Why hello, Mr Postman!

I got 3 exciting packages in the mail today... the first one came all the way from Ann Arbor, MI.. from the lovely ladies (Polly) Minick & (Laurie) Simpson! I won a charm pack of Prairie Paisley II in the recent Vintage Modern blog hop run by The Fat Quarter Shop (but more about that in a minute!) - which will match my Prairie Paisley II layer cake perfectly!

 The next package was my new Heart die for my Accuquilt GO! fabric cutter.. this came from Cutting Art, where I purchased my GO! They have excellent customer service and great prices (similar prices to the US - much less mark up than other Australian retailers!).. Phillipa is planning something with this die for the QCA Bee girls when it's her turn to be Bee Leader in May.

And my last package came from The Fat Quarter Shop. It's a Fat Eight bundle of Twirl by Me & My Sister.. also from the Vintage Modern blog hop. Sadly they'd run out of the layer cakes that were supposed to be the prize, so I had to settle for the F8 bundle - what a shame! And speaking of great customer service, The Fat Quarter Shop is amazing! Aside from upgrading my prize, they also went above and beyond with a recent order that I placed regarding how much they could stuff into a flat rate envelope.. clearly they are just as invested in their international customers as they are in their local customers ♥

So thank you, Mr Postman.. you've made my day!

GO! with the Flo!

My parcel has arrived!

So I promised to report last night on the opening of my package, but by the time I got home from Weight Watchers, picked the kids up, put them to bed and then cooked dinner for myself and my husband I was falling asleep!

Let's see what's in the box..

But don't think that I left my package untouched! I must confess that I came home before WW, opened my package, took photos of all the contents, demonstrated a quick cut for my husband and then packed it all back up and ran out the door.

What shape will we make?

How about a drunkard's path..

This morning I took my box over to my MIL's house and introduced my brand new Accuquilt GO! to her new home. I have named her Florence, or Flo the GO! for short. Once again I ceremoniously unpacked my box, and gave Flo her own dedicated workspace.

All my new toys (well, 2 dies are on back order)

In front of the window? Why not!

Actually, perhaps over here would be better.

I ended up moving Flo from the big desk to the table because then the desk is free to lay out quilt tops, cut larger pieces of fabric etc (in the picture you can see the wadding from Bean's quilt).

While I was super keen to get the Harry Potter quilt that I am making for Bean as a Christmas present going, I discovered that my "4 inch squares" are not all quite 4"... some are just a fraction short, which presents a problem as far as accuracy goes. Sigh. So maybe we might not be doing the split drunkard's path in the HP prints, although I can probably still incorporate it into the overall design somehow.

Harry Potter Fabric laid out (not in any order/design)

Instead of getting the cutting started now that I need time to think, I decided to lay out all my squares to see how much fabric I had compared to the size of the wadding. Total HP prints are nearly half. With coordinating fabric squares, nearly the full top. So I still need to go buy some fabric (oh what a tragedy!) which is perfectly timed with a mommy fabric shopping playdate we had pencilled in for tomorrow! I want to try out the owls from The Tulip Patch and make some Hedwig blocks for the corners of Bean's quilt, so I will look out for some fabric specifically for that, too.

Mary's (The Tulip Patch) Roly Poly Owl Block

My other option now that I'm limited to which blocks I can use for the drunkard's path (as far as accuracy goes) is the 3.5" tumbler block... which is on back order from Cutting Art at the moment, so it might be another week or so before it arrives (along with my 2.5" strip die). Any one have any interesting ideas of things I could do with a tumbler block aside from the standard tumbler design?

While laying out the HP fabric the power went off for a while, so I finished playing with the fabric, packed up, outlined all my dies with permanent marker and went home to make lunch before taking Blossom to kindy.

GO! GO! GO!

My husband informs me that my parcel from Cutting Art arrived today, but because he had the car, Blossom, Bean and I walked to my mother-in-law's house after school because it's closer! And I have to go to Weight Watchers in an hour, so by the time I get home it'll be nearly time to go... So now I'll have to wait 3 whole hours before I can play with my new toy! Gah! The suspense is already killing me! And for those of you thinking "just skip WW", I have just taken on a volunteer role and tonight is my first night so I can't really not go. On the up side, I was afraid that it would come while my husband was out, and end up getting returned to the depot so I guess it could be worse than waiting 3 hours! Stay tuned for the 7:30 report ;)

All Systems are GO!

The Accuquilt GO! Fabric Cutter

Guess what!? I ordered an Accuquilt GO! from Cutting Art today! I've been wanting one for months... and was half hoping that my husband might order me one for my birthday (in July), but no such luck. It wasn't until I 'threatened' to buy from the US via eBay that my husband realised that I was serious and agreed that I could order one as an early Christmas present. It then took another month or so to *actually* get him to agree that I could order it *right now*.

Incase you don't know what an Accuquilt GO! is, it's basically a die cutter (think Sizzix, Cuttlebug etc) that cuts fabric. How cool is that?

Ever since my husband and I finally got married (after 11 years and 2 children together!) in April, I've been thinking about making a 'marriage quilt' to commemorate our wedding. I did a bit of research and some thinking about what I actually wanted it to look like, and I settled on the traditional Double Wedding Ring design, incorporating the Rose of Sharon. I'm thinking that I'll do more of a medallion style quilt instead of having the DWR all over the quilt - partly because I've never sewed curved patchwork pieces before. While reading some issues of Australian Patchwork & Quilting (and similar) I saw an ad for the Accuquilt GO! and so I went hunting online to find out more about it.. and well, once I saw that they had dies for the DWR & the Rose of Sharon, fate was sealed!

Now it will only take me a short eternity to make the marriage quilt, as opposed to the long eternity it would have taken without the GO!.

Having said that, my first project is NOT going to be the marriage quilt, it's going to be my son's Christmas present.. Bean is 5 years old and absolutely Harry Potter mad. We're reading the books (halfway through book #4 atm) and it's all he and Blossom (3 and a half years old) ever talk about. It's been 4 years since I made his quilt, and so I thought it might be time to upgrade from his baby (cot doona size) quilt to a full size single bed quilt. I thought "Hey, surely there must be Harry Potter fabric.. I should do a google search" and found that yes, there is... it's just hard to get because it's been out of print for nearly 10 years! So I *did* purchase some through eBay in the US, precut into ~4" squares (left over from other projects, I gather) and combined with some co-ordinating non-Harry Potter fabric.

August Wind Quilt Designs - "Split Drunkard's Path"

Given the fabric is already in 4" squares I'm kind of limited by what I can do with it (aside from leaving it as squares) so I've been looking online for inspiration. The first thing that caught my eye was the Accuquilt Blazing Star die (because I was so busy browsing their website) and I also searched some other blazing star style blocks that use diamonds, but neither of the Accuquilt dies will suit my 4" squares. Back to the drawing board. What about a 'chisel' star? Nope, still too big. And then I found it. While googling "Drunkard's Path" (I don't even remember why - it could have been because of the super-cute owl tutorial on The Tulip Patch blog) I discovered a design by August Wind Quilt Designs that *looks* like stars, but is actually made by halving drunkard's path blocks!

And even better, Accuquilt has a 3.5" Drunkard's Path die, which should fit perfectly with my 4" squares - yay! But wait, there's still more! Cutting Art was having a 30% off sale on selected Accuquilt dies, so I was able to pick up the DWR die on sale, and I was tempted into also purchasing the baby 2.5" strip cutter (I mean really, how could I not? Not with all those metres of binding in my future!) on sale and then because I just couldn't help myself I indulged and bought the Sunbonnet Sue and the 3.5" Tumbler dies on sale too (as well as the Rose of Sharon & Drunkard's Path which were not on sale). So I have lots of cutting fun coming my way! I can't wait!