Waiting for the Fabric Flurry at Paducah

Design Wall Monday

The pieces of my next Scrap squad quilt are all organized and being picked off one by one and paper pieced.

And Three Little Quilts!

These were made by Carol and I have had them for quite a while, letting those who were in a hurry to get quilted first. For waiting, she is getting free batting on these. The first one is 60" square and I quilted it with the Circle Lord Swirls templates. Gives the quilt lots of movement, I think.



Permacore Yellow thread to give it some punch, and also the backing was yellow. This was the third quilt in a row to have solid yellow backing. I should buy stock in yellow wide backings!



These two are smaller, 32' and 29", and I used the circle Lord Baptist Fan template on them. PermaCore Dyed Natural thread and hobbs 80/20 batting on all three.

A Couple of BIG Quilts

I finally got some photos of Angie's Turning Twenty quilt. Actually I took them just before she picked it up on Friday. She used a Red Rooster FQ tower from Erica's and It turned out great. Angie has only been quitling a little over a year and she has made some great quilts already.



The panto is Double Rose Vine by Norma Sharp and the thread is PermaCore Pine which blended quite nicely.



This one was made by Barb and I love the fabrics!



She likes her borders to be done separately, so I used Daisy Swirl by Jodi Beamish in the center and one row of Double Rose Vine in the borders. That meant unloading and reloading sideways to do the side borders, but I think it turned out great and she loved it.

Stashbusting 2011 - #17

Fabric Added this week - .5 yards (For a football quilt for a co-worker's son)
Fabric Added Year to Date - 33.25 yards

Fabric Used this week - 2.5 yards
Fabric Used Year to Date - 79.75 yards

YEAR TO DATE STASH USED: 46 yards

The used fabric was for Laurie's comfort quilt. I cut up another Scrap squad quilt, but can't count it yet.

I rather dread thinking about posting next week, as I am going to Paducah this week. A couple years ago I went and hardly bought any fabric, so maybe I can do it again.

A Good Mail Day!

First, I received my Hands 2 Help package from my partner Cassey. I love the fabrics and will spend some time this weekend figuring out what pattern to make.



Second, I received this cute little pack of Moda fabrics, for sending in my "Just One Star" block. How cute are these and I certainly wasn't expecting anything form them.



Third, I got my copy of Quiltmaker's 100 Blocks and all I can say is WOW, there are some stunning blocks in there.



I really need to finish quilting Barb's Turning Twenty quilt, but I want to play with my new stuff :(

Great T-shirt Quilt

I finished this quilt that Lois made last night and she picked it up today. I think it's one of the nicest t-shirt quilts I've seen and it was a joy to quilt.



I chose Square Spiral and used Hobbs 80/20 batting and PermaCore White thread.

A close up:



And the back:

Comfort Quilts

I've been working on these 2 quilts for a couple weeks now, but of course, I haven't been able to post much here about them.

Adrienne, one of our guild members is battling cancer now and we decided she needed a little comfort from her fellow guild members. So we made signature blocks. I assembled, quilted and bound this one and gave it to her last night.



The second one is for our guild president, Laurie. You might remember a post I did about her quilting a quilt for her daughter, who has just started her struggle with cancer. Well, a mom needs to be comforted too. So, we make signature blocks for her also. Peggy and I sewed on borders Sunday afternoon and then I quilted it and applied the binding so we could present it to her at last nights meeting.





And the back:


Hearts and Roses panto on Adriennes and Double Rose Vine on Lauries, Hobbs 80/20 batting and permacore thread on both.

WHAT, it's not my party?

Saturday was Andrew's 4th birthday party at Julie and Jim's house.



It was a fun day with almost all the grandkids in attendance. The teenagers kept themselves occupied at one end of the house while the little kids played in the playroom.



I took Elizabeth's dress that I made and as soon as she saw it she started taking off her shirt. She wanted to wear it and I'm telling you, it warmed my heart!



We ate lunch and then gathered in the new living room at. Look at these beautiful new wood floors!



Elizabeth was sitting on a little chair directly in front of me, patiently waiting for the festivities to begin.
I said to her, "Are you ready for the party?"
She replied, "I'm ready for my birthday party!"
I said, "Honey, it's Andrew's party today, not yours."

Well, she turned around and looked me square in the eyes like this...



for quite a long time. PRICELESS!

Design Wall Monday

Or lack thereof.....

There's nothing on my wall today as the latest quilt up there is now quilted and ready for binding.

My package for the Hands 2 Help Challenge is ready to be mailed out. We are to send 2 yards of fabric to our partner and make a 60" square quilt using those fabrics and some of our own, if needed. I'm looking forward to receiving my package so I can get started on my H2H quilt.



A couple weeks ago I had a giveaway on my blog, sponsoted by Quiltmaker and Jaybird Quilts. I asked visiters to tell me what color they might use to make the quilt. The winner, Kira, said orange, so I packaged up a few fat quarters for her to get started on an orange project.

Stashbusting 2011 - #16

Fabric Added this week - 2 yards (a stripe and a panel panel from Cheryl's for $2 each)
Fabric Added Year to Date - 33.25 yards

Fabric Used this week - 3.875 yards
Fabric Used Year to Date - 77.25 yards

YEAR TO DATE STASH USED: 44 yards

Andrew's Cake - The process

Dan shot video of me making Andrew's cake. Now, mind you, I'm just making a cake, my way and Dan isn't a videographer, but it was fun.



There are actually 3 videos, one making the cake, one making the icing and one icing the cake.

#2

#3


On another note - Yikes, I need to lose weight!

FNSI

I did get some stitching done......I finished Laurie's Row-by-Row.The block is Louisiana from quilterscache.com
Mine is the top one:



And here are all of her rows so far. She ran out of background fabric before I got her tote, so mine is the only one with the new background. Maybe she'll make 2 quilts? or maybe not.

Cake, party treats and FNSI

I finished Andrew's Chuggington cake tonight. Certainly not my best work but I'm sure he will like it.



Then I made some party favors for him. I picked up these cookie cutters for 25 cents at Joanns a couple months ago with a plan to use them for this. I read it on a blog, but now I can't find it to know who to give the credit to. Anyway, I melted Wilton candy melts and added rice krispies. I placed the cookie cutters on a cookie sheet with a sheet of wax paper. I spooned the chocolate into the cookie cutters and placed the whole thing in the fridge to chill.



Then I placed one in each bag, complete with ribbon. I added a little tag that I made with Chuggington on one side and Andrew's party info on the other.




Now on to the sewing room for a little Friday Night Sew-In

Finishing Up!

Last night was a finish it up night....

First I applied the binding to Andrew's 4th birthday quilt. It's all washed, soft and ready for his birthday this weekend. I can't believe he's 4 already! Where has the time gone?



I decided to do the binding by machine for 2 reasons, one, it's faster and two, I hope he uses it a lot.



Then I did the topstitching, made the buttonholes and sewed buttons on Elizabeth's dress. This will be her gift for Andrew's birthday.




Then I made a birthday star block for my online friend KD. I dropped it off at the post office this morning, Bert, so you should have it by the end of the week. Her color choices were blue and yellow and this made a pretty block.

Design Wall Monday

This is what it looks like, but not for long as this wall hanging made for my son Jeff, needs to be shipped out today because his birthday is later this week.

The design of badges he has earned was his request and he plans to hang it in his office at West Point.

The half-square triangles are just leftovers.

The quilt hanger is another purchase from the quilt show that I forgot about when doing my purchase pics.

Stashbusting 2011 - #15

Fabric Added this week - 13 yards
Fabric Added Year to Date - 31.25 yards

Fabric Used this week - 11.375 yards
Fabric Used Year to Date - 73.375 yards

YEAR TO DATE STASH USED: 41.125 yards

In addition to what I purchased a the show, I bought some Kona at Joann's to make Jeff's wall hanging. So, I used quite a bit, too.

International Quilt Festival

The quilt show in Cincinnati was GREAT! My guild had a bus trip and we left bright and early Friday morning and returned late last night. The first day we visited most of the vendors and I made a few purchases (actually, I blew my stashbusting report for this week).



The venue was wonderful, the Millinium Hotel was nice and there were lots of restaurants close by. It was a great trip and I say thanks to Loretta for planning!

My purchases include a lovely pink and green stripe for the sashing on Baby Girl Davis' quilt, 3 pieces with no purpose, but I couldn't pass up the price. The red is a Robyn Pandolf and the cream geometric print is from P&B. I don't know who made the blue plaid, but at $1/yard, I will find something to do with it.

The sweatshirt book is, of course, for Elizabeth and Baby Girl Davis, and the new Twister ruler will be great for Quilts of Valor.

Three cones of thread were pre-orded from accomplish Quilting and the 4 cones of Omni are from Superior Threads. I tried the new thread out today and it seems to work GREAT. And it's less expensive than PermaCore if you have a wholesale account.

The truck fabric is for the backing of Andrew's Truck quilt.

I won the Jelly Roll on the bus, having the most correct answers in a word scramble, and the FQ was from Loretta, a.k.a. The Easter Bunny

Mary Helen's Shirt/photo quilt

This one just got a meander. I looked at it for days before deciding. There were so many spaces to avoid and it's for a guy, so I didn't want to do feathers.






I finished putting together the Army badges wall hanging for Jeff and stitched the binding on. I'll do the hand stitching on the bus tomorrow on the way to Cincinnati.

Laurie Quilts, Too!

On Sunday Laurie, our guild president, brought over a quilt she made for her daughter and gave Mabel a try. Here's Laurie working on her quilt:



And here's the finished quilt. She chose Popcorn by Jodi Beamish and used Permacore Eggshell thread.



Look at the heart she appliqued on it:



She did a great job quilting and when Mabel broke down, she wasn't even running her, I was.
Mabel just needed a switch replaced and she was good to go.