A Tisket A Tasket, A Pretty Heirloom Basket

A beautiful welcome to all you lovely lovelies♥ Goodness me, it's been a while since I prattled on here at my happy place. July has swirled around and around, tangled and trapped in howling gale force winds blasting into August, without nary a word from moi. 'Tis just a little too cold for me. Wish oh wish I was right smack in the middle of those 40 degrees hot, hot, hot summer days you up there seem to be 'enjoying'. Believe you me I am counting down the days till I can kick Old Man Winter down my ice encrusted country road, so that he can find lodging in some other part of the world! Though I have been absent from blogland for yonks I have been filling my  wintry freezing days with happy stitching.

I have been enjoying hand quilting my 'Buds in the Basket' quilt ('tis nearly finished) ......BUT.......would you believe I have fashioned another quilt, from start to finish! Yes I have; just a little one to adorn a wall in my humble abode. I know, I know, I should be stitching flowers on my 'big girl quilt' but I am afraid I have wandered from that flowery path where irises and daffodils and cosmos nod as I walk by. I have been led down a path where funnily enough pretty heirloom baskets are dotted here and there peeping from behind the blossoms.

Why was I led from my flowery path??  What can I say. I will have to blame it on one of my sewing room, tidying up frenzies. Whilst re-organising some books I came across a quilting book, 'Basket Quilt Show'. It is a book showcasing quilts featuring baskets and flowers, all of which won awards in quilt shows back in the day. I bought this book about 25 years ago and I can still remember being rather taken with the 'Heirloom Basket' quilt. At the time, I of course thought that I would love to fashion this pretty one day. Well......that day came about six weeks ago........quite a few years down my quilting path. As I am a gal who adores her baskets flourishing with flowers, both in pretty embroidered stitches, ribbons and fabric; and in real ridgy-didge drink-in-the-perfume-of-real, flowers....I wanted to try my hand at a little cross stitching with tiny squares of fabric.

This quilt was designed by Ruth Diane Hosfield based on the original double bed quilt pattern by Anne Orr, which was featured in Good Housekeeping magazine in January, 1935. This quilt's style is called cross stitch. Years ago I used to do a lot of cross stitch, though mainly as gifts. I loved to stitch Anne Orr's designs. Do any of you lovelies of  'a certain age' remember her books?? As I researched, I learnt Anne Orr created nearly 100 books of designs for needleworkers. As needlework editor of Good Housekeeping magazine her designs became part of the decor of thousands of American homes.....and I suppose Australian homes, too. Ann Orr's designs are versatile. Her charts may be used for any needlework technique worked over counted threads or in blocks; as in cross stitch needlepoint, filet and mosaic crochet, petit point, knitting....to quilts made from tiny squares of fabric. So when my beady li'l eyes spotted the Heirloom Basket pattern all those years ago, I snapped the book up quicker than quick. Since time immemorial, yes, even when I was a slip of a girl, I have loved flowers in baskets....actually I have always loved flowers. Hard to believe, I know. =)

And......as I have a penchant for baskets of flowers either in quilts, or embroideries, I think a quilt of  1" squares of a pretty basket spilling over with flowers, in a cross stitch design would be just the perfect addition to join my collection of flowers in baskets, pretties.

Anne Orr's designs have always evoked in me a feeling of bygone days. Days of quaint scenes of children and animals; period children in silhouettes. And....I love, love, love her baskets of flowers, peacocks, birds, butterflies......so many designs evoking a feeling of whimsy. I have always considered her designs to be charming.

I didn't need to acquire any fabric as I had all the Kona colours I wanted to use for this quilt and the white background is a fabric that I had left over from another quilt. Sometimes it is a most excellent thing to buy more fabric than one needs, isn't it.

This quilt is fashioned of 2,322 1" squares in shades of grey, pink, blue, purple and yellow. As the main colour is white I chain stitched the white squares in pairs. This made the assembly of each row much speedier as I joined the required coloured squares together until each row was completed.

Love, love, love all that messiness of the back. Love, love, love the concertina-like swirls and swirls of the strips.

I love the back of this quilt as much as the front.  Love the soft muted effect of the sun shining through the quilt backing.

Love all the little crosses of the quilting in each square. Looks like cross stitch, doesn't it??

I love this quilt.  The piecing of the itty bitty squares took some doing and was a painfully slow process, but now that the last stitch has been stitched this happy quilt makes me smile. As this quilt is oozing with tiny squares I desired all the corners to be perfectly aligned.....I am funny like that. Thus the stitching of each row to the one below took an age. I pinned every corner and then stitched slowly along till the end of the row. I am glad I took  the 'slow is better' approach, ensuring each corner is perfect as I think it adds to the cross stitch aesthetic. Don't get that magnifying glass of yours out though......as there could be a few corners that are a little less than perfect.

Upon stitching all these tiny squares together I noticed the chart that I had followed did not match the photo of the finished quilt. The ribbon is a little different to that in the photo. Don't you hate that!! What a pain in the royal derriere. I dithered whether or not to unpick the offending squares but I decided to leave everything as is. I had just finished stitching the 2,322nd square....did I really want to unpick and create much angst?? Noooooooooo!! The ribbon bow on my quilt looks tolerable enough. =) I am guessing "Little Miss Persnickety" ain't so persnickety after all! Shh......now don't you tell anyone.

I machine quilted this pretty. I thought straight diagonal lines stitched through the centre of each square would be the way to go. The diagonal lines stitched through each square gives the effect of cross stitch. I used Mono Poly extra-fine polyester, invisible monofilament thread to quilt as I wanted the quilting stitches to be 'colourless'. I have used a nylon thread before and had so many problems that I vowed I would never use it again. There were a few times when the thread broke but surprisingly the quilting was rather pain free.

I found after quilting this pretty that the quilt was rather wonky. As it was going to be a wall hanging I blocked the quilt to ensure all the 'wonkiness' disappeared. Alas, there are a couple of places that are still a little less desirable, but I think I will just have to live with these imperfections. Perhaps I will block it again. I have never blocked a quilt before so this was a first for me.

I love the cross stitch look of my Heirloom Basket and the gentle gradation of the colours. I love the pixelated look of this quilt. Why, looking through Anne Orr's Charted Designs book there are many other designs that would make a lovely quilt. Perhaps I will fashion another, one of these days.

I am amazed I have completed a quilt within six weeks! Never in the annals of "The History of Kim Sharman's Quilting Adventures" has this ever been done. No big deal to those of you lovelies who seem to whip up quilts within days......but as for me, I am popping the champagne cork!

But enough of me basking in the warmth of  my small accomplishments. Thank you for visiting my little place and taking the time to read my 'stuff and nonsense' about my little "Heirloom Basket" quilt. For the next little while I perhaps should finish my Buds in the Basket quilt and see that some flowers are 'growed' on my flower garden quilt. I can sense that Spring is not too far away........well at least in my dreams! The pretty flowers in the garden are once again beginning to pop up from the earth to herald the season that fills my days with joy. The wattle trees are blossoming and the daffodils and jonquils are beginning to burst from the confines of the prison of their green spathes resulting in bright and happy flowers. Yes indeedy, hundreds of bulbs have broken free from the damp, dank earth and growing towards the sun.

As for my pretty quilt it has now found it's new home on the wall. I must say I love the gorgeous spring feeling it brings to the family room. It adds to the pretty aesthetic which already oozes in this room. May your day be sprinkled with beauty and smiles♥

Until the next time...............

Linking up this week to Wendy's Peacock Party. and Finished or Not Friday over at Alycia Quilts.

WINTER!!

Winter! The very word chills my bones. Way down here at the bottom of the world, where it is just a hop, skip and a jump over melting sheets of ice to Antarctica, Old Man Winter, that blustery, ill-mannered chap has brazenly blown in. Yep.....he has arrived. He has swirled and swirled wherever he will, tempestuously dispensing his frigid tricks from that over-large bag of his, onto us mere mortals........and Maisie, too♥

I wish I loved Winter. I know there are some of you lovelies who invite Old Man Winter into your homes with outstretched arms and embrace him, chastising him for being away so long.....but I do not. There are some of you who don your snowshoes, your skis; and trudge through snow up to your chin for mile after mile and have the best time, embracing whatever Old Man Winter heaps upon you. Why, I would believe there are some of you who would lay supine, on that white stuff  as it slowly thaws and turns into slush; looking at the crystal blue sky above with a smile on your face.

What can I say?? I am a gal who as a newborn bairn was delivered by the stork right smack in the middle of a Sydney Summer, where perspiration dripped from those who, as they gathered to ooh and aah over my sweet tiny self, they then collapsed onto the floor fainting with heat stroke. As for me, I would not have been perturbed one iota. I would've just gurgled and cooed at everybody, happy to feel the strength-sapping heat of Summer hugging me. Wish oh wish I could be as enamoured with wintertime as you......but I quite simply cannot. As Old Man Winter steals his way into my humble abode, squeezing under the door, I love to crank up the fire and see every little corpuscle of his cantankerous self melt away into oblivion.

Oh, I know Old Man Winter paints the landscape in the most beautiful of suffused colours at wintertime; and though the sky blesses me with sunrises which are more beautiful than summery ones, and the kaleidoscope of bejewelled colours which magically appear as the sun shines on the ice-sheathed earth is a spectacle one would never witness in summertime......it's just that.......it's so darn cold. "But you can rug up", I hear you say. Yeah I can, but it wouldn't matter if I walked out of my bright pink, front door clad in apparel that an Eskimo would wear, I still feel Old Man Winter's icy touch.

I have never liked the cold. It's a family thing. I seem to have DNA which has deemed  that I would always shiver.....just a little. My mum was the same, as was my nanna......so I guess what will be, will be. I will just have to suck it up for another three to four months; don my thick aran knits, throw another log or two onto the fire and follow Old Man Sun's sunbeams around my humble abode, as they shine through the windows.

Freezing temperatures aside the tracery of  naked branches plonked in a glass jar or an old tin bucket, with the background of a ramshackle potting shed, or the sky behind them is always a beautiful wintry sight. I do believe tortured willows are one of my very favourite trees, especially in the wintertime.

What has little ol' shivering me been up to since you lovely lovelies last visited?? Why, during the day, I have been following the sunbeams from room to room as I bask in the warm beams of happiness. Yes indeedy, with my quilting needle and thread....and my Buds in The Basket quilt in hand, I have plonked my gluteous maximus...my derriere on many a sunny chair, enjoying a little hand quilting. Sunshine is one of life's pleasures is it not?? Sitting in a comfy chair, slowly stitching away is truly one of the delights of my days. In the evenings too, I have been snuggling under this pretty, keeping warm, happily quilting whilst watching TV. Aah.....the good life!

I am loving hand quilting this quilt. As I meander upwards in a diagonal line.....down......and then up again, sometimes with wonky dashes wandering off that 'straight and narrow' path, the hand quilting relaxes me; calms me. I seem to get in a groove. I find beauty in the slow, imperfect stitches. Mmm...I wonder if I will ever get the hang of stitching perfectly spaced, perfect stitches of even length?? I find hand quilting tactile. I love the squishy squashy-ness, wrinkled feel and look of hand quilting.  Hand quilted quilts I find, are soft to the touch.

As well as line after line after line of diagonal quilting, I am stitching a basket weave pattern in the baskets and quilting around the buds....all rather meditative.

This last little while 'My Pete' and I celebrated another year of wedded bliss. He and me have been skipping hand in hand along the flower-lined, bendy path for 41 years! AND...some said our happy union wouldn't last....hey, what do they know. Our daughter sent this sweet tea towel and oh, how it makes me smile. I wonder......if ever he will?? As yet.....he has not. =)

Anyway......thank you lovely lovelies for visiting my little wintry world♥ As always the thought that you have visited me and read my musings has delighted my heart once again. May you who live way, way up there enjoy your summery warm, sunshine-filled days and I way, way down here will remember that there is much beauty to be seen and to savor in my wintry days. I will do my darndest to keep warm. So very thankful for toasty, cosy fires, knitted aran woollies, pretty cups steaming with hot ambrosial tea and warm quilts that cover me as I slowly hand quilt. As it is Sunday tomorrow, I feel a little snuggling down with some hand quilting will be enjoyed in the afternoon and into the evening.

Until the next time............

Linking up this week to Kathy's, Slow Sunday Stitching.

As She stitched the flowers bloomed!

Another Sunday morning  has awoken, and still she stitches. The last weeks of late Summer have slipped by. She notices Ol' Man Sun is rising later and saying goodbye earlier......and still she stitches. Seasons pass.  Cold days float into warm days. Warm days melt into hotter days. Hot days cool into mild and balmy days. The garden whispers the changes with the transition of each season. As she looks at the calendar she notices the days of  March are marching on in a steady rhythm. The continual march....the procession of the seconds, the minutes, the days, the weeks, the months.....the seasons. How could that be she questions, wondering where the days of January and February have disappeared to. Already the light is different. Subtle changes have begun. The flowers are beginning to fade, but the seeds remain and when Spring once again dances onto the scene, they will magically sprout yet again. In a little while the trees will be dressed in autumnal glory. The crisp, taffeta-like leaves of deep russets, burnt oranges, tarnished reds will soon adorn the wondrous landscape. She knows it is the cycle of nature.

For six months now the flowers on her quilt have slowly bloomed. With each season she has studied the flowers that have blossomed outside her windows, endeavouring to translate the magic of each flower into fabric blossoms. She is amazed as she looks at the intricacies of the veins in the different leaves, or each tiny petal of a flower; the finer details she has never really noticed before.

So slowly have the appliqued flowers bloomed, that sometimes there appears to be little progress. But she is mistaken. As she gazes upon her fabric garden she notices that there is indeed a flower garden blooming. Not in it's plenitude as she has a thought that perhaps Wisteria would look rather lovely  crookedly winding its way across the top of the quilt in a tangled fashion. Birds too, she thinks will perhaps sing their sweet song amongst the flowers and perhaps delicate butterflies flitting here and there, enjoying the nectar of the flowers. For what is a garden if there are no sweet critters finding a haven within all the floral beauty. From time to time she wonders if her quilt will bloom in all its beauty. She wonders if her fabric garden will ever dance in a completed symphony; but, she looks at how far she has come and shoos those  inimical thoughts to the flowerless abyss. So.....still she stitches.

As she has stitched this last little while, Cosmos have bloomed.....pink, magenta and carmine. They dance in the soft Autumn breeze.

Japanese Anemones have sprinkled soft, pink beauty to the garden.

Irises have popped up, growing tall. Their striking beauty adding a dash of splendour to the garden. Liliums add their unique beauty to the garden scene; as do the Gladdies and Daffodils; all scattering out of that magical seed packet.

She smiles as the last stitch is stitched on each flower and marvels at what sits on her lap. The early morning sky has dawned onto her quilt; a watercolour pastiche glowing with pinks, blues, mauves, lemons and aquas. She smiles happily at her sweet flowers dancing against the backdrop of the pastel hued sky.

She is content. She is always thinking. She is always designing. She is always playing. But......she knows there are more botanical delights to be 'growed'. As she stitches she realises there are yet more flowers to bloom. More flowers will sprinkle from that magical packet of seeds. She knows that there will be a few more seasons; many more days to enjoy, before the last stitch is stitched....Autumn, Winter, Spring and perhaps another Summer. So.......still she stitches.

Until the next time.......

Linking up to Kathy's, Slow Sunday Stitching and  Judy's, Design Wall Monday