Thursday, December 10, 2015

Advent, Advent, ein Packerl kommt

In Europe we celebrate the four Sundays before Christmas as Advent. I LOVE Advent time with all the preparations, markets, candles, cookies(!) and the presents we get up front from people around us (office, stores etc.).

Yesterday I got my first (surprise!) present from one of our guild members as a thank you for the newsletter I´ve been sending (and will start sending again by mid December). Three beautiful GREY fabrics (already know which quilt they will go in) and many natural, handmade and deliciously smelling soaps. I was so very delighted and happy to get something out of the blue. Thank you soo much for it Gisela, you made my Advent!!

I´m again sewing jeans pillows with fir trees for a customer order. It is a relaxing and quite mediative work, to appliqué fabrics with ziggzagg stitches on jeans fabric.

Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Michael Miller Glitz Fabric Challenge 2015

Here it is, a weekends (day and night) work and as you might say: a last minute Christmas Card (XXL).

While I was sewing my last few lines (at 2 o´clock in the morning) my sewing machine wanted to quit! Can you imagine that? So I will have to rip off the last wobbly lines and do them again. But for the application I had to leave it at that. 

I have to accept that my small Pfaff machine is not fit for free motion quilting, no matter how many times I try to get the seams right or take it to the shop, it never will. Not to my judgement.  

But: I had sooooo much fun sewing this quilt, the Glitz fabric and the Michael Miller Cotton Couture fabrics were perfect to cut and sew and the colors are just candy (for me chocolate) to my eye. Otherwise I would not have done this sewing marathon, wouldn´t I? Or am I just a complete addict to sewing and quilting now?







Saturday, November 28, 2015

With Christmas approaching...

... the weekends are the busiest ever! But now I have to add the evenings during the week, too and almost every free minute to get all the things done that I´ve intended to. But even with all my good intentions that is SIMPLY JUST NOT possible. So I took an hour to make a list and see what is possible and what is not. What can be "outsourced"? 

This is what I´ve done the last 2 weeks:

A star is born! A baby quilt for little Jakob, arriving one month earlier than expected.




Also, I finished the top for the Christmas Tree QAL (by Sandra Hohenbrunner and Aylin Nilya). 




And: I finally started on the Michael Miller Glitz Fabric Challenge..... well, if I tell you that the deadline is Monday, 30th November what would you say? 

Late enough but until now I just did NOT know what to make. Then last week when I was thinking about making this years´Christmas Cards I knew what I want to create: a XXL-Christmas Card Quilt.





I was always making the Christmas Cards myself but as I mentioned earlier, this year I had to outsource something on my to do list and now it will be the Christmas Cards. 

A week ago I met a lovely woman at a Christmast Market, she´s from Vietnam, living in Austria, making and selling a lot of crafts. She also supports several organisations in Vietnam and this year it´s a Childrens´ Cancer organisation in Bep An Nhan Ai.  

So I will send out these terrific Pop-up Christmas Cards this year to all my friends and customers (below are just 2 examples from many cards that can be bought):


 


I think they are beautiful and modern and I hope that my Michael Miller Challenge Quilt will turn out like that, too.

In the meantime I wish you all a wonderful and stressles "pre-christmas" time, attending Christmas Markets and meeting nice and creative people!

 

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Christmas market in Schrems

Last weekend we had a small wooden hut to sell our staff at the Christmas market in Schrems - the whole market had about 14 stalls and all of them sold very special and exquisite things: soaps, christmas decoration, christmas cribs, rusted iron sheet decorations, jewelery, beanies and hats etc. etc.
 
Again I experienced that many people do not know quilts and those who do often said "ohhh, I made one of those, too, a long time ago," or "but have never finished it". And again we got so many compliments for our works.
 
But the weather was definitely too warm (only in the afternoon and in the evening it got as cold as it should be at this time of year). So many people mentioned that they did not feel in a Christmas mood or spirit at all. Never mind, we spent 2 lovely days in Schrems and got to know some more very nice people, doing all kinds of handicrafts.
 
 







Friday, November 13, 2015

Christmas sewing....

has already started, even with the warm temperature and the sun outside I am totally in the Christmas Sewing Mood. 

First the Christmas Tree QAL blocks that I have finished and will now form the top, second I made another jeans cushion with fir trees and and third two cute TOMTEs. Tomtes are mischievous little spirits in charge of protecting a home and the people who live there.

I got the pattern for a Tomte in Kirstyn Cogans book "URBAN SCANDINAVIAN SEWING" and I love the book. There are 18 seasonal projects for Modern Living to make, sew or cook, easy to follow and some pretty quick to make and perfect gifts for Christmas or the time until then.










Wednesday, November 11, 2015

Block 11, 12 and 13

The last 3 blocks were (again) fun to make with almost no seam-ripping at all. I really felt "in da flow", sewing, cutting, arranging and finishing the 3 blocks. 

They are now ready to be arranged into a Christmas Tree which I will probably do this weekend - next to being at a Christmas Market in Schrems-Frohnleiten, where I´ll be in a little wooden house, selling my quilts, jiipeeehhh!! 

So should you be in that area this weekend, come by and I will treat you to a little gift! Just mention "Christmas Tree"!








Sunday, November 1, 2015

In between.....

.... I made some more jeans pillows - I love to cut up jeans and arrange them into a pillow, trying out new patterns, training my sewing skills (sometimes not an easy task with my sewing machine) and having fun at it!