Birthday giveaway :)

I had a wonderful birthday! I'm so blessed with great family and friends and they all made me feel very cherished - IG and Facebook messages, texts, phone calls, cards, gifts and great company throughout the day ... it doesn't get much better, hey? 

DH and I went out during the day. I had an ice cream on the beach AND we even found a friendly little quilting shop - Tailor Made - totally unplanned ... honest!

Today, I finished my new sewing machine accessories using these fabulous fabrics gifted to me from the lovely Carla @ creatin in the sticks:

See this post for some of the techniques I used. The sewing machine mat is so handy - I keep my seam rippers, scissors, tape measures in the pockets so I always know where they are:

The cover keeps all that yucky dust off my darling Juki when she's sleeping:

And the little bag is for all my leaders and enders:

Here's it all together:

So here's my giveaway. I need to make a quilt for our God-daughter's 18th birthday (and for her to take to University later this year) and here are my main fabrics - I'll probably add some pinks:

I need some ideas. What block would you choose? Leave me a comment below and I will put everyone's name into a draw on Wednesday night (7pm UK time). Your prize is - I will make you a sewing mat - you choose it's size and colours - and I will add some co-ordinating fabrics for you to make the other accessories (if you want to or you can just keep the fabrics).

Have a lovely weekend :)

Lots of stuff ... :)

I really am a happy little quilter at present. I'm feeling so creative and productive ... if I didn't have to stop for work, I would quilt the world, I'm sure! 

Last weekend, I finally started quilting my 'soldier's quilt':

And I made another scrappy zipper pouch for my friend at work:

And put borders on my Strip Bee Quilt:

And I'm turning these 4 gorgeous fat quarters gifted ages ago to me by my dear friend Carla @ creatin in the sticks:

into a sewing mat, sewing machine cover and 'enders' bag! There's nothing wrong with the old set I made:

But I'm thrilled to be making fresh stuff for the new sewing room. There's lots of tutorials out there but I just made it up as I went along this time! In essence, you're making a mini quilt with a pocket in it. You can spend as much or as little time on it as you want. 

Here's some photos I took along the way:

I have learnt to leave a good 10" when joining the binding ends in this way:

And check before you cut:

Add your pockets where you want them:

Just need to hand sew the binding down:

Do you have a sewing mat? Would you like one? It's my birthday tomorrow so I think it's only right to do a giveaway post :)

Linking up with the lovely Lorna and Lee:

Tired teddy ...

It's a Saturday and so I should have been feeling refreshed and raring to create ... but I didn't. This probably had something to do with staying up until 0130 this morning watching a film I had seen before -

- so why oh why did I stay up WAY past my bedtime to watch it?? And, because my eyes are used to opening at 0600 every day, that's what they did this morning ... despite having only been closed for 4 ½ hours ... that'll learn me!!

So, I decided not to attempt anything difficult. Hoping I'll be 'awake' enough tomorrow to have a go at Trish Preston's cute bag. But I did make something new! I saw this post for this handy sewing machine 'accessory mat' ages ago but have just not got around to making it. TODAY was the day!

Isn't it lovely?

And thanks to this You Tube upload from Connecting Threads, I've finally made something with 'properly finished binding'.

Oh, and of course, SHE had to join me ... that's my Dad's Quilt she's got her bottom on, the little madam:

And a dear friend came around to say 'hi' with some lovely daffodils (they weren't really for your Mum for Mother's Day, hey?!) so not a bad day after all ;)