Wintery gate and a great progress

In the weekend I was working on the gate and a one-over-one birdie for Winter Watergarden. Originally the bird was cardinal which is not native in Europe, so I put a blue tit to the middle. This is identical to the one which is sitting in the corner, and for each side I will stitch the one which is shown there: one robin and 2 others whose name I do not know. The inside of the gate is really beautiful, but was a real hard work to stitch: I was frogging almost everything once because I misplaced the motives.

I also realised the Gloriana thread for the frame won't be enough - the floss is only 3yds instead 6. I suppose the long one was too pricey, but still... I have seen in the pattern it was originally 8yds, then I bought as 6 a few years ago, this year it was 4yds, and now on the website it is only 3yds. I buy it from casacenina, because I have quite a lot floss and I do not need the whole package, moreover, with the occassional 25-30% discount and without tax added it is much better priced, but I have never thought I should look the length of floss as well!

Quilt galore

My son is going to school next September, and I made some lapquilts as parting presents for the ladies in the nursery. I wanted to keep simple, so they are only squared ones in different colours. Each lady got her favourite combination - or at least I hope so. The blue was a little too simple, so I added some quilting to make it nicer. Oh, I just realised the center still missing, I need to finish it up! The red and brown are already popping, so I just made a very subtle quilting not to distract from the setup. There is a real good tutorial from quiltkisses how to make such quilts with the tube method - real easy and quick!

The last one is a practice piece, I thought in the beginning the brown will be ugly, so I quickly set up a new one, but when I added a border and binded the original, I realised it is not bad at all, so the additional piece stood as a free-motion sample. Each corner is done differently, I was experiencing with the motifs. And now we have a nice one to cuddle under when we are watching tv, so it is a real win-win situation! For the backing I used some old fabrics and I really like how they turned out. 

These pieces were really a confirmation for me, that we should not be discouraged if something seems to be not perfect during a project, and even the less attractive fabrics will look real good if they are finished. If there is not enough from a fabric, there is only some creativity needed and the result will be even better. If you check the third quilt, the dark green patches in the side are added because I did not have enough of the yellow - and it really adds an extra touch. The same applies for the backing on the last: I used the fabric I had on hand but it was not enough, so the missing part was taken from some neutral remaining from some previous project.

Click on to see the details! (And try not to notice how harsh was winter on our door's painting...)

A new start - Winter Watergarden

Chatelaine: Winter Watergarden

Fonal/Floss: DMC and many silks as suggested in the kit

Anyag/Fabric: Zweigart antique white 32 ct Belfast

I disappeared for a long time, but my hands were not idle. Paying tribute to the seasons I started Winter Watergarden. Having the Knotgarden series - almost - finished I moved to the Watergardens. Winter and Autumn definitely are on my list, but I am still hesitating on Spring. I do not like it that much, and there are so beautiful designs from Martina Weber (owner and designer of Chatelaine) that most probably I will skip that one. This design is so good to stitch, I can hardly stop. If you click on you can see how much difference some longstitch makes: the tree on the right is without, on the left is with branches - otherwise identical.

Summery butterflyies

Chatelaine: Summer Knotgarden

Fonal/Floss: DMC + many silks as suggested in the kit

Anyag/Fabric: Zweigart antique white 32 ct Belfast

I redid the clouds as Ineke advised, and she was right - much better this way. I really liked the little butterflies flying around. I thought Summer Knotgarden will be a bit boring, but far from it, it is really beautiful!