Showing posts with label neutral. Show all posts

Thursday, September 18, 2025

Scrappy Neutral Placemats

Hi and welcome 😊 I'm still away on vacation but technology is allowing me to schedule these posts. If all goes well...(and of course it will!), when you read this, I'll be on the Atlantic Ocean, making my way to Portugal. Once we finish our cruise, we are spending a few days in Denmark with my brother, SIL and niece. I'm mentioning them because this post is about the gifts that I made for them before leaving.

What do you bring with you from home when you don't have much room in your luggage? Scrappy placemats of course!

Scrappy Neutral Placemats

Here are the three scrappy neutral placemats that I made. Each is finished differently.

Three neutral placemats - ready to leave 😉

This placemat is the least neutral...which of course means that it's my favourite!

The most colourful of the neutral placemats

The next two placemats are scrappier. For one of them, I sewed up strips into sections, slashed them, rotated and then added the diagonal strips. The other one has the diagonal strip in the side corner.

Scrappier neutral placemats

The most neutral of the placemats

There are three different bindings on the placemats. The top one is a yellow tone-on-tone fabric and I ended up binding it totally by machine. I did manage to miss a few spots on one side, so I'll be bringing the thread with me and hand-stitching those spots. I cut the binding at 2¼". I'm sure that it would have been fine if I hadn't been so stressed (I finished it the day before leaving!).

For the other two placemats I found brown binding fabric in my stash that had already been cut at 2½". The placemat with the centre diagonal went on great and I stitched it by hand. If you look closely to the third one (with the side diagonal), you'll see that I managed to sew the binding on to the wrong side of the placemat. In theory it shouldn't make a difference but it did. I stitched that one by machine.

FMQ the Placemats

Here are a few pictures of the FMQ. For the two scrappy placemats I used my walking foot to create straight and diagonal lines, and then added FMQ for a bit of curves and zing.

Free motion and walking foot quilting

More Free motion and walking foot quilting

FMQ in the spaces between the walking foot lines
as well as a feather near the top

FM and walking foot quilting as seen from the back

The last placemat I made is entirely FMQ. My intention was to lightly FMQ it... but that's not what happened 😁 I FMQ most of it, bound it and then finished quilting it.

FMQ details of the most colourful neutral placemat

What I learned

The first two placemats were made and finished a while back but I only finished the last one the day before leaving - not a good idea since I had so much to do.
I do love how they came out. I think that this is the first time that I used the walking foot so extensively and then added FMQ. I really love the effect.
I find that straight lines are harsher - that's why most of my FMQ is made up of curves. It lightens things up!

Linking parties

I'll be linking up to many fun linking parties. Why not check some of these out after you've linked up below? Put your foot down, Off The Wall Friday, Finished (Or Not) Friday, Beauties Pageant, TGIFF, Patchwork & Quilts, Sew & Tell, Design Wall Monday, Monday Musings,

Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to week 549 of Free Motion Mavericks! I hope that you're having a good party without me 😎! I will be reading your posts and comments but since I don't have my laptop, I'll be skipping the features while I'm gone. Have a great week!

It's your turn.

Wednesday, May 21, 2025

Finished Kawandi Style Mat

Hi and welcome! I'm happy that you're able to stop by. I didn't get much done this week, except for hosting a welcome party and attending my son's wedding. It was amazing!!!! I did finish the neutral Kawandi style mat for my niece since she's in town for the wedding. I took a few pictures for this post, just for you! 😉

Neutral Kawandi style mat

I worked on this project for several months, bringing it with me when I thought I might have time to stitch. I finally took a few minutes to finish it this week, since my niece is here from Denmark and going back soon.

Kawandi style mat in neutrals for my niece

I have to admit that this is my favourite neutral project yet. I'm not very fond of neutrals but I worked hard to find fabric that would be considered neutrals but still have pops of colours. For my niece, I included fabric with the Eiffel Tower (she spent a semester in Paris), some doggy fabric and some black and white words in French. There was also many values which helps keep things interesting.

Kawandi style mat in the garden

I couldn't resist the contrast - the mat is on my outdoor rug

The mat is inspired by Kawandi quilting but I'm not patient enough to stitch each piece of fabric by hand the way that it's done traditionally. I did that for my first Kawandi style mat. It was a great learning experience but what I really love about these mats is the running stitch finish. So I sewed the scraps together and then stitched it to a backing by machine. It makes for a fun, slow stitching project that I can easily take with me.

Kawandi inspired neutral mat

I can't leave without a picture of Stéphane and Sarah.

The happy bride and groom 😍

What I learned

I love the Kawandi style neutral mat. This is my fifth mat and I'm hoping to make more.
The wedding was amazing. Now I know how parents feels when their child gets married. The day was so full of love and joy. Sarah and Stéphane worked very hard to make this happen and it was truly wonderful!
Now that hubby is mostly healed and we know that my eye is fine, I'm ready to get back to playing with textiles. I hope to post some interesting projects soon!
Update: I found some great information about Kawandi quilting. If you're interested, it's worthwhile reading!

Kawandi Quilts History and Resources By Carole Lyles Shaw / July 28, 2024

Related links

A Wedding and Free Motion Mavericks, May 14, 2025
Hand stitching fun and Free Motion Mavericks, April 30, 2025
Snow Happens Finish, SAHRR & Mom's Mat, February 10, 2025
Christmas Updates and Finishes on Free Motion Mavericks, December 26, 2024
Stitching and FMQ on Free Motion Mavericks, July 25, 2024

Linking parties

I'll be linking up to many fun linking parties. You may want to check some out. Remember to link up below! Monday Musings, Sew & Tell, Put Your Foot Down, Needle & Thread Thursday, Off The Wall Friday, Finished (Or Not) Friday, Beauties Pageant, TGIFF, Patchwork & Quilts, 15 Minutes to Stitch 2025, Oh Scrap!, Slow Sunday Stitching,

I've linked up to Favorite Finish Linkup

Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to week 532 of Free Motion Mavericks! Unfortunately when I copied my InLinkz coding, I removed some other important blog coding! I was able to fix it but a little late. Please feel free to link up posts from last week also! Here is the project from last week that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting.

Here are some lovely baby quilts that Kat of Scrapbox Quilts quilted. She FMQ this first one in a diagonal grid using a straight ruler.

Baby quilt FMQ by Kat

This second baby quilt was quilted using a serpentine stitch on a diagonal grid. It's a lovely fabric with two borders. So cute!

Another baby quilt with lovely fabric and borders

Kat made the third baby quilt using scraps in a small trip around the world design. It's FMQ using the orange peel design. It's so lovely. You can click on the images to see the FMQ.

Back of the baby quilt by Kat

Trip around the world baby quilt by Kat

It's now your turn!

Wednesday, April 30, 2025

Hand stitching fun and Free Motion Mavericks

Bonjour and welcome 😊. Thanks for dropping by. I haven't done much creatively but Fibre Fling 2025 was inspiring. It was one of our best shows ever.

Kawandi style mat in neutral colours

I started this Kawandi style mat in neutral colours for my niece a couple of months ago. I'm actually very impressed with how it looks, considering that they are neutral scraps 😁 You may know that I don't generally consider them colours - but these really are lovely!

Stitching on the train in early March

This is what it looks like - almost finished!

Kawandi style mat in neutral fabrics

Small Embroidery Piece

In mid-April I shared with you a small embroidery project that I've been playing with. I have many embroidery projects on the go, but this one is small and just for play - so not intimidating! I continued working on it during Fibre Fling. I didn't get much done since I was busy chatting up potential members, existing members, visitors and friends. It was a lot of fun.

Small embroidery piece coming along

What I learned

Fibre Fling was a great show but as an introvert, although I had a great time, it's really hard on my energy. I'm finally starting to feel more like myself.
I was inspired by the beautiful pieces there and am looking forward to checking out the photos that I took. It's always a good show but there was some truly amazing art.
I didn't work on my Floral Fusion, which was my April OMG. I'm not going to post it again, just try to finish it!
I stopped working on the Kawandi style mat after I realised that most of my stitching was being done in hospital waiting rooms. That's not the energy that I want for the piece, so I'll quietly finish it a home this week to give to my niece while she's back in Canada.
I'm looking forward to taking some great outdoor photos once the Kawandi style mat is finished - my back yard is just brimming with bulbs. It's on of my favourite times back there.

Here is a picture of my favourite bulb, miniature irises. I had some other pretty lilac coloured flowers but the rabbit wasn't content with the apples and seeds out there. It ate all of them!!! I hope they tasted good 😋

Miniature irises in the backyard

Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to week 529 of Free Motion Mavericks! It was another productive week! Thanks for linking up. Here are the projects from last week that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting.

Kat from Scrapbox Quilts finished 7 new Bear Hugs. They are so cute and all were FM quilted, just because 😊You can check out the quilts on Kat's latest Bear Hugs post.

Seven FM Quilted Bear Hugs Quilts by Kat

Quilting Gail made a beautiful quilt, Befitting Fours, using the Petal Poetry fabric line by Island Batik. The quilt was featured in their Fall/Winter ’24 Catalogue. Here is a look at the quilt and the FMQ.

Befitting Fours by Gail

FMQ flowers on Gail's Befitting Fours quilt

Preeti made two quilts for the Island Batik April Challenge. This is a version of the Drunkards Path quilt block. The block is called Moon over the Water - it's so lovely, especially in these two very different quilts. Preeti used her walking foot to quilt with squiggly lines.

Preeti's two different versions of Moon over the Water block

It's now your turn!

Thursday, February 27, 2025

SAHRR Week 6 and Free Motion Mavericks

Hi and welcome. It's a very short post today - just too many things on the go and not much stitching to share.

Update: I'll be travelling the first week of March, so I've extended the Free Motion Mavericks linking party by a week. Please link up 😍

Week 6 - Kite block

I didn't really find any methods that I wanted to use to make the kite block so I did a stitch and flip. It mostly worked. Too bad my math wasn't quite right.

This is the first kite block that I made since it was the closest fabric at hand 😁. I made each quarter using the stitch and flip method, starting the stitching line at 1" at the wide part, going down to ¼" from the end. It worked out really well.

Kite block - starting the stitching at 1"

This is the second block I made - starting the stitching at 1½" from the edge. It made it wider. It does waste a lot of fabric but I'm working with scraps so I really don't care. You have to stop clinging to those scraps eventually! 😂

The only issue that I had is my math - my calculations made a 6" block instead of 6½" . I forgot to take into account that each quarter has to have an extra ½" . Darn. I was so proud - but it's not a problem. When I put all the blocks together, I'll just add a border or something. As you can imagine, my blocks are not all 6½" so there will be a lot of setting borders happening. 😉

Kawandi style neutral mat

I mentioned in an earlier post that I'm making a Kawandi style mat with neutral colours for my niece. I'm probably about a quarter done. There was stitching done during the hockey game and then as I listened to some training. I love it!

Kawandi style neutral mat

I'm writing this post at my son's place, while Poppy sitting. Here's our girl!

Poppy 😍

What I learned and updates

When I don't have much to share on the learning front, I'll add "updates" to this section.
As I mentioned above, I'm really happy with my stitch and flip version of the kite block. I just wasn't in the mood for foundation paper piecing so this was a great compromise. I figured that if it didn't work out, that it could be a wonky version, but I didn't even have to do that!
I've decided to make only one kite block for each panel.
Now I'm working on finishing my blocks for both panels. I figure that I have 4 more blocks to make for the Cowboy panel and 6 more blocks for the Christmas panel.
I've started making appliqué blocks for the Cowboy panel. I found a free baby quilt pattern that had cool cowboy related appliqué blocks and I'll be using those. I'll link up to the pattern when I'm done.
Two of the blocks will include the shape appliqué as well as fussy cut appliqués of animals. That will be very cute!
I haven't really thought about the extra blocks for the Christmas panel but it will include at least one bird appliqué block.
I started quilting-in-the-ditch the blue scrappy baby quilt that I'm making for the February Table Scraps Challenge. I'm assuming that the linking up party will start on Friday but I'm hoping to have the weekend to finish most of it. I'm really looking forward to FMQ it.
Sneak peek at
Blue Scraps
I also want to FMQ Poppy's mat but she's probably not visiting for a couple of weeks, so I have time (right, like she'd even notice!)🐶
Thanks for your kind words and wishes for hubby and me - we're probably off to the emergency this afternoon since it looks like it's a disk problem.😔

Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to week 521 of Free Motion Mavericks! It was a very productive week! Thanks so much for linking up. Here are the projects from last week that included FMQ, ruler work or walking foot quilting.

Quilting Gail took part in the Runner Up Blog Hop. This featured a runner made using one of the rulers that they received, as well as Island Batik fabric. I couldn't resist the picture with her grand dog. Gail quilted the runner using the Silly Moon Rocket ruler and meandering.

Gail's grand-dog guarding the bench...or runner?

Preeti of Sew Preeti Quilts created a runner called Crystal Pendants. It's also reversable!

Preeti's Crystal Pendants runner

Preeti's Crystal Pendants runner - the other side!

Kat of Scrapbox quilts made a Little Blu Bear Hug - her 4th bear hug quilts. It's so sweet. Kat used her walking foot to quilt it!

Kat's Little Blu Bear Hug

Here is the mini quilt - Little Blu Bear Hug by Kat

Donnalee quilted a very cute placemat, the first of four - fabric chosen by her husband.

Donnalee's first of 4 placemats

Gwyned quilted this amazing piece, Pond Life, for Project Quilting 16.4. Her densely FMQ is so fun! You'll want to read the post for her inspiration.

Pond Life by Gwyned

It's now your turn! The linking party is open for two weeks. Enjoy!

Thursday, December 26, 2019

More quilted gifts, an OMG and a Christmas runner

I can't believe that I've got so many posts this month! I've been busy finishing up my two Christmas gifts. Actually there was supposed to be one, but a squirrel came for a visit!

More quilted gifts

My December One Monthly Goal (OMG) was another free motion quilted (FMQ) fabric basket. I used some incredibly lovely Japanese fabric for the FMQ.

The light was at its best outside on the snow :-)

I took an indoor shot the next day

I also created another journal cover. Unfortunately I misread my notes and didn't cut the fabric big enough to fit the journals I had bought. So I ran out at the last possible second for a smaller journal. It was a little smaller than I would have liked but it did fit 😊

I really love this fabric for the journal cover.

I FMQ the fabric following the outline of the leaves and the flowers. I used a darker brown thread to outline the flowers. I left the leaves empty (and therefore puffy) and then just echoed all of the leaves and around the flowers.

I added an elastic but I really don't like it. It's just too jarring. I'll have to find some finer elastics in other colours, or just leave it out.

Another Throwback Thursday Christmas runner

At my brother and sister-in-law's, home I took a photo of another Throwback Thursday Christmas runner that I've never included in my blog. Sandra and I may not be hosting Throwback Thursday next year, but I'm sure that older quilts will show up occasionally.

A Christmas runner made BBE (before blogging era) 😊

What I learned

I'm glad to report that this basket is the intended size, since I followed the instructions!
I also used a regular cotton batting, so it was a little stiffer.
That's two things that I learned from making that first basket!
The grid that I followed to FMQ was only one inch but it came out fine. I did FMQ a half square triangle that I wasn't supposed to. I thought that it would be underneath the basket. But following the instructions properly meant that it was on one side of the basket. It's not really noticeable, unless you're looking for it.
I was pretty upset about making the journal cover too small. I made the side seams smaller but it just wasn't enough. Finally, I went to the store and bought a smaller journal, but it wasn't as great as it could have been. I'll be re-writing my notes before I make the next one.

Making a few gifts, December 17, 2019
Learning to make a fabric basket, November 26, 2019
The Japanese fabric is from Kallisti Quilts
Free Motion Quilted Gifts on Bluprint (Craftsy)
Quilting the Grid: Structured Free Motion Quilting on BluPrint (Craftsy)
Christina Cameli
Making a journal cover with practice piece, December 14, 2019

Linking parties
I'm linking this post to the December OMG post since my fabric basket got done! It may be unusual, but I will also be linking up to my Free Motion Mavericks link up since it's still open for a week. Finally there are lots of great linky parties around. Let's see what's going on and support these great bloggers! Off the Wall Friday, Finished or Not Finished Friday, Friday Foto Fun, Can I Get A Whoop Whoop?, Brag About Your Beauties, Peacock Party, Oh Scrap!,

I've also linked the image of the Star Runner in this post to Sarah Goer's Show Me Something With Stars link-up.

Project details

FMQ neutral fabric basket
Pattern and instructions by Christina Cameli
8" x 5" x 6"
Techniques: FMQ, sewing
Material: lanyard, cotton

Wednesday, November 27, 2019

An Epic Bow Tie Neutral Quilt Finish

I'm almost glad that it was raining today because I found the best place ever for the Epic Bow Tie Neutral Quilt's photo shoot!

These were taken this morning at Parks Canada Place in Gatineau Quebec. I was lucky that it was decorated for Christmas and fairly quiet.

Draped quilt lounging around

Are we ready for Christmas yet?

Enjoying the decorations - do I spy a reindeer?

A closeup lounging shot

The lovely folded quilt pose

Finally we need to have the full view shot.

The Epic Bow Tie Neutral Quilt

Here are some of the FMQ designs that I used.

What I learned

I used a quilting ruler to make the straight lines within the snowball. It took me a while to get the hang of it and then I decided to try to just "eyeball" it - and it worked well. It did go better when I turned the quilt around so that I was quilting towards myself. I can FMQ in all directions when I'm quilting a curly design, but I found it much harder for a straight line.
I really love the sun design. I'm sure that I could adapt it for other sizes.
It was good to use just a few FMQ designs, although I have to admit that I did get bored with those straight lines.
I used silk batting for this quilt - it FMQ so beautifully!
I bought more fabric to add extra light fabrics for the background but I used only one of them since the others were too yellowish. I'm going to keep an eye out for beige fabrics since they're not easy to find.
If I were to do it again, there are a couple of fabrics that I used as background that I wouldn't use since they were too close in value to the lighter brown fabrics in the snowball.
I used a scrappy binding. My only rule is that the fabric in the binding cannot be the same as the block next to it. I've made that mistake once and I have learned from it!
I just love the look of a freshly washed quilt. The texture is just so beautiful. I'm glad that I waited to take pictures until I had washed it. Now I just need to add a label and my friend will finally get her quilt.