Weekly Catch Up.

 The weeks seem to be moving on faster and faster towards Christmas and I really want to get back to sewing for the Peter Mac auxiliary shop but I'm still quilting donated tops as well as tops for AQA. I'm also finishing off more UFOs which I will share tomorrow. This first quilt was a donated top and it will be lovely for a male patient at Peter Mac .

 This top was donated by Jo B. and I used a "cheater" fabric in bright colours for the backing so it's a reversible quilt in case the recipient thinks it's too Christmas-like, but I know it will be treasured regardless.

 This fun top was made and donated by Marg. C. who loves to make these fun and bright quilts for children. It will brighten someone's day too.

 The next 3 quilt tops were made by members of my quilting group, AQA, and I quilted them for our Gift Quilt Program. It's our last meeting tomorrow until February so I have brought quite a few finished AQA tops home to finish off during our break.

Now that I will be delivering the last quilts for AQA tomorrow, and my last delivery of Oz Comfort Quilts was made last week, I'll still work on finishing my UFOs as well as making more items for the Peter Mac auxiliary shop,  and I also need to make a start on one or two quilts for AQA's exhibition which will be held next September.
   I've been deliberately spending less time on social media so I have more time for quilting and it looks like I need to stay focused to finish all of the projects I gave planned.
More to share tomorrow .
Hugs, Jan Mac 

Odyssey House Visit.

Today I was privileged to visit Odyssey House which is a residential rehabilitation centre on the outskirts of Melbourne. AQA supply them with quilts for their clients when they reach the "transition" stage where they are ready to return to their communities.
      I attended a meeting where a client was presented with a quilt as was his young daughter. It just happened to be the quilt above which I had quilted. It was very moving to hear from some of the clients as they acknowledged how the person had helped them with their recovery and then from the client who was transitioning as he acknowledged everyone who had helped him with his recovery. His daughter wrapped herself in her quilt and she was obviously happy that her father was returning home again. The quilt is a tangible symbol of how far they had come on their journey and a reminder that they don't want to go back to their previous life. The counselor who was showing me around said that he still has his quilt in pride of place at home.
   Odyssey House has been operational now for 40 years and they offer residential care for 120 at a time, including some families . They provide a much needed service and it was lovely to hear first hand how our quilts are so well received. One of the clients told us that he's due to graduate through the transition stage next year and he's hoping for a red quilt. 
     There was a real positive vibe about the place and a real feeling of hope for the future. I enjoyed my visit very much and hope to return again while in the meantime it has spurred me on to make more quilts to donate. AQA supply the majority of the quilts but I donate any needed at short notice and I plan on making some with reference to the aboriginal heritage of some of the clients, as they are highly prized by those clients.
It's always rewarding to see how much our quilts are appreciated by so many people and the warm hug of a quilt is a lovely way to support our local community members in need. I  can't believe that we are almost at the start of December and need to get some more sewing done for the Peter Mac auxiliary shop .
Hugs, Jan Mac 

UFO Monday - 30th and 31st UFO Finishes.

 Some sewing at night and a couple of child free days meant that I have finished 2 more UFOs and almost finished a third. This first one resulted from some half square triangles I had sewn and put away so when I had some more left over from a donated top, it was time to get them put together and finished. I have lots more signature squares as well as boxes and boxes of 6 inch squares so I can see lots more of these in my future.

 This lovely quilt was a UFO  as it was from a quilt which was too large for donation and I took it apart and finished one quilt but still had these blocks leftover. Finally they were put together,  borders added and then quilted and bound.

 This top is ready for quilting and resulted from these Chinese Coins strips leftover from another project. I used hand dyed fabric to add sashing and borders and it came together well. Now I  need to find backing and get it finished .

Jake's parents had a wedding yesterday and they took Aidan so we didn't have to try bottle feeding him again. He was refusing to even drink breast milk in the bottle so we're abandoning that for a few months before we try again. I had a lovely day again with Jake, playing tea parties, trains and reading lots of books. He's such a loving little boy and now that he's sleeping well I even had some time to sew a little.
I'm also thrilled to get more UFOs finished and as they will all be donated, I have started getting quilts ready for another donation to Peter Mac .
Hugs, Jan Mac 

Weekly Catch Up.

I've been doing some sewing at night again so I can get more quilts finished and donated soon and it's surprising how much I can get done if I use any spare time to pin baste tops.
  These first 4 quilts were all made by members of AQA, my quilting group, and I quilted them. The first one was a donated orphan block and a clever member used some of our donated fabric, and her stash, to finish it off with 2.5 inch squares . She's made a beautiful quilt with her clever use of colour.

This last quilt was made from a donated top and I have finally finished it. I have started another pile of quilts to deliver to Peter Mac and hope to have lots more finishes soon, including more UFOs.

Hugs, Jan Mac

Oh Dear. Hopefully It's Not Another UFO.

On Monday I had my quilting group's Sit and Sew when the Gift Quilt team work on prepping kits for quilts, cutting batting and backings for kits as well. Members take home kits of their choice and they might stitch blocks together and then return the top for quilting. Some members take the kits which need tops quilting. We have a great team and we've increased our output by about 50% in the past year, with most of the quilts being large enough for teens and adults, and not just cot sized.

  We're having a big presentation of quilts at our December meeting so we had to count and sort all of the quilts we have on hand. There are 125 to be given to 4 groups and we will have donated 338 for the year which is a fabulous amount.

We'd also received some fabric donations which we sorted into colours and amongst the fabric I found all if these pre-cut diamonds. Some of them already had the seam allowance drawn. They were going to go in the UFO box but I decided to take them for another hand stitching project as my large La Passion project is now to big to take with me for Sit and Sews. These stars will give me some stitching to do at meetings and will be another quilt for donation.

 They were obviously someone else's UFO  so I hope they don't become another one of mine. They will be a long term project but that's OK as they will eventually be finished and I'm really happy that I rescued them.

My first star is finished and I need to mark more stitching lines and keep going with them when I need portable hand stitching.
Hugs, Jan Mac 

UFO Monday.

 I can't believe that I found enough evening time to finish the last diamond piece for the large part of this quilt. Below you can see my start on it last Monday and I not only finished the diamond but also stitched it into the main section.

 Now I have to finish adding small hexagon flowers around the diamond shape as well as finishing those around the circular section of hexies.

 It's a very long term project with something like 17,500 half inch hexagons, but by focusing on stitching these most evenings, I am really making good progress.

This is another long term UFO  which resulted from my collection of 5.5 inch half square triangles. I have been making them for some time to use up my large collection of signed cream squares from one of my online groups. By cutting them in half I am able to remove identifying information. If it's still visible then I use the reverse of the fabric. I have also included half square triangles which I removed from Jenny H's (New Zealand) large quilt and these will all help to make another lovely quilt.
    No finish to report this week but lots of progress happening.
Hugs, Jan Mac 

Weekly Catch Up.

 This week was fairly productive with 6 more quilts finished. This first lovely quiot was a top donated by Jo B. and it's a fabulous scrappy quilt which will give someone a warm hug.

 The next 3 QAYG quilts were made from donated QAYG blocks from my wonderful blog readers, the last one is a lovely variation with half the blocks being dolphin fabric, and it will be a great quilt for a child.

These 4 quilts shown above will all be donated to Peter Mac for their clients .

These 2 lovely quilts were made by members of my quilting group and now will be donated through their Gift Quilt Program .
            
 I also made a drawstring bag for Jake's train set. He's obsessed with playing with it and he loves to pack it up and then set the tracks up again.

Tomorrow I will be delivering 43 quilts to Peter Mac as well as 2 large bags of items to  be sold in Peter Mac's auxiliary shop. I was surprised to find that I had 43 quilts to donate as I thought I only had 30 finished. I also have 5 more finished to be donated to kids in foster care but I will wait on their delivery until I have more finished to donate.
     It's only 5 weeks until Christmas so it's good to have so many quilts donated and now I can spend some time on my own sewing projects.
Hugs, Jan Mac