Trip Around the World and other stuff

Early this year I started on this hand pieced Trip Around the world.  I saw one that my friend Pip Porter was working on.  Hers was positively beautiful, and I wanted one too.  Pip's is made of modern fabrics with reproductions mixed in and mine in just reproductions.  As I was working on it, a number of people made a comment about using up fabrics, and I started to write down the amounts in case I decided to make a pattern.  I am not making a pattern, but I still have the amounts written down.  You can access the "pattern" using this link.  I will also put something on the side bar so that others can find it.  Let me know if the link is not working.


Apart from a bit of hand work, I have been working on the sewing machine over the last few weeks and have a couple of new things to show.  Last post I showed how I had started on this machine applique from Kaffe Fassett's Museum Quilts book.  I am really enjoying the machine applique!  No wonder people love it......you get something done in Weeks rather than years!

 I decided to use some of my stash of reproduction fabrics.  I love stripe fabrics and I love wiggly prints.

 Love this swan!  and I have wanted to use this fabric for ages.  It is quite overpowering so does not fit in everywhere

 How about the hombre cat? 

 This is a hand or a glove - not sure which, but the same shape.

 So far I have completed 2 of the 5 rows of applique.  It is all done on 15"blocks, then sewn together.  Then you put more shapes over the seams.  You can still see some spaces, so in due coure I will add a few other shapes, not in the pattern

It was a nice day today, so I drew up all the shapes, and sat out on the verandah to cut them out.  I got 2 pineapples done, 2 gloves, 2 pigs and 2 cats.  And, I am one who says I don't like animals on my quilts!  Had to break my own rules.

Also on the machne jsut lately, I launched into a black and white quilt.  I saw something like it on Pinterest, and decided I could probably knock up a few blocks a day. 

The first 6 blocks took no time at all, and I did not really have enough to make them all different, so ended up using a few prints in reversed places.  There are 24 in total and I am looking at a "strippy" kind of setting with 4 rows of 6 blocks.  There is a little bit of red going in there too.

This is the last one I made, and finally I got the zig zags going in the right direction