Stolen Time

Collection 17

Phew where did the time go.  It is now Thursday and I have only now just managed to delete the old linkies for last fortnight's Scatterday. I couldn't delete them earlier because I haven't had a  chance to check them all out until just now. 

Truth also to be told I didn't realise a fortnight had almost gone. I thought I had another week to go. Will have to get stuck into my post for the letter D tomorrow.

By the way I have included the photo here as one of the blocks in my Raconteur quilt was called the Thief of Time. This block was named after a clock of the same name in Paris. I was trying to add a photo of the clock but couldn't find it. The Thief of Time is the burnt orange block on the left hand side

EPP Tested

C? USA International

 A short while ago Carol mentioned that she loved English paper piecing. Personally, although I had made one quilt using that method, it was, like applique, not something that I was going to repeat too often.  However I figured that if she was willing to test my patterns for the method I was willing to convert the patterns for it.

Since then Carol has made numerous blocks using EPP. REsearching on the web I found there were two methods commonly used for converting, scaling the patterns or increasing the line width and then cutting on both sides of the line.

Initially I scaled the blocks and Carol liked this method however when I tried it I found I had difficulty when there were many seams that joined onto a single piece of fabric and so decided to try the thicker line method. 

C? USA International

I tried both methods and preferred the cut both sides of the thicker line but when Carol tried both methods she preferred the scaled pattern method. 

I have now added the thicker line templates to all of the patterns but have promised Carol that after next week I will continue scaling the patterns for her. So if anyone would prefer the scaled patterns just let me know and I will also send those out.

Here are her two versions of USA International. Carol found that the thicker line method made blocks slightly bigger that the required size. While I found that the scaled templates were too small. Interesting isn't it.

Mind you when you add the borders and then trim the whole thing to the correct finished size you can't see the difference...aren't border helpful?

Snippets Class continued

I Love Lucy

Crystal Dreams

I don't know where I have hidden the photos from my first day at the recent retreat. As I said in the previous post it was a two day class. The first was hand work while the second was machine work. I had taken more photos than this from the first day but am unable to find them, which is a shame as there were some lovely colour combinations. Hopefully the students will send me photos so that I can share them here.

I Love Lucy - in progress

I have found these four and you can see what a difference colour choice makes. Daiva again used bright colours and decided in Crystal Dreams that the flower should have some leaves. Also using different colours for the vase and the flowers creates a different look again. Daiva is planning, at this stage to back and quilt each block separately and then bring the backing over to the front and join these to form a bag. Looking forward to seeing it soon.... Daiva didn't seem to be someone who left projects to whenever to complete:) She finished three blocks over the weekend and made them all by hand.

Merry Xmas - in progress

Meg's fabrics for both this block and the machne pieced were pale..exactly what I had planned Raconteur to be when I began it. I wonder if she will make all of her blocks is such gentle colours.

Bev loved the machine stitching day and apart from sewing Enter With Care managed to complete all of the sections for Merry Xmas on the second day, even though it was a shorter day than the first.

Childhood Memories

C11 Rose Garden

C9 Accepted Few

C11 I'm Three

Carol loves to fussy cut and boy does she have some lovely fabrics to do so with. Rose Garden would remind all of us of those old fashioned roses that little old ladies used to have. When I was a child there was such an old lady about three doors down from my home and every Mother's Day, Xmas or special occassion the children in the area would descend on her doorstep. She would give all of us a small bouquet of flowers for our mums. The roses, to me at least, were the most prized as they had such a wonderful perfume. A few years ago I took my husband to see this garden but not only had the garden been removed so had her gorgeous little house ..... sometimes progress isn't really positive.

Actually when you look at her fabrics for all of the blocks in this post you see so many things from my childhood, the chickens in the backyard, everyone had those, and all of the insects we searched for. Oh and the name I'm Three why of course can't you see a small child holding up any number of fingers, seldom the right number, and saying I'm three or I'm four..so big they believe.

What a Difference Colour Makes

Well here we have seven blocks from students at my first Snippets class. It was a two day class with the first day being hand work and the second machine work. Everyone appeared to enjoy the class, particularly the second day.

Several of these blocks still need their outer borders but you can see how great they are going to be. 
Daiva changed her colour layout and achieved a totally different block. I love it when people add their own preferances into something.

Accepted Few

C9 Accepted Few

Another delightful block from Carol. Accepted Few evolved when I started to make it in one fabric and part way through found I didn't have enough fabric to make all of the dark pieces and had to settle on fewer than I had originally planned. I love those chicken feet.

Busy Weekend

C11 - Hunter's Web

C8 - King of Versailles (in the Outback)

C8 - Too Many Thorn

C9 (Feral) Sports D

Well Carol and her blocks have had a very busy weekend. Whilst out with the King of Versailles (in the Outback) and in the midst of her (Feral) Sports Day she encountered Too Many Thorns and a Hunter's Web.  Amazing how if you try you can link anything together..makes one wonder why they don't solve more crimes these days...perhaps due to the fact that fabricating links isn't really the right way to go.

Hunter's Web and Too Many Thorns were two of my favourites. In the original quilt Hunter's Web is actually smaller as I didn't check my printing scale and printed it 'to fit on the page', whatever scale that was I don't remember but I do know that it was my last sheet of foundation paper and so I left it. I prefer Carol's version where the points go right out to the edge... love points in case you haven't guessed:)

King of Versilles was made after a day out with our son. He was studying in Paris at the time and thought we would enjoy the palace, which we did. Carol's busy faric is more reminiscent of the busyness and ornateness of the palace. Well worth the visit and better allows people to understand why the normal people rebelled at the royals considering many of them were starving at the time.

I must say that Carol's take on a sports day is to the point and very true for the average three legged race with senior boys. That is one event I won't miss when I leave work.

Scatterday D

Isn't that D something else.

I just love stripes and for this week we will have

# something humourous

# feet

# furniture

# and a quilty display

Posting date is 16th March.

Scatterday I - Announcing Australia's NEW wealthiest woman

OK all of you poor lowly mortals I believe that I must now be the richest person in Australia.  I just checked on the web and Gina Rhinehart only has a mere $20 billion whereas as may be seen from my photographed notes above I not only have an original Iraqi Dinar of unkonwn value but I also have $100 trillion which everyone must agree is an immense sum. Both of these notes were purchased by my ingenious son using funds saved from his weekly pocket money..boy are we generous parents to be able to afford to give him enough money he could save the necessary funds..and we never thought he was a good saver:)
I have been investigating how poor Gina invests her wealth and figured that mining was the way to go. Now to the eye of an immature individual the second photo may appear to be just rubble from my backyard but trust me it is iron ore from my backyard and after my friend Eddie gets his mate Ian to pay me an over inflated amount for mining rights I could well have another $100 trillion. With this immense wealth I was hoping to purchase an innovative ipad but this tool is beyond my trillions and so I will probably need to settle on the inferior ipad mini whilst waiting for my investments to mature.
Due to my strong finanacial situation I have decided it is the perfect time to expand my craft interests to inchies which I am easily able to afford since my mum gave me a 40L container of buttons and being a scrooge I have never thrown away any scraps even those huge palm sized pieces that many of you store in your trash can...as they say a fabric saved is a fabric earned. I would have actually sewn the buttons onto my inchies but... organising my immense wealth is just so time consuming..perhaps next time.

Fingers Crossed

Snippets

Well in just over eight hours I am heading off to Cobargo. Don't ask me where that is as I don't know, apart from the fact it is about four hours south of here about. I am off to a retreat and am teaching Snippets.  Plenty of photos will follow sometime next week, but this post is just to warn people. If anything goes wrong with my scheduled Scatterday upload or if anyone is having difficulties uploading their link please accept my apologises but I can't do anything until Monday at the earliest.

Looking forward to checking everything next Monday.... and hoping that everything goes better than my iPad transfers have been going..which is why I am still up at 12.43am