It is October, right?

Travelling over a change in month can be so disorienting. How is it mid-October already? Since returning from Italy, we have celebrated B's birthday and Thanksgiving. Next up is Hallowe'en!

The Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild often holds a block raffle at our meetings (one completed block = one raffle ticket to win a set of blocks). Every year I make tons of Hallowe'en blocks to enter, because I really want to make a Hallowe'en quilt! Alas, I've never one the Hallowe'en lotto. This will be my 4th attempt, so wish me luck.

I spent some time over the long weekend playing with scraps. Here's one of the blocks I made using some Oakshott Colourshott scraps from my Chess on the Steps quilt (speaking of which, go look at the incredibly playful All the Colours Quilt Leanne made using my pattern!).

I used a 1/2" hexy to start and pieced 3/4" strips log-cabin style in rounds. So fun!  Our blocks have to be in size multiples of 6" finished, so this one is actually 6 1/2" square, but I've zoomed in on the pumpkin for the photo.

apologies for pretty awful night time phone pics - it's dark and stormy here today!

For this 6 1/2" x 12 1/2" block, I first pieced some strips together and then cut out tumblers using my Accuquilt Go!Baby for some scrappy candy corn. I liked this so much, I made three more similar blocks. The meeting is next Monday night and I will let you know what happens.

I'm slowly making my way through holiday photos, editing, labelling and uploading. I'll be able to post some soon!

Blocks for October

The Vancouver MQG held a Friday night sew-in last Friday and I took the opportunity to sew with Agatha  for the evening. Agatha is my trusty Singer Featherweight that belonged to my late MIL and was generously given to me by my SIL. I just love piecing with this little machine.

Tonight, the VMQG will hold it's annual Hallowe'en block draw.  Guild members can bring as many blocks as they like (blocks must have a finished dimension of  6" or multiples of 6"). You get one entry for every block you put into the draw and if your name is drawn you get to choose a number of blocks to take home. Last year I made 6 blocks and came home empty-handed. This year I've made three 12 1/2" blocks, but I won't be able to attend tonight so I'm sending my blocks with Berene and counting on her good luck to bring a set back to me!

I free-pieced both of these pumpkin blocks with scraps from my orange box. I love free-piecing because you never know what the end result will look like until you get there.  I'll also send along a duplicate of this Great Granny Block that I made for Cindy in the Stash Trad Bee this month.

Have you got any spooky stitching going on for Hallowe'en? I've always wanted to have a Hallowe'en quilt, but never made one. Maybe this'll be my lucky year for a set of blocks to get me started!

Boo!

Granny Says Boo! for Cindy, a photo by Poppyprint on Flickr.

It's October! How did that happen?

Our visit is going nicely here. My parents celebrated their 47th wedding anniversary yesterday under beautiful sunny skies. In fact, their entire vacation has been sunny. It's a record! No really: Vancouver has had the driest August/September EVER since someone started recording temperatures and measuring rainfall in the late 1800's. I'll take it. As long as it snows when it's supposed to.

Sewing is as sparse as rainfall, however I managed to complete my October Stash Trad block for Cindy last night. I loved making this block (there is something so satisfying about all those nested seams!), so I made two. I'll use the duplicate for our VMQG annual Hallowe'en block exchange. You can find a tutorial for this "Great Granny Square" here

BOO!

Last night while I was recovering from a very busy weekend coupled with a rotten head cold, there was a very insistent knock on our front door, followed by the unmistakable pitter patter of someone running down the front steps as quickly as possible.

I had my suspicions right away; after opening the front door, it was confirmed. We'd been BOO'd!

This fun Hallowe'en tradition swept through out neighbourhood about 5 or 6 years ago, but I hadn't seen it again until last night. On our doorstep was a goody bag filled with yummy treats (even two cans of pumpkin ale for Dad and lovely napkins for me!) and decorations. The box of homemade Pumpkin Gobs cracked me up. They are delicious cookies stuck in pairs with icing. The idea is that you drop off a goody bag anonymously, along with a sign to put in the window letting others know that you've been BOO'd. It's super fun and when we did it to several neighbours years ago we included our famously disgusting witchy finger cookies that are always a hit!

Every year B and I go to a fun grown-up party where everyone really gets into the spirit with some amazing costumes. Here we are last Saturday, Phyllis and little Lisa from the 137th Calgary Pack.

I always thought Phyllis Diller was the funniest woman ever! As one of my flickr friends commented, I look pretty good for a 94 year old!

B was working on his beer-consumption badge at the party.

If you've got little ghouls and goblins at your house, I hope you all have lots of fun tonight haunting your neighbourhood!! Happy Hallowe'en!

VMQG Hallowe'en edition & giveaway

Last night was our guild meeting with a seasonal flare!

Our new president and guild founder, Holly made this great table decoration!

Our challenge this month was to bring Hallowe'en themed blocks for a raffle. One block = one ticket. Just to be safe, I made 8 blocks and brought Berene's along for her for an extra entry. Alas, it was not my lucky night. BOO! I'm very happy that Amy was one of the first winners, though. Hallowe'en is her holiday and I really wanted her to get a nice selection of 10 blocks to take home and make into something fabulous (which she'll totally do).

Here are some of the 69 blocks turned in!

Our guild has two very talented man-quilters who turned up last night with some very fine show and tell that I want to share with you.

This is Matt's amazing Judy Neidemeyer quilt that he just got back from a long-armer who spent over a week custom quilting it.

Here is Paul's take on the mood string quilt. The colours are incredible. Sonja will have better photos on her flickrstream soon.

Our always amazing door prize table!

Just before I had to duck out early, I won a very cute package of jack 'o lantern buttons!

Aside from all the Hallowe'en fun, there was a little exciting moment last night when I realized that Matt (who owns a quilt store called The Quilted Bear in Ladner, BC) actually had a real life copy of Modern Quilt Blocks...with my block in it!! The contributors haven't even received their copies yet, so it was really fun to see it and realize it would be in stores here already. Fellow VMQG guild member Sonja has a sweet Robot block in, too. There are so many of my blog friends also published that the entire book is just so exciting for me to be a part of. Thanks StashBooks!

I have permission from Stash to share one e-copy of the book with you. This is a quickie giveaway for those of you on the ball today, just one comment below gets you a chance to win your own electronic edition of Modern Blocks. This book contains 99 amazing blocks designs - you want this in your library! I'll close comments at 11 pm. PST tonight and announce the winner tomorrow along with the BasicGrey giveaway which you can still enter here. Good luck!

Comments are now closed, thanks for visiting!

On retreat last Saturday, I managed to finish a couple of small projects, one of which is this adorable little skeleton plushie, complete with jack-o-lantern dress.

This clever design comes from the creative brain of Berene and it won 5th place in the weekly Spoonflower fabric design contest! You can buy your very own Happy Sew Lucky Pumpkin Skellie from Spoonflower and then follow Berene's blog tutorial here to put her together in an afternoon. I think everyone's Hallowe'en decor should include a well dressed skeleton, don't you?

Especially one with a sweet little heart on her bum.

NOTE: Mine is a smaller, FQ version, but you'll get a 27" high skellie if you buy the full yard pattern size. I'd recommend choosing the upholstery-weight twill, or linen cotton canvas substrates if your skellie will be played with by small people, but quilting weight cotton would be fine for a display-only version like mine.

Carving Pumpkins

Aneela did a lovely fall post the other day and I was smitten with her sweet pumpkin table runner. It inspired me to immediately dig through my orange scraps and make these three amigos for my VMQG Hallowe'en block raffle coming up later this month!

Wanna know something so awesome? When I clicked on 'edit in picnik', those of you familiar with flickr and picnik know that these little turning cogs come up on your screen while your photo loads in the editing program. Along with the cogs, the smartypants picnik people always put silly little excuses for why the program takes time to load; things like "setting the table....", or "picking daisies..." Well, this time, and I kid you not, when I clicked to crop this photo of the blocks, it said "carving pumpkins..."

I might have snorted.

If you're in the mood to stitch up some quick improv pumpkins, Kaelin just posted a sweet tutorial for a log cabin pumpkin table runner here. I'm done stitching up the squash, now I'm going to roast one. I love making pumpkin pie from roasted sugar pumpkin and there is always lots leftover for a batch of muffins, too.

It's Canadian Thanksgiving this weekend. There will be pumpkin pie!

Happy October!

In honor of Lynne's Fresh Sewing Day, here's what I've been cutting and sewing: Hallowe'en blocks for the VMQG's October meeting. We are going to have a block raffle. Every block you turn in gets you a ticket to win a set of blocks. The only rules are that it has to be Hallowe'en themed and each side of the block has to finish in a multiple of 3. I have a stash of Hallowe'en prints that I have never used and it is great to do some busting with these. I have a feeling I'll be making a lot of blocks for the raffle.

I cut these 3 1/2" tumblers with my GO!Baby Accuquilt cutter. I thought it would be fun to piece them into two long blocks, each 6 1/2 X 18 1/2. I must say, this shape has been my most successful die in terms of clean cutting on the GO! Baby. I think the dies with sharp angles 90 degrees or less have a tendency to snag threads between the blade and the foam inside the angles. These tumblers cut beautifully using 5 layers of fabric. I laughed when I turned off my sewing room light and discovered that the jack 'o lantern mouths and eyes glow in the dark - I had completely forgotten that!

These two 6 1/2" blocks were made with the Lazy Angle ruler. I took a course on it many years ago and it was a total brain bender. I had to completely re-educate myself on how to use it. It's still a brain bender.

This simple, 12 1/2" 9-patch uses my all time favourite pumpkin print. I think I bought it nine years ago in San Fransisco at Mendel's in Haight Ashbury. They had all kinds of great Alexander Henry prints there....the spider web print must be from there, too. I know because they ripped the fabric off the bolt at that shop and there is about 1/2" of useless frayed edge on that 1/2 yard. The webs are an embossed gold ink that makes them extra fun.

These quick blocks are a great way to get into the season and a lot easier than making costumes!

linked!

All Hallow's Eve

T's most excellent pumpkin (smeared with Vaseline to preserve it's week old carving)

Agent Smith & rescued Chilean miner ready to party!

[don't get any ideas about my house being this tidy - our neighbour took this shot in his living room!]

I borrowed this capsule from a fellow rescued miner, sadly by this time the fabulous mesh door on the capsule had been torn off during some feverish dance-floor antics

We've got yummy treats, but first you'll have to get through this ghoul!

Starry Night Tree Skirt

Look, I made another one! Even though that black fabric has been in my stash for several years (purchased no doubt with a different Christmas project in mind) it works well with the bright reds and greens.

The workshop filled up last night, so I'll have 15 fellow guild members all making Carol's lovely Oh Joyful! pattern with me in late November. It will be a fun class - I have a great time making this pattern. A 1/4" foot with guide makes sewing all of the strips together easy peasy. I needed to make a second one so that I can demonstrate the technique I worked out to attach the bias binding to those pesky (but cute!) scallops.

My first tree skirt is complete now that I've embellished the trees with these sweet hand made clay star buttons.

Aren't they perfect? Wendy makes the most beautiful buttons on Pender Island, B.C., all cut and painted by hand so no two are alike. If you like these, visit her website and see what else she makes - cute sheep, doggies, kitties, frogs, hearts, skulls, 2-hole sweater buttons...you name it. Wendy even welcomes custom work and she'll ship her buttons safely anywhere. Great customer service! I love supporting women entrepreneurs, especially ones close to home.

[fun aside: Wendy is from the same teeny weeny town in Nova Scotia where my mom was born and my sister was married. This vast country we live in really is rather small at times]

I attached my star buttons with knotted DMC floss in case they have to be removed for washing (heaven forbid, because those reds were not pre-washed and that could be trouble with the white background!!). I usually try to soak reds and navy/black in Retayne before I use them just to be sure. In fact, that black starry fabric released a lot of dye when I treated it.

Is everyone ready for Hallowe'en? I've got a very au courant costume this year which should be fun. I'll show you photos on the big day. And wait 'till you see the amazing pumpkin T carved on the weekend - it's going to be a crowd pleaser for sure.

Decorating for Retreat

Rebecca brought the most hilarious pumpkin to retreat last Saturday. Look!

Isn't it fantastic?? Rebecca's got some time on her hands, so she didn't stop there. Once on the Better Homes & Gardens Hallowe'en crafting pages online, she spied these little kitties. They would go perfectly with my dead cat on a stick wall hanging.

Adorable pencil toppers made from some recycled wool coats and all displayed in a vase of orange lentils. Genius! Here's a closer look. She did such a great job on these and everyone got a big kick out of her table display.

Thanks RJ!!

I had a great day on Saturday and got to make a big ol' checkmark against a longstanding item on my TO DO list. Finally complete is the quilt I've been working on sporadically on behalf of a neighbour. Sadly, Kim lost a long battle with ovarian cancer a year ago before she could complete this quilt for her friend. When her parents came to my door with the top, border fabric, black sheet for a backing and asked if I could finish it, I wanted so badly to help out. However, it has taken me way too long to attach two borders and quilt it. I had a really hard time with tension and thread breakage which I think may have been due to the sheet. Much unpicking and re-quilting, a machine tune-up and several tears of frustration later, I'm very happy that I can now return it to them bound and washed. I thought of Kim a lot as I stitched on Saturday....she was only a few years older than me. I will try and get a photo this week because the log cabin setting she chose is really cool and would like you to see it, too.

And now onto the baby quilt commission. Sewing room here I come!

A spot of seasonal colour

As seen in Victoria, B.C.

Tune in tomorrow for some hilarious Hallowe'en decor that was brought to retreat yesterday!

Squishy Squash

Thanks to my friend 'e' at pinksuedeshoe, I was inspired to make these fellas as a hostess gift for our sweet friends that put us up for Thanksgiving. There is still time to whip some up for your Hallowe'en or harvest table using her free tutorial.

It is the same family who hosted us last year and we had another wonderful holiday weekend; Neighbourhood strolls with beautiful views, soccer in the rain, Mexican dinner out, used book exchanging for the kids, a retro-barber shop visit for B, jamming in the basement music pad (turns out D is quite the drummer!), hard work on a math assignment for T (boo hiss on a holiday weekend!), cheering for the Victoria marathon runners, and as always, a delicious harvest feast.

These pumpkins may be a bit too squishy. I tried to stuff them as much as possible (I recycled the stuffing from an old pillow no one will sleep on anymore), but they still wrinkled when I pulled the floss tight around the seams. No worries, my dear friend loves her new pumpkins. There are dried lentils in the bottom for weight and stability. The felted wool stems are courtesy of the hand-dying skills of Paulette, the white stripey pumpkin is an old men's shirt, the orangey stripes are a Kaffe shot from India that has been in my stash forever and the mod orange one is Picnic Parade by Jenean Morrison for Free Spirit.

Don't you just love putting love into a gift for someone that you know will truly appreciate it? I know I do. And she does, too.

Feelin' Hallowe'eny?

Are you itching to get busy on some fall sewing? If my Christmas tree skirt post a few days ago put you over the edge, you may want to start off slowly and tackle your holiday sewing in order. So, next up Thanksgiving (for us Canucks) and for everyone, Hallowe'en.

I've got some amazingly talented blog friends and I want you to know about their work. First up is 'e' of pinksuedeshoe. I know her real name, but you have to crack a few good jokes before she'll tell you. She just posted a fab tutorial for making the cutest pumpkin pillows ever. Head on over there for your FREE (ahem, personal use) pattern. Honestly, I told her to make us pay, but she wouldn't hear of it. I plan to make a set of three for our dining table!

If you'd like to make the funkiest Hallowe'en wall hanging ever (or your kid is so into ghouls that they want a whole Hallowe'en quilt of Awesomeness) then visit Sonja's blog to see samples of her patterns all sewn up. Not only is Sonja a member of the VMQG, she's an incredible photographer and designs fantastic foundation patterns (with some help from her husband!) right here in Vancouver. You've never seen Hallowe'en patterns like these: Mumford Mummy, Chuck the Wolfman, Carl Frankenstein, Larry the Creature from the Black Lagoon or my fav, the Vegan Vampire.

Chuck the Wolfman, by Sonjartisania

Carl Frankenstein, by Sonjartisania

Hmmm, I think Sonja's quilt needs a Hallowe'en Heroine....but a witch is so last year....maybe Carl needs a Belinda Bride, or maybe Mabel the Mad Scientist? Sonja, are you reading this?

Sonjartisania's block patterns are available for a ridiculous $5 each, but only until the Wolfman howls...so hurry here. While you're there, check out Peeping Horse: A. Door. Able.

All Hallow's Eve

Here's how the kids went off to school this morning...

Hope you and your goblins have a bewitching weekend!! I just have some Bert hair repair to do...the dog ate it after school. Really! He did! He chewed Bert's red nose to shreds as well. AAAAArrrrrrggggghhhhhh!!!

The Gathered Threads were over today. We all did a fun paper project and made ourselves orts boxes, (you can see the one Dorothy made me last year in the photo here). Photos coming over the weekend...when exactly depends on how severe my sugar hangover is.

What's your fav candy bag item that you steal from the kids? I love Rockets, those little round sugar candies in pastel colours all tightly rolled in cellophane.

Winning Weekend

I am completely exhausted. In a good way. Well, except for the head ache. So many exciting things are going on, I don't know where to start....I think I'll make a list.


1. On Friday during my whirlwind cooking, packing, fabric preparing, grocery shopping, entertaining kids while getting ready for QBTB, I took a wee latte break & checked my Flickr page. Lo and behold a message! An ad agency wanted to contact me regarding one of my pictures because they wanted to buy it! Like, with real money! Nothing like the offer of $ for something you weren't even trying to sell (and not far from Christmas, either!). Naturally, I called right away. After some nice conversations about pixels and potential prices (but without first obtaining consent from my model) I agreed. It is not a done deal; they still have to present it to their client, but if all goes well, B may be gracing the cover of a tourism magazine for the interior of British Columbia next summer.

I'll keep you posted as I should find out in about 2 weeks. Even if it doesn't happen, the thrill of being asked will last a lot longer than those 2 weeks!!

2. For 13 hours on Saturday, I got to hang out with 23 of my quilting buds sewing, eating and having a generally fabulous time. I can't believe it, but after all of the packing up and driving to the hall and setting up, I realized I had left my camera at home, charging. Rats!

3. B came to pick me & all my gear up, help pack away the tables and clean the hall. Then, we came home and transformed ourselves for a Hallowe'en party (sorry, he's too shy to share - it was his first event in drag and it may take a few more before he's up for posting photos). I can let you know that he totally rocked it as HRH, the Queen of England. Super fun time with friends, complete with impromptu group line dance to Disco Fever! Burn, Baby Burn!

4. Then today, after returning from a killer soccer game (killer-bad due to 8 a.m. start, after 2 a.m. bedtime, and killer-good due to D scoring several amazing goals!) I finally sat down to peruse blogland. Well, much to my surprise and sheer delight this is what I saw at the top of my dashboard:

Hey, that's me! Really? I won a giveaway? I LOVE sweetjessie's fabric garland and think that she is indeed sweet to be sending it to me. Thanks Jessie!!

5. Ok, nearing the end of the report. For me this is a biggie, just cuz I've been a major follower and fan of everything they do at sew, mama, sew. I think the sms gals run an incredibly efficient shop, blog and forum, provide tons of resources for 'the modern sewist' and generally do a wonderful job helping creative people connect and share. And I'm not just saying that to win $50 in fabric from their shop. Honestly. But check it out, my Crop Circle Table Runner tutorial made it onto their post yesterday amongst other fab entries to their Scrap Buster Tutorial Contest.

Wow. What a weekend. Like I said, totally exhausted, in a good way. Looking forward to a nice hot bowl of chicken soup, the Amazing Race and my pillow.

After a good night's sleep, I'll take some pix of my finishes from retreat yesterday and I do believe I should get busy devising some sort of giveaway - Must. Share. The. Love.

Dismembered Digits

How's that for a post title? Before you start imagining hideous rotary cutting accidents, spurting blood and ruined fabric (let's face it, that's the biggest worry, isn't it?), let me remind you that Hallowe'en is only NINE sleeps away!! Costume supplies are gathering slowly around here. I'm sure there will be some late nights next week because this week I am busy preparing for Quilt By the Bay (otherwise known as QBTB) coming up on Saturday.

In order to support my habit/addiction/not-so-secret-obsession (the EXACT same one all of you have, I'm sure), four years ago I decided to start a small business offering one-day quilting retreats. For 13 hours on a Saturday, 25 women gather to sew, laugh, share and EAT. Emphasis on laughing and eating. We do this 5 or 6 times a year. I love it, although the days leading up are busy for me, shopping, cooking & baking. It's great when QBTB falls near a holiday, because we all know that holidays = fun cookies. Thus:

We make these every year...they are great for freaking out friends at school. If you'd like to make your own, here's what you'll need to mix up in your cauldron.

BLOODY WITCH FINGER COOKIES
1 Cup (250 g) room temperature unsalted butter
1 Cup icing sugar
1 egg
1 tsp (5 mL) almond extract
1 tsp (5 mL) vanilla extract
2 3/4 Cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
green food colouring (I use cake decorating gel)
3/4 C blanched almonds
small tube red gel icing

In a mixing bowl, beat together butter, sugar, egg and extracts. Beat in flour, baking powder and salt. Add green food colouring until your dough becomes suitably witchy. Refrigerate dough for 30 mins. or overnight.

Pre-heat oven to 325F. Using about a heaping tablespoon of dough at a time, roll between your hands to get a finger shape. Squeeze in two places to form a middle knuckle. Press an almond in one end. Score the middle knuckle with a knife to make wrinkles (I forgot to do this part in the above photo). Place cookies on a sheet lined with parchment paper. Chill the sheet with raw cookies for 15 mins in the fridge, then bake for 20-22 minutes until the bottom is just starting to brown.

Remove from oven, cool 5 minutes. Pull up the almonds, squeeze some red gel icing in the dent left by the almond, then replace the almond so the icing oozes out around the 'cuticles'.

Leave a bunch on the counter and listen to the comments: Euwwwwww! Gross!!!! Yummy!!!

I'll be back in a few days with some photos from QBTB. I can't wait to see what everyone is going to work on!

Deck the walls....

...with kitty scarecrows, fa la la la la, lalalala. Or should that be Mwah hahahahaaaa, ha ha ha haaaa? Now that (Canadian) Thanksgiving is behind us, it's time to bust out some spooky decor.

I've been pretty forthright of late regarding my love of pumpkins. These pillows are no exception. I just LOVE them. If you do too, the pattern is available from a B.C. designer called Bella Moon, available here. They did take the better part of a weekend quilting retreat to finish (but the decorative stitching just makes them, so it was well worth it).

We don't go too crazy, but I've made these few things for Hallowe'en that get us in the mood around here. Most of my October sewing time in the past has been busy with costume-making. Speaking of witch, I mean which, we need to get going on that! There is talk of D being Elvis (not too difficult for a skinny, almost 11 year old, blond girl - Yikes!). T's thinking of going with a friend as Ernie & Bert. I love it! This is T (on the left) and his friend last year - this was totally their own idea, but I did have to help with the booties and boxers...

Check the ears. Cutest. Christmas. Elves. Ever!

Edited to add: HEY! There's another awesome giveaway in blogland! check out Jenny's generous giveaway at cutsewironrepeat