Lines by Design Quilts winner

Thanks for all the entries to the Lines By Design Quilts book giveaway! I can't believe how many of you have so much BLUE in your stash. That was far and away the most prominent color stated in the comments. I found that very interesting!

The winner of the book is Julierose! Thanks to all of you who entered! Hope you are having a great week!

big and little

Welcome to finish it up Friday!

My first finish for today is quite exciting to me, mainly because I've had the supplies for so long. It is one of those projects that should have been quick and easy, but finding that hour or so to get it done took a few years. (Yes, years!)

I was in Duluth at Hannah Johnson Fabrics about two years ago. The owner, Janet, sold the chalkboard fabric to me, and she threw in the frames for free. The frames had been sitting, unused, in HER basement for a few years prior to my visit. I think she had intended to use them for something similar to this, but never got around to it. The frames were already painted these lovely colors, which was a bonus! A few weeks ago, I had my husband help me cut down thin backer boards (to stabilize the chalkboard fabric) and last night, my two younger kiddos and I finally assembled them. The kids helped pound in the nails (to secure the backer boards into the frames) and they thought that was the best thing ever. Well, second to actually using the chalkboards.

They had such a blast trying it out! I had to chuckle that they immediately started doing math problems....gotta love that! This one will be for the kids, and the other one will be for me. I'm so excited to have this project complete! Each of the frames are about 32" x 41".....nice and large for long to-do lists. Ha!

I recently purchased a brand new bag of this...which means I have enough filling to make about 100 more pincushions. My husband is not amused. I, on the other hand, am thrilled! :)

I was playing with scraps this week and got sidetracked from my original project. I end up with this tiny block of patchwork, which is about 5'' square! Each of those strips finish at about 1/2''. Teeny, tiny and oh-so-cute! Quilted pincushions are a great way to use up those long skinny strips of leftover batting. It's fabulous!

 This one might be my new favorite! It reminds me of my kids' tiny Lego pieces.

I'm smitten by these seriously tiny (and bright) pieces!!! This is scrap project # 128!

It's been awhile since I showed my "candy dish" of pincushions. It's steadily growing...and it could be classified as a situation at this point. But, I'm good with that! Here's to 100 more! :)

Now it's your turn! Please link up your finishes for the week. Thanks for joining me for finish it up Friday!

Lines by Design blog hop

Today I'm happy to be a stop on my friend Debbie's blog tour for her new book, Lines by Design Quilts. This book is so true to Debbie's clean, graphic and straightforward style. The book contains 17 fun projects--in various sizes--to sew and inspire. It's a beautiful book!
The bar chart quilt caught my eye immediately. I've thought about making something similar to this for a long time, but I never had enough vision to follow through. For that reason, I was more than happy to give this pattern a try. It's much better than I could have done on my own!

I've had this red jelly roll in my stash for years, so I was thrilled to finally have a reason to sew it up! I pulled various fabrics from my stash to round things out. I am not good at following directions, or counting, apparently, so I had to add an additional fabric to the mix about half way though....but that's pretty typical for me! Ha!

Sewing with jelly rolls is messy. Yikes! I bet I will be vacuuming up red fuzz for the rest of the year...but it was totally worth it. I LOVE how the quilt turned out. LOVE it!

I was worried that some of the darker red prints that I pulled would blend into the background too much, but I think it turned out to be the perfect balance. Hurray! (And phew!)

When it came time to quilt it, I decided to do a small stipple in the background. I quilted loopy L's in the printed strips. I also changed thread colors for the strips: some were quilted in red thread, some were quilted in white thread. It required me to bury quite a few knots, but it was time well spent. I love how the stippling unifies the background strips. This quilt will be texture-iffic once it is washed!

The ovals print (on the left) was the last minute addition to the quilt. I'm glad I had to add one more fabric, because it introduced another scale of print to the quilt. It needed it!

It has been awhile since I machine bound a quilt, but this one was a good candidate for it! 3 out of the 4 corners turned out beautifully. I suppose that's the best I could ask for. :)

The backing was a very deliberate choice. I wanted something that would camouflage both the red and white threads. This definitely did the trick! (The backing, binding, ovals and one of the red polka dot fabrics are all from my good neighbors fabric line.)

The finished quilt is about 60" x 78" or so. I was tempted to make a few of those strips scrappy, but I resisted. Aren't you surprised? :) Red is a bold choice for the background, but I couldn't love it any more. I need to go bold more often!

(The red background fabric is Moda Bella Solid (9900-JR 16).)

Since this is a blog hop, Debbie and her publisher are giving away a copy of the book to one of my readers! If you would like to win, please leave me a comment in this post. In your comment, I would love to hear what color of fabric is most prominent in your stash. (Is it because you always use it? Or is it because you never use it?) The contest is open to everyone! A hard copy will be sent to a US resident OR a digital copy will be sent to a resident outside of the US. I will pick a winner in a few days!

 

Oh! And feel free to visit the other stops on the blog tour to see more of the book:

 

Wed, Mar 2     Christa Watson     http://christaquilts.com     

Th, Mar 3        Casey York      https://studioloblog.wordpress.com/

Fri, Mar 4        Heather Jones http://www.heatherjonesstudio.com/blog/

Mon, Mar 7     Kate Colleran  http://seamslikeadream.com/blog/

Tues, Mar 8     Rossie Hutchinson      http://www.rossiecrafts.com/blog

Wed, Mar 9     Amanda Jean Nyberg http://crazymomquilts.blogspot.com/

Th, Mar 10      Amy Ellis         http://www.amyscreativeside.com/blog/

Fri, Mar 11      Lynn Krawczyk            http://smudgeddesignstudio.com/blog/

Mon, Mar 14   Debbie Grifka  http://eschhousequilts.com/blog

 

catching up

Welcome to finish it up Friday!

This week was one for catching my breath and catching up. I was quite behind on my bee blocks, so I spent a few days fixing that.

Top left: flying geese for Stephanie (tutorial here)
Top right: books for baby block for Cindy (pattern in the book Patchwork, Please!)
Bottom left: charming stars block for Terri (tutorial here)
Bottom right: improv herringbone for Shelly (tutorial here)

The star block was super fun to make and it's so simple. I want to make an entire quilt from that pattern some day. The herringbone block, while cute, was SO time consuming...and it ate a LOT of fabric. Thankfully, there is no shortage of fabric around here. Ha!

Phew! It feels good to have those done. Thankfully my friends are patient. :) Now, to get these in the mail...that's always the trick!

Did you know that you can link up your finishes from Instagram? See this post for more details.

It's your turn! Please link up your finishes for the week. Thanks, as always, for joining me for finish it up Friday!

a big week

Welcome to finish it up Friday!

It's been a big week over here. Boy, am I glad it's Friday!

My middle child turned 13 on Wednesday, so no more little boy.... (sniff, sniff.) My husband thought it would be a grand idea to buy him a brand new drum set to celebrate this milestone. Things got serious pretty quickly! And loud. HA! Actually, he's a great drummer and it's exciting to be investing in his future in this way....even if I do have to wear hearing protection while I am sitting in my living room. :)

Along with that, I finished writing my book this week. (!!!!!!) I'm beyond thrilled and quite exhausted. Words can't even begin to describe....

Completely unrelated...this is a new quilt I started working on this week. I am loving it so far! And...I'm so looking forward to sewing for fun! Hurray!

Now, it's your turn! Please link up your finishes for the week. Thank you for joining me for finish it up Friday! Have a great weekend. xo

fleet and flourish fabrics

Today I'm happy to be a part of the Fleet and Flourish blog hop. This beautiful fabric line was designed by Maureen Cracknell and is made by Art Gallery Fabrics.

The floral on the bottom left is my absolute favorite from the whole line. It's SO delicious!

It didn't take long to come up with an idea for the fabrics. I was inspired by the Vast Quilt by Jeni Baker, from her book Patchwork Essentials: The Half-Square Triangle. It was THE perfect pattern to show off the large scale prints. I cut my blocks at 13'' square (rather than 18'' square) due to the size of fabrics I had on hand. It worked out very well!

Since I'm such a hard-core scrap user, it felt a little weird to cut into so much new fabric all at once. I almost forgot what that felt like...but it sure was fun! I made the entire quilt top (and basted it!) in one Saturday. I could get used to that. :)

Here it is, finished! I love how it turned out! I kept it simple by free-motion quilting loop-de-loops over the entire piece.

Whenever I make a quilt with an entire fabric line, I like to mix in a few choices of my own, just to add my own stamp on it. I only added two fabrics...this yellow ochre solid, and a yellow squared elements print from my stash (you can see just a touch of it on the left hand side of this photo). I like how the yellow pops from the rest of the colors and how it highlights the yellow details in the other prints.

 The backing is a mish-mash of things from my stash. It's kind of quirky, but I love it all the same!

I finished it off with an eggplant Kona cotton binding. I'm not a fan of cats, but this cat print by Lizzy House (from a few years ago) is pretty darn cute! It was a welcome addition to the backing.

The quilt is BIG, finishing at about 72" x 84".

While I was making this quilt, my oldest son kept commenting on how the fabrics don't look like me. I thought that was funny--and pretty astute of him! These are a bit of a departure from the usual candy colors that I seem to gravitate toward, but it was still a delight to work with them! My husband likes it quite a lot and thinks I should make another one...but this time a king size quilt for our bed. I'm kind of surprised that they still pay attention to my quilting shenanigans after all these years! I'm pretty lucky. :)

If you care to see what others are making from this beautiful fabric line, check out the other stops on the blog tour:

Feb 22nd ~ Amy Friend
Feb 23rd ~ Heidi Staples
Feb 24th ~ Amy Smart
Feb 25th ~ You are here!
Feb 26th ~ Brooke Sellmann

Feb 29th ~ Amber Carillo
March 1st ~ Nicke Cutler
March 2nd ~ Nicole Daksiewicz
March 3rd ~ Christopher Thompson
March 4th ~ Alexis Wright

March 7th ~ Jessica Stewart
March 8th ~ Stephanie Kendron
March 9th ~ Heather Bostic
March 10th ~ Ali Brorsen
March 11th ~ Melissa Kelley

March 14th ~  Maureen Cracknell Handmade

pattern winners

The pattern winners for this week are Joan G, Linda Rose, Anja, and Brooke! Ladies, please email me and I will get your choice of 3 PDF patterns to you! Thanks to everyone who played along. Happy Monday to you!

pixie basket

Welcome to finish it up Friday!
Today's (start) and finish is a cute little project that you could probably make in less than an hour. Be warned, you MAY want to make about 100 of them. I know I want to!

There is a tutorial for the pixie basket here. Thanks, Heidi! This was the perfect project to brighten up a rainy day.

I used scraps to make this basket, of course, including the measuring tape pieces. They are actually from the selvage of the fabric. I couldn't bear to throw it away, so I'm thrilled it came in handy today. Hurray for saving everything! :) This is scrap project #127!

I can't wait until my daughter comes home from school so we can squeal over the cuteness together!

It feels like another giveaway week. I will randomly select a few winners (from the comments and the links) to win their choice of 3 of my PDF patterns from my pattern shop, just as a thank you for reading and joining me for finish it up Friday!

Now, it's your turn! Please link up your finishes for the week. Have a great weekend! xo

micro geese mini quilt

Welcome to finish it up Friday!

Well, I already claim to be crazy, so showing you this shouldn't hurt my reputation at all, right?

These are left over scraps from the handles of the mini coffee cup quilt that I am working on. Most people would throw these scraps away.....and that is great! It's the sane thing to do. However, I had a feeling that they had potential. I trimmed the corners at a 45 degree angle, which produced instant fusible micro geese!

I had a lot of fun playing with different arrangements, but settled on this simple configuration. I was afraid that the quilting would distort it, but there were no problems whatsoever. Hurray!

The scraps are teeny, tiny....

...but they make a mighty fine mini quilt! I really LOVE how it turned out! It measures 14 1/2'' x 19 1/2''. It's scrap project #126!

 

This mini would make a good partner for my frugal gal mini quilt....and I just may turn them into a series. I'm so excited to see where that will take me! Hurray for small scraps!

 

Now it's your turn! Please link up your finishes for the week. Thanks for joining me for finish it up Friday!

practicality and a pink patchwork pincushion

Welcome to finish it up Friday!

This week I finished knitting a rag rug runner. The idea behind this project was to have a place for my kids' boots to dry after they go out sledding. You know...somewhere other than directly in front of the door. I love that my kids aren't too old for sledding yet, even though one of them is taller than I am! They certainly make good use of the hill in our back yard. It's so great!

When I first bound off the rug, it was a few inches too short. Since perfect is better than finished (how many times do you hear that??? hahaha!) I put it back on the needles and knit several more rows. Now, it fits 3 pairs of boots nicely. I love that this is not only a good scrap buster, but it's so practical! It's scrap project # 124!

The rug measures about 15'' x 29''. There is a tutorial here, if you care to try your hand at making one of your own. (For this rug, I cast on 28 stitches on size 17 US needles and I used one strand of fabric "yarn" that was cut about 3/4"-7/8" wide.) If you don't knit, but you can crochet, you may want to check out this tutorial instead.

Another practical project this week was sewing up some cloth napkins from the stash. I used up some fabric that I don't really LOVE, but I don't hate, either. (Sometimes it's a fine line, right?) I cut the fabric 18" square, and hemmed the edges. Nothing fancy, but they were quick and we will use them! PLUS, I busted 2 1/2 yard of my stash. That's a great thing!

My daughter got pink eye this week....so I've had pink on the brain. (What can I say, inspiration comes from the strangest places!) I thought about making a pink pillow, but that would take too long, so a pink patchwork pincushion was the next obvious choice. Ha!

I love that little strawberry so much! The patchwork squares finish at 1'' each! The pincushion is about 4" square. It's scrap project #125!

Now it's your turn! Please link up your finishes for the week. Thanks for joining me for finish it up Friday!

add it to the list!

After finishing several quilts last month, I allowed myself to start a new project. In the middle of last year, I had 25 WIPs (gasp)....and I managed to whittle that number down to 10! I think I've earned the new project! :)

I'm using my mini coffee pattern to make the blocks, but I'm shooting for a lap size quilt this time around. (You can see the two minis I made here.) I decided to use the test blocks that I made when I was developing pattern and just add to those. They vary a bit from one another, but I actually like that. One block was too small, so I added a little border. It works!

The blocks are a little fiddly to make, but I think the finished product will be totally worth it! Notice the few handles facing left? I'm a lefty, so I couldn't resist. I'm sure all you other lefties out there can appreciate that, too!

Only 98 more blocks to go..... (Ha!)

Because I know someone will ask, the handles are appliqued on with fusible applique. I prefer Lite Steam a Seam or Lite Steam a Seam 2. I've tried other fusible products but I had so much trouble removing the paper backing and it was maddening. The Steam a Seam products are GREAT!

pattern winners

Thanks for all the kind words about my snowflake pillow! I appreciate each and every one! It was pieced, not bias tape applique, to answer that question. :)

The winners of 5 PDF patterns are: Alidiza, Diana, Carol, and Myra @Busy Hands Quilts! Please email me so I can get your patterns to you. Thanks to all of you for reading, commenting and linking up!

Happy Monday to you!