Another design by me...

My second quilt is a door curtain. I received four autumn colored fabrics from Bente - a friend in Norway - thank you, Bente! I didn't know what to make out of it, but in the end I went for nine-Patch blocks. Since I only had four fabrics I had to find five different matching fabrics; some blue and yellow.

Here is the completed door curtain. The dark blue and red fabrics have dragonflies.

When I still lived in Norway I had already purchased one ruler, rotary cutter, cutting mat and some fabrics. In the sewing chest I discovered some fabrics that looked a bit "old" as well as an old salt sack that I had completely forgotten! I have no idea how old it is. I remember my mom once mentioned it was common to buy salt in such big quantities for preserving and such... Since I already had that old-looking fabrics, I decided to use it for a wall quilt.

Here is my very first wall quilt - my own design. See how clever our cat Birre-Liten is - how he helps me holding the quilt! Isn't he cute?! :-)

My very first quilt...

I didn't know much about quilting, but thanks to the book "Lappeteknikk fra A til Å" by Grete Gulliksen Moe & Kirsten Vistnes, I did get the basics.

Just after i settled here I purchased a new, simple sewing machine; Brother XR-36. At that time - when I bought the machine - I didn't know the quilting bug would hit me as strong as it has done.... :-) If I had known that, I had bought a machine more suitable for quilting. At least it does the basics...

Bitten by the quilting bug...

Hello - and welcome to my blog!
In this blog I'm going to share some of my passions. Patchwork/quilting is one of them, but I also enjoy other crafts like; knitting, needlepoint, stitching, hardanger, cross-stitch etc. Other things I enjoy are working in the garden, do some cooking - or better say baking... Everything chocolate is to die for! :-) I'm veeeery new into blogging, so hopefully this is the first step to become better. Please be patient with me - I'm doing the best I can... :-)
You may wonder why I have named the blog "Grandma's Red Needle"? Both my grandmothers and my mom were into crafts. My mom's mom did beautiful stitchery and my dad's mom did stitchery too as well as cross-stitch, hardanger and crocheting. Sadly I have not inherited her talent for crocheting. My mom did a lot of things; knitting; beautiful knitted tablecloths (knitted sweaters, mittens, socks etc), sewing clothes, counted cross-stitch, needlepoint, hardanger and she was also into tatting, but I think she gave it up... What I know about tatting is how fun it was to play with the shuttle when I was a little girl! I remember my bessa always said to my mom; "the needle gets red when she's sewing!" Thanks to these three women - I have inherited the love of crafts.
It all started one rainy and very windy day 4 years ago. A cyclone swept over the island so there was no chance to venture out. I was kind of bored and decided to have a peek into some quilting books and magazines I already had... That was the beginning to my quilting craze! I had never done any quilting or patchwork earlier, but I knew I'd like it.