Just slap me (gently) across the face with a fat quarter*

…if I ever again start whining about not being much of a finisher.

Admittedly my big quilt finishes are so rare it’s been rumored there are small principalities where a national holiday’s declared when Di comes to the end of stitching a binding down. But when I trawled back through this year’s photos I couldn’t suppress a tiny “Hooray” of my own.

Hey, small projects count as finishes too – don’t they?

I’ve made sock monkeys (“Stella” for Toni’s Auction for Queensland Flood Relief, and “Blossom” for the St Luke’s Hospital fundraiser).  Along with my friends Di B and Gail I made origami bags for the Gumtree Designers’ New Beginnings appeal after the QLD floods.

In addition, for the St Luke’s Hospital (Potts Point) fundraising event mid-year I crocheted and knitted baby bootees and beanies, sewed pincushions and pink origami bags embroidered with grub roses, and created a ‘parliament’ of cute little sock owls.

I sent off two cosy knitted cowls to Sarah, shivering with the approach of winter in the USA – they arrived there just a day before she left for tropical Botswana (but that’s another story!). My dear friends Moo and Margaret scored mug mats for their birthdays this year, and there were baby singlets appliqueed with an elephant, a teddy bear and a ladybug for our new grandson, Jack.

And there were just enough quilt finishes to keep those principalities happy . I had great fun making the red, white and navy hippo quilt for Jack, and tried my hand at a quilt-as-you-go scrappy quilt that went, along with others from St Mark’s Quilters, to help victims of the Christchurch (NZ) earthquake.

I managed to complete several Blankets of Love for RPA Newborn Care, and put the finishing touches on my Scrappy Hexagons quilt which hung in the Victorian Quilters’ Fabric of Society Challenge at the Melbourne Craft and Quilt Fair in July.

Then there were the projects Di B and I worked on together, though when I think back to our stitching days throughout the year I’m amazed we were so productive with all the fun and laughter going on.

We delved deep into our scrap bins for the most colourful and girly fabrics we could find and made a large hourglass-patterned bed quilt for our friend Alicia’s 60th birthday. This was extra-sneaky of us since we’d only just completed a bowtie quilt Alicia had asked us to make for her to give her friend Ian, and she certainly wasn’t expecting to be presented with a quilt of her own at her birthday party in January.

Our St Mark’s Quilters made individual blocks with appliqueed teddy bears which Di and I sewed together into a quilt for the arrival of our Assistant Minister’s new baby boy in the middle of the year.

We quilted and bound a large cheater cloth in time to cover the table in the entrance to St Mark’s for the Advent and Christmas season, and Di helped me sew and machine quilt all the “healing hearts” blocks sent to my mother by Southern Cross Quilters when my father passed away last year. This was a real labour of love.

Finally, there were the cupcake potholders we made as Christmas gifts for our lovely St Mark’s Quilters. Let’s just say the question “Whose bright idea was this, anyway?” might have been uttered a few times, as we tried to wrangle several thicknesses of fabric and batting beneath our sewing machine feet and machine needles constantly broke under the pressure of stitching through Insulbrite. We expended quite a bit of blood, sweat and … laughter on that project .

* Non-quilters, be assured this isn’t some kind of masochistic plea. A fat quarter is just a small piece of fabric (18” x 22”) whose uses include small projects, piecing … and silly hyperbole such as this. 

I have a little more to add to this story about baby Morgan:

One of our St Mark’s Quilters, Ruth, has moved out of town but still makes Blankets of Love for us and keeps up with our doings via this blog. 

I was so excited when, after reading about Morgan, she emailed me this - “You’re not going to believe this! The couple featured were in the cabin next to us on that cruise.” Ruth and her DH shared the same dinner table with Paul and Leanne a couple of times, but Ruth had no idea of the drama that eventually unfolded and was very happy to hear the positive outcome.

What a small world it is – and what an uplifting ending to 2011!

Happy New Year, everyone. God bless you and thank you for reading my ramblings.

Di