Sunday Stash #4

For my birthday, I received this fat eighth bundle of Free Spirit solids in blues and neutrals. It’s from my favorite quilt store. I’m not sure what I’ll do with it yet. I’m feeling an all-solids quilt coming on…

Flashback Friday #2: Quilt in a Day Flying Geese Baby Quilt #1

After my queen-sized Log Cabin quilt, I was ready for something smaller and quicker. I decided on a baby quilt, even though I didn’t know anybody that was having a baby at the time. Soon after, so many people were having babies that I couldn’t keep up! I chose the Quilt in a Day Flying Geese pattern and bought both of the templates. At the time, I lived very close to Eleanor Burns’ shop and visited there when my family came to visit. My mom and I put together the quilt top over a long weekend. I was able to hand quilt it in under four months. The best friend of my roommate at the time knew that she would be a single mother before the baby was even born, so I made this quilt especially for her baby. My roommate picked out the turtle focus fabric and I picked a variety of fabrics to match. I never met the baby that this quilt belongs to, but that’s okay.

WIP Wednesday: May 25, 2011

This week I finished my Floralgraphix pillows and have been plugging along on a couple other projects.

Check out Freshly Pieced for more WIP Wednesday goodness.

Current Projects

Color Book: I’m making a color book for my baby based on the pattern in the recent magazine 101 Patchwork Projects + Quilts. I have started collecting and cutting the fabric, but it will take me awhile as my scraps tend to be heavy on the cool colors and light on the warm colors.

Call Me Crazy {12/42 blocks complete}: I am still really enjoying the improvisational piecing of these blocks. I especially like starting a new block out of the trimmings of a finished block. It’s such an organic and satisfying process. I have enough blocks completed for two rows! Only five rows to go.

Scrappy Nine-Patch {12/70 blocks complete}: Slow and steady wins the race on this one.

Unicorn Pillowcase: This is my in the car project. Not much progress, as we haven’t had any long car rides.

On Hold

Yellow Brick Road Baby Quilt #1

Yellow Brick Road Baby Quilt #2

Forest Friends Embroidery

Stats

New projects: 1

Completed projects: 1

Total projects: 14

Fifth Finish of 2011: Floralgraphix Pillows

I don’t know why it took me so long to get up the courage to make pillows! After making a few, I find them to be quick and easy projects. For me, the most challenging part is making sure the cover fits the pillow form. For some reason, the pillows forms that I buy are not true to size.

After making a hexagon pillow for a friend, I knew I had to make one for myself. I’ve heard of people getting burnt out on English paper pieced hexagons, but this is my third (small) hexagon project and I still love them. To go with the hexagon pillow, I chose to make a plus pillow. I have long admired the plus quilts I have seen on the blogosphere, but have been intimidated by them. I thought that I couldn’t make one for myself since I don’t have a design wall where I can plan the fabric placement. I am very happy with how my pillow turned out, but am not sure that I would make a plus quilt, still due to the lack of design wall.

The fabric for both these fabrics is one of Jason Yenter’s Floralgraphix lines, for In the Beginning Fabrics, plus one Tula Pink fabric that coordinates well. My mom made me a diamond quilt and then gave me the scraps. It lives on the banister in our living room and I felt it needed a couple pillows to keep it company. I still have a ton of scraps left over, so maybe one day I will make a table runner to match.

Sunday Stash #3

One of the reasons I love Pink Chalk Fabrics’ solids club so much is that it is a fun source of inspiration. Before receiving the May Pocket Full of Posies package, I had never thought of making a purple and gray quilt. I’ve made a blue, gray and purple quilt, but would have never thought of using just purple and gray. Now I really want to make one in that colorway! The gray Sherbet Pips fabric that I stashed previously would work well. Now I just need to find a pattern.

Bloggers' Quilt Festival (aka Flashback Friday #1: Queen of the Log Cabin)

What better quilt to share in the Bloggers’ Quilt Festival than my very first full-sized quilt?

My mother was an avid quilter as I was growing up. Finally, the years of watching my mother create warm and beautiful quilts compelled me to start one of my own. During high school, I borrowed a thin book on Log Cabin quilts and painstakingly designed my quilt on graph paper. While it was a very traditional pattern, I made it my own by changing the traditionally red center to purple. My mother and I poured over bolts and bolts of fabric to find just the right ones. I was so terrified of making a mistake that I had her cut all my fabric. For some reason that I don’t remember, I had decided to make a queen sized quilt. I didn’t even have a queen sized bed when I started. It took me two years to piece the top and two years to hand quilt it. I love how it turned out, but wish I had started smaller. This project taught me not to bite off more than I can chew, but also cemented my love of quilting. It now lives on our living room couch.

WIP Wednesday: May 18, 2011

There hasn’t been much progress on the sewing front lately due to a bout of sickness in our house. Hopefully this next week will be more productive.

Check out Freshly Pieced for more WIP Wednesday goodness.

Current Projects

Unicorn Pillowcase: I started a pillowcase during my embroidery party this weekend. I used chain stitch for the first time!

Yellow Brick Road Baby Quilt #1: I finished making the binding.

Forest Friends Embroidery: I finally bought frames! Now I just need to wash, iron and assemble.

On Hold

Matching Floralgraphix Pillows

Yellow Brick Road Baby Quilt #2

Scrappy Nine-Patch {8/70 blocks complete}

Call Me Crazy {6/42 blocks complete}

Stats

New projects: 1

Completed projects: 1

Total projects: 14

Fourth Finish of 2011: Veggie Goodie Bags

My fourth finish of 2011 was completed just in the nick of time. Ever since I saw the Stitchin’ Bee Embroidery Kit from Sublime Stitching, I knew I had to throw an embroidery party. To make it extra-special, I made five goodie bags so that everyone could take their projects home in a nice little package. The fabric is Hoodie’s Collection for Blank Quilting and the pattern is my standard drawstring bag inspired by Pink Penguin. I finished them Thursday night and the party was on Saturday. I forgot to take a picture of the contents, unfortunately, but each bag held a hoop, needle, instructions and a pillowcase. The party was incredibly fun.

Sunday Stash #2

Somebody over at Pink Chalk Studios has a great eye for color. I was browsing their site, looking for yardage for Christmas presents, and stumbled across the Solids Club stack for April. I absolutely love the jewel tones they picked! I broke down and subscribed to the club going forward, since I keep buying each month’s stack anyways. My stash box is full though, so no more stash purchases for awhile.

Third Finish of 2011: Mother’s Day Gift Bags

A while ago I was going through my stash and found this butterfly yardage, which was perfect for the Mother’s Day gift bags that I wanted to make. I paired it with Kona solids in Artichoke and Delft and made four of them, one for each of the extra-special mothers in my life. Special thanks to my mom who taught me how to sew and inspired my love of quilting.

WIP Wednesday: May 4, 2011

These WIP Wednesday posts inspired me to take stock of my current unfinished projects.  I was shocked to discover that I have fifteen projects in various stages of completion at the moment. I do love a finish, but apparently I love a new start even more. Not all of the in-progress projects will make it into my WIP Wednesday posts as some of them are secrets and this is a public blog. I wouldn’t want someone to read my blog and have a surprise ruined. (Hi, Mom!) I’d like to have a couple finishes under my belt before I start on the Christmas presents that I have in mind.

Check out Freshly Pieced for more WIP Wednesday goodness.

Current Projects

Veggie Goody Bags: I’m making five goody bags for when my friends come over for a party. The fabric is Hoodie’s Collection for Blank Quilting and the pattern is my standard drawstring bag inspired by Pink Penguin. I just love the graphic vegetables, especially the tomatoes.

Matching Floralgraphix Pillows: I bought the pillow forms, but haven’t done any more sewing. I hope to have these done before we have guests over later in the month.

Yellow Brick Road Baby Quilt #1: I worked a little on making the binding this week.

Call Me Crazy {6/42 blocks complete}: I’m still really enjoying improvisational piecing. There’s no rush on this one, as it’s for me.

Scrappy Nine-Patch {8/70 blocks complete}: This week I cut fabric for two blocks.

On Hold

Yellow Brick Road Baby Quilt #2: I need to buy more fabric for the binding.

Forest Friends Embroidery: Still no progress. I keep forgetting to look at frames while I’m out running errands.

Stats

New projects: 1

Completed projects: 0

Total projects: 15

Book Review: Scrap Therapy Cut the Scraps!

A few weeks ago I checked out Scrap Therapy Cut the Scraps!: 7 Steps to Quilting Your Way through Your Stash by Joan Ford from my local library. The patterns were nice, although none screamed “make me now!” to me. I was very inspired, though, by Joan’s scrappy story. She saved all of the scraps from her quilting projects, boxed them up and stored them in the basement out of sight and out of mind. One day, she decided to put her scraps to good use. She methodically cut her scraps into 5”, 3.5” and 2” squares and developed patterns that used those pieces and made scrap quilt after scrap quilt. I look working with scraps, but never thought about organizing them in such a manner. After reading her book, I couldn’t wait to start trimming my own scraps!

I decided to cut my scraps into 5” and 2.5” squares, as those are the sizes that I use most often, due to the prevalence of pre-cuts and patterns for pre-cuts. I really like the idea of using charm pack patterns with charms I have cut myself. I’m a sucker for charm packs anyways. I classify my stash into three categories: scraps, which are smaller than a fat eighth or so; leftovers, which are bigger than a fat eighth and/or sorted by projects; and unwashed fabric, which is new fabric that I haven’t touched yet. I plan on trimming all of my scraps and some of my leftovers into 5” and 2.5” squares. I’ve only just started, but already my box of neatly trimmed scraps makes me smile.

P.S. My mom made the quilt in the picture above.