Archive of ‘Giveaways’ category
It’s Thursday and it’s time to get your quilt on! Quite literally, it’s FREEZING here in Canberra!!
Thank you to those of you who noticed that I’ve been quiet. I have a thyroid anti-immune disease and it is playing up at the moment. Whilst I’m mostly fine, the last couple of weeks I had a good day followed by a bad day. Thankfully the fatigue and general unwellness that my mean old thyroid brings, seems to be on the way out 
I’m off to a Guild meeting tonight (yay!) unlike last Thursday when I was half comatose on the sofa and the FABULOUS Ms Midge offered to step in at the last minute and host I Quilt for me. Yay for awesome, quilty friends!! Thank you Midge xxx
This week I’m featuring another fabulous quilty lady, Karen of Karen’s Quilts, Crows and Cardinals.
Image used with permission by Karen’s Quilts, Crows and Cardinals
Karen wrote the most marvelous post last week full of FANTASTIC quilting tips! She quilts on a Janome Horizon with Aurifil thread and has some advice specific to her machine as well as some really good, general quilting advice. Karen doesn’t drop her feed-dogs, rather she covers them, she also uses a bobbin genie and supreme slider. With my Bernina I feel the extension table is smooth enough for quilting but I’ve heard great things about supreme sliders. Karen also uses Machinger gloves which I find to be excellent for quilting on the domestic machine. Thanks for the tips Karen!!
Image used with permission by Karen’s Quilts, Crows and Cardinals
While you’re over there make sure you check out her work, she is a really talented quilter and I love that she shared her top tips with us last week. That’s what I wanted I Quilt to be all about; sharing the process so that we can all improve our quilting <3
Image used with permission from Karen’s Quilts, Crows and Cardinals
Speaking of sharing the quilty love, this evening on Instagram I happened across an awesome hashtag: #machinequiltingtips
This advice is aimed at longarmers and there is some FANTASTIC advice there!!! Check it out if you’re a longarm quilter, please share your tips and support the wonderful online community that we have <3 My top tip for both longarm and domestic quilting is to relax and not worry about perfection. Closely followed by my second top tip which is to never sew/quilt when tired! 
Speaking of this online community… I reached a big milestone on Instagram this week and will be celebrating with a giveaway over the next few days. If you’re not on Instagram, head on over, if you are, keep your eyes peeled The giveaway will be limited to Instagram (don’t worry, I’ll have an awesome August giveaway here on the blog) because it’s all about celebrating the great IG community I’ve pulled out some fabric and I’m thinking of doing a stripy, binding bundle <3 As much as we all love fat quarter bundles, I was thinking of some WoF stripey prints that can be used for binding. Sound good?
Now it’s your turn to get quilty! Link up your quilting process, visit three other linkers and share the quilt love <3
An InLinkz Link-up
Welcome to Pretty Bobbins! Today is my day in Jennifer Sampou’s blog hop for her new line Shimmer. I am super excited to be involved and I have a lovely fabric giveaway for you <3
I was so excited when Jennifer first contacted me to be part of the Shimmer party, and had a lot of trouble deciding which prints to use, they’re all gorgeous! The sparkle of these prints is just fantastic and I really love the wavy line prints, very dynamic and ones I know that I’ll be using again and again.
We’re heading into winter here in Australia and I couldn’t resist making a sparkly, modern lap quilt to snuggle up under and reminisce about summer time. We have beautiful, clear skies in Autumn here in Canberra and photographing this quilt by the lake was a lot of fun. I love how the piecing looks like part of the skyline, totally coincidental but I’ll happily claim good design
I was inspired by Jennifer’s cushions (check out her lookbook!!) and backed it in a super soft, cream minky and it’s super soft and cuddly.
I really wanted to come up with a design that was modern and featured Jennifer’s gorgeous prints. The improv curves with set in contrasting blocks nicely highlight how well this line plays together. I must say, as a longarm quilter some metallic prints are very troublesome to work with, Jennifer’s line quilted BEAUTIFULLY without a tension issue anywhere in sight! If you want metallic highlights and lots of shimmer AND you love to quilt, then Shimmer is a must! As always I used my favourite thread, Aurifil 50wt in 2000, 2600 and 5004.
This lap quilt measures 38″ x 62″ and was made for cuddling <3
I still haven’t decided which way is up and which was is down (is it stormy seas or dark skies over snow?) but I love the subtle prints and tones.
I had a heap of fun finding all the background shimmer that I could. I can’t lie, this quilt was fun from beginning to end
So now that you’re dying to get your hands on some Shimmer I can happily tell you that there is lots on offer! It will be hitting stores soon, but in the meantime you can win some right here at Pretty Bobbins and at each of the other stops on the blog hop (schedule below)!!
All you have to do is leave me a comment on this post before 18 April (I’m sticking to a US timezone for this giveaway) and a charm pack of Shimmer could be heading your way! I will use a random number generator to pick a winner, but if you like you can let me know what your favourite charm square project is
Bon chance!
And if a charm pack isn’t enough Shimmer for you, you can head over to Jennifer’s blog for a chance to win a fat quarter bundle of the entire Shimmer line!! To enter the giveaway, new readers should sign up on Jennifer’s mailing list and comment on her blog before the end of the hop. Be sure to comment about your favorite projects and why. Existing followers are automatically eligible to win.
BLOG HOP Schedule:
April 1-21.
April 1- Robert Kaufman/Jennifer Sampou- announce blog
April 2- Janice Ryan- Better off Thread
April 3- Alissa Haight Carlton- Handmade by Alissa
April 4- Julie Herman- JayBird Quilts
April 5- Natalie Barnes- Beyond the Reef
April 6- Stash Books- C&T Publishing
April 7- Amanda Jean Nyberg- Crazy Mom Quilts
April 8- Lee Heinrich- Freshly Pieced
April 9- Cheryl Arkinson- Naptime Quilter
April 10-Christina Cameli- A Few Scraps
April 11-Elizabeth Hartman- Oh Fransson
April 12-Faith Jones-Fresh Lemon Quilts
April 14- Katie Blakesley- Swim Bike Quilt
April 15-Amy Smart-Diary of a Quilter
April 16- Laura Nownes, Jennifer Rounds, Pati Fried, Darra Williamson- See How We Sew
April 17-Holly DeGroot- Bijou Lovely
April 18-Jennifer Sampou-Wrap Up
April 21-Jennifer Sampou- Announce Winner of Giveaway FQ Pack of entire ShimmerCollection.
If you need some more Shimmer in your life you can check out Shimmer on the Robert Kaufman Website
And if all of that isn’t enough, The Cotton Patch (CA, USA) is taking pre-orders of Shimmer.
Big apologies on the delay of this announcement (although I did contact the winners on Monday), my internet has been dropping in and out and I’ve not had a signal long enough to write an entire post… Fingers crossed I’m back online!
Congratulations to Ashley from Instagram who has won the quilted cushion cover!
Quilted Curves Cushion Giveaway (closed)
The winner of the French cross stitch magazine is Patty K who said: I’m a follower. I love to hear French being spoken. It’s such a romantic language.
I’m still waiting to hear back from Patty who I have emailed but hopefully she’ll see this post If not I’ll redraw in two days.
French Cross Stitch magazine giveaway
I also want to say a HUGE thank you to everyone for entering and your comments. I am slowly getting through and replying. Your comments regarding my blog were so helpful and inspired a very fun idea that I’ll be sharing in a couple of weeks! In the meantime I have a crazy week ahead with a whirlwind trip to Australia to test drive some long arm machines! Can you believe that? It’s all happening! I’ve also started a running list for the move so things are getting pretty crazy here.
Thanks again xx
THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED
Hurrah for August! I’m celebrating one last time by giving away a quilted curvy cushion cover. I shouldn’t really be celebrating as August is nearly over and I still need to complete my bee blocks and prepare for a double birthday party this weekend…
Improv curvey quilted cushion cover
As a final celebration of August I’m giving away this 15″ cushion/pillow cover (insert not included) that I made yesterday. As always I used my lovely Aurifil threads (2810 and 2605 in 50wt) and had a lot of fun free motion quilting on my Bernina 440QE. The grey is kona steel and the prints are some favourites that are fast becoming scraps! This giveaway is to say thank you to all of you lovely readers here on the blog and the wonderful bunch over on Instagram. Whilst Instagram is definitely dampening my blogging mojo somewhat I really encourage you to give it a try if you haven’t. There is so much inspiration and a really nice quilty/crafty community.
I used nearly the last of a favourite print on the back
Just leave me a comment letting me know why you like to read my blog (or follow me on Facebook or Instagram). As I’ve mentioned before I have a dream to turn Pretty Bobbins into a business quilting for other people whilst continuing to make quilts for family, friends and for sale. Being online is a big part of what I do, I love the social interaction with other crafty types. I love meeting like minded people all over the world. As much as my blog is a place for me to share my makes with you, I also want to make sure that I’m actually sharing things that interest you. There are lots of posts that I’ve hesitated about writing because they were too wordy, I was worried I’m not qualified/an expert or I just didn’t think it was a good fit. I would love it if you could tell me what keeps you coming back. The pretty quilts? The visual inspiration? The posts about colour or process? The tutorials? Is there something that I’m not blogging about that you would like to see or something that I could do better?
A simple zippered closure so you can feature the front or back (but I hope you like the front enough to show!) :)
I don’t talk about myself very often so I’ve decided to share a few things about myself today Feel free to just scroll down and enter the giveaway
I’m an only child who has three children and an incredibly patient and supportive husband. I have crazy hair, I’m forgetful, I always try to do too many things at once and I never knew what I wanted to do until I started quilting. Now I get anxious at the thought of not realising my dream of being a full time quilter.
It’s seriously hard to giveaway a cushion cover that looks so good on my sofa! ;)
I speak four languages (English, French, Indonesian and Mandarin) but my Mandarin is pretty basic these days. I always wanted to live overseas but now that I’ve done it a couple of times I’ve realised that actually I love holidays overseas. I’m a homebody who needs a haven in the suburbs and a job that gives me time with my family.
I don’t remember learning to sew, but my Mum, Grandma and Aunt all sewed and I was always around sewing growing up. My Aunt is the only other quilter in my family but we have very different styles (her quilts are beautiful!).
Quilting detail up close
Whilst I’m not one for pigeon holes, I would put myself in the “modern quilter” camp. I love colour, creativity and improvisation. I LOVE to quilt. I am much better at drawing with my sewing machine than with a pencil and paper! I’m a perfectionist and I love the absolute perfection and micromanagement that is part of piecing. Free motion quilting and improv curves make me happy. I crave simplicity. I want a vegie patch and chickens and I want to quilt day after day after day.
So there you go That’s me in a nutshell (and now I have Austin Power’s nemisis in my head crying “help! I’m in a nutshell” LOL)
Improv curvey quilted 15″ pillow cover
If you’d like to be in the running please leave me a comment letting me know why you like to read my blog/instagram/facebook or what else you would like to see me post about. If you follow me on Instagram you can have a second entry over there, just share the photo that I’ll load shortly with the hashtag #prettybobbinsgiveaway and tag me I will combine the number of entries with blog comments first, ie. 1-50 then followed by IG comments in order ie. 51-90. The giveaway will be open until midnight AEST (Sydney time) Saturday 31st August. I will use random.org to draw a winner and announce it on Monday 2nd September. Please leave your email address (if the winner is on IG I will tag you there) so I can contact you.
This giveaway is open wordwide (it’s for the cushion/pillow cover only).
Good luck and thanks for supporting me on this creative journey xxx
THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED
THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED
So last week was slightly crazy. Two of my babies had birthdays and we had the removals company come over to start the process of our return to Australia. I have done a number of international and interstate moves but it still threw me for six. I often feel like I live in a toy shop that exploded. Well, it’s not really possible to move when you’re house resembles a bombsite, so I have a lot of work ahead of me. It’ll be fine, but I did take a few days to come to terms with that. Oh yeah, and the little fact of returning to work after eight years on leave! Yes, it’s been eight years! But that’s a whole different story so let’s just ignore that fact for awhile
French Cross Stitch magazine cover
I mentioned that August is my bloggy celebration month. Two family birthdays and my blogiversary. With our time in France coming to an end I have been hitting the bookshops, so I decided to giveaway a French quilting magazine. Except after spending a good half an hour choosing between the three available I realised that the measurements are all in centimeters! So I spent another half an hour deciding whether or not my readers could cope with quilt patterns in centimeters (I know I couldn’t). In the end I selected a lovely (and very French) cross stitch magazine. Now I know that you might not be interested in cross stitch, but it is a lovely magazine and cross stitch was my first craft love.
Basket cover
As much as I hate chopping up books, you could even just use the lovely images and text for something crafty.
Wild flowers
There are some really sweet projects and the magazine provides the number of the DMC threads used, so it should be fairly straight forward to make the projects.
Drink cooler cover
My favourite project is the drink cooler cover. I love the colours but I also can’t go past French text. Oh la la!
Don’t despair if cross stitch is the last thing that you’re interested in. I have another giveaway ready to announce tomorrow. It will be the last for the month and is going to be hard to part with! In fact I’ve hidden it from my husband as he will want to keep it! If you follow me on Instagram you will have seen a sneak peek already, but for the rest of you, here is a progress shot from earlier today
Cushion cover in progress
To be in the running to win the French Cross Stitch magazine you need to follow my blog. Just leave me a comment letting me know that you follow along. If you like you can let me know what (if anything) is your favourite French thing. Do you love baguettes, French accents, French films or French country style? Living in France I have found that the stereotypes are true but there is also so much that I didn’t know about I hope that you will appreciate this little piece of France <3
The giveaway is closes midnight AEST (google Sydney time) Saturday 31st of August. I will draw a winner using random.org and announce it on the blog and contact the winner via email on Monday 2nd September. Please leave your email address so I can contact you
Bon chance!
THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED
***August is a month of celebrations for Pretty Bobbins. It is my two year blogiversary and two of my children have birthdays this month. There will be a giveaway for each of these events, you will find the first giveaway at the bottom of this post.***
Back in April I was Queen Bee for Wombat Stew, a paper piecing bee. I struggled with a theme from the beginning, I really wasn’t sure that ‘celebrate’ would work. I put together an inspiration board and by the time my month rolled around I hadn’t thought of anything better so I decided to go for it. I asked the girls to make blocks of any size to fit the theme ‘celebrate’. I planned to make a wall quilt to hang every time we have a family celebration. I also like the challenge of making a quilt from different sized blocks. I asked the girls to stick to fun, bright and relatively gender neutral colours (so pink is OK but not all pink). You can see some progress shots here. Today it’s all about the big reveal! (And if you really like the patterns you should keep reading right to the end *HINT HINT*)
Celebrate – a paper pieced quilt
I LOVE this quilt! My kids love this quilt and August is a month of celebrations so as soon as I buy some dowel it is going on the wall I quilted the heck out of the quilt and had soooo much fun doing so! You can see the quilting better on the back. It measures 37″ x 37″ and was put together and quilted with Aurifil threads by me on my Bernina 440. Full credit to each of the bee members below <3
Celebrate – quilting details on back
I had my own little party quilting with a rainbow of Aurifil 50 wt threads (really, what’s a party without Aurifil? Alex seems to be everywhere if you follow him on Facebook LOL). I used 2000 on the cream/off white areas and I love how they sparkle. Can you see the word PARTY popping out in Kristy’s party hat blocks (Kristy of Quiet Play designed most of these blocks, isn’t she AMAZING???)?
Party hats by Kristy
Marieka baked me a delicious cake. I was really unsure of how to quilt this block but really happy with how it turned out. My icing is never that neat LOL There is enough cake here for everyone, LOVE!
Tiered cake by Marieka
I had a lot of fun playing with Alyce’s pom poms (and I’m sorry, I had to make that joke LOL). She very cleverly used a flying geese pattern, you can see her tutorial here. I’m still considering adding a few beads to the pom poms but for now I’m sticking to the star in the middle (and yes, more micro-stippling there). Aren’t they fun?!
Pom Poms by Alyce
Jane’s block is immediately apparent to Australian’s but some of my readers may be wondering what it is. This is an absolute classic and staple of children’s birthday parties. Known as “fairy bread” it is sliced white bread, spread with butter and then covered in sprinkles. Jane obviously took a bite out whilst piecing and left her party blower behind as evidence
Fairybread by Jane
Fiona’s cups (pattern by Ayumi of Pink Penguin fame) had a real retro feel so I quilted the wall paper to enhance this vibe. Possibly better seen from the back, but aren’t they the cutest drinks ever? (There is a fourth block, you can see it in the larger photos)
Paper Pieced cups by Fiona (pattern by Ayumi Mills)
What party would be complete without bunting? The adorable Lara (she is completely adorable, you should check out her instagram – luellabella) made me rainbow bunting. LOVE! I went a little nuts and quilted pebbles with each dot being inside a pebble.
Rainbow bunting by Lara
Whilst the wonderful Ms Midge wasn’t in round one of Wombat Stew she decided to join the party early and brought the candles. Can you believe she tried to tell us she was a novice paper piece-er when we asked her to join us????
Candles by Ms Midge
And whilst we’re on the topic of Ms Midge, she sent me the cutest scrap EVER! I LOVE this fairy and I quilted her in a micro version of the the FMQ design that I used on my daughter’s quilt. I’ve saved the last skerrik of this scrap and plan to make my daughter a cushion with it. Thank you Midge xx
Cutest fairy scrap EVER complete with micro quilting
I totally got my FMQ on and micro-stippled this fantastic cupcake print (did I mention the girls sent the most amazing scraps with their blocks?!).
scrap love from the Wombats
I think every block/print features a different FMQ design. I must admit I went a little crazy quilting around each candle (print in the bottom right of the above photo) this scrap is only 1.5″ x 4.25″. I was so impressed with the affect that I then quilted around the jellybeans and balloons too LOL
Celebrate paper pieced quilt
I added in some three dimensional bunting down the side (left over from another project) and at the suggestion from a friend quilted words underneath (sing, dance, encore, cake, secret, surprise, kiss). The idea being that the birthday person must choose an activity to complete
You gotta dance! (then shout hooray)
Well done if you’ve read this far! Possibly my favourite part of quilting this beast is the words in the border. I used 12wt Aurifil (2250) for top thread and the same colour in 50wt on my bobbin. The stitches are perfect (I suggest going slow and smoothly and dropping your top tension a few notches). Can you believe that I didn’t mark the words first? It was all done free hand and I’m so pleased that it filled the borders perfectly and looks rather neat YAY for machine quilting with Aurifil 12wt. I will be doing this again and again and again <3
FMQ writing in 12wt Aurifil in the border, woohoo!
Did I mention that it was worth reading to the end? Well, the fabulous Kristy of Quiet Play who designed most of these patterns has come to the party with a giveaway of most of the patterns seen in this quilt! Thank you Kristy xx I highly recommend that you give her patterns a go if you’re thinking of trying out paper piecing. I’ve made quite a few of them and they’re always easy to follow and very well designed. You can find her shop here on Craftsy.
Pattern giveaway thanks to Quiet Play
All you have to do to enter is leave me a comment letting me know that you follow both Pretty Bobbins and Quiet Play blogs. (Head over to Quiet Play and follow Kristy here.) You can have an additional entry if you follow me on Instagram, Facebook or Flickr, just leave me a comment letting me know You have a chance to win a bundle of paper pieced patterns by Kristy of Quiet Play as seen in the collage above (bunting, candles, hat and cupcake). The giveaway will close at midnight 18th August Australian Eastern Standard time (google Sydney time).
***This giveaway is closed***
Bravo if you made it to the end. What a mammoth post! I’m taking my celebration to the Paper Piecing Party at Quiet Play and TGIFF at Bedtime Quilting.
I’ve seen lots of posts in my reader today announcing winners, so exciting!
I was completely overwhelmed with the number of entries I received! I loved reading all of the comments and a huge welcome to the new followers I’m looking forward to the next Giveaway day already
But without further ado, the winner of the novelty charm squares is:
who said:
Congratulations Nikita! I’ve sent you an email and I’ll get these charm squares in the post once I hear back from you with an address
Bonne weekend a tous!
****THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED****
If you’re visiting as part of the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day excitement, welcome to Pretty Bobbins!
I started this blog a year and a half ago, at that time I was mostly sewing clothes for my kids, now I quilt. I still sew clothes sometimes, but quilting is my obsession. Here are some of my recent projects:
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| Current WIP Create Wall Quilt |
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Equation Mini for Mr Husband
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Retro TV cushion (paper pieced pattern available here).
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Tea or Coffee mini (patterns available here).
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But you’re interested in the giveaway
I will be giving away one set of 27 5″ novelty charm squares. I participated in a swap last year and got a little over-excited, I can’t actually use three sets of novelty charms!
Ooops! But that’s your gain
I actually used some of these charms squares in my most recent finish, my son’s Rainbow I Spy quilt.
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Rainbow I Spy Quilt
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If you would like a chance to win these charm squares please leave a comment below letting me know what you might make with these (the winner will be chosen at random, it’s not a test You can just say ‘hi’ if you can’t think of a project right now). You don’t need to be a follower to enter, but I will give those who follow my blog a second entry (please leave me a second comment letting me know that you’re a follower).
This giveaway is open worldwide and is open until May 10 5pm PST. Please make sure that you have an email linked to your profile or leave your email address with your comment. I will use Random.Org to select a winner and notify the winner by both email and here on the blog.
Good luck!
****THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED****
Thank you so much for all of the entries into my Birthday Giveaway! I really appreciated all of the birthday wishes and LOVED the creative ideas for Paper Piecing patterns! You guys rock
But you want to know who won, right? Well, Mr Random.Org selected #25
The lucky Rachel Booth! Congratulations Rachel!! I will email you in a few minutes
Now if I can get myself organised I will put up my Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day giveaway shortly. Then bed!!
THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED
So I mentioned that I was planning a giveaway for my birthday. I had the best intentions. Then my husband had food poisoning. All night, then slept all day on my birthday. That’s cool, I had an awesome day with our kids. I took them toy shopping and gave them each a budget. It was really fun and there were no tears (bonus!). It was actually probably the best birthday I’ve ever had. I usually get a bit depressed thinking of sad family stuff on these occasions, but I realised that my kids are awesome and there is nothing better than spending the whole day with them.
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| Blowing out the birthday candles |
You’ll be pleased to hear that my husband got up the next day and took the kids out so I could have some ‘me time’ that was also great I did a bit of this:
But back to the giveaway! You know I love to Free Motion Quilt. I’ve previously discussed some of my quilting resources and it turns out that I have two copies of one of these great books. I don’t need two copies and I’d much rather someone else got to use this fabulous resource than it just sit on my bookshelf
You can read more of my thoughts about this book here, but it is essentially a FMQ sketch book that has been filled out for you by an awesome quilter, Bethany Pease.
This giveaway is open worldwide and you have two chances to enter.
1. You need to be a follower of this blog to enter the giveaway (however you please, you don’t need to tell me, I trust you) and just leave me a comment below letting me know what theme you would like to see for my next set of Paper Pieced Patterns. You can find the existing ones here.
2. For your second chance to enter you need to follow my Facebook page, just leave me a comment letting me know that you do. Previously I was using it as a platform to share my items for sale, but it is now blog focused and with Google Reader shutting down it will be a good place to keep up to date with my posts.
I will use Random.Org to select a winner. The winner will be announced on the Monday 6th May and I will also email the winner. Because timezones confuse the heck out of me and I live in little old Nouméa, you may enter until midday Sunday 5th Australian Eastern Standard Time (eg. Sydney).
Please make sure you are not a no reply blogger or leave your email address in your comment If I don’t hear back from the winner within 3 days I will redraw.
*Phew* I hope I’ve covered all bases there
Best of luck!
THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED
