Happy New Year!

I hope everyone out there had a great Christmas and a very happy New Year!
After selling loads of stuff at Dartmouth by Candlelight and sending off all my Christmas orders I fed the family on Christmas day and then fell into a happy turkey, pudding and vintage embroidery-induced haze and have just completed my Christmas holiday project. That’s it above – the little rabbit calendar quilt blocks.
A little while ago I acquired some vintage transfers of little rabbits carrying out seasonal activities – one for each month of the year and I promised myself that when I had enough time I would stitch the 12 quilt blocks. What better time than the Christmas holidays? And above you can see the results of my labours. I haven’t made them up into a quilt yet, I’m still making up my mind about colours etc, but they are great for the first post of 2010.
Here’s a close-up of January ….

.. I’ve used my favourite vintage linen as usual and an assortment of floss. I’ve stuck to the same palette throughout, dipping into one or two extra colours for some of the squares. Keeping some colours constant through the blocks does, I think, give an harmonious finish.

It’s not always possible to spend time embroidering quilt blocks – it’s certainly not something I normally have time to do, so I quite often take a vintage design, alter and enhance it in Paintshop and then print onto pure cotton to make great quilt blocks in a fraction of the time. That’s what I’ve done with the quilt blocks below, using scans of vintage feedsacks to make Nellie look as though she’s been appliqued onto the cotton.

 

As a new year’s gift I’d like to offer you a set of “Around the Week with Nellie” quilt blocks as a pdf file … just click here for your free downloadable pdf file with all of Nellie’s weekly activities. I’ve supplied the images both right-way-round and reversed to suit whichever image transfer system you’re using. If you’d rather purchase these blocks ready printed onto pure cotton sheeting, then please visit DevonBear Designs to purchase.

And finally … here’s a picture of some of the picture quilts I made last summer …


Hope 2010 is sew good for you !!

2 Comments

What an absolutely charming quilt! I made a similar one for my daughter when she was about 2 years old. Sad to say, it's been lost over the years, but I've been toying with the idea of making another.
Love all your beautiful handwork!
Blessings,
G

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