Greens are good for you

I have put Emerald piece aside while I dither about how to quilt it because the problem is that I am now in love with the flatness of it, and with the suede-iness of the sand linen.

I think this picture better shows the effect you get from exploiting the grain of the fabric.  You can see it best in the mid green, and just about make it out in the dark green top and top left.  I still cannot capture the green-ness of it, even though I discovered that my camera has a function to enhance greens.   (Did you see Martha's piece on photography btw? The pics on her blog are always beautiful.)

Meanwhile I've been trying out the effect of the different threads on offcuts of the Oakshott, and some bits of Backstitch Klona cotton left over from this.  Although the Klona isn't shot it has a lovely sheen to it.  Photo overload coming up.

The heart is a piece of sea glass my husband found.

I'm quite tempted to leave the edges unfinished.

WIP Wednesday

So nice to finally be able to share a WIP! I'm working on a piece in green Oakshott cottons (leftovers from this cushion).  I should be working on the Aviary quilt I'm making for Siblings Together, but got distracted by the Pantone Emerald Quilt Challenge on Flickr.  Despite the horrible time I had with my sewing machine yesterday it's coming on and I'm auditioning threads for quilting.

The piece is supposed to represent a cut emerald in a clasp setting:
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The layout above was my intended one but I was distracted by my love of dog-tooth stars.  Is it a square stone, or a round one?

Anyway, I was trying to use the subtle difference between the two palest colours and play with the direction of the grain of the Oakshott to suggest light on the facets.

You can see the effect a bit better in this pic. The central square is cut from one fabric, but the triangles reflect the light differently.  Oakshott is extraordinary and looks different all the time.  Sometimes the greens look much closer to the very bright green thread but they are difficult to catch in a photo.

 I'm bordering it in plain linen because I like the idea that it could also be a rough emerald still to be cut from the rock.

Above are the threads I'm thinking of using.  On the subject of thread, I have so far done all my piecing with Gutermann thread, as that is what's available in my local store, so I will have to try Aurifil some time to see if there is a difference.  One thing you really have to admire about Aurifil is that the way they have the social networking thing sewn up, so to speak!  A year or so ago, it hadn't really occurred to me that there was any variety of sewing thread - duh! - until I wrote to Leanne to ask about some she had used.  I so appreciate the helpfulness of the blogging community.

Linking up with:

Two Words

Tension headache.

Oakshott WIP

So I learned not to do my laying out on the floor for the cat to play mousing on and am using an old bit of Ikea desktop to lay out the Oakshott pieces. A design wall would be nice - as would a sewing room in which to instal the design wall - but this is doing the trick for small pieces (these are 3.5 inch HSTs) and has the advantage of being portable.

Try not to look too closely at the banana seams and missed points.

I have to trim off all the dog ears, but I do like the pattern they make.

Sunday Stash/Not at Quiltcon

Someone's been a very naughty girl.

Egyptian cottons, bought at the Scottish Quilt Show.  It will take ages to get round to using them, but they had to be had. They were incredibly cheap and the colours are radiant.  I also picked up some more perle cottons from the Avery stand just because.

I heard about this - a Scottish Quilt Retreat!! - from Jo Bearpaw Avery.  It sounds great.

Just like the last show at Ingliston, my M-I-L and I were probably among the youngest people there and the quilts were mainly very traditional - it's not that there's anything bad about that, but it would be nice to see some more modern quilts too, just because a good mix is stimulating.  The skill involved was amazing, and this, My Garden by Louise Bell, stood out for me because the fabric for the flowers, leaves and insects was beautifully fussy cut to create different shades and textures, and I love the dandelions!

My Garden by Louise Bell

My Garden by Louise Bell

This photo (c) Louise Bell, http://www.louisebellquilts.co.uk/, all pics used with permission.

Linking up with Fiona at Finding Fifth

Cat Attack

Wee bugger.

Signs of Life!

We have just had half-term holidays here - yet another excuse for lack of creativity.  Only on my part though. My daughter brought this model of the Titanic home from school:

I love the colours and it reminds me of the strange nautically-inspired bit of EPP I did for the Travelling Pic Stitch Blog Hop:

Within a day, the ship had become part of this tableau on the windowsill:

The Titanic has just hit the iceberg, and there are a lot of people in the lifeboats.  Poor people. Amazingly, when he was a very tiny child my grandfather was taken by his mother to Southampton docks to see the Titanic launch.  If you happen to be anywhere near Philadelphia, I can highly recommend this exhibition which we saw on holiday a few years ago.  It is atmospheric and informative and somehow manages to get round the potential for horrible voyeurism by concentrating on the personal stories of the passengers.

On that note I feel a bit bad going back to the trivial!  But I will.  Now that school has started again, I have a bit of gloriously uninterrupted time and have begun cutting up lovely bits of Oakshott for a new project.

I can't resist throwing in a few extra pictures of Sea and Sand/Hot Chocolate and Marshmallows.  I washed it for the first time last week, and I absolutely love what has happened to the texture - not sure if the fabric has shrunk or whether the thread has tightened up or both.  I particularly like the effect on the linen, and I've added a linen quilt to the list of things to make which is increasingly likely to last me a lifetime.

Linking up to the wonderful Really Random Thursday at Live a Colorful Life.

Missing Link(y)

The norovirus hit our household yesterday (one down, and the rest to follow no doubt as there are more than 60 children off the school) which is why I forgot the Slow Bloggers link!  So sorry!

I am having a bit of a think about the linky and its date at the end of the month - a rather foolish choice as it clashes with the wonderful link up at Lily's Quilts - and will be posting again on that subject shortly.  I am very grateful to the slow bloggers who have linked up in the past and look forward to next time.

I'm also very amazed and grateful to have reached more than 90 followers of my very slow blog - thank you!