Qults for Women's Aid

Last week I contacted Women's Aid to see if they needed any quilts for the children in their refuges, and the answer was a resounding 'yes please!' I took 25 quilts for them, which was a blessing, as I have so many quilts here, it would have been impossible for my son to sleep in his bed at Christmas.

Here is Kate holding up just one of the quilts. The reason I have so many, is that I have been over to Shepshed, to 'Quilting Together' and brought back 45 quilts (luckily quite a few of them were prem quilts, or we'd have had to extend the house!) all of which were of the most fabulous standard. This nursery rhyme quilt was one of them.

This is a panel, beautifully hand quilted.Choppy stars with the design echoed in the plain blocks - a great quilt for a boy!Another choppy stars quilt, but looking much more dramatic, and sashed with cornerstones.Anbother panel - don't they look lovely when they're quilted?Mile-a-Minute on point with spacer blocks. You can just see that letters, numbers and simple designs have been quilted in the cream blocks. It makes a simple quilt extra special!A scrap quilt with a difference - Chinese coins stripped with hot pink. Bound to be snapped up by a Barbie Girl!Blue strippy with dogs! What a clever way to use up scrappy blocks and a small piece of novelty fabric! The red border adds extra pizzazz!

A medallion quilt for a Star Wars fan. The colour choices here are perfect!Black, white and red always make a dramatic, masculine-looking quilt. The border and red binding really set it off.Some farm animal pictures bulked out to make a super quilt for a nature lover. Love the borders top and bottom.I recognise these blocks, as they were donated by someone who had done great work making them. They've gone together beautifully with the light sashing allowing them to shine, but kept in trim by the purple border. Smashing.A cute quilt for a small child, with 3-D prairie points to play with. More Mile-a-Minute with a subdued colour palette. The sashing compliments the colours in the blocks.And the last photo for today is of school-related images. Not sure how well that will go down, but the colours will certainly brighten a child's day!

Many thanks to all the ladies from Quilting Together for their lovely quilts, their lovely welcome, and the lovely way they dive into my donated scraps and not only take lots away, but then come back with more fabulous quilts!

Quilts for vulnerable children

I had a call yesterday from Micheala from Catch-22 to see if I thought the children she works with would be eligible for Linus quilts. If, like me, you've never heard of this organisation, have a look here to see the kind of work that they do. As far as I'm concerned, vulnerable children like these are the ideal recipients of Linus quilts, as not only do they need the hug, but they also need the quilt!

Michaela kindly came to my house, and took 12 of the largest quilts I had (for young people aged 16 and over) and six cot quilts, as some of these youngsters are already mums. So if anyone out there has any large quilts or a good pattern which knits up big, please let me know!

Another TWG workshop!

There was an emergency call from my Mum last week, hoping I could do another quilting workshop with the Chesterfield Townwomen's Guild, as their booked person had had to cancel.
I need to find out how to say 'no' (anyone out there with tips to help me?!) as it's a 120 mile round trip, but the promise of lunch with my parents was tempting, so off I went with my squares of Vilene and a bag of blue strings.
They were a lovely friendly group of ladies, and here they are all hard at work. I rather optimistically brought 49 squares, hoping for a good-sized quilt (blocks are 6" finished).They were very diligent about mixing up the fabrics and the values, to produce blocks which would go together well.My Mum, in the blue, helped out with the teaching, and we got on well. I pinned the completed blocks onto the back of a quilt I had brought as an example, and they quickly mounted up.Here are the blocks close up. They'll look even better when they're sewn together. There was a total of 20 blocks made in a two hour period, and the prize for the fastest worker went to Doreen who made five blocks. Well done, ladies. This will make a great quilt for anyone who likes blue!