Baby Boy Cot Quilt

If you are anything like me you have tonnes of beautiful scraps fabrics from previous projects that are just sitting in the cupboard begging to be used. Recently I decided it was time to put them to good use and I made a simple cot quilt with blues and greys in a basic square design. I raided my fabrics and found some gorgeous prints I knew would work great together.

I found a pretty blue with white spot fabric for the backing. Squares were cut at 5.5 inches and I used a total of 80 squares.



By chain piecing I find that these quilts come together nice and quick and although 80 squares seems like a lot it is quick to get through. For me I like to iron my seams to the side and alternate sides each row so when I go to sew the rows together I can simply nest the seams for a perfect finish.

I quilted this one on my domestic machine using a beautiful grey aurifil 40wt thread called "Dove" just a quarter of an inch either side of the seams. This is my go to thread now and blends so well even with bright coloured fabrics.

I've also just started using quilting gloves as it gives me better grip on my quilts and I find I can guide the quilt through the machine and have a lot more control than without.

Not the best day for taking quilt photos (a little overcast in Sydney) but that wasn't going to stop me sharing this beautiful quilt. I finished the quilt off with a dark blue binding and I love the blue and white polka dot backing.

Such a sweet quilt now available in my etsy store here .....


Till next time...happy sewing
Jenny xxx

Magazines Galore - Part 2

So this is post number 2 of my magazine completed quilts I wanted to share. If you missed my first post check it out here.

I have three more quilts I'd like to share which includes one of my favourite quilts so far (that is if you are allowed to have favourites).

Firstly is my "Desert Trekking Quilt" published in Quilters Companion. This was made with the Arizona fabric range by April Rhodes for Art Gallery Fabrics and also Art Gallery fabrics matching solids. I enjoyed working on this quilt using classic patchwork shapes and joining them together to form unusual rectangular blocks. I quilted this one myself on my trusted Janome too.

Desert Trekking by Jenny Woodward

Next is my all time favourite quilt "Arctic Blue". This appeared in Homespun Magazine in January 2016. For this one I jumped out of my comfort zone of using fat quarter bundles and sourced predominately blue fabric from various quilt shops and online, and experimented also with low volume fabric. Something I have been wanting to do for a long time. I used a classic log cabin block with a contemporary layout and I love how it turned out.

Artic Blue by Jenny Woodward

Finally we have "Pretty Plus" made from Skopelos fabric range by Katarina Roccella for Art Gallery Fabrics. This one featured in Down Under Quilts and was such a fun quilt to make.

Pretty Plus by Jenny Woodward

So that's where I'm at right now with published quilts. I have one more coming out in Handmade shortly and will be published later this year in UK's Love Patchwork & Quilting magazine which I am super excited about.

Till next time....happy sewing....

xx Jenny

Paperie Fabrics - Giveaway

A Sponsored Giveaway.

If you haven't already realised I have a real fondness for the texture and feel of Art Gallery Fabrics so what better way to share my love but to share some of this gorgeous fabric with you.

Together with the Fat Quarter shop I am giving away a Fat Quarter Bundle of Paperie fabrics by Amy Sinibaldi for Art Gallery fabrics to one lucky reader. This is such a sweet collection with romantic shades of pink, subtle greys and a hint of royal blue, and part of the Art Gallery Limited Edition range. Amy’s love for books, not only for the stories, the wonderful words, and the faraway places, but in the look of the book themselves, was her inspiration for this Limited Edition collection.

GIVEAWAY DETAILS:

The Paperie Fat Quarter Bundle includes 9 fat quarters and one half yard cut.

 

To be in the draw please leave a comment on this blog post. Only one comment per person/per email address. International entries welcome! 

 

The draw will take place at 9pm (Australia EDT) on Sunday 13 March 2016, at which time comments to this post will be closed. The winner will be announced by edit to this blog post, and will also be contacted by email.

 

Good luck !!

 

Till next time....happy sewing....

Jenny xxx

 

Thank you for all of your entries!

---------------------------------

ENTRY HAS NOW CLOSED.

---------------------------------

The lucky winner of the Paperie bundle is:

Mara has been contacted by email.

 

 

Magazines Galore - Part 1

Over the past year I have really enjoyed working with a number of our fantastic Australian editors. I have had the privilege of having many of my quilts feature in prominent Australian magazines and feel trying blessed to be able to have the opportunity to feed my creative side.


Featured in this post is a number of the quilts I can now show you finished. The most difficult thing about working with magazines is all the secret sewing I can't share with everyone so I wanted to make sure I show you all the completed products. So this isn't the biggest post you've ever seen I've decided to break it up into 2 posts. I hope you like what you see.


My first quilt "Cascades" was made for Down Under Quilts using the Linen Cupboard range from our very own Emma Jean Jansen. This quilt utilised triangles (lots and lots) and some complementary geometric quilting by my gorgeous longarmer.




Cascades by Jenny Woodward

The next quilt "Tribal Dance" featured in Patchwork and Stitching magazines using the Etno fabric range by the lovely Pat Bravo. I love working with Pat's ranges as a long time quilter herself she really does design ranges that work so well together.

Tribal Dance by Jenny Woodward

Lastly we have "Beginnings" which was part of Handmade's 2015 Yearbook utilising Indelible fabric range by Katarina Roccella for Art Gallery Fabrics. This is a fat quarter friendly quilt and is such a simple but effective design to make a lovely large quilt with no waste. Within this range there is a gorgeous monochrome fabric featuring stags and doilies that makes the perfect backing. I think I need to get myself another bolt.


Beginnings by Jenny Woodward

With all this quilt designing and making and after many enquiries I am now making my patterns available for sale and I've been very humbled by the demand already so thank you. Current patterns are available for download from Crafsty here and hopefully soon you will also see them on sale in some of your favourite quilting shops.

Till next time....happy sewing....
xx Jenny

 

 

Arizona - an Aztec styled quilt

I while ago I bought a bundle of Arizona fabric by April Rhodes. The bundle included matching Art Gallery solids from the Pure Elements range which made a nice set of 14 fat quarters. I haven't used matching solids in my quilts before rather I tend to use a white background to my blocks so I wanted to explore a design that would incorporate both the solids and fabrics together.

I was fortunate enough to share my design with Quilter's Companion magazine who will be featuring my quilt later in the year so I can only share with you a couple of progress shots for the time being.

I incorporated some flying geese blocks and some square in a square blocks and decided to use a quilt as you go method as the blocks are quite large to make the quilting more manageable on my domestic machine.

I bought some matching Aurifil cotton mako' threads in the 40 weight which is a little heavier than the standard 50 weight thread but shows off the quilting stitches nicely. I love that there is just so many colours to chose from making it so easy to match the fabric you are working on perfectly.

I did some shadow quilting around the geese and squares in the quilt to create texture.

I really liked the feel of quilting with the aurifil threads which I hadn't used before.

I am loving the way the quilt is coming together it has a real Aztec feel to it and I can't wait to finish it off with a final border using the Nocturnal solid from the Pure Elements Art Gallery range.

The quilt will be Queen sized and I will be keeping this one for me for my spare bed and I'm sure it will make it's way on the couch now the nights are getting colder here.

Linking up at Freshly Pieced for WiP Wednesday!

Till next time....happy sewing....

xx Jenny

"Bunny Hop" Nursery Set - Work in Progress

When I saw the new range Littlest by Art Gallery Fabrics I just knew I had to buy a bundle. It comes in two colourways, a peach for girls and green for boys. I decided to make a nursery set in the girl colourway.

The fabric is super cute especially with the little bunny rabbits. For inspiration on a quilting design I spoke to my fellow quilter and good friend Moira of CraftyPa & CraftyMa. You can see her beautiful work here. I decided on a simple square design with sashing and some strips top and bottom as I couldn't bare to cut up all those little rabbits.

Sashing was in a grey shot cotton from my stash and was a little difficult to work with given the difference in weave between it and the Littlest fabric.

But I persisted with it and am happy with the result so far. I'm still deciding how I'm going to quilt this one.

With the left over fabric I made up some cute little fabric wall canvases to match.

I also decided to make some bunting to complete this beautiful nursery set.

 

I can't wait to see this in a little girls nursery it's super sweet and the fabric just makes me want to smile. The set will be available in my store soon.

It's Sunday so I'm linking up with Molli Sparkles Sunday Stash weekly linky party.

Till next time.....happy sewing...