starting week

Last week was finishing week, so naturally, this is starting week.

Here are glimpses of the 4 quilts that I started in the past 2 days.

What fun I am having!

It's apparent that even though my favorite color is orange, I am still awfully fond of pink.

piles of boxes, piles of fabric

So this is what Amy Jo and I were working on the other day in my sweatshop. We made 9 striped boxes and 2 white and green boxes. These are so much fun! We basically used this pattern, but made all pieces 6" x 6". And instead of adding the timtex for the sides, we used 5.25" squares of thin cardboard, one for each side and one for the bottom. We used all the cereal boxes that I had in my cupboard, and we still ran out. We almost had to dig in the neighbor's recycling buckets at the curb, but we held back. :) The striped fabric is a remnant that I picked up at JoAnn's. It's actually fabric made for outdoor use, like on the patio, but I saw the stripe and knew I needed to make something out of it. It worked out perfectly for this because it is a medium to heavy weight fabric.

I sent several home with her, and right now I am using mine to store my tiny fabric scraps and selvege edges from my fabric on my desk. They make me so happy! I have a feeling that there are many more of these to come.

Carolyn went to Japan last month and she brought back fabric just for me! Isn't that sweet?

I love it!!! It couldn't be more perfect.

And I had mentioned that I had a setback in my fabric diet...

...here are the results. I tell you, it's hard to resist a store closing (40% off!!!) fabric sale when your friend is in town visiting. Even though we had 4 kids in tow, it didn't damper the shopping one bit. Obviously.

the charity quilt

Heather and I finished the charity quilt in 11 days (one day to spare!). She will be dropping it off tomorrow morning. I feel like it's the perfect mix of our styles. Again, this quilt is a tough one to let go, but we are hoping that it brings in (at least some) money at the silent auction to help out the young mother that is battling cancer.

Heather made 6 blocks and I made 6. We got together a few mornings last week, figured out a layout and sewed it all together.

We basted it together, I quilted it, she did the binding and she will add the label. It was a fun project to work on together.

We used the same backing and binding combination that I used for my grandmother's quilt, because when you find something that works, why mess with it?

Heather and I are both very very pleased with how it turned out.

For those of you that are still working on the quilt-a-long, this is another (and much easier) way to put your blocks together. The sashing is 4.5" (cut) x the length of your block (12.5") and the white square is 4.5"(cut). The stars that are in this quilt will be all making an appearance in the star quilt along, which should start up in a few weeks. I want to get the top pieced before we begin. This is for two reasons: 1. so you know what you are getting yourself into and 2. so I am sure that I am happy with it and am not leading you all astray. ;)

In other news, Amy Jo and her boys are here and we are having a blast. She is working in my sweatshop so I have time to blog. Isn't that nice of her? We are working on a very fun project (squeal) that will be posted later. And I was on a fabric diet...until today. I fell off the wagon and boy was it fun!

Happy Monday to you!

finishing feels good*

edited to add: the pattern for the pincushion is from the December 2007 issue of American Patchwork and Quilting Magazine.


finishing up wee bunnies (or bunny bombs, as we call them) feels good.

finishing up coasters from Christmastime feels (really) good.

finishing the quilting on the charity quilt feels good.

(nearly) finishing the pincushions feels good.
(I ran out of embroidery floss.)

finishing up some packages to send off to friends feels good.


*inspiration for this post came from this book.

progress

the bunnies are sewn together...

the quilting has begun on the charity quilt...

but nothing finished.

I'm not giving up though.

How is your finishing it up week going?

this one's for me

see, this is what happens when I try to take photos of my quilts.



and I'm really not complaining. :)

Yes, it's another happy hour quilt. This is a great pattern for a beginner. Aside from the cutting, (which is easy, but takes awhile) the quilt goes together in a snap. And it's a good way to show off fabrics with a larger print.

I used Heather Bailey Freshcut fabric, some Joel Dewberry and a few prints from Mill End Textiles. Oh, and there is some Denyse Schmidt fabric in there, too.

This time I used serger thread to quilt it. Although it's polyester, I love serger thread for a few reasons. It's thinner than the cotton stuff I usually use, so it blends in a bit better. And it comes on a spool with 3000 yards, so there is no danger of running out of thread during a project. I used light pink thread here and it blends in well, even with the green.

For the backing I used some Freshcut fabric that I got at my local quilt shop for 60% off. (It was difficult to stop from buying the whole bolt.)

The quilt measures about 70" square.
---------------
So this is the start of finish it up week for me. I have a bunch of projects that I need to complete, (pincushions, bunnies and quilts) so I am going to try to finish as many as possible. Anyone else care to join me?

happy friday!

I'm finally back from spring break and a blog break...I was feeling burnt out. I'm happy to report that after some time away, I am feeling refreshed! It's friday, the sun is shining, I have a few new projects in the works and I have some Neil Diamond playing in the studio. Good times, good times. I hope your day is going just as well!

Thanks for all the wonderful comments on my last few quilts. Each and every comment is much appreciated. Thank you! You guys are the best.

The block shown above is going to be for a charity quilt that Heather and I are working on. There is a fund raiser in my community for a woman how has melanoma and has an infant that was born in October. I can't imagine the scary times the family is experiencing. The donation list was pretty weak, so Heather and I are going to donate a quilt for the silent auction. We have 12 days to complete it. You may be seeing a lot of this one. You've been warned. ;)

For next week, I am planning on hosting some sort of finish it up week. I have LOTS of projects in the works and I need a kick in the pants to finish them up. So say tuned. I hope you join me.

Oh, and my grandma loved her quilt! yay! She doesn't have the best track record for gift receiving...even my sister warned me not to be too disappointed if she doesn't gush over it. (So it's not just me being paranoid.) It was nice to visit her and give her the quilt for her birthday on her birthday.

Have a fabulous weekend!

that's more like it

Now, this quilt, I LOVE!

It was inspired by this flickr group.

It is a total scrap quilt except for a bit of the white.

It is a lap size, measuring 54" x 70".

I will be sending it to my friend, Jill, who lives in AZ, and is battling cancer.

I will be signing off for the rest of the week. We are on spring break (which means that we got dumped on with snow) and we are headed up to MN to spend some time with my sis.

See you next week.
Be good while I'm gone.

green

I finished the green quilt on Saturday during my virtual quiltathon with Anina. While I was uploading the photos to post about it, I realized that it's St. Patrick's Day today. Ha!

I'm not crazy about this quilt. Maybe I'm just not a green girl. I do like this version better than the first version, though. I like the gradient thing that's going on. It is about 42"x45". The backing is flannel, which I feel puckers extra well.

I usually have one quilt a year that I don't just love and I guess this one is it for me. Kind of early in the year to get that out of the way, but hey, what do you do?

Next up for my monochromatic challenge will be blue.

Happy Monday!

sometimes i am smart

sometimes not so much.

smart

making 2 of these aprons right off the bat. I usually make one of anything when I am drafting a pattern, but I knew if I only made one, the other would never get sent. (because I am so keeping one of these for myself!)

see the backing fabric peeking out on the left side? it's a marvelous little cherry print made by Robert Kaufmann.

I had to bribe my little man to model this for me. one stick of gum does wonders.

not so smart

making 7 bunnies at once. I really dislike mass production.

smart

making a prototype before making multiples of these pin cushions. I learned a few things the first time through. the pattern came from American Patchwork and Quilting magazine, December 2007.

not so smart
trying to tackle way too much gift making in one week's time. I only accomplished a fraction of what I wanted to and I am frazzled. oh, well. tomorrow Anina and I are having our own little quiltathon. woo-hoo!

slow going

The gift making process is slow going. I keep getting sidetracked. And then I get all nervous wondering if anyone would even want the things that I am making. They seem so...insignificant. I am not feeling too sure of myself with my gifting plan so far.

This is the artsy clutch, again, from this book. I am going to be using this for a gift bag, essentially. For the loop closure I used the elastic thread that holds baby shoes in pairs when you buy them. Frugal or genius? Not sure. Miserly? Probably. It works well, because you only need a bit for each loop.

Inside the bag will be some handmade cards, inspired by this book.
(In case you are wondering, no, I can not come up with one single original way to stylize these photos.)
There is something really fun about sewing fabric to paper. If you haven't tried it, you really should!

And here is probably my favorite card of the lot. The selvage tucked in there makes me happy. It doesn't hurt that it's pink, either.

I'm not afraid of pleats anymore

This week my goal was to make gifts for others. Like Jennifer and Melissa, I want a granny gift closet. But first I have to catch up. I am way behind and I need to send out several gifts. So what do I do? Make myself a present.

Isn't she a beauty?

This bag is a lot bigger than I guessed it would be from looking at the photos in the book and from the others that I saw. It measures 18" across the bottom. But I love the size and the shape. I love the fabric, too. It was in the bargain bonanza section for $1.29/yard. And it's decorator weight, so no interfacing required. Good news for me, as I loathe interfacing. The blue parts are cotton so I did need to interface those. They got all crispy and wrinkly. Any tips on what I am doing wrong? The interfacing is Pellon brand, so I don't know what the deal is.

I added a loop at the top, to which I will attach a key ring, so I can hook my keys on it. (I usually spend 10 minutes rummaging in the bottom of my bag to find them. And in a bag this size, with all that it will hold, it would take even longer.) I put a plastic rectangle (template plastic) in the bottom to help hold the shape.

If you want to make one yourself, the pattern is in this book. I did add length to the handles...mine are about 28" long compared to the recommended 22" in the book. Other than that, I pretty much stuck to the pattern.

Hopefully this week I will have more projects from the same book and more gifts to show you. For someone other than me.