Monday Makers!#27

I am on a short holiday everybody! Me and my family are taking three days of to relax at Moruya, only 2.5 hours away from Canberra.

(images from Google)

I don't have anything to show you today-I am scheduling this post to go live while I am swimming LOL- but I sure will check what you have made and what new things you are starting today!

Your project can be anything you start on that Monday as long as it makes you move and be active and creative: a new quilt, a knitting project, scrap booking, cross-stitching, baking-we don't mind yummy recipes!, a gardening project, painting your house!, tidying up the pantry!...This is your Monday and you are the maker of the day!

2. Grab the button from the side bar- DONE!!- or put a link back to me in your Monday post.

3. Click on "add your link" and just fill in the required areas. 
4. Please link to your specific post, not to your homepage: We would like to find your post easily.

5. To link in Instagram photo, click the Instagram icon at the bottom of the link-up screen and use the URL of your IG feed as the link ( for example, my URL is http://instagram.com/hugabitquilts) Please hashtag #MondayMakers!
6. Please take time to visit other links and leave a sweet comment: We love comments!

7. Share the photos of your finished Monday projects in your next link up- I am hoping you will come back again!: Who doesn't love a sweet, finished project or a "before-after" photo?

An InLinkz Link-up

Trying mosaic tiling

As some of you might know, I have been (forever) building a Mediterranean garden in my backyard. There is a pond in the garden which we put right in front of the fence between us and our neighbours. The pond has a 1.5m by 1.2m wall for a water feature. We want to mosaic this area with a nice design which suits the Mediterranean theme. Because I haven't tried my hand at mosaic tiling before, I decided to attend a workshop to learn at least the basics before I attempt taking up such a big job.

I found Lynne and Jennie of Benianna Mosaics through a friend. They are located at Bungendore, a lovely little town which is 55km from Canberra. A couple of weekends ago, I attended their two-day workshop.

Both Jennie and Lynne are mosaic artists but each has another profession that they retired from. They love what they do with a true passion and are teaching this art to others.

 The workshop was held at Country Women Organisation, a lovely little cottage in Bungendore.

We were six lovely women who got along very well :)

Mosaic tiling is so much fun but it sure requires a lot of concentration and, in some cases, some very precise cutting. It is not like, ok give me a piece of tile and I smash it and then glue them back on a surface.You cut your tile, then trim into the shape you want, file the sides, place it on your design. Then re-place it and re-place it...until you fit all your pieces nicely. Like quilting really.
We were given two design options: a butterfly and a fish. The instructors had already made the templates from a piece of paper. We traced the design on to our concrete paver. I, of course, played with my fish and made it a little different.
I chose to work with black, red, orange and an orangy yellow for my fish and some blues for the background.

 I love how black defines the tail and the fins.

Working slowly and adding pieces bit by bit, my fish started to look like a real fish.

Isn't he gorgeous?

I have received some compliments from my instructor which boosted my ego! They said that I was really good at using my hands and that they could see the quilter in me with my precision cutting and long thinking and playing over the placements of the pieces LOL

I couldn't finish my fish (nice rhyming) in this workshop. We were given all the material we needed to finish our projects except for the cutting tools. I am yet to buy them and finish this gorgeous fishy to be a feature piece in my garden. 

Here are what the other participants made:

What about you? Have you ever tried mosaics? Would you like to? What is your experience?

Cheers,

Nurdan 

Monday Makers!#26

Hiya all!
How was your weekend? I hope it was a good one.
First of all, I want to thank you all who visited my Layers of Charm blog post and left a comment. It has been a great experience in terms of using only solids, make the quilting a little challenging and finally sharing it with you. I have also enjoyed visiting the other bloggers. It is amazing to see how each person interpreted the pattern differently and came up with a wonderful quilt.  I also want to thank you all who have been linking up with with Monday Makers! I have noticed new names and new blogs in the last couple of weeks which is great. I enjoy visiting your pages and seeing what things you are making/ have made. Once again, thank you very much.

Now to Monday Makers!
You know the triangle scraps I ended up with after making two Layers of Charm quilts. I loved the pillow that Afton of Quilting Mod made for her Layers of Charm quilt so much that I decided to make a matching pillow for the other quilt I made with print fabrics.

I haven't played much with the placement of the colours. It also needs one more round of HSTs. As I didn't use one single colour of solid fabric, I am not sure whether the design will show as good as Afton's. But it will sure be a very happy pillow :)

Have you finished a project last week and starting up a new one? Here is the right place to share it with us!

Your project can be anything you start on that Monday as long as it makes you move and be active and creative: a new quilt, a knitting project, scrap booking, cross-stitching, baking-we don't mind yummy recipes!, a gardening project, painting your house!, tidying up the pantry!...This is your Monday and you are the maker of the day!

2. Grab the button from the side bar- DONE!!- or put a link back to me in your Monday post.

3. Click on "add your link" and just fill in the required areas. 
4. Please link to your specific post, not to your homepage: We would like to find your post easily.

5. To link in Instagram photo, click the Instagram icon at the bottom of the link-up screen and use the URL of your IG feed as the link ( for example, my URL is http://instagram.com/hugabitquilts) Please hashtag #MondayMakers!
6. Please take time to visit other links and leave a sweet comment: We love comments!

7. Share the photos of your finished Monday projects in your next link up- I am hoping you will come back again!: Who doesn't love a sweet, finished project or a "before-after" photo?

An InLinkz Link-up

Layers of Charm with Fat Quarter Shop

Hello everyone and happy Monday (again)! :)

Today's blogpost is about a new Shortcut Quilt project of the Fat Quarter Shop. It is called the Layers of Charm. With this post, I will also reveal my Sweet Darling quilt that I made with this pattern by using only solid fabrics.

The Fat Quarter Shop approached me (and other quilt bloggers) and asked if I would be interested in participating in a blog hop to introduce this new project and I happily accepted it.
They sent us the pattern which had instructions for four different size quilts.
To make a Layers of Charm quilt, you will need one layer cake and one charm pack. It is so quick and easy to make that you can whip up a queen size quilt in a day! I chose to make a crib size quilt and it only took me a couple of hours to put together the quilt top.
Now some photos!

You probably noticed that my quilt doesn't have a binding. I took these photos yesterday when the weather was windy but nice enough to take outdoor photos. So glad I did because today it was really miserable; no sun but really strong wind. The quilt has a binding now in that gorgeous blue in the top right square.

For this quilt, I used the colours that I chose from the 2014 New Kona Cotton Solids layer cake and charm pack. The finished size it approximately 38 inches by 38 inches. You can tell I like bright colours!

When I finished the quilt top, I really didn't have an idea about how to quilt it. I looked at several FMQ designs, spent a fair bit of time on Pinterest searching "quilting negative space". I just didn't find the inspiration I needed nor a pattern that made me say "yes, this one". A few days later when having lunch at work, I just picked up the paper and pen and started sketching and came up with this design I used in the quilting. 

There is quite a bit straight stitching here! Because I only used solids, I wanted to make the quilting dense, let it talk and enhance the quilt pattern. I wanted to bring out the squares that are formed in the centre of each block by stitching a four point star and echoing it around. I created the same star in the very centre of the quilt as there is no square pattern there and made some of the straight lines cross over to the others to make a checkered area. By doing so, I created an attention point in the centre as well. I am very happy with how it turned out!

I made a REALLY good decision by choosing a crib size quilt. Straight stitching takes a lot of time, patience and it shows even the smallest, slightest wonkiness in your stitching, which is widely available on this quilt!

If you want to make the Layers of Charm quilt, the Fat Quarter Shop has a tutorial on their Youtube Channel.
I am looking forward to seeing what others made-so exciting!!

Also, I wasn't able to post the Monday Makers!#25 link because of a technical problem-SOLVED. So, if you have any projects that you would like to share with me and others, come join me and link up your new project you start today and/or a finished one from last week. Why not linking up your Layers of Charm quilt ;-)

1. Your project can be anything you start on that Monday as long as it makes you move and be active and creative: a new quilt, a knitting project, scrap booking, cross-stitching, baking-we don't mind yummy recipes!, a gardening project, painting your house!, tidying up the pantry!...This is your Monday and you are the maker of the day!

2. Grab the button from the side bar- DONE!!- or put a link back to me in your Monday post.

3. Click on "add your link" and just fill in the required areas. 
4. Please link to your specific post, not to your homepage: We would like to find your post easily.
5. Please take time to visit other links and leave a sweet comment: We love comments!

6. Share the photos of your finished Monday projects in your next link up- I am hoping you will come back again!: Who doesn't love a sweet, finished project or a "before-after" photo?

An InLinkz Link-up

Monday Makers!#25 Update

Hiya all!

Hope you all had a lovely week. Mine was pretty good.
This post is a quick update to let you all know that this week's Monday Makers! might be a little late (or might not even up!) due to a technical problem I have been experiencing. I hope I will be able to fix it soon!

Thank you!
Nurdan

Monday Makers! #24

Hi all!
How was your week? Mine was pretty good! I made another baby size quilt top with the same pattern that I used to make the Sweet Darling quilt top. I won't be able to show you the quilt tops yet as these are for the introduction of a new pattern which will be released by the Fat Quarter Shop soon. The pattern is quite simple and fun to make. You can whip up a queen size quilt in a day!
I will buy some backing fabric tomorrow for both and will try to finish them as quickly as possible.
I used only solids for the second quilt.

I love these colours. They look so good together; especially on a quilt top :)
From both projects, I was left with 67 pieces of colourful, 4.5 inch triangles.

I am thinking about ways of using them. I came up with this placement after a ten minute play on the design wall.

I imagined a few lines like this floating on a solid base. There are many other designs you can make with triangles; I just don't know what to do. Would you mind sharing your suggestions with me? It doesn't have to be a quilt.

I also experimented cutting my son's hair yesterday. His hair was so long that I was able to make a decent length pony tail! So, after I gave him a bath, I sat him in front of me with his ipad, aka concomputer LOL, and got on with cutting. I normally trim my own hair so I didn't struggle with cutting his at all. 

Because I loved his hair long, I didn't cut it super short. This was his first ever hair cut and I am happy that I did it. I also kept some of his (baby) hair as memory. I need suggestions as to how to keep it; maybe sew a little pouch and keep the hair inside?

Now to Monday Makers!

Share with me what you did last week and what new projects you are starting today.

1. Your project can be anything you start on that Monday as long as it makes you move and be active and creative: a new quilt, a knitting project, scrap booking, cross-stitching, baking-we don't mind yummy recipes!, a gardening project, painting your house!, tidying up the pantry!...This is your Monday and you are the maker of the day!

2. Grab the button from the side bar- DONE!!- or put a link back to me in your Monday post.

3. Click on "add your link" and just fill in the required areas. 
4. Please link to your specific post, not to your homepage: We would like to find your post easily.
5. Please take time to visit other links and leave a sweet comment: We love comments!

6. Share the photos of your finished Monday projects in your next link up- I am hoping you will come back again!: Who doesn't love a sweet, finished project or a "before-after" photo?

An InLinkz Link-up