oh how I wish,

weekendticket, a photo by Lynne @ Lilys Quilts on Flickr.

I could repeat the wonderful experience I had at the Fat Quarterly sewing retreat again, next year. Next year, my heart will not be as heavy from losing my Dad as it was this year. Next year, I could have the conversations I wanted to have, without the fear of my eyes leaking.

I am so thankful I could attend, it was so amazing to meet friends made on Flickr, and to have made new ones!

I'm not going to say I'll not be able to attend next year, cause you never know. Unfortunately, October is too early for me to say I can go. The new year may be a different thing though......

keep your fingers crossed for me please
cheerio for now
x Mandy

I'm in the Fat Quarterly e-zine!

I felt overwhelmingly compelled to 'give it a go' for this Fat Quarterly Design Challenge. The brief was to design a 'cross' block using solids. I had so many idea's swarming around in my head I had to check myself. Lynne over at 'Lily's Quilts' explained K. I. S. S. a short while ago, Keep It Simple Stupid!!! That's exactly what I did when I designed this block.

So.....how can you make a simple cross block look new?

How about this!

My main thought was how the block would look multiplied in a quilt, and how could I make more crosses when they were! There still had to be a recognisable cross in the block, that didn't get lost, so I used a different colour palette for it. And I wanted to have as many colours as I could without it looking too busy, and to illustrate how solids can be dramatic, but subtle also. I have Aqua's galore so this seemed the obvious choice. The four corner squares make a whole jewelled tone square when the blocks are complied and the repeated longer aqua strips make the additional cross arms.

Like this...

I also put together a tutorial for the e-zine, which was also amazingly used. Hope I wrote it okay, I'm a little worried it doesn't read correctly, or I missed out a step, or the measurements are wrong. I hope it was checked. If anyone has any questions about the tutorial, please just ask!!

Goodness, what an exciting day that was!

Cheerio for now,

x Mandy