Lovely Scraps

My fabric scraps have finally outgrown their bin so lately I have been trying to incorporate more scraps into my projects. One sunny morning at the breakfast table, I sketched out this idea for a sunflower made of strips of scraps.

Well... it hardly made a dent in my orange scraps. I cut into some of my freshly purchased fabrics for the background and enjoyed a bit of embroidery. I do believe that Percy Persimmon likes all the orange!

I realized half way through that I needed to glue baste all the petals down because they were flopping all over the place. I will be finishing it off with some yummy free-motion quilting... lots of petals to secure all the scraps and then something fun in the wide outer border. Off to do some doodling!

And here is a scrappy mug rug I made for the VMQG March challenge & swap. I tried different free-motion quilting on each strip! I quite like how it turned out and since I'm unable to go to tonight's meeting I guess that means I can keep it ;o)

Enjoy your afternoon tea & quilted crafts :o)

Crane Star Pattern

The Crane Star pillow pattern is now available in my SHOP. The Crane Star is a versatile pattern made up of six cranes. This pattern includes instructions for basic paper-piecing technique as well as layout & instructions to make a 19 x 19 inch pillow cover.

Paper-piecing allows the quilter to create intricate blocks with accuracy and ease. The fabric is sewn directly to the paper template. Felicity tested my pattern using her own choice of fabrics which I think looks fabulous. I have enlarged the pattern ever so slightly. Read her review here.

PatchworkPottery pattern booklets include a metric conversion chart, stitches & terms section, fully illustrated step-by-step instructions, and full size templates. Try joining rows of half Crane Stars to make a matching quilt or incorporating a single crane into a quilt.

The Teacup Pouch pattern will be available next week. The SpringTime Bag and Quilted Teacup & Saucer patterns are coming soon!

Enjoy your afternoon tea & quilted crafts :o)

Rainbows

There is nothing like a rainbow on a dark & dreary day...

This lovely quilt is a collaborative effort to which I added some different prairie points and pieced rainbow binding. I wanted the points to echo the points on the wonky stars and I think it turned out nicely! The fabulous quilting was done by Janet!

Here is the front of the Rainbow Wonky Stars quilt. I pieced the aqua block...

And here it is all washed and folded... super yummy!

Some more rainbow wonky stars appeared in my craftroom. The pieced rainbow stripes were the backing for my wonky star quilt but looked amazing as borders along the top & bottom of the quilt. A herd of cranes were slowly spreading across the floor...

And now for some random cute fluffy Percy cat-ness...

And some more rainbows in Claire's hand...

Enjoy your afternoon tea & quilted crafts :o)

Feedback

Today I added a feedback section to my BigCartel shop! I think it's very important to receive feedback from my customers so that I can improve my shop and my patterns.

The button is now on my shop's sidebar as well as in every shop e-mail as a FEEDBACK link. It also shows a link to feedback from my old Etsy shop which I hope helps to relieve doubts about purchasing that first pattern.

Now I'm asking for your help :o) If you have purchased a PatchworkPottery pattern and would like to leave feedback, please click on the image below. Right now I have no feedback for my 355 sales in my BigCartel shop.

I can't wait to hear about your shopping experience. I want to know if the pattern was easy to print & assemble, instructions easy to follow & if there any mistakes no matter how small. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated!

Enjoy your afternoon tea & quilted crafts :o)

Mosaic & Magic

I made this mosaic today showing some of the things that I posted on flickr in 2011. I can't say I made it all in 2011 because patterns published in books take about a year before you can tell anyone!

Today was a wonderful sunny day that was too warm for a scarf. It reminded me of a little quilt I made in August 2010 that I totally forgot about! I called it "Sunny Day Neighbourhood" and it started out as a Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild challenge to use leftover triangles from a flying geese block...

I just can't get enough of these cute little houses and the fun loopy quilting...

And yes..."neighbourhood" is spelled the Canadian way. My blogger preview window doesn't like it ;o)

Yesterday, I received a lovely e-mail from one of my fans in the Ukraine..."Hello Laurraine, Looked at your work and simply fell in love with each one. Do you have a magic wand? This is something unreal! You are an extraordinary person with special hands and creative head. Good luck to you." I thought it was quite hilarious because there just happened to be a magic wand in my studio at the time!

Claire asked Santa Claus for a real magic wand... not those plastic sparkly light-up ones which are obviously just toys... a real wand... a wood wand. She was absolutely thrilled to find this amazing wand in her stocking Christmas morning. She makes sure that everyone knows it is made from "100% wood" which is apparently a VERY important detail! Oh... and apparently it works!

Enjoy your afternoon tea & quilted crafts :o)

Butterflies!

The Butterfly Potholder is now available as a PDF pattern booklet in my SHOP! This pattern was published along with my Teapot Trivet in Pretty Little Potholders by Lark Books in 2008. Unlike the book, PatchworkPottery pattern booklets include a metric conversion chart, stitches & terms section, fully illustrated step-by-step instructions, and full size templates.

It's easy to make a Butterfly Potholder to suit any decor from modern to country. Just slide your fingers into the pocket wings, tuck the rickrack antennae under your hand & you are ready to take that blackberry pie out of the oven!

Enjoy your afternoon tea & quilted crafts :o)

TeaTime Trivets

These TeaTime Trivets were so much fun to make! I guess it's one of those inspired projects that magically comes together in no time at all. I think little elves were helping me!

If they hadn't been made for my dearest friends who I have over for tea every monday night, I probably would have kept them both! It took me an afternoon to make each one and I was in such a rush to finish the first that I forgot to erase my chalk lines!

I made them both 9 x 9 inches using the same background fabrics, one teapot and one teacup & free-motion steam. However I changed the placement and shapes of the teapots & teacups to make them more interesting and original. The only problem is that I can't decide which I like better! This red one went to the same friend who received this teapot cozy.

Linen, tea & pretty prints... what could be better? I will definitely have to make one for myself maybe in robin's egg blue... I wonder if I have enough of that pretty Strawberry fabric left!

Enjoy your afternoon tea & quilted crafts :o)