Hopfaldera

Marcelle and Anouk

Today I want to show you my Marcelle Medallion. I don't have the book that the pattern is in (Liberty Love: 25 Projects to Quilt & Sew Featuring Liberty of London Fabrics by Alexia Abegg), but I do have the magazine (only available digitally now). 

This is how I planned my medallion and how it grew.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am now working on border 5. You can see the bricks above. I have already sewn them into strips, and next thing will be to add those strips to the medallion. It is a great project. I'm having a lot of fun with it. I'm actually cutting into my Liberty fabrics and some other precious fabrics that I normally keep in a separate place. Stay tuned for more of my Marcelle Medallion!

Today I also have to talk about the Eurovision Songcontest. Tonight is the semi-final in which Anouk will try to get a place in the final for The Netherlands. This has become a bit of a national trauma; we haven't gone to the final in so many years that I can't even remember when was the last time. And we want it so bad! So bad, that this year Anouk, who is definitely the coolest and maybe the best singer in the country, is representing us. If she doesn't make it to the final I suggest we forget about it and never enter again, with pain in our hearts. Here is the song (please vote for us if you are in one of the countries that can vote tonight, thank you!!):

 

Grandmother's Choice update

I'm still working on the Grandmother's Choice block of the week project. Each week I make a block in red and white, and it's still fun. We've made 36 blocks now, only 13 to go! I'm already thinking of how I'm going to sew them into a quilt. Shall I use a traditional setting, or think of something new? These are my blocks so far.

Did you know this week is the big Sew Mama Sew giveaway day event? Be sure to enter my giveaway before it closes on Friday! Here it is.

 

A little house in Zierikzee

A while ago I made a quilt block  (for Charise in the Cocorico bee) picturing the house that my grandmother used to live in. My father liked the quilt block very much; it is also the house that he grew up in. He was sorry I had to send it to someone else. He 'suggested' that it would make a perfect birthday present for him...

So of course I made another block just like it, but in different colors, and made a mini quilt for my father's birthday. I kept it  secret from him, but we celebrated his birthday last weekend so now I can reveal it.

Here is a photo from Google streetview of the actual house in Zierikzee.

And this is the sneak peek I posted on Instagram of the back and a bit of the quilting.

Tomorrow is Queen's Day and the inauguration of the new king! We're going to have fun!!!

Some orange sunshine on the mini quilt I made for my mother's birthday last year

Finished picknick quilt

I completed my Lovely Year of Finishes goal for April: to make a picknick quilt out of a quilt top I had made a long time ago. Here it is:

The quilt is made of 14 Friendship star blocks and 2 Ohio stars. The binding is my favorite part because it is made of strips of all the fabrics that are featured in the quilt. The fabrics were a fat quarter bundle that I bought at Sew Mama Sew and that was put together by Hillary Lang of Wee Wonderfuls. I added the turquoise background fabric myself. It is a rather sturdy fabric. That's why I made this into a picknick quilt; it is a bit too thick to snuggle under. 

At the last minute I thought of the idea to add a carrying strap to the quilt. The strap also keeps the quilt rolled up. It is integrated into the binding so you can't lose it, handy feature!

the label: made by Muriël

a colorful detail on the back

Size: 55"x 55"

Spring and summer can come now!! 

I'm linking to the Finishes party of A Lovely Year of Finishes.

I'm still debating what to do next month... I have another week to make up my mind.

But it is a strange week. On April 30th our queen (of The Netherlands) will abdicate and we'll have a king, Willem-Alexander. It is going to be a very festive day I think, so that is something to look forward to! But last Sunday night we got a big scare in my town, Leiden, to make everybody think twice about big festive occasions. Sunday the police found out that someone had made a threat on an internet forum to carry out a school shooting at a high school here in Leiden. It did not say which school. My daughter is a high school student. She had to stay at home on Monday because all schools (20) were closed. At the elementary schools the children couldn't play outside that day. On Tuesday schools reopened, but because there was still no resolution, armed policemen and women were posted at every school and only one entrance could be used. Today was the same. And we still don't know who made the thread, if it was serious in the first place, and what this all means (they arrested someone and then released him). It is really scary, but it also feels like this doesn't apply to us at all. I mean, how can a high school student have a weapon here in The Netherlands? And how come they can't find out who posted the threat? Will it all blow over? Will we just forget about it, and feel safe again after the spring break? Will we get more clarity? Not the best week.

update: The Dutch 18-year-old that made the threat was arrested in Costa Rica and brought to The Netherlands. After telling a judge that he hadn't been serious about his threat, and handing over his passport, he was left in his parents' custody.

 

On with the sampler

I made another block for my sampler of some sort. It is the Squash Blossom block from a tutorial by Anita of Bloomin' Workshop.

In this block you can see the background fabric that I'm using for this sampler. It will be in more blocks, together with fabric from the two FQ stacks that I'm using.

I put all the blocks that I have so far together in different ways to see what that looks like.

My conclusion is that I need more blocks before I know anything about a layout. I do like the symmetrical layout though. I think my original idea was to have asymmetry, so that changed... we'll see what happens next...

From Hope to Comfort

From September 2010 until now I have been part of the Hope circle of do. Good Stitches. Do. Good Stitches is a charity quilting bee consisting of (many) circles that make a quilt each month for various charities. Hope circle is one of the first three circles of the bee and the charity we most often make quilts for is Threading Hope, an organization that distributes the quilts to children in underprivileged countries. I made many many blocks (57, I had to recount because I couldn't believe it) for the Hope circle and sent them (most often in pairs) to the quilting members of the circle who live in the USA.

first block I ever made for do. Good Stitches

Last month I offered to make the quilt, so this time everyone has to send their blocks from the US to me (in The Netherlands). I didn't really have a problem with paying the postage and I didn't hear from anyone else that they had, but of course it's all rather costly when you add up all the small amounts.

So I was pleasantly surprised when Rachel (the brains behind do. Good Stitches) approached me about moving to a European circle that Nicolette, another Dutch quilter had thought up. I said yes, then everything went very quickly, and now I am part of the Comfort circle, with people all based in Europe, benefiting European charities.

I already made my first two blocks, that will not have to travel very far.

my first blocks for the Comfort circle

Bye bye and good luck to everyone in the Hope circle! I had a great time!! Of course I will still finish the quilt for March for the Hope circle and show photos of it here and on Flickr.

 

 

Plan for April

It's Lovely Year of Finishes goal setting time again! This month I want to finish a quilt that I have started a very long time ago. Years ago actually, way back when I was just starting out. I think I even calculated the measurements in centimeters for this quilt, because I didn't have rulers in inches yet. The quilt top is all finished and made up of 14 Friendship star blocks and 2 Ohio stars. The backing and binding are also ready. The only thing the quilt needs is basting, quilting and adding the binding. So that should be possible, right... 

First thing will be to unfold these piles and see what I actually made more than 3 years ago. I'm looking forward to that! 

I think this quilt will become a picknick blanket because the background fabric that I used is quite sturdy. Did you hear that, Spring? A picknick blanket. Don't you think it is time to come out now, Spring? I hope it will work!! (I heard on the radio it might snow again tomorrow, oh no...)

I'm linking up to the April Goal setting party!

Round and round and round

I thought I would give you some eye candy to go with all the Easter candy that will be around this weekend. These are all photos of medallion type quilt blocks (or add-a-border blocks or round robin blocks) that I have been working on, either by myself or with the add-a-border bee on Flickr (always accepting new members as Dustin says) or with the Double Dutch group (Dutch quilters that have met on Flickr and have now already met off line three times, great fun!!).

Click on the photos if you want to know more.

 

 

 

This block has already grown quite a bit you can see it here

 

This one is much larger now too and looking fantastic here

 

This one looks like this now

 

Happy Easter!!!

p.s. I want to thank three lovely quilting and blogging ladies who nominated me and my blog for a Liebster Award! Really nice to think of me! These are the ladies: Anne, Celine and Alia; go visit their blogs!!! I will see if I can answer all the questions that came with the award later. Thank you to all three!!!

Converging corners quilt finished

Two bees with one stone... The members of two online quilting bees made blocks for this quilt using Kona Stone as the background fabric. Yes, I have finished my Converging Corners quilt (tutorial by Film In The Fridge) and so I have met my Lovely Year of Finishes goal for March! 

And it is a good thing we have another finished quilt in the house, because spring still seems very far away and last weekend we even had Siberian temperatures around here (this was what the weatherman on national television called it; he might have exaggerated a bit but not much...)!

on the back are four blocks from the 3x6 sampler bee and leftover scraps and yardage from the front

I used a teal solid for the binding

Quilt stats:

Pattern: Converging Corners by Film in the Fridge

Blocks made by: members of Sew Buzzy and Bee Europa 2012-2013

Batting: 100% cotton

Size: 48" x 72"

Sewn together, quilted and finished by: me, Muriël

A big thank you to all my fellow bee members!!

Getting there

How is it going with my goal for March? It's going pretty well.

the quilt top, consisting of 24 blocks

I have all the elements of the quilt sandwich ready to be piled on top of eachother and to be basted and quilted and I have already made a roll of binding. I chose a solid colored fabric for that, because there are already so many prints in this quilt. 

blurry photo of the quilt back, made from leftover scraps and yardage, and a few old bee blocks

double fold binding ready to go

Today I want to do the basting. I'm going to use my quilting safety pins. I want to try basting with temporary glue in the future, but I couldn't get it right now.