Finishing takes so long....

Do you find that? You start new quilts with great gusto, and think they won't take long to make, but somehow when you get to the finishing stages you get distracted by new ideas, and the pile of unfinished quilts gets bigger and bigger.

I've accepted that April and May just have to be my finishing months this year.  This year I've entered three different shows!! Yes, from never having entered a show to entering three in one year.  It's just the way it's worked out.

1. Capital Quilters 12 x 12 Exhibiton

We're having a 12 x 12 exhibition at Capital Quilters from 2-12 August this year, and I handed in my three entries on Saturday.  I can't show you them yet because the quilts are being judged and I have to keep my entries secret until then.

If you live in Wellington, or even further afield like Levin or Palmerston North, do come for a look.  It's fee entry and from the few I saw on Saturday there's going to be some great minis on display.  We already had over 30 entries on Saturday and the main hand in day isn't for another month yet.

2. Sydney Quilt Show - Quilt NSW

I'm a member of Quilt NSW in Australia (New South Wales).  It's a huge guild that welcomes overseas members too.  Their annual show will be held at the Sydney Convention Centre from June 22-25 and two of my quilts will be in the show! My la passacaglia and Oh! Christmas Tree will both on display.

I'm very excited because I'm going over to Sydney for the show and it will be the biggest quilt show I've ever been to.  I've made lots of online friends who live in Sydney, and it will be nice to meet them face to face.  I hear the stalls at the show are great too, so I better put my credit card on hold until then. I'll be there on Thursday and Friday if you're looking for me.

3.  Quilt Symposium Christchurch

Our national symposium is in October and entries close on 13 June.  I've been working furiously on two quilts for most of this year.  One is a secret and I won't post any photos until the exhibition in October, but the other is my Possum Magic quilt which everyone has seen throughout it's three year life.  There's one category for quilts totally made by one person (which I'm entering) and then another category for quilts made by more than one person.  Possum Magic will be in the second category because it's a group effort.  You can read more about the round robin I was in here.

My centre block that I made

I'm still hand quilting the final sections of the quilt, but I really hope to have it ready for photographing this coming weekend.  I'm using Aurifil 12wt and 28wt on this quilt.  I use the 12wt for all the visible decorative quilting, and 28wt for when I'm quilting in the ditch. The red spools are 12wt and the grey ones are 28wt.

I'm not aiming for prizes, but just having my quilts hanging in the show would be great.  It's a juried show, so not every quilt gets accepted.

I always use a hoop when I'm hand quilting.

So that's what I've been up to lately.  I'm really looking forward to starting something new once all these deadlines have passed.