A few weeks ago I joined a Yahoo German Quilt group...it is helping me with my German. I can write my messages in German, and practice a bit more...on a topic I love!
Marga, a member, who lives close by, sent me a private email to invite me to the above group. I bundled up my nerves and went along.
The yahoo quilt group I belong to in Australia calls meeting people from the internet, "meeting axe murderers".
When I arrived I introduced myself at the doors, and was asked who told me about the group.
I say "Marga, but I don't know her last name, I talked to her on the internet"
She replies "Ahh Marga.....yes, I will introduce her to you"
So, I met Marga, and a few other ladies at her table. There was some talk about new exhibitions, a big quilt show coming up in June, and other stuff. It was spoken in normal German speed, which I am not terrific at....so I missed a lot of it, but that will all come in time. There was show and tell, with some divine quilting and lovely quilts, wall hangings, bags. Marga wanted to know if I had bought anything for Show and Tell....no not this time....perhaps next meeting (they meet once a month).
We watched a short film about a weaver in Southern Germany....he was 88, and travels to peoples homes. The owner supplies all the wool, and he weaves these amazing pieces of cloth, which the owner then makes into clothing. He made a piece that was about 1 metre wide, and just over 7 metres long. It took him 3 days in total to complete, the woman paid him 80 DeutscheMark....about 40 Euros in today's currency! Man....so much work for such a small amount of money. The accents were very thick, and even Marga had trouble understanding some of it.....and some of the film had German subtitles.
So, I joined the group, bought a pin, and a CD with all the show and tell from May 2005 -Dec 2006.
The CD has over 350 photos to look at...I had a quick look this morning, and there is some lovely things on the CD. Above is the logo of the group, that is part of a friendship quilt. It looks like each member made a star, and signed their name on their block, and it was all sewn together. It is a lovely quilt!
Marga is an amazing applique quilter...she thinks she will be able to turn my into a hand quilter.....my Sydney quilting group will be howling with laughter with this one.....usually I don't even use the "A" word....we will see!!!! :)
Marga invited me to her place on Tuesday for a sewing day. Unfortunately I have already agreed to help out at Alexander's school trip to the Egyptian Museum, but I will try to go to the next one.
I wish I had have met this group when I first got to Berlin. I think this would really have helped with my quilting, and my German, and getting to know where the quilt shops in Berlin are...and internet shopping a lot earlier! (Although I think this is a bonus to the credit card) See, the internet really can be a helpful resource!
Here is a picture of the entire piece so far....
Next week I can hopefully do a bit of knitting, I bought some wool for a scarf, and I am also going to try a pair of socks....it is the "thing" to make at the moment! :) I have never worked on 4 needles before....the challenge intrigues me!
I think they look quite good when they are laid out like this!
Here are the cream ones I did a few weeks ago.
These are sewn directly onto the wadding, so I can try some reversible quilts (see 19th Jan post). I have thought of a block to use on the other side of the wadding, but I want to get all the strips sewn on first, to see which colours I will group together!
This one is for Lisa who lives downstairs, who is expecting a baby boy in June.
Wicked Easy Quilt, link below.
http://www.byannie.com/free_patterns.html
Right, now to try the same pattern with some pinwheels!
I am also going to sew up the blue strips, like I did with the beige/neutral strips. I am going to guess that I will get 8 squares out of my blue strips. I will see how that goes!
The Japanese fabric quilt complete. This one is for me...lots of Japanese fabrics that I have collected over the years... Alexander held this quilt up for me to take a quick photo of the quilt...It is a little bit taller than him.
The pattern is a very simple one from Wicked Easy Quilt..I have a few more ideas with this pattern, and hope to make a few more. I want to try to add some pinwheels in there as well.
Wicked Easy Quilt, link below.
http://www.byannie.com/free_patterns.html
The designs are by Lauren Tucker from Twilleys of Stanford. I won them in from a cross stitching magazine. I wrote a letter to them with a photo of a piece I had made from the magazine. Floral is not my "thing".
Here is a photo of the matching one that I finished last year!
Sorted strips into the right boxes...I have been lazy and not putting them away. It only took 20 minutes to do the whole lot. So my sewing space is looking neater...for the moment!
Sewed the borders on to the Japanese fabric quilt.
Pulled out appropriate strips for Lisa's baby quilt....all from the scrap boxes. I only had to pull 2 fabrics out of the stash to add to it. It is the same pattern as the Japanese quilt. But I decided to colour co-ordinate it a bit more. I think it can be used as an "I Spy" quilt. Lots of things in there to point out. If I can get it sewn and bordered tonight, I can pin both quilts tomorrow afternoon, ready to quilt!
I pulled out the Japanese fabrics to start something new. Here is a really quick pattern to use stash, and it doesn't take long to sew up at all.
Wicked Easy Quilt, link below.
http://www.byannie.com/free_patterns.html
It will be lap size by the time it is finished. Today we found out the young lady in the bottom floor of our apartment building is pregnant. She is having a boy, so I will pull out some fun fabric and use this pattern to make a cot quilt for her baby. She is due in June, so I have heaps of time, but I would like to get it finished this week as well. Another great way to use up some of that "boy" fabric that I bought so much of when the kids were smaller.
Right, Phil has taken the boys ice skating, then Cameron goes to Mohammed's for a play date, and Alexander is off to Martin's party...I have plenty of "me" time to sew.
In a previous post about these strippy blocks from the Reversible Quilting book (see 19th & 28th Jan post), I thought I had enough fabric strips to make 8 of these blocks. Today, I decided to sew all the beige strips before I begin sewing the next quilt.
I completed 15 blocks! Almost enough for a lap size quilt....just from my 1 1/4 and 1 1/2" strips. I can't even imagine how many quilts I can make out of the 2' strip box!
This weekend, I hope to start a quilt with Japanese fabrics, and try and work on some blue strip blocks as well.
P.S. Family is all well. Boys are at school and happy and Phil is busy at work...seems to be a lot of quilting going on, and not much else! :)
