Hug-a-Bit Quilts.

Monday, 23 February 2015

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

Friday, 20 February 2015

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, 16 February 2015

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!