Better Late than Never?

I haven't posted in a looooong time. This is why I was skeptical of starting yet another blog. I have great intentions but just can't follow through. But I'm going to keep trying.

First, its Spring! Finally. Today is partly sunny, I can see little buds on the giant maple tree in the back yard, the grass is green, green, green. Maybe now the Winter blahs will go away!

I've finished and sent off 2 quilts- One for my sister Jessica and one for my BFF Liz.

Jessica's is all flannel and was supposed to be a Christmas gift. She got it last weekend. I love the flannel- its so soft and comfy. I used a thicker batting than I usually do and it really gave the quilt a good loft. The quilter did a great job with a cool, kind of modish 70's leaf pattern. We decided on a green thread on both sides and it makes the back look great. You can see the quilted pattern and I think I like the back more than the front in some ways!







Liz's quilt is a wonky log cabin block quilt. I showed some pictures in a previous post. The fabrics are not ones I would usually work with, but I love the final product. I made the binding with leftover strips and its the first binding I've ever sewn where you really can't see the stitches. I am super proud of that. The quilter used a meandering pattern and I love it. It makes the quilt just bumpy enough but doesn't distract from the quilt top pattern. Another good job by the Patchwork Peddler!





I have been crocheting lately. Well, trying to crochet...I made a scarf (no pictures yet) and it took forever. I think I took it apart at least 5 times before I was feeling like I could actually follow the pattern. This new crochet adventure has made me realize how much I suck at following directions! I get distracted and just don't pay enough attention. Thank goodness for my friend Karla, she really talked me through the pattern. Thanks Karla!

I have these fabrics all piled up and am trying to decide what I want to make with them:



I am thinking maybe this or this. I have to think on it some more...hmm.

Go on out and have a sunshiney day!

Its a swap! And, of course, some tangential rambling...

Darci over at Stitches and Scissors is hosting a fat quarter swap, so go on over and check it out!

I love fat quarters. You can get lots of different fabrics for a little money with fat quarters. I've found that they are a really great stash builder and I love to just look at them. They are usually under $3.00 each and I just feel like I get tons of variety from them. And the size is easy to mange, which I like in my limited and not-so-organized space. The first quilt I made was made with fat quarters. It was a pattern from this book , made with all batiks and I love it. I'm sitting with it on my lap right now.



One of the things I love about this quilt is the batting. I used a very thin batting that is a silk and cotton blend. So the quilt is super lightweight but SUPER warm. The lightness of the quilt is deceiving. And it is one of the few quilts in my living room that hasn't been taken over by the dogs, although they've tried. But I am a total fanatic about making sure they don't get it. I yell at others in my house if they leave it laying on the couch for the dogs to lay on. My husband thinks I'm crazy...

Don't forget to check out the swap and have a lovely day...

I love it...With a little help from the blogosphere

I am a copycat. Let's just get that out there, right up front. I saw this post over at Crazy Mom Quilts (one of my favorite blogs), which led me to this post, which just inspired the hell out of me. It looks like a few people are loving this pattern right now. I guess I'm just not very original, but I don't really care. Amandajean from Crazy Mom Quilts is always such an inspiration to me! So I set to measuring and cutting and sewing and ironing...and came up with this:



which eventually became this:



and turned into this:



After repeating the cutting, sewing, ironing, sewing, ironing, sewing, trimming 36 times, I ended up with this:



And I am psyched. I managed to sew straight lines and iron well and be patient. And it turned out the way I imagined. YAY! It took me a while to figure out how to lay the squares so that they may the right pattern. I don't know what it is about my brain, but it can really screw me up sometimes when I am looking at things. Which is funny because I always think of myself as a visual learner. I think that things go one way, I do them and they are wrong, wrong, wrong. Case in point:



Notice the one on the left is backwards- the wide parts of the square are all in the center, instead of on the edges. And it seriously took me like 5 minutes to figure out what the hell I did wrong. Niiiiice.

Some of the details:
I used a charm pack of Mary Englebright Recipe for Friendship and 36 white on white 5 inch squares for the squares. I made a template using the internet (I can't for the life of me remember where I got the instructions or I'd link it here...but Amandajean over at Crazy Mom Quilts has some good info here ). I used the cardboard backing from a charm pack, drew a line down the middle then measured 1/4" inch above and 1/4" below that line. I drew a line from 1/4" mark to 1/4" mark and cut the thing in half. I then had 2 templates, one for the bottom and one for the top. I cut all those damn squares in half with the templates and ended up with 8 bajillion little wonky rectangles, which I sewed into the foundation squares. I just sewed them all at once, in a continuous chain thing (see the first picture). It was loooooong... I then matched them up with each other (same colors together) to make the windmills/whirlygigs. They definitely needed some trimming. By the time I trimmed them all up, I had squares that were about 8 inches. Some were smaller, some were bigger, but most were around 8 inches (I'm just not a perfectionist about this stuff...sorry). I pressed most of the seams open so that there wouldn't be a lot of bulk.

Anyway, now I want to quilt it, myself. I've recently secured a bolt of batting (sidenote: its fricking HUGE, 40 yards of batting is B.I.G.- I don't recommend this if you don't have the storage space. I had a brilliant idea to store it in a large plastic storage container- ahhh, NO...way too big) and I am planning on trying to machine quilt this one myself. I won't be doing any stippling or fancy stuff, just some straight lines. I am nervous because I love this top so much but I have to try sometime! I don't know when I will be brave enough to do this, but I'm sure gonna try...I'll make sure to post the results- disastrous or not!

Enjoy this lovely Sunday with someone you love!

**Homemade Holiday**

I am a novice sewer/quilter. I love to create quilts but haven't yet achieved the level of sewing excellence that I would like to have...My nine patches are still a little wonky and my triangle squares are just a little off. But I still decided to make some gifts this year. First up, a small quilt that is about 16" x 16" to use as a table topper. I used a Mary Engelbright charm pack to create the squares and I bound it like a regular quilt. I really like the results...I think it turned out okay:

This is the front.


This is the back.
So, I don't think its too bad. And my co-worker seemed to really like it.

The other thing I tried was to just trim out some flour sack towels. I used a Moda Merry & Bright charm pack to do this. Then I made a couple of little trivets to match. I love the Moda Merry & Bright fabric...its just so cheerful. I am pretty proud of these items. And my other co-worker seemed to like them, too!





So, slowly but surely, I am moving toward my goal of becoming a more-than-competent seamstress.