I’m all ways surprised its another WOW or WIP’s and time to link with Esther again
Starting in the garden this morning it’s wet and mostly drab!
This is the tiniest frog I have ever seen, he’s not quiet a 1/4 inch long! He is So perfect and not at all worried that my iPad is withen inches of him?
wet and drab day this morning
Giant palm is dropping it’s fruit, in a few days there will be 100s of them and in the wet and high temperatures they ferment quickly and it’s a dreadful smell.
SO I lay sheets of plastic to make it easy to scop them up and dispose of them.
Even the swimming pool looks sad this morning.
But the water Lillie’s are happy.
Some one stole a couple of my days this week and then some hours this morning!!!!! I was going to sew for several hrs this morning, I was up early so I could but it is 11.30am and not a stitch done LOL
Spent most of the last week working on my Red and Green quilt block loving it.
First block a rough draft for a Red and Green quilt to be, nothing is sewn down here.
First I made up my centre flower
I did not want to many layers of fabric on top of each other for when it came to appliqueing and quilting the block, so I drew a line around the second fabric then cut out 1/4 inch inside that line, did this for each layer so I ended up with wonky rings!!!!!
Put centres a side for another day and built up my flower. I’m using iron on fusing behind my flowers and I make them up on my Teflon sheet.
See below all the pieces to make one flower centre
Before making up the flower I made templates of these pieces out of black cardboard so I can quickly make up the next 12 flowers.
I tried 2 different fabrics for my stems to be, one on the right bleed in to the background to much so went for the batik on the left. I have enough of that fabric for all the stems to be. These are all going to be cut on the bias and have iron on fusing behind them.
First half of the stems machine appliquéd down. To get a mirrow imagine I fold the block in half over a light box and drew with a pencil where these stems were, a perfect imagine . My light box is my small round glass top table with a light shinning up from the floor LOL
Threads I used on the stems, I want light in the centre of my blocks so using a bright gold thread on all the left hand side of the stems , if I add it to the other side of the stems it looks chunky see top of right stem, so I have used a violet thread that blends in and makes the stem softer.
First stems all appliquéd down, centre flower is just lying there not appliquéd down.
Finally all stems appliquéd down/
Now to iron down my leaves, I had to place ALL the berries so I could place my leaves and not over lap the berries or the berries over lap the leaves?
Appliqueing those leaves down using a aqua fine dress makers sewing machine thread top, It was chewing the thread and making birds nest at the back till I used the same thread top and bottom, why am I using a dressing making thread instead of applqiue thread? because it was all I had in aqua LOL
Slowly it grows
For some reason I thought there were leaves on each seam of the blocks also, so added them to see what it was going to look like and to my surprise I see a lovely circle of leaves? have since checked the original pattern and there are NO leaves on those seams but mine is going to have them LOL SO not only are my leaves different shape, my circles different sizes, I’m adding more leaves now LOL
All done waiting for the berries, there will be all most 200 on this block!
Close up on the stitch I used on the veins
To make sure I had the same vein shape I made up 1/2 a leaf in cardboard then it was so quick to mark those veins.
Stitch I used for the veins, on the right is the stitch as programmed in my machine, on the left is the same stitch but only 1/4 of the size it made a wonderful vein stitch
Where I’m up to now, two bunches of needle turned berries hand appliquéd down next bunch waiting to be pinned, and second block has its stems fused down and 1/2 have been machine appliquéd down.
BLock on the right waiting for leaves to be ironed down?
In the garden this week its very wet!!!!
New leaves such a fragile leaf at this stage .
This heliconia grows wild here now.
Ants love the honey so if you pick them you have to plung the heads in a bucket of water for a while before taking them inside.
This is the strangest plant in my garden, never seen another one any where here?
love this colour.
heres another stunning colour combination?
These are chive flowers so so dainty around 1/8th of and inch across each flower?
Thank you so much from visiting
Off to link with Esther now my favourite time of the week to visit others links and see what they have been doing.
Happy sewing every one who sews. Cheers Glenda
It’s wet here too but I have snow! 🙂 How adorable is that tiny little frog! Loved all the photos of your garden !
That is such a beautiful applique project..it will be fun to watch its progress !
Morning Deb, you can keep your snow LOL I know it was your first day of Spring yesterday but many parts of the Northern hemisphere were covered in snow !!!!! Its meant to be autumn down here but as I live in the far north our climate hardly changes all year round. its been a tough one for those further south this year with terrible fires and floods!!!!!! So may people have lost their homes to both the fires and floods. Im throughly enjoying the new project its meant to be for when I need a break from my other projects but I’m enjoying it so much I keep picking it up LOL Glad I started it as I’m missing not working on my Morning Glory centre it was such a joy to make. Cheers Glenda
So lovely to see how you build up your applique blocks so carefully. It must be time consuming but what stunning results you get! I particularly liked seeing the threads that you’d chosen for your machine appliqued stems. Lots of tips for how to make a good job of all the design! Thank you!
Morning Plum Ive just been in to your blog and seen the added flying geese circle its stunning !!!!! Going to hopefully work on my Red and Green blocks today have wanted to make this for many many years and finally found the design that I wanted to make, so another one marked off my bucket list. Its a cool 24C here this morning bleak and over caste so a good day for sewing Hugs Glenda.
I love visiting your garden with you every week. Thanks for sharing. We still have a few piles of snow lingering with a few daffodils starting to pop their leaves up out of the frozen ground.
Hi Chris I have seen lots of photos taken of the first day of Spring in the Northern hemisphere and it looks like the middle of winter not Spring in many placesLOL OZ has had dreadful bush fires and floods the last couple of months and many have lost their homes very very sad. This year we have had unusual weather for the Far North, more like the South Pacific rain, torrental rain then sunshine Where we usually have gentle rain for days on end none stop which can be very depressing not seeing the sun for weeks on end. Use to love seeing the first spring bulbs appear in NZ that is some thing I miss. Cheers Glenda
Hi Chris you would NOT have loved it this week with the storms we ahve had raging around us, Ive never seen rain like it and hope i never do again, check out my blog to see what the falls looked like after 16inchs of rain in 4 hrs!!!!!! Cheers Glenda
love your new quilt with the red/green theme, I made one quite a few years ago and always so glad I did even though it take ages to complete. Love all those flowers and plants and sounds like a good plan to put the plastic on the ground for the stinky fruit to drop so you can get rid of it
Hi Karen where do some of these weeks go to???? This morning I was going to sew but here I am still doing house work at 10pm and have not even put the washing on yet LOL I’m glad I’m a person who likes to ahve a coffee break each morning and Avo this is when I sit down and catch up on mail and recharge my batteries LOL . We had rats, bats, and possums in last night eating and squabbling over the ripe fruit on the palm tree, and to day the birds are squabbling over it LOL But still 100’s drop! Love working on the Red & Green quilt, I’m prepping the 4 centre blocks at the moment appliqueing all the stems down as I go as its so humid the iron-on-fusing just keeps lifting after 1/2 a day. Happy quilting. Cheers Glenda
Oh, my! 200 berries! Your block is going to be lovely and I like the thread colors you’re using to add some interest in the pieces. With the changes you’ve made, you’re definitely making it your own.
Hi Kyle so sorry I have just got back to you but we have had torrential rain over the last week and on Monday night we were up most of the night trying to keep the rain water from coming in to the house, many homes had 3 or 4 inches go through their homes. In 4 Hrs we had 16 inches of rain Ive never seen rain like this and hope I never do again. SO I have not been making berries LOL Two nights when I was trying to forget the rain I passed it making tiny tiny houses that ended up 3inchs, I did them by paper piecing so did forget the storms as I had to concentrate so much LOL Cheers Glenda
Your Red & Green block is so lovely! I was wondering if you were going to applique those tiny circles with your machine. They take awhile to applique but they are so beautiful. It’s nice to see the gardens with green plants and beautiful flowers. We don’t have the snow the northeast has but it is still cold here. But this spring is great for the maple syrup business. I need to get a gallon or two so we will have a treat. Happy Stitching!
Hello up there Gretchen , I was pleased to read you had not had the heavy snow others were having. Does not matter were you live in the world now the weather is unusual to what they usual have. I’m beginning to wonder what our dry will be like this year??? Reading about the maple syrup makes my mouth glands water, I fell in love with sourdough pancakes, crisp bacon, and maple syrup any time of the day in Canada LOL. Yes those tiny circles are been needle turned by hand and having stuffing added behind them as I want 5hem to give the quilt a 3D effect I love making berries LOL. Hugs Glenda.
Hi Gretchen so sorry I have just got back to you but we have had torrential rain over the last week and on Monday night we were up most of the night trying to keep the rain water from coming in to the house, many homes had 3 or 4 inches go through their homes, many lost cars and caravans, plus having water through their homes. In 4 Hrs we had 16 inches of rain Ive never seen rain like this and hope I never do again. Flooding was wide spread but to day the sun has come out and things are drying out, so I hope those who were flooded out can get back home and start cleaning up. SO I have not been appliqueing LOL Two nights when I was trying to forget the rain I passed it making tiny tiny houses that ended up 3 inchs square, I did them by paper piecing so did forget the storms as I had to concentrate so much LOL I was so surprised we did not loose the power as that usually goes first thing but there was no wind so trees did not come down, but now the mud slides are starting!!!!!Cheers Glenda
As always, coming to the end of your post I am struggling to process it all. It’s such a given your garden is a high point. I love the flora and fauna so different from what we have. A simple glass table with a light below never ‘dawned’ on me to use as a light box. Flipping your block in half to get a perfect reflective design is brilliant. And I realized you mix your machine and needle turn applique methods in the same block–and you use trapunto to make them pop. I learn so much here! Thank you for sharing your days.
Dear Julie I’m just glad some one is learning some thing from what I write. Very little sewing was done the last part of this week!!!! I have PM you about the storms we have been having. Thanks for dropping in but sorry it took so long to get back to you Hugs glenda