Free motion appliqué

I had a bit of a break from quilting this weekend (apart from a couple more rows on my cross quilt, only 6 to go, although now I'm thinking about making it big enough for our bed, which is king size, but I need more fabric. Anyway I digress). We had a 4th birthday party today (and I try and make sewn cards for birthdays if I can, fun and cheap), and I've also had a couple of t-shirts sitting around (Target) that I've been meaning to appliqué for Claudia for WEEKS. So on went the darning foot, out came the scrap bin and here's the results:

the birthday card

the t-shirts

butterflies

dala horses

I really love doing appliqué free-motion style with the darning foot, I love the sketchy freehand look that it gives. I went around my shapes three times. Can't wait to get these on my girl.

Girl on a swing mini-quilt

At last at last, something to blog about!! Sorry about the huge gap in posts, I packed the sewing machine away for a while so I could focus on a few other long neglected jobs at home (such as cleaning out my daughter's wardrobe, selling some stuff on ebay, etc etc). But boy did I miss that machine, and it's now back where it belongs, in the middle of the dining table surrounded by sewing crap necessities.

A while back I bought a darning foot on ebay so I could try out a bit of free-motion sewing, well, turns out the ebay foot was dodgy so I bought a proper Janome one. So glad I did. This could possibly be my favourite item I've made ever (did that even make sense??):

It's something I've wanted to make for ages, using Aneela Hoey's briliant tutorial here. It was easier than I thought, and so much fun doing all that free motion stitching and embroidery, I think I'm breaking out of my "must be perfect" shell. The imperfections are what makes it so perfect.

Here's a close-up of my swinging girl:

Not sure what to do with it though, I don't think it's actually a quilt in the making, I might stick it in a white Ikea frame and find a spot on the wall somewhere.