Wednesday, January 07, 2026

Playing with watercolour and stitch

Bonjour and welcome 😊. I've taken some me-time to play with watercolours and stitching. It's been so much fun! I love watercolours, the way that they mix with each other to make something different. I have no interest in becoming a proficient painter, rather I want to make cool marks and blobs that I can stitch into (spoken like a true fibre artist😁)

Creating Bold Botanicals

I've been following Helen Wells, a very cool British artist, who exudes energy! She does wonderful work in her sketch books and loves to share and teach. Last winter I bought her virtual Creating Bold Botanicals course and I finally took a day this week to do it. It was wonderful!

My first Bold Botanicals sketch book

The sketchbook is a work in progress. I painted watercolour botanical shapes on 5 pages of sketching paper and then used lightly coloured card stock to paint various designs that end up being vases and such. I cut out funky vase shapes from the card stock pages and collaged them onto the botanical pages. I'm afraid I got carried away and didn't take any progress photos.

The front page of my accordion sketch book

The back page of my accordion sketch book

I couldn't wait to put the accordion book together. The book is rather wonky, just like its botanicals and vases! 😃Then I started stitching into the book. As you can imagine, that's my favourite part. Here are some details of the stitching. I mostly used the running stitch in various colours and thickness of thread. It'll be fun to experiment with various colours - some of the thread blends in but we also need colours that pop.

Stitching on paper - what fun!

Running stitch and chain stitch

Part of the accordion book

January's One Monthly Goal (OMG)

I've been playing a lot...mostly as a procrastination technique. I really want to get the Cowboy panel quilt finished. If I work hard, it can be finished by the end of January!!!

January's OMG

What I learned

As I stitch, I can examine what happens with the watercolour paints. The way that they blend and play with each other is so fun. I also used a bamboo stick to spread around the paint, like a pencil.
Helen suggested that we use thick sketching paper (instead of watercolour paper) - so that it's not intimidating or feels too precious. That was a great idea but I'm looking forward to using water colour paper because it's so much easier to stitch into.
I should have stitched some of the pages before turning them into an accordion book. Once attached to each other, they are awkward to stitch into. That's why I've worked more on the front and back pages.😊
I used a half inch fold to stick the pages together - I should have used one inch. It would have made for a sturdier book.
For Christmas, JJ got me another of Helen Wells' course - Nature and Nurture. I'm looking forward to sketching natural objects and then use watercolour paints.
A couple of years ago in the TextileArtist.org's Stitch Club, we had a workshop with Sam Owen where we used water colours and then stitched onto them. I've wanted to explore this further - so this will be my chance.

I Quilted This!

Welcome to the I Quilted This! linking party. I'll be featuring the projects from last week's party that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting. Thank you everyone who linked up.

Feel free to grab the button.

Last week Donnalee made more Christmas placemats for her and her husband. Apparently many more will be needed by next year!

Christmas placemat made by Donnalee

Deb, the Scrappy Quilter, made this gorgeous quilt through the Spring String sew along. Those lovely brown and blue fabrics really go well together.

Deb's first finished Spring String quilt

Melva of Melva Loves Scraps finished her RSC Color Wash Hexagons - what a great quilt.

Melva's RSC Color Wash Hexagons

It's now your turn!

Friday, January 02, 2026

Best of 2025

Welcome to the Best of 2025 post. The annual linking party is hosted by Cheryl of Meadow Mist Designs. Thanks Cheryl!

I'm very ambivalent about what I accomplished this year, so I hope that you'll oblige me as I review and see how I did!😟As in the past years, I've placed my finishes in categories. These have changed through out the years to reflect what I've made. This year, the categories are quilts (which this year include baby and cuddle quilts, as well as wall hangings and runners), Practical Quilted/Sewn Objects (this includes my 2025 agenda, placemats, a pouch, cell phone holders and water bowl mats), Art Quilts and finally Hand-Stitched and Embroidered projects. The related links are within the post. It's a long post, so feel free to just look at the pictures 😁

Quilts

In my 2025 planning post, I wanted to FMQ 2 quilts. I had hoped to quilt some UFOs but instead I quilted the two quilts that I made in the 2025 SAHRR (Stay At Home Round Robin). These are the two panel quilts - a cowboy quilt and a Christmas panel quilt, that I worked on most of the year.

The Christmas panel quilt

Finished with a few hours to spare!

My Cowboy Panel quilt is a flimsy, that I will finish in the winter of 2026 🤠

A finished flimsy to be quilted soon!

Baby and Cuddle quilts

In 2025, I made and finished one baby quilt and a purple and a teal cuddle quilt. There were all made for the Table Scraps Challenge 2025. I also FMQ a community project baby quilt for our guild.

Scrappy baby and cuddle quilts

FMQ community project baby quilt for the guild

Wall Hangings and Runner

Snow Happens wall hanging is both an embroidery and a quilt. It was a slightly late Christmas quilt decoration for my DIL.

Snow Happens embroidered wall hanging

The Floral Fusion Wall Hanging was a SAL with Denise of The Quiltery. It started in the Fall of 2024 but I didn't finish it until early Summer this year. It now hangs on my youngest adult child's wall!

Floral Fusion wall hanging

I made this fun scrappy runner purely because I could and I wanted to! 😀

A scrappy runner for these two cuties who keep me company at the back of the car.

Practical Quilted/Sew Objects

This year, this grouping includes my 2025 agenda, placemats, a pouch, cell phone holders and water bowl mats.

For the last few years I've sewn a cover for my new agenda. This year, I made an Upcycled Traveller's Journal that would act as an agenda and a place to keep my project notes, and made a cover for the journal. It turned out to be a good idea. I mostly kept my notes up-to-date and only needed to remove the individual journal to work in. I didn't really use the calendar much but I will use the same system in 2026, and won't have to make another agenda cover.

Fabric cover for the Upcycled Traveller's Journal

Inside the Upcycled Traveller's Journal

The Ombre pouch was made for Project Quilting 2025.

Ombre pouch to carry my glasses and phone

I made Scrappy neutral placemats and cell phone holders as gifts to bring to Denmark on my visit.

Call phone holders - so practical!

Scrappy neutral placemats

Finally I made and quilted two water bowl mats for Poppy. One for her home and one for ours!

Poppy's water bowl mat at her home

Poppy's water bowl mat at our place

Art Quilts

Some of my art quilts this year were made for challenges - Project Quilting and/or from TextileArtist.org Stitch Club.

This art piece was made based on a TextileArtist.org workshop and it just happened to be the theme of the first Project Quilting challenge - Mythical Creatures.


My favourite art piece of the year - The Rabbit's Liver - A Korean Folktale

Project Quilting - Common blocks

Reclaiming Fallen Feathers

My other art quilts are not technically quilts but hand-stitched textile art pieces. I learned the technique in TextileArtist.org's workshop by artist Julia Wright. I've made three of these coiled pieces so far and there are more in the works.

Pink Turtlehead Flowers

Sunset Over Water

Desert Landscape

Hand-Stitched, Embroidered and Woven Projects

This Spring, I finished a Kawandi Style neutral mat for my niece.

Kawandi-style neutral mat

I participated in the annual Zen Stitching event and made a lovely scrappy hand-stitched needle case as well as a Mindful stitch sampler.

Needle Case

Mindful Stitch Sampler

This summer, based on artist Mirjam Gielen's branching video on Patreon, I started making the tree and its roots on a piece of eco-dyed linen fabric. I finished it and called it "Mercury Retrograde - Strong Roots Required!"

Mercury Retrograde - Strong Roots Required!

In October, I went back to my first love, weaving, and made a number of hand-woven pieces made on cardboard. Two of the pieces were also my Table Scraps Challenge since they incorporated, denim, quilted scraps and neutral colours!

Autumn Beauty

Earth Tones

In November, one of my favourite embroidery teachers, Mirjam Gielen, hosted a spiral challenge.

A few embroidered spirals

I almost forgot those cute Christmas scrappy mats that were November's Table Scraps Challenge finish.

Final finishes for the Table Scraps Challenge of 2025

Finally but not at all finished, is my Not-so-daily-stitching project. I'm afraid that it's not even been weekly but I did enjoy embroidering reminders of what I had done this year. Here are a couple of examples.

Joe-Pye weed as seen during our trip

Sunset over water

What I learned

The year was better than I expected. I did finish many smaller projects and on the whole, had fun making them 😊(which is what it's all about!)
The two panel quilts were a lot of work, and although I enjoyed making them, caused me stress because I wanted to get them finished! I'm going to try to avoid that in the upcoming year.
My true measure of the type of year I had is the number of posts that I published. At 63, this is not as good as the past few years, but I'm quite happy with it, considering the year I had.
I'm glad that I hosted the FM Mavericks linking party - that meant that I had to publish at least once a week. I changed the party name and button as of January 1st - I Quilted This!. It has the same objective - quilts that are quilted on a domestic machine or custom quilted on a longarm.
My favourite hand-stitching projects were the coiled pieces and the hand-woven pieces on paper/cardboard. They were so much fun to make and perfect for experimenting and playing.
My favourite quilting projects were the baby and cuddle quilts. They were as simple or as complex as I want to make them but always fun...they are also perfect for experimenting and playing.
I will really miss the Table Scraps Challenge that's been hosted by Joyful. Many of my finishes were as a result of that party, so I'll have to keep myself motivated to play with scraps - especially to make scrappy hand-stitched mats and cuddle quilts. Thanks Joyful for keeping us inspired. We will miss the party but you need to take care of yourself!
I think that I've found my 2026 words - playful experiments!

Linking parties

I'll be linking up to many fun linking parties, particularly the Best of 2025 as well as Quilting Jet Girl's #2025QuiltingCheckIn. Yvonne wanted to know how our year went - well, it was much better than I expected - so it was nice to see that! Thanks Yvonne.

You may want to check some out! Finished (or Not) Friday, Off The Wall Friday, Patchwork & Quilts, Slow Sunday Stitching,

Wednesday, December 31, 2025

A Finish and the First I Quilted This! linking party

Hi and welcome!😀 I hope that you spent a lovely holiday season. Today I have an OMG finish to share as well as some news.

2026 is approaching (or here by the time you read this!) and there will be a few changes coming to the Quilting & Learning blog, The first one is our weekly linking party. Free Motion Mavericks is now the I Quilted This! linking party. It remains the same but with a lovely new button created by Katelynne. Make sure you check it out and link up below!

Christmas Panel Quilt Finish!

Christmas panel quilt - a wall hanging?

I've been working on this Christmas panel quilt since January 2025. I'm so happy that it's done and gifted to my lovely DIL.

Christmas panel quilt - a throw?

Here are just a few FMQ details to share with you.

I really loved this small Christmas tree

Small Christmas tree FMQ

FMQ holly and swirls in the yellow bands.

FMQ holly in the narrow yellow bands

It's New Year's Eve and I just finished binding the quilt. We are heading out for a late supper so I'm going to keep it short tonight. I wanted to post today since this was my December One Monthly Goal (OMG). I did it with a few hours to spare 😁.

What I learned

I'm going to stop promising to make quilted or textile art quilts for everyone. But that's only from now on, since I still have a few more to make.
There were some minor issues with tension when I was FMQ - until I switched to Bottom Line thread in the bobbin and some lighter polyester thread on the top. I would much rather quilt with cotton but you have to work with what ~~you have~~ your machine wants!
I'm happy to say that using the walking foot with cotton thread worked very nicely.
I was very nervous about using red thread in the yellow bands. I usually use matching thread, but if it's just going to blend in, what's the point? As well, I couldn't see well enough to use yellow thread on the yellow fabric.
The red FMQ is far from perfect but if not examined too closely, it's all good.😀
I have the Cowboy panel quilt next to do. I 'll try to use my walking foot as much as possible. When I can't, I'll use the lighter thread.

I Quilted This!

Button made by Katelynne

Welcome to the I Quilted This! linking party. I'll be featuring the projects from last week's last FM Mavericks party that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting. Thank you everyone who linked up. Please grab the button

Preeti of Sew Preeti Quilts had her lovely Veronica quilt published in a Norwegian magazine 😀 You'll want to read her post for more details.

Veronica quilt by Preeti

Details of the quilting of Veronica by Preeti

Gretchen of Gretchen's Little Corner poster her 2025 End of Year Review. I'm featuring one of her cute quilts that she quilted in May - Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit, made and quilted by Gretchen in 2025

Frédérique of Quilting Patchwork Appliqué posted her Best of 2025 and some of her goals for 2026. You'll want to read her post! Here is a little pretty fabric card that she made for her mother.