Pineapple Sherbet

My daughter Jenni and her cousin Gabby were born 5 days apart and our families always celebrate birthdays and other major occasions together.

3 year old sweeties

In September the girls turn 30 and we will be celebrating Gabby's wedding.  Saturday night was the Hens Night and we had such a fun time at an Italian cooking class in Sydney "making" a 5-course feast.

My cousin Stephanie (mother of the bride) stirring the risotto

Making ricotta ravioli

I wanted to make a quilt for Gabby's birthday present so last August I asked her big sister for ideas.  Danielle immediately suggested pineapples and I was tickled pink because I'd seen many pineapple blocks designed by Jackie Padesky Quilts on Instagram over the previous year or so and had been wanting to make some of these cute blocks mainly using some bright and fun Me and My Sister fabrics in my stash plus a few others I bought.

Sewed the last stitches in the binding on Friday night so I could pack it up to give to Gabby on Saturday.

 

Came across a fun shopping bag in Coles a few months ago, so wrapping was sorted.

Such a happy quilt to make.

More Tops

"Little Star" is together and on top of the pile to go to Karen for quilting.

Next up was sewing "Snippets" blocks together - into a quilt top.  The blocks have been made for a few months.

 

The quilt is pretty big and it was difficult to take a photo in the gloomy rainy weather to show the lovely colours.

 

The backing is made with some leftover blocks and fabric from FigTree's "Aloha Girl" range.

 

Had a lovely time on Friday night/Saturday morning with ChaCha staying over and then she and I went to lunch at Sublime Point with some friends - such a lovely restaurant and fabulous view when the weather is not so gloomy.

Sunday I spent pretty much all day in the sewing room making "Takes the Cake" nine patches - 98 of them.  I've been re-watching "Downton Abbey" while sewing - it's so fabulous.

I sewed some blocks/rows together using black crossweave I bought from Karen - it so lovely to work with although it does fray a bit.  First time I've used such a dark background but it works very well with these bright and fresh Bonnie and Camille fabrics.

 
Time to think about what to cut out next.

Yesterday Karen sent me a photo of Pineapple Sherbet just after it came off the quilting frame.  I'm so thrilled with how it looks.  Hoping to find a green fabric in the stash to use for binding.

Might need to take out a bank loan to pay for all the quilting :)

A Day Off

My cousin's daughter was married in the Hunter Valley on Saturday.  Lynell came with me and on Friday we drove up north in torrential rain.  A three-hour trip took 4-1/2 hours.  The groom is from Scotland and his family, along with many friends, had made the trip to Australia for the wedding.  We met up with most of them for dinner on Friday night - a fun night in a pub in Maitland.

The wedding was wonderful - the bride looked spectacular.  The groom and all the Scottish visitors wore kilts, even the couple's 11 month old son had a kilt specially made for the wedding.  The groom's aunt is a kilt-maker and hand sews every kilt she makes.  There is up to 7m of fabric in a man's kilt and 3.5m of fabric in the baby's!

On Sunday morning we attended a recovery breakfast with the family then started the journey back to Sydney.  For Christmas Jenni and Kurt bought me a ticket to see "Cabaret" with Paul Capsis and Lynell dropped me at the theatre where I met up with Jenni and Kurt.  The show was fabulous.  I've seen the show performed live twice now and it's very confronting and quite sinister.  Everyone in the show was fabulous.

Monday was a day off work - recovery day from the big weekend.  Spent most of the day sewing the Scrappy Trip Around the World blocks together.

and on Monday night I sewed backings for three quilts to drop off with Karen when we have stitching on Saturday.

"Summerville"

"Summerville"

"Pineapple Sherbet"

"Scrappy Trip Around the World"

On Monday afternoon I called in to Karen's to pick up two quilts she had quilted for me:

"Medley"

"Cakewalk"

The last two nights I have been binding quilts:

More Cutting Out

At long last the weather cooled down enough last week so I could iron the Snippets blocks - they are ready to sew together one day.  Spent a bit of time cutting out the Takes the Cake strips into 2-1/2" squares (1800 of them).

I'm looking forward to making up a couple of the Takes the Cake blocks to try out the black crossweave for the background in this quilt - something completely out there for me.

So glad I have the pink cutting mat - much easier to use than the dark green for black fabrics.

I picked up Scrappy Churndash and My Pink and Green Heaven from Karen on Friday afternoon - that was a scorcher of a day.  By Sunday the weather had cooled down enough for me to sew on some binding and stitch down Scrappy Churndash binding.  This quilt is now on the way to its new home.
 

 

The pineapples have multiplied - outer borders to go on (maybe) tonight and this is ready to go to Karen.

ChaCha had a two night sleepover on the weekend.  We went to a great basketball game on Saturday night and cheered the Hawks into the finals series.  Her first game - have to start 'em young (says her uncle).

Scrappy Quilts

I've been invited to a wedding in early March and the pre-wedding celebrations started on Saturday with lunch at a fantastic pub in Marrickville.

 

Lynell came with me to the lunch and we finished up the day watching the Hawks win an absolute nail-biter.

Very much looking forward to the wedding and a weekend away with family and my dear friend Lynell. 

The sewing machine has been whirring away making more Scrappy Churndash blocks - 18 made, 7 to go and I can put this quilt top together. 

The embroidery machine has been busy too.

The pile of orange, pink, yellow and white fabrics in the last blog post has now been made into something and it was finished yesterday.

I've been wanting to make a Pineapple Quilt for ages and I now have a reason to.   Love all these colourful fabrics. 

I LOVE making these blocks - they whip up in no time and I hope they will look wonderful in a quilt top.   Might have to make two quilts.