New 12 x 12 group

I have recently helped set up a new 12 x 12 art quilt group in our area.  I have been playing in the background of another local group  for about a year - I made small quilts for there first six topics but was not part of their reveal.  Now that we have our own group up and running I have stopped making quilts for their themes. 

I held the first meeting at my house and chose the first theme - spring.  I chose this theme for several reasons:
                -the word has several meanings
                -it will be spring when we have our first reveal later in September
                -I thought it was a relatively easy topic for those who have not done this sort of work    
                 before.

I have made the following quilt and will call it "Spring Garden Festival"  - we have a fabulous annual garden festival in our region every spring.

 

I will also be revealing a second art piece that I made for another textile group I belong to.  I will call this "Spring Homecoming Ball".  Although there is very little fabric on this one it is made with a front, batting and backing.  I found the idea in a recent Cloth, Paper, Scissors magazine.

 

 

 

I am really enjoying making these art quilts.  I will blog about some of the others soon.

 

 

New Toy

I am feeling so chuffed - I have shouted myself a new Juki sewing machine and swiftquilter frame.

 

When we set it up we didn't realise that it had an extension for larger quilts - will have to rethink how I set it up as I wouldn't be able to use the extension at the moment. 

 

However I have quilted one cot sized quilt already.

 

 

This quilt has been sitting around for awhile although I have only recently added the 4" squares in the border.  I made this quilt in response to a challenge on http://www.15minutesplay.com/ to use low value fabrics.

 

I also rescued a much loved small quilt from my daughters place that needed a few repairs.  Because of my love of using small scraps of fabrics I don't always use 1/4" seams and have had a problem with seams coming adrift.  I mended the seams with invisible thread and the quilted it all over.  Hopefully it will last a lot longer now.  I have no photos of this one.