New Halloween pattern from Upper Canada Quiltworks Publishing

WOW!!! I can't believe that it is already August 17th!! Since I was on holidays for two weeks and then I was working extra shifts at the drug store to cover other people's holidays the first half of August just seems to have vanished into thin air!!

BUT.... I have been doing lots of work at home too and a couple of the things we've been working on are new patterns for Upper Canada Quiltworks using new fabric lines from Northcott!!

The first new one is coming out just in time to sew for Halloween and it is called "More Little Tricksters" which uses Northcott's new "Happy Halloween" line.

Our pattern uses the panel from the line as well as some of the fun co-ordinates.

The pattern for "More Little Tricksters" is now available at quilt shops and in our Craftsy Store!

Using up leftovers to make a baby quilt

52 Week UFO Challenge - Project #26 - Leftover braid baby quilt

Last year I made this Braided Lap Quilt which was featured in the Fall 2015 issue of A Needle Pulling Thread Magazine. This quilt was super easy to make because I used my Accuquilt Chisel Die  to cut all of the pieces for the braids. 

The ONLY problem I have when I'm using my Accuquilt Studio Cutter is that it's really easy to cut too many pieces!! As a result, I often have shapes left over and I HATE to throw them out. 

So, once I had finished this quilt, I had one section of braid left over. I set it aside and once I started my 52 Week UFO Challenge, it was added to the list.

I worked on this quilt top while I was at Quilt Retreat in February. The first thing I did was to sew two borders down the sides of the braid. Then I sewed a large piece of butterfly fabric to the right side and a narrower strip of the same fabric to the left side.

Then I cut this long piece into two sections about 1/3 of the way from one end and sewed five strips of fabric in between the two sections.

I then machine quilted it using large modern flowers all over the top.

The quilt turned out quite pretty AND one of my coworkers has bought it to give as a baby shower gift. I'm sure the baby girl who gets it, will enjoy it for years to come.

Project #26  in my 52 Week UFO Challenge is finished!!

Northwood Cabin pattern now available on Craftsy

Our newest quilt pattern is called "Northwood Cabin" and it features flannel fabrics from the Northwood line from Northcott.

The line comes in three colorways - Red/Tan as we used in our pattern, Navy/Green and Black/Gray. The blocks for our quit are made using the panel that is shown below. The blocks are big and easy to assemble so the quilt can be made in almost no time at all!!

F21125-12

The pattern for this quilt is now available in quilt shops and as a pattern download on Craftsy! No paying for shipping OR waiting for your purchase to arrive in the mail!

Check it out today!

Modern Vibe now available on Craftsy!!

Nellie and I have been super busy for the last few months designing and writing patterns for Northcott. We have finally finished writing the pattern for our Modern Vibe quilt which went to Fall Quilt Market in October.  We've also redesigned our pattern cover - here is the new look for Upper Canada Quiltworks!!

I blogged about machine quilting this sample back in October and I still love this quilt. The fabrics are available in quilt shops now and the pattern should be arriving shortly.

You can also check out Craftsy to see our downloadable e-pattern.

Modern Vibe

Block of the Month - March block

New Beginnings BOM Program

I know it isn't quite March yet, but I was super excited to post the March block of the month block, because I worked on it (and some of the others) at the quilt retreat last weekend and everyone there was really loving how the blocks are coming along!

I think this one is my favourite so far!!

March Block of the Month pattern

The digital download is now available on Craftsy - just click on this link which will take you to the page: New Beginnings BOM - March

First thing I needed to do was to pick my fabrics. I am really loving having my little tags to label each fabric as I pick it out and cut it. It makes it so much easier when I go to sew as I am not doing my blocks in the same colours as the pattern.

My fabric choices for the March block

My pieces are all cut and labelled and ready to go!

Here is my finished block. I just LOVE how the two flying geese units join together to make the arrowhead design!! And could you imagine a quilt made with a bunch of these blocks?? It would be stunning - maybe I'll have to put that on my wish list!

Here are my first four blocks up together on my design wall. It feels so nice to have taken down (and finished) a few of my UFOs that have been on the design wall for months - it is a clean slate and looks great with my new blocks.

Have fun sewing! And don't forget to post pictures of your finished blocks on Craftsy so that we can enter your name in our draw.

It's always a good day when I can use lime green thread!

 Today I got to do the quilting on our sample of one of our new patterns - Modern Vibe. This fun and colourful quilt was made using Northcott's Colorworks Concepts fabric line and I just LOVE how it turned out. How fun would this be to make for a kids room - you could get one of the co-ordinates to make curtains and pillows!!

I used a few of my favourite "modern" quilting designs to do the quilting using my lime green thread!!

I just LOVE this stripe that we used for the inner border!

Simple quilting designs always look great on modern quilts.

One of my favourite designs - modern boxes.

Our sample is heading to Houston to be displayed in the Northcott booth at International Quilt Market. I wish I was going too!!

Here it is the finished quilt!!

A quilt of another colour

One of the BEST things about designing in quilt patterns is getting to see the quilt made in a different selection of fabrics! This pattern is called "Stella Violet", after Nellie's cute little grand daughter, and last week I got to quilt Donna Taylor's version of our pattern.

Not for the faint of heart, this quilt pattern has blocks that have 49 pieces in them, but Donna likes a challenge, so not only did she make the quilt, but she made it twice as big!! And for her colour palette she used white as a background with dusty blue, rose, pink and grey fabrics. It turned out just beautiful!!

The first challenge for me was to select the thread. This one is a very light grey which I decided would blend in with the pieced blocks but stand out nicely on the dark grey borders.

I decided to do some feathers and swirls in the pieced centre with different designs in each of the borders.

The Feather and Swirl design.

A different design for each border.

I always love it when I can take the quilt of the frame of the Gammill and have a look at the whole thing quilted. Here it is! I hope she likes it :)

Autumn Rag

Our Autumn Rag pattern has been available for some time as a printed pattern, but as I was getting lots of requests for a downloadable version on Craftsy, a couple weeks ago I FINALLY added it! This quilt is quick and easy and SO cuddly. If you haven't tried rag quilting, this just might be the project for you! If you prefer a printed pattern, it is available on our website too.

More ten year olds...

After my first pattern was published, I had many more ideas for quilts and decided to make them all similar in size so that I could have one nice display space and rotate the quilts to match the season - my "Changing Seasons" quilt series was born! Here are "Butterfly Spring" and the ever popular "Cold Weather Friends" which incidentally was designed on one of the hottest days in July AND remains one of my best selling patterns EVERY YEAR!!! They are both available for sale on my website http://www.fairfieldroaddesigns.com

Ten Years Old!!!

My son, Carson's, birthday is coming up at the end of the month and he is going to be TEN YEARS OLD. And he isn't my only baby to be turning ten this year - my business, Fairfield Road Designs, was started ten years ago while I was on my maternity leave with Carson. Boy how time flies!!! Here is the first quilt that I designed and published as a pattern and it is called "Everlasting Harvest".

Baby Blocks

Here is our newest pattern, designed with the "Teddy Bear Dreams" fabric line from Northcott. It is called "Baby Blocks" and is available now on our website!!!

New patterns have finally been added!!!!

I have been a busy girl tonight! Our three new patterns, "Skating Party", "Snowed In" and "Sandstorm" are all now available on the Upper Canada Quiltworks Publishing website. Check them out at the following link:

http://www.uppercanadaquiltworks.com/uppercanadaquiltworkspublishingco/pages/patterns.html

Skating Party

Here is the second pattern we designed with Northcott's Snow Day fabric - this one is called "Skating Party" and uses the panel as the centre of the quilt. We just LOVE this one too and will have it available on our website very soon. The fabrics will be available in quilt shops this spring/summer.