Starts and Finishes

I'll start with a finish:

9 year old (yes it's true, sadly) UFO, finally complete. I'm going to send this one to Bumble Beans Basics.
I've also finished some other projects that need to wait before they get their turn on the blog.

And I spent some time picking out fabrics for a new quilt. Because I want to.

 

(Wish I had better light! I might have to start taking more photos outside.)

I'm planning on making another circle quilt.

This one will be bigger, I'm thinking 60x80 inches. 48 quarter circle blocks that are 10" square finished. I had a wider assortment of colors picked out at first and decided to try out a primary color scheme this time. I don't have very many blue fabrics. I am going to make my templates for this one right away.

And I picked these out for a quick little secret (for now) project: 

 What are you working on? Do you have any secret (or not) holiday projects you're making this year? 

Potholders

One of the books I've found in my unpacking adventures is my copy of Natural Patchwork by Suzuko Koseki. I decided to try out the raw edge applique potholders. Even the binding is applied with raw edges, and I kind of thought that was a little bit wrong but wanted to try it out anyway. Also, I dropped one of my potholders in the oven the other day and it's a little melty-burned.

I used some of my moda twill tape, probably from a layer cake or other precut, for the hanging loops. Even though I never use hanging loops. They look cool though. Also I pieced together some batting scraps, two layers each, for these. It was fun to make something quick, and to use scraps too.

I found these rolls of binding scraps last night. I made the big roll when I was sorting through my fabric before the move, and I found the smaller one in my scrap bin last night. I think I need to make a super duper scrap quilt and use some of these scraps to bind it. Someday.

Today I'm working on a giant amount of laundry due to a certain 3 year old who's had crummies in her tummy. And also a couple of quilt bindings. One by hand, one will be done completely by machine. I hope it turns out ok!

I'm still here...

We moved into our house last Friday and are trying to get settled in. Things have been busy--the boys are going to new schools *again* (sigh) and they each had a sick day this week and I've been a bit under the weather myself. And I'm working on getting things somewhat organized in our new space.

I do have a cool new sewing area; I'm setting up in the dining area on the main floor:

The black hutch was in the kitchen at our old house and it doesn't fit in the kitchen here. I am going to use the main cabinet area for my small fat quarter bins. I have 5 of them, sorted by color. And somehow they all got packed into different random boxes. I've found four of them but am still missing the red/purple bin. I hope it shows up soon.

The door on the right is a little closet under the stairs, which is perfect for storing my big fabric bins. I will probably get a new, bigger, sewing table eventually, but this little gray table will work fine for now.

So, this past week I've spent a lot of time quilting. I finished quilting the baby quilt that's folded up on the floor in this picture (above), but can't show the whole thing yet. And I also quilted this old UFO:

This little quilt is from a few years ago when I was trying to decide if I wanted to make and sell quilts for a business. It's been pin-basted and waiting, for a long time. I don't want to sell quilts for a business. But I decided to finish this up and send it in to the Bumble Beans Basics quilt drive. A while ago I looked at my goals for the year and I had said I wanted to make two quilts to donate to charity this year. Victoria from Bumble Beans is asking for quilts that will be given to families in NYC who need them. More information here, if you're interested!

I am not sure how my time will be organized here yet. Things are good here, but a lot different. My boys each had about 6 more hours of school each week in Kansas, and their schedules are quite staggered here (one leaves at 7:10 and one leaves at 8:50) so that means I have more time with them one-on-one, and a bit less time for my own personal stuff. Which is fine, just different. I am going to have to get more organized and settle in a bit more before I will be able get into a good routine for blogging.

I did want to share one cool thing before I go--750 Words. Melissa, who is Living a Creative Life, shared this site a few days ago and I signed up that day. If you are familiar with the book The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron or morning pages, which are a part of the Artist's Way program, it is a website for doing morning pages-type writing online. It's not really the same as writing them out long hand with a pen and notebook, but it is a good substitute and takes less time. Which is good. I've written my 750 words for the last 10 days and it helps me dump my brain out, figure out what I need to be doing, what I want to do, and what is important to me. So go check it out!

I finished up this quilt top yesterday afternoon and made it outside with my oldest to take a couple pics in better light:

 

Overall I really like it. I bought this fabric because it reminded me of my Grandma Taylor, and these colors still make me think of her. (I think this is about a 2-year-old UFO.) That outer border was frustrating to make, and it has some mistakes, in part due to seam allowance consistency problems caused by the pinked edges of the precut fabric. I think if I make something with little fiddly squares again, I will trim the pinked edge off first.

If you want to make a quilt like this (or if I ever want to do it again), here are some of the specifications: 

*Hourglass blocks started as 6" squares and I'm not sure what they finished at.

*First border is 2" (cut measurement) strips of the more solid fabrics I had left over.

*2nd border is 1.5" strips cut, finished at 1" wide.

*Outer border started as 2" squares. Actually I did a little bit of strip piecing, just to get the fabrics for that border into pairs, then I sewed 4-patches and then added another pair to make 3x2 units. And then I didn't have enough squares so I cut a few more strips and added a few 1x3 segments in as I was piecing together the 2 long borders. Also, I didn't do the math to make the squares in this border fit on the quilt exactly right.

*The solid is a quilter's only solid from JA, can't remember the name right now.

*Finished measurements of the top are about 43"x47".

my big boy :)

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In other news, we are ready for the next big step in our relocating adventure. Tomorrow morning, the moving truck is bringing all our things (that we said goodbye to on September 15) to the home we are renting. We are looking forward to having more light, more space, and a shorter walk from parking to the front door. And of course we are excited to have all our things back too. I am looking forward to seeing my colorful dishes, my kitchenaid, and my fabric/sewing machines. I'm most looking forward to settling down and hopefully feeling like we are home after all these months of the upheaval that comes with moving.

Halloween 2011

We had a fun Halloween this year. Here are the kids in their costumes before we headed out to the trunk-or-treat:

 

This is the only picture I have of #2 wearing his ski mask. He was a robber; I convinced him he needed the getaway bag with a dollar sign so people would know what he was up to. 

  

 

Another shot of all three of them. Kid #1 is "a guy with a mustache" and he made that mustache out of duct tape. And #3 is Rapunzel, of course. Here's another picture of me and her; this time she has her Rapunzel hair on too:

 

I love how the dress turned out, it was a lot of work but I'm happy with it in the end. (A lot of work like my sewing machine doesn't have a zipper foot and I was going to just sew it in without one but then there was the extra layer of the overskirt and well... I just handsewed the thing. The lace didn't stay in place either so it's all handsewn --tacked really-- down.) Anyway, my little girl loves it, and that helps. I'm glad it fit her right, because I didn't check out the pattern on patternreview.com or measure it beforehand. 

I'm happy that Halloween is over and looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas and moving out of our apartment, next week!

Blogger's Quilt Festival--Matching Quilt

Hi everyone! I wish I had been able to finish a new quilt for this fall's Blogger's Quilt Festival, but with our recent move and the fact that we are living in temporary housing (just for 2 more weeks!), that just hasn't been possible.

So for my entry, I ended up deciding on a quilt I made for my oldest son back in 2004. I had just had my second baby and wanted to make him a baby quilt, and I also decided my then 4-year-old needed a bigger quilt as well. There weren't really sewing blogs back then, but I found an online quilting message board where I participated in a 4.5" I-spy charm swap. The fabrics were swapped in pairs, and I made my boys each a "matching quilt." So each square has a match and it's kind of fun to try to find the matching pairs of kitty, or cow, or ghost, or whatever fabric.

 

I decided to sash this one with 1" strips of black fabric, and I love how it turned out. It's quilted with variegated brightly colored thread, but I don't have any other pictures of this quilt at the moment.

Don't miss out on the rest of Blogger's Quilt Festival! Check out all the great quilts at Amy's Creative Side.

Three years old

Today I have a 3-year-old girl for the first time! I'm so happy that she's been a part of our family.
She was born over 6 weeks premature--it was quite the dramatic fall season that year. I love this picture of her; she was 2 days old.

 

Here she is around her first birthday:

(If you want to make a charm pack dress like this one, I have a free tutorial here.)

And age 2:

And last night, while she was opening presents:

And just to keep this a little bit sewing related, here's the progress on this year's Halloween costume, so far:

Happy Birthday Lauren!!

Progress (& my take on copyright)

I fixed my daughter's skirt, what do you think?

 

A couple of people suggested that I just add to the length or let her wear leggings underneath...and that could have worked, but it was so short it didn't really cover her tushie very well anyway, (it did but it flipped up very easily) and also when I was putting the elastic in the first time it was clear how short that yoke section was going to be and I stitched really close to the edge of the casing fabric when I was putting the elastic in (I sew the elastic into a circle first and then sew the fabric down around it. No threading the elastic through here!) Anyway I was worried that it might not last through being washed. So. I cut the new yoke 6" wide and made sure I sewed a good 1/4" from the edge when I put the casing in this time. The skirt looks really good on my girl and will be less likely to flip up and show her bum (which will be wearing tights or leggings, but still). 

I've also made good progress on my hexagon project this week.

 

I am pretty much copying the layout from Alex's solids hexagon pillow. It won't take too much time to finish sewing this together, and then I'll need to decide if I need to make some partial flowers to go on the ends of the shorter rows. 

On a different note, this week Angela wrote a couple of blog posts about copyright as it pertains to quilt/craft designers. Very interesting. What she's saying, and I agree, is that pattern/tutorial writers don't have any legal right to dictate what can be done with finished products made from their patterns or tutorials. This is something that has been covered a lot on Sewing Mamas (where I used to spend a lot of my sewing-related internet time :) ) over the years, and the general consensus there (admittedly referring mainly to clothing designs) is that selling a pattern tracing or copy of a pattern is illegal, and selling items made from someone else's pattern is not against copyright law in the U.S.

Anyway, it's a big topic that can be expanded into the shady practice of cottage licensing, digitizing licensed characters, the use of licensed fabrics, and more. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Skirt for my girl

 

I made this little skirt for my girl over the weekend. Sadly, I think it's a little too short and I'm going to need to unpick the yoke, cut out the elastic, and add length by making the yoke a couple inches longer. The worst part? Well, besides black thread + black fabric? I topstitched the yoke. Oh well, I will be much happier with the project if I redo it, even though it won't be the most fun.

It has been a little chilly here lately and from what the locals say, it's going to be this way until March (at least). So I decided to make a scarf and found some cute patterns over on ravelry. I am trying to hold myself back from going and buying yarn to make this or this, at least until I make a little more progress on my hexagons or finish up the skirt re-do.

We are coming really close to making a decision on where we will live for the next year. (We're going to rent for a year while we get to know the area better, and then buy a house.) Looking forward to hopefully having a place with more light! Here's a picture of the view out our living room window:

 

It's pretty, but also makes things quite dark inside. Even when it's sunny out. We have a similar view from all of the windows here, by the way. (Also, they have been replacing/repairing the wooden deck railing out there and it's not painted yet, if you were wondering.)

So this week my project goals are to work some more on my hexagons, redo the skirt, and finish a quilt back. What are you going to make?

Sewing Pretty

My new little backup sewing machine arrived on Friday. I decided to get the Janome Hello Kitty machine, and so far it's working great. It's a very basic machine, and I can't use my quarter inch foot from my other Janome on it, but I think I'll be able to figure out a solution to that.

I also wanted to share a little sneak peek of what I've been working on. I'm probably not going to share the whole thing until it's been given to its owner.

In moving news, we are working on getting adjusted to our new place and climate. My little girl keeps asking if various friends from back in Kansas are moving, too. It is a little sad to have to keep telling her that no, they are not moving too. We are working on adjusting everyone's wardrobes to fit the wet and cool climate--I am still looking for a rain jacket for myself; it needs to be cute. We are looking for a home to rent for a year and hoping our Kansas house will sell soon. I don't have a great internet connection or as much time to sew...I can't wait until I can sew more and share about it here on the old blogge. :) 

Easing back in (with hexagons!)

Well, we are in our temporary digs here in Seattle—the boys are in school and happily riding their respective buses, my husband has figured out the park and ride and our cars arrived yesterday so I don’t have to drive anyone to their destinations any more. I'm happy to have my very own car back too; it was so weird driving a different (rental) one. We moved here with what we were able to pack into suitcases and bring on the airplane, so that means no sewing machine. For a little while. (Hopefully there will be an update on that very soon!) I brought some bits of my favorite fabrics and have been working on some hexagons.

We are in a dark-ish, halfway underground apartment for these first two months, and taking photos is going to be challenging.

Back in July I went to a blogger meetup that I then failed to blog about. One of the cool people there was Leigh, who blogs at leedle deedle quilts. I LOVE this project of hers (she brought it for sew-n-tell that night), and thought I might maybe start a hexagon quilt. I'm not all the way decided on that, but I am thinking making a pillow, or maybe two, might be more realistic for me.

I wanted to share a couple of things quickly (we have kind of crummy internet here, sigh)--Amy from the cute life started making some Dear Jane blocks; I love them. Some of them are the same ones I made for my Kona challenge No Prints Allowed/Jane Stickle 9-Patch.


And I heard from Jessica at Favequilts.com, and my crooked pumpkin quilt block tutorial was included in a round up of twelve pumpkin quilt block patterns. Check it out if you need some fall sewing inspiration!



Hopefully I'll be able to start posting here more regularly--I've missed sewing, and sharing about it here too. I have some other sewing projects I'm planning on working on in the next few weeks too. I hope you have all been doing well!

All packed up

Today's the big day, well one of them. Yesterday everything got packed up. Our suitcases are packed for the next 2 months in corporate housing, everything else is going on a truck today and then into storage. The house goes on the market tomorrow, fingers crossed that it'll sell quickly!

Big News

Hi everyone! Sorry I haven't been blogging very much lately; we just found out we will be moving to Seattle in about 3 weeks from now! My husband had several job interviews (for one job) and we were hoping he would be offered the job but weren't sure until earlier this week. So now we are hurrying to get our house ready to sell and get our stuff ready to move. I started on the organizing/decluttering a few weeks ago and it has felt good to donate and trash a lot of the extra clutter around here. I did find out that neither Savers nor Goodwill will accept a fake Christmas tree in August, though. I still have a lot to do but I am trying to do some of the deep cleaning each day now along with continuing to go through all our stuff. It is going to be really hard for our family to leave our friends and neighbors here, and I know being in a new place will be challenging too, but we are excited to start a new adventure!

I don't have a lot of sewing of my own to show off but I did get my quilt from DQS11 in yesterday's mail.

The quilt was made by Karen, who goes by Fun & Comfort Quilts on flickr. She was so generous and included workbooks for each of my kids and a quilting book for me, along with vintage zippers, trims, thread, and chocolate. Amazing. I really like the gorgeous color gradation in the quilt and the triangle blocks are so cute.

Also, I mailed my quilt for this swap on the last day which was Tuesday, and Marilyn got it yesterday. I had a lot of fun making a quilt for someone that I actually know this time. She sent a really sweet thank-you email yesterday... as much as I love getting my quilt in these swaps, I have really enjoyed making quilts for someone else, especially when they really love it. :)

I also have a little toddler dress to show you:

 

This was made with the peasant top pattern from Little Girls, Big Style, with a few changes. I folded out some of the ease in the bodice front and back pieces, and the skirt tiers aren't as full as the pattern suggests in the book. I had to cut the whole thing out of this remnant of shirting fabric I had that was just under a yard. I shortened the sleeves, too. I like it, and I think my girl will be able to wear it into the fall and winter with long sleeves underneath and leggings or tights.

So... I will probably not be posting here very much for the next little while. I am still not sure if I will be able to have my sewing machine while we're in temporary housing so I am thinking I need to put myself together a little hexagon hand sewing kit to keep myself busy.

Farmer's Wife Blocks 7-10

Top left--block 7, Birds in the Air. The lesson I learned is that even if things look contrasty, they might not be so much on a really small scale. Also, I got a Parisville fat quarter stack and am excited to use some of the Parisville purples in my purple-focused Farmer's Wife quilt. :)

Top right--block 8, Bouquet. Done is better than perfect!

Bottom left--block 9, Box. Adding in some darks.

Bottom right--block 10, Bow Tie. Kind of monochromatic.

Finished Doll Quilt--DQS11

I finished this up the other day and decided to share the final product.

I did mostly machine quilting, but the houses are hand quilted with 2 strands of embroidery floss.

So glad to have this one done!

DQS Quilted

I did the quilting on this today. It was fun, and I like it! I will be sending it off to my partner soon...just needs binding and a label, and it will be done!

This was going to be a "quilt blocks" post

But I kept going and got all of my Punctuation blocks finished and sewn together.

This is pretty much what a whole jelly roll makes. I have about 6 blocks left over to sew into a strip for the back. Each strip of the jelly roll made 2 complete blocks with about 2.5" left over at the end. Right now this is 48" x 54", and I'm going to get some yardage from my LQS to add solid borders just to the top and bottom. These blocks were really easy to make, with only two trips to the ironing board needed. I love the bright colors and the letters. My favorites were the strips that had 4 prints on one strip (like the yellow one on the bottom row.)

And here are some quilt blocks I've finished recently:

Blocks 3-6 of the Farmer's Wife quilt sampler. I am having fun using purple in each block, and some new fabric arrived today that is greatly increasing my purple stash. I'll show you later.


And, some more blocks for my DQS project. I'm going to make a little row sampler, with these stars and squares, and some of the houses I made earlier. (Oh yeah, and one more row that isn't done yet.) I hope my partner likes it!

Finally, I have an idea for a fun little quilt using these:

It's going to be a baby quilt for my niece who's scheduled to arrive anytime now. I got the solids from Tammy at Marmalade Fabrics. Turns out she's pretty much my neighbor. It was super sweet to be able to drive just a few minutes and see her cool little fabric shop last night. Thanks for letting me stop by, Tammy!

Summer Fair Quilt Show!

I finished up the binding on this quilt the other day, and this morning I saw a post about the Summer Fair Quilt Show, hosted by Gen X Quilts, so I decided to join in the show!

I made this quilt top last year, I think in March, just for fun. Did the quilting over a few days during the last couple weeks, and finished it yesterday. It's 36" x 48", and it's just going to hang around at our house for now.

Go visit the fair, and see all the cool quilts! There are recipes, too!

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I've been working on some more Farmer's Wife quiltalong blocks, and blocks for my doll quilt swap too. I guess I'll do a quilt block post soon here.

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It has been super hot here for days, no, weeks. (I don't watch the weather, but other people in this house do, and they are saying we've had something like over 30 days with a heat index over 100 so far this summer). My 11 year old just got out his 5th grade solar cooker and I think he's making hot dogs for dinner tonight.

Go! Baby Winner

Thanks so much to everyone who stopped by to enter the Go! Baby fabric cutter giveaway. I really wish I had more than one to give away, but I don't.

Anyway, I'm happy to announce that the winner was commenter #37, Sharon, who said, "I would use the strip cutter to make a jelly roll race quilt." Congratulations, Sharon!

Here are some burp cloths I made after I got my Go! Baby; the pic is a bit dark but I think they turned out pretty cute! The circles are just raw edge appliqued on, and the tumbler strip has the edges all turned under, with a couple ribbon loops for added cuteness. The burp cloths are double thickness of prewashed white flannel, 10" x 15", and they are turned and topstitched.

Machine Quilting Sampler

I finished up the quilting on this quilt today. I decided to have it be kind of a machine quilting sampler. There are 12 blocks, and within each block, each strip of fabric is quilted with a different design. I did repeat designs in different quilt blocks, though. I still need to bind it but wanted to show you some of the quilting:

I really like how that feather turned out. I quilted it after watching some Karen McTavish videos.
The loopy zigzag (right below the feather) is repeated in probably every block in this quilt.

Echo quilting around a bird. It isn't perfect, but that's ok.

I am in love with this sort of fan quilting thing I did in the purple/pink strip above. I tried some loopy hearts up there too, should have done that one more than once.

I did a kind of carnation filler in the center square of this block.

This photo is a little more close up than the others, and you can see some less attractive quilting here too. That's ok... it's all part of the process. I learned a lot while quilting this quilt, my skills improved (you get better with every quilt you quilt, you know) and it was fun, too! I will probably do a sampler like this sometime again. 

Now I need to figure out what to do next. I will probably get going on some Farmer's Wife quilt blocks, and make the binding for this quilt. I have a baby quilt that I really ought to make soon as well. :) (My sister T is having her 2nd baby girl within the next month!)

p.s.... Don't forget to enter my giveaway for an Accuquilt Go, Baby! :)