Unpicking

The nice thing about working with 2-inch blocks is that they unpick quickly when you make a mistake...or mistakes as the case may be.

More to come soon!

Still A Blog Slacker

Not many posts recently...husband still has control of the laptop (he's busy watching the game tonight so I was able to steal a few minutes of precious computer time) and I have not been feeling well at all.

Since before my birthday (beginning of October) I have had one thing after the next. Lucky stars - kids have managed to stay healthy! I am breaking down and going to the doctor tomorrow, which I NEVER do.

I have not been quilting much recently either...every night I've been flat out on the couch with a fever and headache. So today's post is some photos taken at fotofly about a month ago. I cannot praise and recommend them enough. I have had nothing but super fantastic experiences with them.

My favorite shot of the afternoon...

Here's a shot of the fam...

My "baby" boy looks SOOOO grown up in these. I about fell out of the chair when I saw them (and then promptly got all teary-eyed).

A cute one of me and my big guy.

Hopefully I will be feeling better soon. I'm pretty sure my quilt room is wondering what she did wrong to deserve such abandonment. My MANY quilt projects are like ghosts in my mind at this point....haunting me. I even dream of them. Hopefully I can rest up this weekend and get back in the swing of things soon!

Silly Dinos

I decided to determine if my Cricut Expressions can help me reduce time when appliqueing. And, to my delight, it works! This cute dino was cut out using my Cricut and then appliqued on to the onsie (a gift for my girlfriend Lori who just had her baby girl).

I made this little shirt for Lori's son, who is almost 5. He LOVES dinosaurs (also very popular in my house) and thought I would make him a little something special. I did the T-rex the old-fashioned way, but used my Cricut to cut out the RaWR! text.

I'm very happy with how these turned out and love to have another gift idea in my repertoire.

Also super excited to see what I can get my Cricut to cut out of fabric. It seems the larger, less-detailed objects and fonts do well, but the smaller, more-detailed objects tend to not cut out as well. Still, this will save me lots of time!

For anyone out there wanting to try this out, I set my needle all the way down (I believe it was the 6 setting - regardless, whatever the highest number is what you want to turn your needle position to), speed set to slowest, and pressure set to highest. I also sort of went along with the needle and tried to keep the fabric down as much as possible (occasionally it would sort of hang up and the needle would catch it). I was using Heat N Bond, with Heat N Bond side down on the sticky mat.

If anyone has tried this, please comment on what success you have had!

Quote of the Day

Blogging is not writing. It's just graffiti with punctuation.

-Contagion (movie)

Giggles Quilt

It's been quite awhile since my last blog. Several reasons. One, my husband commandered my laptop so I have been without computer access for quite some time. Two, I have not had as much time to quilt as usual.

But, I have been working on this quilt for my girlfriend. She's having a baby girl and I wanted to make something special for her to match the baby's room. She was using these fun apricot and pink colors. I was lucky enough to have a charm pack from Riley Blake's line Summer Song. I was even luckier to find one of my local quilt stores, Cottonwood Fabrics, had a few bolts of this line left in their clearance section.

I was hoping to applique the baby girl's name, but they are not sharing the name they have chosen, so I improvised. When I think of my children as they were babies (or are babies as the case may be), I love their giggles the most. Such joy to hear a baby giggle! A great milestone and one I felt worth documenting.

Here is the finished quilt...

I've been doing so many gifts recently, which I love to do, but I was getting bored and wanted a challenge, so I took on flying geese. This is my first attempt, and I am really proud of how they turned out.

I was also really happy with how the applique turned out. The yo-yo for the dot on the i is also my first yo-yo. The quilting was also the first time I had done some small, filler quilting on my new-to-me HandiQuilter 16. I'm starting to get more comfortable with it and I can't wait to keep trying more and more!

Here is my friend, Valerie, after opening her quilt.

Another Finished Quilt!

This is SOOO exciting! I am actually finishing projects...of course, these ones have due dates - much like the mommys these are going to. Having a deadline always helps.

This morning I am taking this quilt to my girlfriend's baby shower. She is having a little girl. She is doing the room in a dark purple/plum-ish type color and I thought these fabrics would go well.

Here you can see the quilting a little bit better. This is the third quilt I have quilted using the HandiQuilter 16. I did a simple freehand loop and flower all over the quilt. I'm still getting comfortable with the machine.

You can see there is an assortment of prints in this quilt. I believe I picked up this custom charm pack from Quilts Etc. awhile back. There are some Moda It's a Hoot, which is one of my favorite Moda lines in quite awhile.

I picked up the border and backing fabric from Thimbles and Threads - a quilt store I just recently discovered that is right in my backyard! Who knew!? I'm so glad I found it. Cathy and Janet are so wonderfully helpful and nice.

Back to the fabric. The mommy-to-be is a hip, modern mommy so I thought this simple plum-brownish with simple flowers would be perfect for her and tie into the crib collection she purchased.

Here it is all ready to go!

Finished Quilt!

I absolutely love the way this quilt turned out. I am so happy with the colors and the overall feel of it.

My favorite part has to be this fun and colorful binding which really tied the whole quilt together.

Sunday Night Show N Tell

So this quilt began as a simple blanket (at least that's how it started in my head!) and somehow evolved into this very cute quilt! My goal was to only use fabrics from my stash, and I needed to do something quick - fast! Hence the original quick blanket idea. But, the fabrics that inspired me I didn't have enough of to make a blanket with, so I started adding and cutting fabrics, and somehow ended up with this:

To try to make up for some time, simple quilting - simple lines spaced far enough to keep the batting happy. I loved all the fun little boy prints - fun dinosaurs, dogs, polka dots, and stripes.

Oh gosh, forgot to mention. The manager at my daycare is having a boy next month and I wanted to make her a handmade gift...always my goal. In one of my typical rants, it is SO difficult to find boy fabrics. I don't think any of these are super spectacular fabrics, mostly stuff from JoAnns, Walmart, and Hobby Lobby, but cute nonetheless and they ended up working out very nicely together.

And for the backing, I was lucky enough to have a yard of this super cute dark brown large polka dot fabric. I think it provides a nice contrast.

The only thing left is the binding, which I didn't find anything in my stash that really spoke to me, and I am thinking some sort of orange would be really nice. I don't have enough of the orange polka dot used in the quilt, plus I didn't know how the orange polka dots would work with the brown polka dot backing, so maybe an orange stripe?! If you know me, you know I LIVE FOR stripes and polka dots! My two favorites.

So I will be back to the quilt store tomorrow (oh bummer!) to try to find something fun to finish this quilt off with a pop of WOW and FUN.

Although my corners aren't perfect...for me they are pretty darn good!

Tumbling Into Another Project

Yes, I started ANOTHER project! Somebody please send help! I was inspired by this tumbler quilt by Cluck Cluck Sew. I picked out a dozen fat quarters that just spoke to me. When I came across these fabrics, I was instantly reminded of my grandparents house and the wallpaper they had put in throughout their house. No doubt if they were alive today, I would see some of these on their walls!

I forgot to take a picture before I started cutting - I just got so excited! But here they are cut out...

I have sewed the rows together, but haven't had a chance to sew them together quite yet. I can't wait to see how this all comes together. These photos were taken downstairs in my quilt room where the light is off, so the pictures are never very accurate of the actual colors.

Ghosts, Goblins, and Ghouls

I made this Halloween quilt top last year, but (shockingly) have yet to finish it. Alas, it is still not completed, but steps have been made. I believe these are Riley Blake fabrics from a couple years ago...still my favorite Halloween prints of all time!

I decided to piece the backing with the left over fabric. I really like how it turned out.

I got it pinned together, and I have some great ideas for the actualy quilting part - now I just need to make the time!

The pattern from Crazy Old Ladies showcases this fabric perfectly! I just love this quilt.

Can't wait to finish this one up just in time for Halloween this year!

Crochet Flower Headband

These are so easy to make and I think they turned out super cute! I made some minor adjustments to this pattern.

These are wonderful spring and summer accessories...and they are great for bad hair days too!

Boy Quilt Top

This is probably my most favoritist (yes, I'm making up words again) project I have done in a long time! I love the way this quilt is turning out!

It is SOOOOO difficult to find fabrics that are for boys/men, especially if you aren't a fan of the baseball and football fabrics. This quilt is for one of my sister-in-laws who is expecting a boy this fall. She has a little bit of an edge to her (in a totally awesome way!), so I kind of went with it.

The pattern is from Moda Bake Shop, Building Blocks Baby Quilt, which I just made a bit larger than the recipe called for.

I basically just decided to go around the fabric store and pick out fat quarters that I liked, that weren't completely girlish. I found about 4 fabrics that reminded me of a skater/80-90s era, and I decided to just go with it. I ended up with 8 fat quarters that went together pretty well. There are a couple of Ty Pennington designs, a few Sugar Pop from Moda, as well as some others mixed in there. Can you spot them?

And I loved the herringbone-ish sashing fabric! One of the girls at the quilt store helped me pick it out - thanks Emily!

I will be going back to the fabric store on Friday to try to pick out the border fabrics. I really hope she likes it! I kind of want to keep it for myself!

My Chickies!

We decided to jump on the bandwagon and adopt some chickens this year. We got six, and we now have five. My favorite chicken, who I (very unfortunately) named Lady, turned out to be not much of a lady, but rather a rooster! Luckily, I was able to find her - I mean him! a good home (Lady has been renamed Lord Lady).

Just in the last week, we have started getting eggs. How much fun is this!?

Today we got two eggs - and the first brown one! Can't wait to enjoy these for breakfast tomorrow.

And speaking of chickies, how can I not share this photo of my favorite little chicky of them all...Pookie post double-stuffed Oreo.

Minkie Blanket

I was perusing Etsy for some ideas, and it seems these blankets are all the rage so I made one for a gift to a girlfriend who just had a baby girl.

Once I figured out how to properly work with the Minkie fabric, it was quite easy. This is the perfect size for a car seat or stroller, and I think they are so cute and cuddly! I want a big one for myself :)

Apricot Birdies

Although I have been starting a lot of projects recently, I have been working on finishing some as well. I started this quilt knowing it would be the first one on my new (to me) quilting machine - the Handi Quilter 16. I wasn't sure how it was going to turn out, so I didn't want to spend a ton of time on the piecing of the quilt.

But sure enough, it turned out pretty cute after all, and the quilting is not so bad either.

I really loved these buttons I found and put them on the flowers.

For the quilting, I did a simple loop and flower. Unfortunately, I used a thread that blended in so well you can barely see the quilting on these pictures. Here is the best photo I could come up with.

The quilting turned out much better than I had anticipated - at least for my first try. I was quite pleased. And I just loved the backing fabric too...