24 Thursday Jan 2013
Posted in News
Ya know what sucks? Spam sucks. I have a finite amount of time to spend working on these mystery quilts, and sadly I seem to spend more time dealing with spam comments than I do sewing. Seriously. Argh.
But I am here, and I am sewing. I’m hopeful that I will be able to send the Jelly Roll Mystery to my test sewers by the end of next week. *fingers crossed*
29 Monday Oct 2012
Posted in News
My mother, Sandra McKenzie (also known as WinterBear to some of her online friends) recently passed away.
She was a prolific quilter as you can see from the small sample of projects below. I just picked random pictures of some of her finished projects that she’d posted on Facebook to share with you.
Mom had a lot of friends online who she swapped blocks, projects and fabric with on a regular basis. Also, like most quilters, my mom had a large stash of fabric. My sister and I took some of her stash, and a huge amount was given to one of her friends to make charity quilts with, but in the spirit of my mom I snatched a few meters to share with her friends online.
I cut the fabric up into fat quarter(ish) pieces that I’m going to mail to Mom’s friends. I will be sending some to a couple different people from the online groups Mom was a part of, and they will be able to distribute them at the same time as they do their regular swaps. But I also have a few extras I’m willing to send to any of my Mom’s friends who may not be a part of swapping groups. If that is you, please email me at rhonda@jofigure.com and I’ll send something your way.
Mom would be estatic to know that her fabric was going to continue to be used in wonderful, creative fabric art.
I have at least two different patterns planned in memorium of my mother, but I’m going to finish the Jelly Roll Surprise one first. I’m still not emotionally ready to design the Mom-centric ones just yet.
15 Wednesday Aug 2012
Posted in News
I’ve got it. The perfect project for getting back into the quilting (and mystery quilting) groove. It’s simple enough for uber beginners but interesting enough that it won’t bore more experienced quilters. It’s scrap-friendly and should be fun. I’m starting to press my fabric and all that good stuff tonight.
Yay!
12 Sunday Aug 2012
Posted in News
I had a project I wanted to do, the Meta Project, but I just couldn’t seem to get started on it. I knew what I wanted to do, but I just felt really uninspired. All the fabric I picked out to work with wasn’t quite right, and then my quilting space was wrong and, etc. etc. etc. The point is, it wasn’t happening. Not even a little.
In writing when this happens and I find that I am fighting myself to get something done, that means the timing is not right. In the case of a story it means I need some more time to let it stew around in my subconscious before I try to put it onto paper, or if I’m revising it means I need to separate myself from the project for a little while and then come back to it with a fresh perspective. It turns out that in quilting, the same is true.
Now is not the time for me to be working on that project, so I’ve put it on hold and I’m currently drafting a couple others. I say a couple others because I’m apparently totally indecisive right now and I can’t choose which of several ideas I want to full develop into a mystery quilt. Or, more specifically, which one to do first.
I may come to a decision all by myself (like a grown up!) or, I might come to you with several options and do a poll to see what you’d like to do. We’ll see. We’ll see very soon as I’m hoping to have all my rough drafts done tonight.
04 Wednesday Apr 2012
Tags
I’ve decided that my next project isn’t going to be mysterious at all. In fact, it’s going to be more like a tutorial.
I mentioned that one of my friends is very new to quilting and was looking for a good way to ease in, well this is going to be that. I’m going to do step by step directions (with pictures) of everything from how to use a rotary cutter to how to strip piece. The end result ought to be a lovely but very, very, very simple quilt or throw with a Nine Block at its heart.
I’ve picked out the fabric I’m going to use and tonight I’ll start taking pictures and playing around with it.
I’m also in the middle of ripping an old quilt apart to see how much of it I can save though, which is taking up a fair amount of my time, so my progress on the Meta Project may be a little slow. Slow progress is better than no progress though, right?
29 Sunday Jan 2012
Posted in Easy, Medium, Table Runner, Three Colors, Two Colors
This tablerunner has two different versions — a three color version and a two color version. I will be releasing it on July 1st, just in time for Canada Day but since July 4th is so close I thought two versions would be a good idea. If you’re going with a Canadian theme you may want to do the two color version in red and white, but if you want more colors or happen to be an American looking for a red, white and blue theme — you can do that with the three color version 🙂
Two Color Version:
~ Step One ~ Step Two ~ Step Three ~ Step Four ~ Step Five ~
Three Color Version:
~ Step One ~ Step Two ~ Step Three ~ Step Four ~ Step Five ~ Step Six ~
A note on difficulty. I listed this as both ‘easy’ and ‘medium’ difficulty. The two color version is easy, and the three color one is of medium difficulty, not because of any trickiness in cutting or sewing, but because you need to be paying attention when you put the units together.
25 Wednesday Jan 2012
Posted in News
Heh. New material. I kill me :-p
Though, I really am working on some. A friend of mine recently told me that she was interested in quilting but, sorta didn’t know where to start. So I’m working on a new mystery pattern that is super duper easy, but ought to be pretty awesome once it’s done too. It’s almost like an introduction to strip-piecing.
I’m still in the planning stages, but ought to be ready to start cutting within a week or so (depending on how often my video games distract me).
In the meantime, I’ll keep moving the patterns from the old site over here. Keep watching this space 🙂
23 Monday Jan 2012
Posted in Easy, Table Runner, Three Colors
This is a quick project that can be finished in a weekend with no trouble. It’s slightly more difficult than the Valentines Day Mystery, but is still very much a ‘beginner’ pattern. Even if you’re just starting out in quilting you can jump into this project and create a lovely table runner to grace your home — or give away as a gift.
This tablerunner will take one fat quarter each of three different colors, and about a half meter of your background color to complete. The finished size is approx. 44″ x 14″
Remember, don’t click on the ‘Finished Projects’ link until you want to know what the quilt looks like when it’s done.
22 Sunday Jan 2012
Posted in Easy, Quilt, Square, Three Colors
This is my first mystery and was created for the Mailblocks quilting group. I wanted it to be something even the most inexpirienced quilter could do with confidence — as such, it’s extremely simple but really quite charming just the same.
It could be done over a weekend, but I’d suggest giving it a week — so that you don’t go mad from making HSTs. The end result is approx. 40″ x 40″ without any borders.
Remember, don’t click on the ‘Finished Projects’ link until you want to know what the quilt looks like when it’s done.
16 Monday Jan 2012
Posted in News
So I’m back.
Sort of.
I’m going to skip the big, long explanations. The fact is this blog got accidentally deleted. By me. I was so pissed off at myself that I put up the old HTML version again and walked away.
It’s been a couple years now, I’m willing to forgive myself and I’ve come back to put this back up. At least one mystery project has been lost forever, but I guess that just means I ought to get my butt in gear and make more.
Right after I get this website back up and running. It’s going to take some time. I’d say bear with me but no one can see this yet. By the time you can, the site will be up. Heh.
So. Yeah. I’m on it.
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