.: Geek Chic :.

A gorgeous, fun week in Brisbane.

Vee and I have both been to the Ekka with our families - we went on Saturday, Vee on Sunday - lots of food, rides, animals, cakes, quilts, show bags, people, fun.  We've had such beautiful weather this past Ekka week - it's like Spring has come early.    

{{my husband and youngest are up there}]

In the middle of getting the house packed up ready for painting, I've been squeezing in some sewing - with good reason!  

Remember the fabulous Retro Sunnies pattern from our last post?  The gorgeous Penny and Kerry sent me a surprise set of their new Geek Chic patterns, available now from Sew-Ichigo!  Can you imagine how excited I was to see their email? - this was the morning after I had checked both their blogs, and the Sew-Ichigo site the night before, lurking around looking for Geek Chic!  I am thrilled that these lovely, talented ladies thought to send me Geek Chic.  These patterns are just so fabulous and fun.  Here are all three pairs of specs together.

{{top to bottom - Retro Sunnies, H-Bo and EJ}}

These ones in the next pic are called 'EJ' as a tribute to Elton John.  I've pulled a heap of fabrics from my stash - anything I could find with a vague Elton John song reference - I've got more borders planned - we're talking jets, rocket men, candles, lions, matryoshkas (for Nikita ... told you there were some vague connections).  But what I really wanted was crocodiles ... I stared at and searched through my stash, muttering "surely I have crocodiles" ... but no.  Happily though - thanks to the wonderful instagram community, I have crocodile fabric flying towards me as we speak!  

{{waiting for crocodiles!}}

And these next gorgeous specs are called H-Bo - a reference to Penny and Kerry's friend Heather Bostic.  I don't know Heather, though I do follow her on instagram - so I know she is one of the amazingly talented crafty ladies from Portland.  So - I really did have to make these H-Bo specs out of fabrics designed by three other amazingly talented crafty ladies from Portland - Violet Craft, Monica Solorio-Snow and Mo Bedell. 

{{I love them}}

Thank you so much Penny and Kerry! - next up will be a Geek Chic mini!

Hope your week has been a good one.  Have a great weekend.  xoxo cat

.: this week's sewing :.

Just popping in to share a little of this week's sewing.

First up - an absolutely f-a-b-u-l-o-u-s retro sunnies paper-piecing pattern by the super-talented Kerry from verykerryberry - available through the current issue 14 of awesome e-zine, Fat Quarterly.  I love this pattern, it's so happy and fun - and the fabric-possibilities are pretty endless! 

The sunnies are made from (I think) Michael Miller fluro prints - a solid and a spot.  The lenses are Chicopee ladder dot, and the sweet hula girls are from a print I snapped up through an instagram de-stash sale (but I honestly can't remember who from!).

I will definitely be making more - I'd love to make a pair with birds flying across the lenses, like in the pair that Kerry made.  I'm hoping that the birds-in-flight print from Violet Craft's new Waterfront Park line will be the perfect print to use - just need to wait til my order arrives!

Next up - more paper piecing - this time a little origami boat by Rumi of Right Patterns on Etsy.  This was a super-quick little block to sew, and I loooove it so much.  The blue starbursts are Prints Charming and the newsprint is a Spotlight find - I think it looks like a little paper boat sailing along in the stars.  

This block would be so sweet sewn up from different text prints too.  This little boat will be sewn into a zip pouch pressie for a friend from church who just welcomed her first grandchild.  

And today's sewing - one more word block for my younger daughter's quilt.  Both girls have given me a list of words they'd like in their quilts.  One by one, I'm ticking them off.  

The letters are - as always - based on the patterns in Tonya Ricucci's awesome book 'Word Play Quilts'. 

{{do you spy the fish and the turtle?}}

{{more fish, a dog-with-a-bucket-on-his-head, and a glimpse of a starry horse}}

 I am d-e-t-e-r-m-i-n-e-d to finish both quilts in time for Christmas.  There's still about 3 words each to sew up, and they've both asked for more wonky stars and churn dashes.  They didn't actually ask for churn dashes - but I've made them one each already and they liked it, and asked for "more of that one".

In other news - I finished my Sweet Pouch Swap for Kara and posted it yesterday.  After all the sneak peeks here and on instagram, we agreed no more til the swaps have been received!! Kara posted hers the day before me, so hopefully we will each receive them at the same time!! Oh.  The.  Excitement.  

And in non-sewing news - we are getting the inside of the house painted in a couple of weeks, so have been busy boxing things up, taking pictures off the wall and generally getting things organised and ready for two weeks of chaos.  It will be so worth it - all white, and we're getting wallpaper in the front hallway, and the girls have each chosen a feature colour for their rooms.

Hope your week has been a good one.  xoxo cat 

.: Care blocks + a house block :.

We've just had the most gorgeous weekend here in Brisbane - low 20s and sun - perfection.  

Just popping in to share some sewing I did during the week.  First up - an Irish Chain block and asterisk  block for Merran, for our Care Circle in do.GoodStitches.  Merran had asked for bright, happy colours - think oranges, pinks, magentas - on a white background for the asterisk; and lime green on white for the Irish Chain. 

{{the asterisk was based on this tutorial, with fabric-size and corner modifications by Merran}}

Here they are together - I really should line up my photos better, especially when taking them on my cutting mat!  All the blocks together will make such a bright, happy quilt.

I had to buy some of Shannon's limited-release Aunty Cookie prints from her Etsy shop - love her designs so much.  I've sewn the girls a house-block each for their quilts (which I've promised to have finished by Christmas ...) - but only remembered to take pics of one block.

{{the measuring tapes are from Shannon's Hipster line with Riley Blake}} 

{{the roof is Prints Charming ... not sure of the bricks and the sky}} 

This week's sewing-plans are to finish my Sweet Pouch Swap for Kara, get started on a few Christmas things, and to make more blocks for the girls' quilts.  What are your sewing-plans for the week?   xoxo cat