Tuesday at the Table : Coconut Lime Syrup Cake

I was watching Better Homes and Gardens on TV last Friday night whilst binding my Sea Breezey mini quilt and they showed how to make this quick and easy cake. I didn't get a chance to write down the exact recipe from BHG but found a similar one from Taste here. 

I had all of the ingredients available and just had to grab a couple of limes from our tree,  so after soccer on Saturday afternoon I cooked this cake ready to take to a craft get-together on Sunday.  Even my teenage sons commented on how nice the limes smelled as I was making the syrup. I am not really into cooking but this is definitely one of those recipes that I will be making again as it was really delicious!

Pop on over to A Quilters Table where Debbie has a great list of "foodie" books to read. I have only read a couple on her list including Like Water For Chocolate by Laura Esquivel and Peaches for Monsieur le Cure: A Novel (Chocolat sequel) by Joanne Harris who also wrote Chocolat. I think there is a bit of a theme here:)
Kirsten.

Sea Breezey not-so-mini quilt

A few weeks ago I decided to join in with the Sea breeze mini QAL. 

It is hosted by Angie @ Gnome Angel using the Sea Breeze pattern by Megan @ Canoe Ridge Creations.

I really loved Megans use of solids in the original mini quilt so I chose to do a fairly similar colour scheme using a bundle of organic Prima solids I bought from my local Spotlight store some time ago.

 There are quite a number of different ways to make HST and this time,  I wanted to try out the "Magic 8" tutorial which yields 8 HST at a time 

 I certainly think it was a lot quicker to make the HST this way rather than the traditional method.

I quilted this in a basic grid pattern, just echoing the main seams a quarter of an inch on either side.

This quilt finishes at 22.5 " which is on the larger side for a mini quilt.

I am quite keen to make another one but I might downsize the HST's so the mini finishes a little smaller.
This project was on my list of finishes for the Q3 FAL hosted by Katy @ The Littlest Thistle. Also linking up with Fabric Tuesday at Quiltstory.
Kirsten.

Orange Palette.

This weeks palette colour over at Porch Swing Quilts was "orange" so once again I used the Play crafts palette builder on a few photos. This first one is of a Prickly Pear flower which was an incredibly vibrant orange.

And this one is of my kitty Simba laying on the reverse side of my Scrappy Trip along quilt - I added a few more colours using the "+" to increase the number of colours chosen for the palette up to 10.

So according to Jennie, next up will be yellow which is probably one of my least used colours.

Kirsten.

Playing with palettes!

Jennie over at Porch Swing Quilts is hosting a "Color Mondays" link where she sets a theme, you upload a picture following that theme to Play-crafts Palette builder then link it back to her blog.

I thought it may be fun to play around with a few photos to see what colours pop up in the palette builder. The first theme was "red" and I immediately thought of this photo I took a few years ago of the poppies at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne. 

And the block from the centre of my  Red Letter Day quilt.
Jennie said she might start off with rainbow so I might have a look around for some orange pics to do next.
Kirsten.

WIP Wednesday - Feathers quilt

My goal over the recent school holidays was to get the feathers quilt top put together and I am pleased to say that it is done and at about 81 wide x 90" long, It barely fits on my loungeroom floor!  

I have had these feather blocks from my wonderful AusModBee group here for almost a year now and ended up keeping the layout similar to the original Anna Maria Horner pattern.

Another member from the AMB group (@lorena_in_sydney on IG) is also putting her feathers quilt top together - she sent out a mix of AMH fabrics for the bee members to make her feathers from and it is going to look amazing! 

The backing is also made using a strip of the feathers and another Denyse Schmidt print which I think was from the Daisy Mae range which matched perfectly with the acid yellow/greens of Chicopee. It is a good thing that this photo was taken on a cold and dreary winters day as it is so bright!!!

So here it all is folded up ready to off to the long arm quilters as this one is much too big to me to handle here on my little sewing machine.

Linking to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced.

Kirsten.

Red Letter Day mini

The theme this month at Le Challenge was "small" which can be interpreted so many different ways, but I chose to go with a downsized version of a larger quilt. 

This pattern is the Red Letter Day mini by Camille Roskelley and after seeing how Cat used fussy cut blocks for the centres of her fabulous RLD quilt, decided to do something similar with some Lizzy House Constellations fabrics.

This block finishes at about 7.5" which is certainly smaller than the original Red Letter Day block size of 22.5"...

I would love to make more blocks from this pattern as it was quite fun going small! Linking up with Le Challenge.

And this project was also on my list of Q3 finishes for the 2014 FAL hosted by Katy @ The Littlest Thistle so linking up there too.
Kirsten.

Q3 FAL to do list...

As always, I have so many projects that I want to do and then I keep finding more things to make along the way. So I have a mix of large (quilts), medium sized (bags), and smaller (mini quilts) projects on my list for this quarter.

1. Road Trip Case : this is one of Anna @ Noodlehead's patterns and I have some fun fabrics (above) selected to make this. I haven't sewn with clear vinyl before so this might be interesting...

2. Red Letter Day quilt - the quilt top is done so I just need to decide on how to quilt it. 

I have some lovely Bliss dots flannel here ready for the backing which is incredibly soft and cuddly.

3. And I would like to sew up a Red Letter Day mini block using a fussy cut Lizzy House Constellations print for the centre .

4. Super Tote: Another of Anna's fabulous patterns, this is a gift for a friend who is celebrating a special birthday this year - her favourite colour is green so I have a few prints selected already which I am going to team with some blue denim.

5. Whilst I was looking in my stash recently, I came across another unfinished project which I hope to get done. The "Phoebe" pattern is by Melly and Me and makes up a cute elephant soft toy.

6. The Poolside tote pattern was released earlier this month and although we are in the middle of winter here, I thought I'd get ready for summer by making one:) I have chosen some pretty coral canvas for the outside and a cute Lisette ice cream print for the handles and lining.

7. AMH Feathers quilt: This one has been on my list for the past few quarters and I am really hoping to get it finished this time. I have quite a lot of feather blocks here which were made by my lovely fellow AusModBee members last year so this will make a nice Queen sized quilt.

8. I started these mini quilts for a friend a while ago and need to get them finished and mailed to her. I used one of the "Spell it with Moda" letter patterns for the "T" and the mini "Round and Round" pattern by Camille Roskelley for the other.

 9.  I just bought the Amy Butler Weekender pattern and I would really like to do a QAYG version using my Chicopee scraps. As well as the Weekender bag support group on flickr, there are plenty of great tips in the Weekender sew-along hosted by Love by Hand,  Modern Handcraft  and Chrissy at Sew Lux (who BTW made the fabulous version Camille had on her trip out here to Australia recently) which I have been studying as this bag is notoriously tricky!

10. Another fun QAL that has just been announced that I would like to participate in -  the Sea Breeze mini is a nice little quilt which is made of HST and squares. Not sure if I will do the whole 9 blocks though so I have picked colours for 4 to begin with...
Linking up with the 2014 FAL hosted by Katy at The Littlest Thistle.
Kirsten.

Q2 FAL list!

It is hard to believe that we are already half way through the year! Although this quarter seemed to go very quickly, I did manage to get a few of the projects done on my Q2 FAL list from back in April:

 1. Cargo duffle- done and this bag has already been used on a recent trip away.

 2. Umbrella prints Trimmings projects - done. I have the runner on our table and the mini quilt is hanging in the kitchen.

3. Social tote - done. Filled with my most used sewing supplies and ready for use!

4. Rugby stripes throw - done

And alas, due to the fact that I did a few unplanned projects (above) , neither the DS mini quilt, AusModBee feathers quilt nor the table runner got a look in:( Maybe next time...
Linking to the Q2 FAL with Katy at The Littlest Thistle.
Kirsten.

Fresh Sewing Day - June

Last month was quite a good one for me as I celebrated a birthday and attended a very special quilting class.

I also managed to sew up quite a few projects - a Super Tote to take to the Red Letter Day workshop, a Rugby throw rug, a Cargo Duffle, a couple of Migration blocks for Jess in the Aus Mod bee, and a Social Tote.

I dont think I shared photos of this earlier - I also used the Mini Spools pattern from Camille @ Simplify  to use in a zip pouch to hold all of my sewing supplies.

Linking up with the Fresh Sewing Day at Lily's Quilts.

Kirsten.