It's my day to be WICKED!!!!!!!

Whoo hoo - have been so excited about this hop:

you might want to grab a cup of tea (I'm English don't you know!) as this is going to be a long post!

Remember for the Leafs Me Happy hop I said I was limiting myself to only one block as I am amassing a huge pile of these mini quilts (the scarecrow was my 19th!) well that all went completely out of the window for this hop.  Probably because I love Halloween stuff or probably because I am just plain wicked - you decide!

Anyway my head was spinning with two ideas - I wanted a haunted house block and skeleton block - I started with the house:

I got a cut out of a sizzix haunted house and drew it larger by hand onto some freezer paper then drew a circle around it with a side plate.  I then ironed on the freezer paper and cut out the moon, windows and house outline from the black material and added some yellow fabric behind.  I then just straight stitch appliqued around the edges - this seems to be my go to favourite method of applique at the moment - I didn't have time to hand applique all my blocks and I am not keen on the blanket stitch my Bernina has, didn't fancy a zig zag either so straight was the way to go!  I then decided the block needed a bit more (I was still trying hard to keep my blocks minimalistic as I do have a tendency to go overboard with embellishments and little extras but with what I had planned there was just too much so simplicity was key!).  However there was far too much yellow space for me so a T!m Holtz witch was the solution - this is actually from his mask and not his die - I placed it on freezer paper, drew the outline and then ironed and cut it out of black fabric - then attached it the same way as the house.

One block down onto the next...

How cute is he!  Found the picture on the internet - cobbled it together onto freezer paper and cut it out all in one piece of white fabric.  I then stitched around all his bones and ribs etc to give him features.  Eyes and nose are appliequed on the top and the mouth is stitched on.

By now I am on a roll and there is no stopping me:

Next came a cat who flies amongst the graves
Along with a ghost who has arms like sea waves

Then a pumpkin with a liking for hats
Followed closely by lots of flying bats

Then a witch flying high through the air
Followed by Frank - don't they make a nice pair!

And finally last, but certainly not least
A web that is home to a big scary beast:

Told you I went a bit overboard didn't I!  The reason I did nine was because I decided that we all needed a nice quilt to cuddle under on All Hallows Eve:

Here it is bound with some left over halloween fabric I had from a kit I bought in the States in June.  Also you will spot I added stitches to Frank's face - much better now!

I was going to leave you all in peace now and ask you all to come back tomorrow to see the back of this wicked creation but I have decided that that would just be too ghastlie of me!

So here it is:

whoo hoo finally got to use some of the ghastlie material I have been hoarding!  I have come to realise that I have the same aversion to patterned materials as I have to patterned paper and that is I find them so hard to use!  Give me a blank canvas and plain material/cardstock and the world is my oyster and my imagination is unstoppable but patterns - gosh where to start? As soon as you cut them you lose half of the pattern - so they take me way out of my comfort zone!  As you can see from this I didn't change anything much but just cut out the pictures I liked and framed them with grey - but can you see that I have had a go at free motion quilting?? can you ?? so exciting!

Here is a close up:

sorry it's a rubbish picture - but I have quilted it with frankenstein stitches! Very pleased with myself although doesn't it take an age! I had no idea.  Anyway I quilted this side only to the wadding - not sure if that's right or not but I didn't want the stitches coming through on the wicked side and as it's just me bumbling along teaching myself quilting in the comfort of my dining room I just decided to go for it.  I then bound the wicked side to the ghastlie side with a black edging.

This was finished last Thursday and me and my two boys have been cuddling up underneath it in front of the tv since then so much so I had to iron it take the final photos!

Thank you for keeping up with me this far - sorry it's such a long post, also a big thank  you to Wicked Wendy and Head Witch Madame Samm for putting together and organising all of this hop.

My fellow halloween hoppies today are:

Wicked Wednesday,
October 31st

Beaquilter

Fun Thread Designs
Stitch, Stitch, Stitch
Made By A Brunnette
Buttons And Butterflies
The Recipe Bunny
Quilted Delights
Sunshine Reflections   This is me!
Louzeekreativ
Mice In The Mix
Rosemary - That Other Blog
The Fuzzy Hat Quilter
Sew We Quilt

Please go check them all out and show them some spooky love.

Thanks for looking - All spooked out from Solihull