Shush doings

Hello my lovely friends.  Long time no see!  Life has been interfering most inconveniently with blogging.  I have managed to get some sewing in though, in between work and looking after Princess and the wee man.

So - I have decided to have a no sewing night tonight so that I can show you some of the things I have been up to - although I apologise to those of you on Instagram, because you will have seen these pics already!

First, here is a cushion I made for the birthday of a 4 year old friend of Princess.  Her parents are friends of ours, and her mum seems to like my sewing - which seemed a perfect opportunity to inflict a hand made gift on a child.  As you know, I love the feather European pillow inners from Spotlight, so I used one of those again, and squashed it into a 20" square rainbow cushion.  Squishy and delicious.

Princess and I chose the fabrics together.  Pink goes in rainbows, dontcha know?

Rainbow bright

The strips are 2 inches wide (finished) so this would be great for using jellyroll strips.  I quilted it with the super simple wavy lines that have become my current favourite.  I also put a strip of the rainbow into the back, to make it a bit more exciting.

Rainbow strip in hot pink corduroy

I forgot to take a picture of the zip, which Princess also chose.  It is bright orange, to go with the general rainbow brightness.

And pink ric rac edging, just because

I didn't go to the party, because I was on wee man duty, but Hubby tells me it was well received.  Everyone loves a rainbow, right?

I also made a cushion for Mother, it being Mother's Day and all recently.  She had said she was looking for a red velvet cushion to go in the shrine (aka bedroom) to Henry Fish: The Quilt.  The room has a lovely vintage look, so I thought a strip of the Japanese lawn I got recently from Polka Dot Tea fabrics would go really well.

The pompom edging was just because ..

I gave the buttonholer a run on Bernie and discovered that it works perfectly!  I really do love my gadgets.  The wooden japanese buttons on the back are from a cute little shop I found on Etsy.

I also put on a little label ala Pretty by Hand.  She is good at the little details like that.

In between the other projects I have managed to start on the Sugar is Sweet sampler from Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery.  I have found that cross stitch is the perfect antidote to the end of a long, hard day at work.  It doesn't seem to require the same level of energy as sewing!

I'm using a 32 count white linen with sparkles through it, which I picked up from The Embroiderer in Birkenhead - a lovely shop.  It doesn't have quite the range of linen you can find on-line (although it does have a good selection), but at least I could have it straight away.  I can be a bit needy like that!

Cakes and strawberries and all things good

I also might have the Cherry Blossom Festival sampler in my inbox, but we're going to pretend it's not there for a while, okay?!

And ... I started on the sudden revival of the ABC BOW - and finished the embroidery.  I have decided to make log cabin blocks with cool and warm colours.  It is a sugar sweet girlie concoction which Princess seems to like very much.  I am slowly putting the blocks together - they are taking a while to sew up.

C is for cupcake

Those strips are 3/4" finished.  Cutting them all up was not really the best job.

I have decided that there will be spontaneous revisiting of the ABC BOW blog posts (which as you know, died off slowly when I finished the wee man's quilt and I started work) to celebrate the finish of this quilt.  Everyone who has finished their ABC quilt can link up and we'll have a little giveaway.  So get sewing, if you haven't finished - it could be any time soon (or not so soon, more likely, to keep you on your toes!)

Did you know that Citrus Sweet Love BOM is nearly finished too????  Eeeeep.  The last lot of fabric is being sent out this month.  I could not be more excited - it is hard to believe it has been a year since this started.  I have learned so, so much from making this quilt.  And I still love it (despite us having some challenging months in the middle, mostly to do with my lack of desire to appliqué).  I couldn't say for certain, but I may have bought some backing fabric from Fabric.com in anticipation of basting it in early June.  I.  can't.  wait.

Late night photo of the blocks all laid out.

Are you still reading?  Then let me tell you about dumpling pouches.  Love them.  That's all I have to say.  Megan got me hooked on these.

This is the large size (scissors for scale) ...

And this is the small size...

There have been more, but I'm exhausted!

That's enough from me!  What have you been up to??

Linking up to finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts. Howdy visitors!