Challenge Accepted

Last month, in the lead up to Christmas, my team decided we should do a Secret Santa. Historically and anecdotally, office Secret Santa gift exchanges can be pretty lame, but we decided if it was just within our team of six, and everyone had enthusiastically opted in, then we could all walk away with something not shit.

I suggested that everyone write their name on a sticky note, with two or more general suggestions of things they might like that could be bought within the $20 spend limit. For example, I wrote "craft beer" and "vanilla".

Wouldn't you guess it, I drew my team leader! And not only that, it soon became clear that he was using the Secret Santa scheme as a personal shopper for his three year old daughter! If you can't read the hand writing the note says:

• Frozen
• Plush goat... maybe patchwork
• Toys => make bubbles
• Modern architecture

So he wanted a gift for his daughter, hey? Challenge. Accepted.

I found some Frozen themed quilting fabric at my local quilting store to make this unique little cushion just for Alana.

I did some fussy cuts to get the four feature panels of the characters from Frozen. The rest of the fabric came from scraps and my stash, as did the batting. Maybe that's a bit of a cheat, but it did ensure I kept to the $20 budget!

For the back of the cushion I just used the rest of my 30cm yardage, and some aqua gingham scrap leftover from Olivia's quilt. I fastened the cover with colourful snaps from my collection, as has been my habit ever since my improvisation for Georgia's retro floppy disk cushions.

The final personal touch was to machine embroider Alana's name onto the back of her cushion, with little snowflakes. This cushion is no mass produced Frozen merchandise, and it's definitely not for daddy!

Sorry Dyl, looks like you're buying your own architecture books. :D

Happy new year!

Layouts

This long weekend I'm making a cow-themed quilt for my cow-obsessed husband, after last winter he confessed to being jealous of my lap quilt. :3

So far I've finished the cutting and layout, which is inspired by this brick quilt from Tallgrass Prairie Studio. I spent ages umming and ahhing over the layout, making sure there was a good distribution of colour and pattern. I'm sure I'm not the only one who does this!

Olivia's Quilt

Having had reasonable success with my first quilting endeavor, I decided to make a quilt for my friends Matt & Ying, who were also expecting their first baby. Unfortunately I wasn't going to get away with another black & skully baby quilt (dad would have approved, mum not-so-much), so I decided to go with a red, pink & aqua colour theme. I also wanted to include some fabric with bunnies on them, as Olivia was born in the year of the rabbit.

The quilt top was constructed using a Disappearing Nine Patch block.

I pieced the quilt back with some strips, giving me the opportunity to use a fairly gratuitous amount of that bunny print from Spoonflower. :3

G (an-object-that-tells.tumblr.com) kindly took some beautiful sun-dappled detail shots of this quilt.

This is a great shot of Girl in a Tree Swing (I can't tell if this is the Vanilla Ice Cream or Pink Lemonade colourway... XD), my favourite print from the Sherbet Pips collection.

Oh yes, these prints are so ridiculously sweet. Never fear, I balanced it out with a nice frosty glass of Paulaner during its construction, hehe...

I gifted the quilt at the baby shower before Olivia was born, so I still need to add a label to the quilt with her full name and birthday. Any clever ideas?

Cheers,
Kim