Walsall Quilter - for one day only!

There isn’t much sign from the outside that the inside of this church has been a hive of activity from 7am this morning…

The locals have barely noticed all the too-ing and fro-ing

Today is the bi-annual exhibition of 

I get to become a temporary member for 8 hours.  This year I’ve graduated from hanging quilts in the church to setting up the sales table…..We get about 2 hours to cover the tables in all sorts of quilting and needle crafting related goodies to be sold in aid of a local charity – this year its Walsall Samaritans.  What a lot of gorgeous donations we have to sell….

 

 

By 9:45am I really think I’ve earned my hobbit like second breakfast of a scone and a cup of tea…

By 10am there is a queue of people outside the church, patiently waiting in the drizzle to come In and see what the quilters have been up to in the last 2 years.  What a treat they have inside, the church is hardly recognisable…

There’s a children’s corner by the font

Then some inspired by last year’s patriotism for the Olympics…

The altar is  just about recognisable behind all the class workshop projects…

 Just a little bit thrilled to see one of last year’s scissor keeps in action in a needlework box.  Hoping this one goes home and is put to full use by its owner.

Behind the altar is a fabulous Christmas corner ….

 

 

Even a little bit of English gardening gets brought inside…

There’s also a space for the bunting made to celebrate the “twinning” of Walsall with Mulhouse in France…

For me, the big quilts, each displayed in a pew of their own, win the day, here’s a few of my favourites…

By the end of the day, several hundred very generous people had been through the exhibition and sales hall and having bought teas and cake, raffle tickets for quilts or bid in the Chinese auction for lovely patchwork bags…

Enough money had ben raised to give the Samaritans a cheque for £1,000.  So I think its fair to say that everyone involved had great fun and although we were all tired, it was widely agreed it was in a jolly good cause.

EDIT: for the record. Not all of the scissor keepers sold. L 

BUT all of the little houses did sell so I think I know what I’ll be making for the next 23 months before the next sales day!

Quilting itch V: The final scratch

There is a certain satisfaction to binding a quilt.

Its like being back in primary school, finishing a piece of good work and ruling off.

A nice straight, bold, precise line that finishes everything off.

This quilt needs a particularly good binding...its my final chance to reference the 25 years it is made to commemorate, so I've decided to make it from 25 pieces of fabric.  So I need to plan the order they will be joined together in...

 

Not to mention work out the maths so I get just enough to go all the way around...

I can't believe I'm resorting to bits of cereal box and a calculator to work this out! - where's an excel spreadsheet when I need one!

So its a couple of hours work for me..

Trimming...

Measuring...

Drawing the sewing line...

Lining up...

Pinning...

Until its all ready in one long piece...

Ready to be sewn together...

 

Then snipped and trimmed to make a long ribbon of binding...

 




There's no point having a straight ribbon of binding if the edge of the quilt its being attached to isn't straight as well.  The easiest way to achieve that is to throw the quilt on the floor, measure the edge and crawl all over it trimming away the unwanted bits...

Time to sew it on...did I mention it was a pretty long ribbon of binding...

 




So once the binding is on there's nothing more to be done than a quick trip round the washing machine to rinse out those pencil lines...look it really does fit in there...

 

Sadly the weather is being typically April today and I just can't predict that the quilt will dry out there on the grass, like the last big project I did.  So its time to push the furniture back again, and think to myself that I seem to have done this rather  few times for this quilt...

 

..and if I crank up the heating far enough it should be dry in the next few hours ( don't breath a word to 'i indoors -he'll get grumpy with me) and I can sew the label on and wrap it in some lovely shiny silver wrapping paper. 

I'm just wondering now if the friends celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary will really like it...

And the other thing taxing my little grey cells is ......What to do with all the scrappy left overs

mmmmmm......I feel a bit of an itch coming on.......