BossyOz

Less than a year ago I attempted paper piecing for the first time. So far I have paper pieced only that pattern, the Little Hedgehog by Artisania , and the Mail Envelopes from Love Patchwork and Quilting . Both of these I used for my partner in the Schnitzel and Boo mini quilt swap. A few months ago, Lynne at Lily’s Quilts posted a picture on Instagram asking if anyone wanted to make something with fabrics from the Cherie line by Frances Newcombe for Art Gallery Fabrics. There was absolutely no logic to why I put my hand up to create a new paper piecing design. The only reason I can see, is that I have always liked challenges. The fabric line has a few pastel fabrics which I usually are not too keen on, but also a few with grey, white and beige. As I couldn't decide which colours to use and using all of them would be too busy, i n the end, I made two versions. To give you some clues, it involves sewing and cake…. You can find my two mini quilts in the paper piecing...

For November, Angela asked us to make the Trellis Crossroads block in pure white and black. This sounded simple enough, and finally a block without lots and lots of HST. It was nice with a change, LOL…… This being a new block for me, I made a test block in red, blue and white to add to my collection for the "Dear Nina" quilt. The biggest challenge for me this month was to find properly white and black fabrics! Plenty of the ones I had in my stash were off-white. As you can see in the block below, the off-white just doesn't look right. Deciding this wasn't properly crisp, I made a new one with 'whiter' fabrics. This is the one I finally sent off to Angela: To see more of this quilt and other things Angela is up to, hop over to her blog  or Instagram . As before, the pattern can be found in the book "Modern Bee - 13 quilts to make with friends", by Lindsay Conner.

I never win anything, but it suddenly happened! I won!! And what a prize!!!! Donna at The Modern Maker nominated me, and I nominated her (without the other one actually knowing about it!) in Karen Lewis' give away when she reached 6,000 followers on Instagram. Karen is based in the United Kingdom and makes fabulous screen printing designs on (mainly) Kona Solids. Donna and I both won 12 panels each; of our choice, both in colour and in print! I finally settled on plenty of different colours, to fill some of the gaps in my rainbow stash. I asked Karen to use a light grey print instead of her usual white and the result is amazing. These are the fabrics I selected: With the UK mini swap and various bee blocks coming up, I'm looking forward to using some of these fairly soon, albeit sparingly…. To see more of Karen's gorgeous fabrics, head over to her blog and shop . Thank you so, so much Karen (and Donna for nominating me!). xxx

Sign-ups are now CLOSED We call it the Late Joiners' or the Stragglers' version of the UK Mini Swap!!!  Please read THE RULES .  If you agree to all of them, and only then, please head over and sign up for the swap.  Please take your time filling in the answers! I'll publish a "final call for sign-ups", so please don't rush!   The better information you provide, the easier it'll be for your Partner to make a Mini Quilt which makes you happy! All levels are welcome. You MUST be active on social media. Sign-ups are now CLOSED December is a festive and busy month for most of us, hence please be patient whilst we prepare for and celebrate Christmas, and match you with your partner.

Finally, I'm able to post this!!! After what has felt like FOREVER, it has finally arrived with Kristal ( IG - tootlejayne ). During the last few months I have been working on a mini quilt for my partner in the IG mini swap. I had some information from the questionnaire she filled in when signing up for the swap. But most helpful, was her inspiration mosaics which she posted on Instagram. Based on the information in the questionnaire, the above mosaic and two others which she reposted from other swappers, I decided to develop my mini around a few headlines: Rainbow plus the LOVE of orange Hexagons Negative space Bonnie and Camille Tula Pink Deciding to combine all of the above, it seemed fit to do hexagons, with Bonnie and Camille plus Tula Pink fabrics, in a rainbow-ish pattern, with negative space around. GLUE BASTING, without you there would never have been a mini!!!! Having previously used thread to tack my hexagons, the glue pen was a saviour!!! As you m...

In January 2015, we are kicking off a quilting bee called Scandi Bee. As the name suggests, it's for quilters living in or connected to the Scandinavian countries. As a starter, we decided to make each other a mug rug for Christmas. We were split in two groups and one person from the other group allocated partners for us. Stalking my partner on Instagram and Flickr, plus looking at her specially created inspiration mosaic, I decided it was time to make my first ever Dresden. Or, as it turned out, a quarter of a Dresden. Her feeds are very colourful, so I'm hoping this little cutie hits the spot. Confession time; the bird and the branches are actually one piece of home dec fabric, on which I appliquéd the Dresden flower / sun. It feels great when an idea pops up, which then is possible to execute with the right fabrics. #scandibee