizes. We managed to snap a quick picture of Jennifer Watson with her new Husqvarna sewing machine.  Congratulations Jennifer! Jennifer is local quilter and longarm quilter in the Victoria area, her work is incredible. It is wonderful that her hard work was recognized and honored!

We spent the weeks before the quilt show sewing our hearts out, I can honestly say I have never slept so well at night. I just would fall into bed and lights out! It was all worth it though, the quilts came out great. Here are a couple shots of the booth. Sorry they are a bit blurry....lightening wasn't good in the arena.

So the store is back together and tidy once again. Now we just are going to add a bit more quilting to the samples and get them hung up! I will admit we get the binding on the quilts and then after the show take the time to quilt them! Now you know our secrets! Thank goodness for 505 basting spray!

For those of you who were at the show I hope you all had a wonderful time and left completely inspired!

Have a quilty day in this rain,

A Strawberry patch

Greetings!

It has been a bit since I have done a post, we are currently sewing our hearts out getting ready for our booth and the quilt show! It is coming so fast now.

This weekend I had an embroidery class that I just had to share couple photos of. We made these charming little Strawberry pincushions. They were so much fun and addictive!

I have to keep this post short....sewing machine is calling! Have a great day.

The rest of my projects from retreat

Hi all

   As promised here are the rest of the projects that I worked on. I took enough projects for 3 months. It felt so great to pull out older projects and get them going again. They kind of feel like old friends!

These 2 runners were panels I had kicking around, I just added a 9 patch to the center and borders.
Just quick and easy and oh my goodness a couple of gifts done already!

Just in time for summer too!

I had the center made of this flannel quilt. This is what I originally made the piano border for.
As I mentioned yesterday the scraps made enough for two quilts. 

A couple of years ago I made a friendship log cabin.
These were all the leftover 2" wide strips.
I made the 1600" quilt and added the 2" gold squares. It came out very long and skinny.
I still had strips so I made the piano border for the right side and a checkerboard for the other.
Who says that borders have to be the same!

Ok well now I have a few more quilt tops! Oh well those are for another day!

Quilting retreat

Hi All

    What a busy couple of weeks this has been. I have been working on my new embroidered quilt. I have the show and Demo this Saturday. I am almost done as far as I can get so that is feeling really good! It has been a bit of work but I have learned a lot and am looking forward to sharing my hints and tips....there are many!

     I also went away last weekend to a Quilting Retreat. We went to Wyldflower B&B in Qualicum. It is a great location for a group, lots of bedrooms, great workroom, no cooking, no dishes and no cleaning! What more could you ask for. The workroom is really well laid out and lots of space for each person. A great design wall large enough for large projects. The facility was really great. In a quiet country setting perfect for crafting, sewing and quilting.

     It had been many years since I went into Qualicum Beach, what a charming little town. I had a chance to venture in and spend a couple hours wandering around enjoying the day. Not to brag or anything but we do live in the best place. I don't think I could live away from the ocean.

What a day! Sunshine and blue skies....nothing better!

My sisters favorite stop!

This was my favorite shop. The owner had such wonderful little gifts and very well priced too.
I picked up the business card but have misplaced it, I will have to find my receipt and get the name!

These are just a few of the projects I worked on over the weekend and once I got home. I will share the rest tomorrow as the pictures are saved on my computer at home, darn!

This was a border print fabric from several years ago. I made the piano border for another quilt I worked on, I had enough for the 2 quilts. Awesome! My goal was to just get things done, doesn't need to be fancy just done!

This is a really easy pattern that is easily adjusted for larger or jelly rolls/Charm packs. I used scraps from another quilt from many years ago. All you do is cut a 2 1/2" x 5" rectangle of scraps and a 2 1/2" square all in the same fabric, for the number of rectangles you have. Sew the square to one end and press. Then just flip every other unit. I added a 2 1/2" sashing between the rows and bordered with a 4 1/2" print. Great baby size project and done in a few hours!

Well enjoy the rest of your day and I invite those who are in the area to come to my embroidery demo this Saturday at 3pm at The Cloth Castle.