Summer Sewing

Cleaning up the prior day I forgot to move this pile of scraps, meowing ensued rather loudly the next morning until I came and moved what was invading "her" space. Amazing how they "train" us!
If you have not visited the various Pets On Quilts participants, I urge you to do so. There are so many cute pets and quilts to enjoy.

This is the quilt Cinabella has claimed and was shown on in the prior post. It's made out of leftovers from a prior project, no pattern just squares put together in an effort to use up a small amount of pink chenille I had leftover.

I just quilted it by meandering.

And bordered it using my favorite fabric. I bought all my LQS had at the time but wish I had more.  It's called Charlotte by Anna Fishkin for Red Rooster Fabrics. I know it's silly but I have an irrational love of it!

Those green ferns on a mottled background and I swoon everytime!  You can see the other fabrics in the line archieved  here. I am glad my LQS had the green ferns as that would have been my choice of the 4 colors offered.

This is the quilt the budgies were on. I call it the Wisdom Teeth quilt. My daughter had her 4 wisdom teeth removed in May 2007 and to keep her company I perused Ebay for the first time. I was the winning bid on a stack of 9-patches thinking I really scored.  They were all made using Joann's fabric and rayon thread! Uh oh! That taught me to read Ebay carefully and ask questions. So, I sat, in between making mashed potatoes for my daughter, and ripped out the thread and re-sewed the 9-patches. This is only half of them, the ones I thought went together. I do love the way it turned out.

Except for the binding. I made a two-colored binding, yellow on front and aqua on back, but you can see the aqua through the yellow binding on the front. Sort of. I don't know if it's worth the effort of re-binding it though.

These are 8-inch blocks I donated to a quilter who is making a Quilts of Valor quilt. I swore I'd not make another Missouri Star block that small again and then Randy posted one at six-inch! I grumbled and complained but did it and it wasn't too bad.

I wish I'd used a darker fabric for the star points.

This is Handweave.

And this is Boxes and Baskets.
Glad you came for a visit~

iPhone Pics

I forgot I had these on my iPhone.  I made this a few weeks ago as a wedding gift for my nephew who is marrying the end of June.  He and his fiancee are very outdoorsy and active (they are going to track gorillas in Rwanda for their honeymoon!) so I thought a picnic quilt would be in order. 

It measures about 80 inches square and I desperately need to get it quilted soon!  I call it R.O.K.  I used Denyse Schmidt fabrics from Joann's but only the ones manufactured in Korea or Thailand, sort of my private boycott of things Chinese-made.  I did notice that the ones from there was rougher feeling and not as nice a hand as the Korean and Thai ones.

I'll leave you with a pic of my cat, Cinabella.  She turned 18 in February and has all her teeth!  She keeps me company when I'm sewing.  My sewing room is her favorite room in the house.  Funny how animals pick up on their owner's passions.
Talk to you later!

September Schnibbles

When I went up to Marietta for the quilt show I did a mini-quilt shop hop. I wasn't about to let 20 inches of rain slow me down. Gosh it was soggy, rained the entire 4 days I was there. I desperately needed some reds and aquas for the Disappearing 9-patch I signed up for at Jane's. I had 1 aqua fabric in my stash. Never realized it before, but I guess it's a color I just haven't worked with. I picked up these fat quarters at Intown Quilters. What a fun shop! Filled to the brim with mostly bright and funky fabrics with a very helpful staff. I sound like a commercial but really, I loved the shop. Sorry for the lack of shop pictures but the day was so drear and rainy I left my camera back at the hotel.

I got this little bag filled with 20 Kaffe Fasset fabrics and some Schnibbles patterns at Red Hen Fabrics and Quilting Emporium. I think this was my favorite of the 4 shops I visited. The fabrics were arranged by color, something different and had a load of patterns and again, a very friendly staff.

These are either Kaffe or Martha Negley, got them at Intown Quilters also. I also went to Little Quilts and Tiny Stitches. I had been to Little Quilts for the first time about 9 years ago. I was amazed how it is exactly the same! I guess when you've found your niche and it works why mess with it. Still mostly civil war reproduction fabric. I still have my purchase from 9 years ago uncut. You know how that is. So I didn't buy anything here. Last stop was Tiny Stitches but I found the shop too dimly lit to do any serious shopping. I hate that!

Back in January I started sewing along with the Forever Green Quilts BOM program. Well, I have not made a block since April so I figures this was the weekend to do all 5 months AND the September Schnibbles for the Year of Schnibbles. I am finally caught up. The Forever Green blocks are so tedious as they all have so many pieces many you have to draw the seam allowances on to get the triangles to fit together right. One block really gave me a problem. I think the cutting directions are faulty but regardless it got finished.

The Year of Schnibbles pattern was Winter White. I decided to use Fig and Plum by Moda as I really liked the fabric. In fact I love any fabric that Joanna Figueroa designs. Love that vintage-y thing she has going. I first made the flying geese in greens and peaches but they really didn't work. The geese needed to be dark, or at least half of them did.

I needed 18 dark charms and the Fig and Plum had only 16. I spent quite a while trying to get something to work and hoped to use some of the geese I'd already made.

Here's what I came up with. Ditched the green geese, kept the peach geese, and made new plum ones. I actually found a fat quarter, civil war reproduction no less! in my stash that went with the Fig and Plum plum. And that is one different shade of plum!


Those peach cornerstones seemed like a good idea but now...

Had a chance this afternoon to cut into the reds and aquas for the swap ~ 225 squares cut!

Check out the head on the windowsill!
Talk to you later.