Jennie's Threads

Another nice easy block for week 6... just tiny rotary cut pieces, some flying geese and a couple of quarter-square triangles. I picked ou the fabrics on the Sunday. On the Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday it snowed. A lot. How appropriate! The Angel of the North in the Snow for Flying Birds. Week 7 is a stinker....I haven't made it yet!

Well thank goodness.... after week 4's Aves block, Week 5 was a dream! This is Wild Goose Chase. Admittedly, some of the pieces are quite tiny. But definitely not the smallest we played with in the 365 quilt. The biggest challenge for me was finding a purple print I could fussy-cut to go in the "large" centre square (3" finished). I dug this piece of Tula out of the back of my stash and I'm quite pleased with it... note to self - more purple fussy-cuttable fabrics are required!

So I mentioned something about week 3 being back in the comfort zone.... well week 4 blew that comfort zone out of the water! I have to confess when I first looked at it, it scared me, and it's not often a patchwork block does that. But this innocent looking 6" block came complete with templates, y seams and curves! That's a lot to fit into a small block! I spent all week wondering how to do it. Do I sew it by machine, or do I make myself some EPP templates, or do I sew it by hand (without papers). Or do I do what some have done and just applique those leaves? On Sunday afternoon I put on my big-girl panties and just got on with it. By machine. And whilst it took me a couple of hours, and a few seams did spend time with the seam ripper, overall I'm quite pleased with it. I'm certainly pleased that it is done. And even more pleased that week 5 looks straightforward! This block is part of the Aves Quilt - a block of the week pattern designed by Kathy Kerr of ...

Week 3 of the Aves quilt was a step back into our comfort zone - a 6" rotary cut block. This one is called Birds Nest. Of course, it still wasn't totally straightforward - some of the pieces were cut at eleven sixteenths of an inch!

The Aves Quilt started with a bang last week with the central medallion, and it didn't change for week two. This week we added a ring of flying geese to that centre medallion. The ring itself was foundation pieced in 6 parts, and then we had the option of appliquing it to the centre, or piecing it. I decided to piece it, and despite thinking it would be difficult, it actually went very smoothly - I had a couple of gaps that needed a couple of hand stitches, where the points of the compass don't meet the ring of geese - this is a design feature (not an error on my part), but because the centre was foundation pieced, and I didn't sew into the seam allowance, there were just a few gaps. Ten minutes hand sewing remedied that! And I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.

So I'm sure you're pretty sick of me talking about my 365 Quilt Challenge. If you're not, you can read all about here! And here's a picture to remind you! Well that was 2016. Last year, the designer, Kathy of Green Avenue Quilts, ran a block of the week called Etoiles Rouge. I decided not to take part. But this year, her quilt is called Aves (Latin for birds, I believe) and it is totally bonkers! Here's the mock up of it she shared back in October. It was one of those moments where you know you have to make that quilt. The first block was finally released this week and it is the centre of the quilt. Can you guess my colour theme? Unlike the 365, which was entirely rotary cut, this involved foundation piecing. I have developed a bit of a love hate relationship with foundation piecing if I'm honest. I found the freezer paper method a few years ago and I love it. But with a nearly-4-year-old and a nearly-2-year-old (especially the nearly-2-year-o...