Time for a giveaway

As mentioned last night, I (finally) completed the Cut To Order section in my online store. Oh, and my blog turned 1 on the weekend so of course that means it's time for a giveaway.

The concept is straightforward. Firstly choose any Moda layer cake from the CAKE menu ...

... then pick any shape and size from the CUT menu ...

 ... and I will die-cut the whole layer cake for you (or just a half a cake if that's all you need).

All my existing products are still available. You can still pick up a hexagon charm pack or two from the Die-Cut Fabric menu, or choose from a wide range of paper and card templates.  

Whether you're stitching by machine or by hand, whipping up a quick charm quilt or working on a long-term project, I hope you find something in my store to make your life easier.

Giveaway 

Speaking of things to make life easier, how does winning a gift voucher sound? To celebrate my blog's birthday, I'm giving away a $50 voucher, a $25 voucher and another $25 voucher to spend in the Possum Blossom Patchwork store.

You can spend it on anything, maybe something from the new Cut To Order section, or you could stock up on some die-cut paper templates, or grab some pre-cut hexies to make Christmas gifts.

The giveaway is open to everyone, just leave a comment below, perhaps telling me which Cake and which Cut you'd choose.

Open until 5pm Sunday 5 August (Aussie time), then the first three names pulled out of the hat will win a voucher.

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Hi Everyone, thanks for your comments, they got me itching to try something new. So I started a new quilt tonight! It's California Girls in large diamonds, a present for a niece.


I tried to email you all good luck, but all my emails started bouncing back today as undeliverable. I had this problem about a month ago. Not sure why it happened and not sure how it fixed itself. I hope it fixes itself again.

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NEWS NEWS NEWS!

I am so excited to tell you that I have completed the new "Cut to Order" section in my store. You can now choose any Moda layer cake, choose any shape and size, and I will die-cut it for you. 


I'll tell you more about it tomorrow night as I'm a little tired after 14 hours sitting at my computer yesterday and 10 hours today.


I'm the last person to blow my own horn but I am so proud of this marathon effort (appropriate for the Olympics opening weekend I guess) as I have been trying to make this come together for quite some time.


I just couldn't wait to share my news!

What would you do with the new Trade Winds by Lily Ashbury?
I'm thinking big, chunky diamond charms.

Expect to see some changes

Sooner or later, every quilter learns the saying "measure twice, cut once".

They usually learn it the hard way, after they've cut up their fabric and after they've started sewing. I thought I'd learnt that lesson long ago but it looks like I needed reminding.

Earlier this year, I had some more dies custom-made so that I could add triangle charm packs and diamond charm packs to my reportoire. I asked for equilateral triangles with 5" sides, and diamonds that were the same as two of these triangles stuck together. Simple, right?

I couldn't wait to get stuck into a making a new quilt so I quickly die-cut a couple of layer cakes - using the pale blues and pinks of Papillon and the French reds of Rouenneries Deux - and started this quilt.

I admit my machine-sewing skills have never been great. I guess I don't take enough care, I want to get things done quickly, and as a result my seams don't always line up. It didn't take me very long to get fed up with this crooked messy one.

I moved onto other projects, including making a huge stack of these new charm packs for my store. I finally set aside some time this weekend to prepare the ads and I got 95% of the work done when I discovered that ...

My custom-made dies were custom-made WRONG! I am going to kick some butt tomorrow morning and insist that that they are made again, properly!

The triangles measure 4 7/8" on 2 sides and 4 3/4" on 1 side. ALL sides are supposed to be 5". Obviously that means the angles are wrong too. No wonder my Papillon/Rouenneries Deux quilt failed.

 Now I have $900 worth of pre-cut triangle and diamond charm packs that I can't sell. This has really confirmed in my mind that I need to go ahead with something I've been thinking about for quite a while.

I need to re-focus the direction of my store. I didn't intend to be a "shop" with stacks of pre-cut stock but I found myself heading that way. That doesn't work for me. Being a "die-cutting service" that makes things to order is what works for me, and I think it works best for customers too.

Expect to see some changes to my store in the coming weeks. The changes I have been planning will allow a lot more flexibility and choice in the products available to customers. It won't be just hexagons any more!

Too much yolk in my yellow

I spent a serious number of hours stitching my Rose Star blocks on the weekend. While my goal of making one block each night was overly ambitious, I managed to hand-stitch 2 blocks last week and 2 on the weekend. Phew!

I also stitched some of the hexagons into the centres of my blocks - they look great - and some of the yellow in-between bits - not so great. There's too much egg-yolk in the yellow so it looks like I'll be using egg-white ivory instead for the background.

But the weekend wasn't all craft therapy, I had some laughter therapy too and lots of it. I recently came across some clips from the Ellen show that showcased some hilarious "autocorrects" - you know, those mistakes that turn up in your text messages when your smart phone decides it's smarter than you are.

Warning: If you look at this Ellen clip you'll be hooked and end up wasting some serious time searching for more. But if you are in need of a good laugh (and let's face it, everyone does), these will do the trick.

All the autocorrect "fails" were sourced from a website called Damn You Autocorrect where you can find 100s more, but if you need a superfast pick-me-up watch this fantastic compilation of 55 fails in one video. (Some are a bit rude so it's not for kiddys.)

Take my advice and have your finger on the pause button - I guarantee you'll be laughing so hard you'll need to stop and catch your breath.

Rose Star re-started

About a month ago I mentioned that I had restarted my Rose Star quilt in a new fabric range.

I am pleased to report that I am very very happy with how my new version is coming along. It's made in Flora by Lauren and Jessi Lung for Moda. The colours are so pretty and sunshiney - not too heavy and not too light - they really cheer me up.

I've made 12 blocks so far and I have about 24 to go. (They're approx 12" by 11" each.) I am determined to complete a block per night over the next few weeks, because I really don't want this quilt to end up on the UFO pile. 

I decided to use a light buttercup yellow for the in-between bits, but now that I look at the fabric again it looks stronger and darker, more like an egg-yolk yellow. Hopefully it will grow on me.

I think that once I stitch in the centre hexagons, the background yellow will tone down a little. The centre hexagons are also from the Flora range and have a tone-on-tone pattern, which makes a welcome change from plain centres.

My photos don't do the colours or patterns of these fabric justice. It's a bit grey outside today, which is a good excuse to get back to stitching another block of sunshine. Bye for now!