AMH Painted Portrait Dress

There are so many beautiful fabrics available these days and although I rarely make clothes,  it was hard to resist using some of this lovely rayon to make a dress.

I chose the Anna Maria Horner Painted Portrait Blouse/Dress and made the sleeveless dress version with pockets.

One of the reason I don't tend to sew clothing is having to trace off pattern pieces from the flimsy paper but for the dress there were only a few that I needed.

To ensure I was cutting my special fabric correctly, I even made up a muslin beforehand to check sizing.

The dress came together well and the bias edging around the arms was quite easy to do and finished off the seams nicely.

It is still warm enough here to wear a sleeveless dress and I happen to have a cute wooden beaded necklace that matches it well:)

Linking up with Fabric Tuesday @ Quiltstory. 

This was on my FAL Q1 list for this year so linking up with the 2016 FAL team.

Kirsten.

Tula Undercover Maker Mat

Now that I have my own craft area, one of the things I wanted to make for my sewing desk was an Undercover Maker Mat using the pattern Nicole @ Lillyella.

My favourite colour is green so I chose some of the Tula Pink fabrics from True Colours and Eden.

Firstly I made the butterfly block for the pocket panel - so cute and easy to make.

Then the rest of the panel came together quite easily.

 And it now sits under my sewing machine in my nice new craft area!

Linking up with Fabric Tuesday @ Quiltstory. 

This project was on my FAL Q1 list for this year so linking up with the 2016 FAL team.

Kirsten.

The Big Pineapple quilt

After making a Pineapple mini quilt and runner recently, I decided to make a lap sized quilt using a cute pattern by Jackie Padesky.

I already had plenty of yellow and green fabrics so just needed some white for the background. 

Last week, I finished sewing the yellow pineapple blocks.

Then got the quilt pin basted ready for quilting.

I found the perfect yellow backing for the quilt to match the bright colour of the pineapples.

For the quilting, I did a simple cross hatch which kind of resembled the texture of a pineapple and then bound it in some of the teal green. 

And because I live in Australia and we have a great love for "Big Things" this has now been renamed "The Big Pineapple Quilt" in honour of the iconic Pineapple at Nambour in Queensland.

Above photo courtesy of @carrose on IG

Linking up with Fabric Tuesday @ Quiltstory. 

This was on my FAL Q1 list for this year so linking up with the 2016 FAL team.

Kirsten.

"MisDirection" pattern giveaway (now closed)

Last year, I tested the "MisDirection" pattern by Jess @The Elven Garden. Jess' stunning quilt was featured in the Quilt Con 2015 magazine and also won 3rd place in the "Use of Negative Space" category at the Modern Quilt Show Australia. 

Jess has now released the "MisDirection" pattern which can be purchased from her craftsy shop or from payhip, so please stop by her blog to see all of other amazing versions by her team of pattern testers!  .

This is my version "Sublime" which you can read about more on the original blog post here.

Jess has also very kindly offered a PDF copy of her "MisDirection" pattern to giveaway so if you would like to win, please leave a comment here  - maybe tell me what colours you would use to make this quilt. You can also gain another entry by commenting on my Instagram post (@67kirsten).

I will combine the entries and draw a winner on Monday 21/3 using the random number generator. Please leave your email address in your comment if it is not linked to your profile so that I can contact you if you win. Good luck!

*winner drawn* 

And it was one of the IG comments by @angesullivan who would like to make the quilt in grey, white, black and purple for a KSU sports fan - I will contact Ange and forward her email onto Jess. Thanks all for entering!

Kirsten.

Le Challenge - Fantastic Mr Fox mini

This months theme for Le Challenge was "Reading" so for inspiration,  I looked through the childrens books we found when we were clearing out my daughters room recently.

"Fantastic Mr Fox" by Roald Dahl was always a favourite of mine and it made me think of the cute fox blocks in the Fancy Fox pattern by Elizabeth Hartman so I made a little foxy mini.

And because I now need to wear glasses for reading, I thought I should put a pair on him too:)

Linking up with "Le Challenge" over with Lucy and Nat.

Kirsten.

Scraptastic Tuesday - Scrappy HST's

A fun QAL which I am joining in with is the Moda ABC Birthday QAL which I blogged about here .

To make many of the letters, the patterns involve sewing "Easy Corner Triangles" - for example to form the corners of the "O", "D" and "A" below. Before I trim the corners of the alphabet blocks,  I have been sewing an extra seam so that I make another little HST measuring about 2".

After making all of the letters for the alphabet, I had a pile of almost 80 leftover scrappy HST which I have now made into a panel for a tote bag.

Linking up with Scraptastic Tuesday hosted by Leanne @ She Can Quilt and Nicky @ Mrs Sew and Sew.

Kirsten.

Very Hungry Caterpillar quilt

The Very Hungry Caterpillar book by Eric Carle was one of my childrens favourite stories when they were young, and I recently used the fabrics to make a baby quilt.

Like the Tribal Woodlands baby quilt I made last year, I again used the the Jeliquilts Plus quilt pattern by Kelly.

I started with a few of the Very Hungry Caterpillar fabrics and added in a few coordinating prints.

For the quilting, I used the Serpentine stitch as it made me think of a caterpillar crawling over the quilt:)

For the backing, I used some Ed Emberley "Happy Drawing" fabric.

And a lime binding to finish it all off - these frogs really are very cute.

Still not convinced the white background was the best choice for a baby quilt but I couldn't decide on an alternative  - anyway, it does look nice and fresh!

 

Linking up with Fabric Tuesday @ Quiltstory. 

This was on my FAL Q1 list for this year so linking up with the 2016 FAL team.

Kirsten.