a few finished projects

Thanks so much for your feedback on my bento box quilt! It was great to get some objective opinions. I stared at the quilt too long and got stalled a bit. I'm excited to get back at it....I have a plan now. Thank you!!!

I finished up these hand knits yesterday. They are for my friend + neighbor, Mary. A pair of toasty mitts (pattern here) and a scarf (pattern here). I am not a good knitter, but I can see that I am making progress. I actually knit thumbs! Woo-hoo!

I'll be away from my blog for the rest of the week. (Well, I'm going to try to.) My kids and my husband are off on spring break and we are knee deep in a bathroom remodel. It's going to be such a fun way to spend our "vacation". :) Have a great week!

the beginnings of a bento box quilt

I finally started my bento box quilt and I'm having color doubts...

I'm not sure if I love the brown in the mix. Is the brown is too dark? Does it jump out too much?

Here it is without any brown. Does it lack a certain zing that the brown brings to the mix?

Since it will be going on my bed, maybe the brown fabric will be the key to tie everything together once it's done and on the bed?

What do you think?

red + white

Here is my quilt top made from the blocks I received from the Virtual Quilting Bee. It's nice to finally have it assembled!

I thought long and hard how to put these blocks into a quilt top. I couldn't decide what color to use for sashing, so instead, I added a 3" border (3.5" cut) around each block, which made each block 18.5" unfinished. The blocks are HUGE! It was fun to be able to put 12 monster blocks together to make up a substantial quilt top. I much preferred adding borders to each block rather than working with long sashing strips. The colors of the blocks lent themselves well to adding white borders to half of the blocks and red to the other half. The quilt top measures 54" x 72".

Now I have to come up with something for the back. From my stash, of course. :)

I'd like to say thanks to the lovely ladies that sent me such fabulous blocks!

a new project

I've finished up 3 quilts in the past week, so it's time to start some new ones! Hurray!

These blocks are for a block of the month that Anina is hosting.

More details here.

I'm not only paper piecing, but I am enjoying it! Go figure.

hopscotch

You know how I have such a hard time naming quilts? Well, I finally came up with a solution. I called on my blog friend, Susan (who is one creative + clever gal), and she agreed to help me name my quilts!!! I'm quite excited to have her on my "creative team". Thank you, Susan!

This little quilt is made up from scraps and white muslin from my stash. I didn't have anyone in mind when I started making it-I just wanted to try a slightly different style of random piecing and I wanted to use up some scraps. It was challenging for my little brain to figure out the math so the squares would go to the edges of the quilt, but it was worth it. I love how it turned out.

The backing and binding came from my stash as well.

It measures approximately 36" x 44".

I will be sending it to the Mountain Baby Blankets project. It's good to know that this little quilt will help keep some baby warm at night.

vintage kitchen quilt

Here's my finished swell quilt. I like it but I'm not in love with it yet. Maybe I will be after it's washed and dried? Or maybe my feelings for it are tainted by the March funk I'm in? I'm not too sure. Either way, it's finished.

It took a long time to piece.

And to quilt. (Over a week and a half just for the quilting---off and on.)

This quilt is h-e-a-v-y. My son even commented on that while he was holding it up for the photo-it must be all those bulky seams from the triangles.

I paired the swell charms (I used 4 packs) with quilter's only cotton in the color parchment (from JoAnn's).

I pressed the first seams (the diagonal ones) open, rather than to one side, which made the assembly of the quilt top much easier. I learned that lesson after making an hourglass quilt.

It measures 58" x 75".

I love a striped binding. This is lighter than I would normally pick for binding, but the stripes won me over.

The backing is also from the swell line. I love the bold print. I think this is the first larger quilt I've made that I've splurged on the backing by using all "quilt shop" fabric. (It was on sale, but still, it sure adds up quick.) I'm glad I did.

Since this quilt looks somewhat vintage already (love that), it should get better with age. I can only hope the same for me. Ha!

one of today's projects...

i finally said goodbye to the circa 1997 floral wall paper in one of our bathrooms. it's so not my style. it took less than an hour to remove it. hurray! and now i'm wondering why it took me 362 days to get around to do this. next to go...the hunter green walls. soon!

sewing for therapy

i got back to work on my spiderweb quilt yesterday. it is good "wind down" sewing. it's fun to play with different fabric combinations. and it's a great way to use up those small pieces of fabric that i can't part with for some reason.

i've decided that i am going to make it a twin size, so i'm just about 1/3 done with the top of the quilt. if it takes me the rest of the year to piece it, i'm ok with that. i'm enjoying the process. and i'm also thinking i need to make one in PINK, as there is no shortage of pink scraps in this house.

the tutorial is here.

i couldn't resist

last week i purchased my first japanese fabric.
from bee square fabrics.
i think i found a new favorite on-line fabric shop.
(check out the sale section, too!)
oh, and please don't blame me if you blow your grocery budget on fabric. :)

thrifty thursday or one way to piece batting

My sister is visiting this week and we have been cleaning and organizing. Today I tackled my mountain of batting scraps. I use my leftover batting for making coasters, quilted purses, and doll quilts, but I don't use it fast enough. I have several larger pieces set aside, but they aren't quite large enough for baby quilts. For my latest WIP, I pieced my batting for two reasons:

1. My favorite batting has increased to $10.99/yard. (ouch! even with a coupon.)
2. The storage space in my closet is nearly maxed out.

What I did:

First, I find two pieces of batting that are going to be large enough (once they are combined) for the quilt. I draw the line at one seam per quilt. :)

I look for the straight edge from the manufacturer and place the two straight edges together.

Using hand quilting thread (that matches your batting), make large whip stitches and join the batting. (I used contrasting thread here to show the detail.) It takes a bit to get the right tension to join the seam without buckling. You want the batting to be joined without any gaps, but you don't want to pull too tightly to cause a ridge where the seam is. Whip stitch the length of your seam, and knot at the end. That's it.

For this baby size (about 46" long) it only took me about 30 minutes, which I didn't think was bad at all. But of course, I don't mind hand stitching.

I have also heard that you can use your sewing machine set on a zig zag stitch to join the batting, but I have never tried it, as my JUKI doesn't have a zig zag stitch function.

Have you pieced batting?

wishy washy

I want a new bed quilt.
But I can't decide what colors to use.
Or what pattern.
A few weeks ago I was going to use this stack.
And make a candy bar road quilt.
(But making the blocks larger than the pattern calls for.)
Then I got nervous about my color combination.
I wasn't feeling it.
But a few days ago it came to me.
Use my lovely Denyse Schmidt fabrics.
(I will be able to see them every day!)
To make a bento box quilt.
With lots of white.
Now I had better cut into this fabric.
Before I change my mind.
Again.

wip

here is my newest work in progress- a baby quilt.


it's small. only 36" x 44" or so.

(it's very hard for me to work on a small scale.)

but i love it so far.

i'm really, really happy that i was brave enough to add the one orange square.

and i like that the squares go right to the edges of the quilt.

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thanks for all your answers to my questions yesterday. i'm going to try to upload my photos through flickr and see how that goes. a huge thanks to Alissa who walked me through the specifics of how to do this, as i'm fairly computer challenged. and while i have a wonderful in house IT guy (my husband), he draws the line at blogging problems. i don't blame him one bit. :)