Showing posts with label Quilting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Quilting. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 29

W.I.P. Wednesday

UntitledIf you’ve been following me on Instagram, you know that I’ve been working on a new baby blanket, from the book Growing Up Modern by Cluck Cluck Sew {aka Allison Harris}, pattern Sweets. This quilt went together really fast, which is the entire premise of this pattern book. I think I could’ve made the whole top in a matter of 2 hours, but I had a few distractions to deal with and a week in between that left me with no time to do any sewing.

I had a bunch of fabrics in my stash that I knew would be perfect for this quilt, just the right colors! I did have to buy a neutral though. The book suggested white, but after my last white baby quilt, I wasn’t doing that again! So I went with Kona Solids’ Ash: PERFECT! Black would’ve been too harsh; the grey just sets it all off perfectly.

Peacock Grey Sweets Quilt from Growing Up Modern

The other day, the kids were napping and I just wanted to get the top finished so that I can get it tied and packaged up and ready to go! My machine started giving me trouble: The thread cutter wasn’t working and instead of doing nothing, it was twisting all the threads up in a mess and pulling the fabric. I had the machine apart twice before I was able to do something {don’t ask me what} and it worked again.

Then before the kids came down from their naps I raced out into the cold to get a picture….

Sweets from Growing Up Modern, by CluckCluckSew.com at LifeintheWhiteHouse.com

It’s not quite as Technicolor as this, but it is pretty close: I’m going to try and get a better picture of it once the binding is on. I love how the yellow POPS! against the other colors. This is really not my “style” of quilt, but I absolutely love how it came out! I think it would’ve been better with a few more fabric types, but I’m still pleased with it.

Linking up with

Thursday, January 9

Quilts in 2014

I’ve gotta get crackin’ this year on quilts! I’m already behind the 8 ball on a baby quilt for my sister in law. Technically the baby wasn’t due until the beginning of February, but she made her debut 2 days after Christmas. The problem is, the perfect fabric hasn’t released yet….I’m still waiting on the email from FatQuarterShop.com to tell me I can order it!

Then we found out on Thanksgiving that my sister is expecting at the end of March, which means another quilt! Plus I wanted to get the girls’ big girl quilts done for next Christmas {my goal is that they all get the quilts for their twin beds as a Christmas gift—the boys’ were finished last month}.DSC_0001 And then just before New Year’s we found out that another dear friend of our’s is expecting on my birthday, so that’s another quilt. All these baby quilts!

And, of course, there are always those little things that I want to do. There’s still the Falling Leaves quilt that I started *ahem* almost 5 years ago. And, I have a couple of Jelly Rolls that are waiting for me to sit down and play with them, as well as a couple of books of just Jelly Roll samplers. I’m having a feeling this is going to be a year of Samplers.

I did FINALLY finish my Heartland BOM sampler! I got it in the mail on Christmas Eve, but the fabric I had gotten for the binding just did not work with it. I ended up having to order a yard of one of the fabrics I used in the quilt, but since it was a kit, there just wasn’t enough to bind the whole quilt. I love how the black makes the whole thing pop!

After doing my Heartland BOM sampler, I’m really loving the idea of being able to play with different styles and blocks without the commitment of a WHOLE QUILT of them. Most likely almost all the quilts I do will be samplers. The  girls’ is the trickiest, because I want to somehow tie it in with the boys’ quilts, with having their names appliqued on them…not sure how to do it yet.

I’m not getting too crazy with my to-do list, since I may very well not a have a house much this year. We’re still a go-ahead on our major home renovation for the Spring, which means that there will be lots of DIY going on and not a lot of time to sit in a {most likely covered in dust} dining room and sew.

What projects are you hoping to accomplish in 2014?

Wednesday, December 11

W.I.P. Wednesday

I managed to get quite a few things started and finished since my last post. The kids’ Christmas outfits are sitting patiently by waiting until Christmas Eve, the jammies were finished just in the “Nick” of time for St. Nicholas Day, and I got the binding stitched on the boys’ quilts…I’m now just hand stitching it down.

I love how the boys’ quilts came out. There are a couple of spots of quilting, that I would’ve done differently {more symmetrically}, but they’re beautiful still. Once they’re finished, I stitch the label on them, and pack them away until next year…when, hopefully, the kids will all move into their big kid rooms!Sailboat Quilt collage

And here are the kids in their jammies! We had to pull out one pair of bottoms from last year for Ellie, her nightie kept hiking up on her and she was getting cold at night. I had to bribe them with chocolate to get this picture.

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Linking up with Lee at FreshlyPieced.com

Wednesday, November 13

W.I.P Wednesday

This is more of a finish than a WIP, but I’m going to count it. You won’t mind, right?

I shared a few weeks ago about the baby quilt that I was working on. I got it finished and in the mail last week, just a few days after the recipient was born. I even somehow managed to do that despite my machine giving me a love F04 error code {that the repair place couldn’t figure out}.

Front…

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and Back…

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I love the back panel on this quilt…it’s so fun! I have decided one thing while doing this quilt: White makes me nervous….extremely nervous. I did my usual double thickness of cotton batting, then hand tied with embroidery floss…I just think it makes for a cozier quilt that way.

On to the next one! I have to work on a quilt for my sister in law, but the fabric I’m using won’t be released until January…so that gives me plenty of time to procrastinate figure out what pattern I’m going to do. AND, AND next Tuesday I’m picking up the boys’ sailboat quilts and my Heartland BOM quilt!! So excited!

wipwednesdaybuttonLinking up with Lee at FreshlyPieced.com

Thursday, September 26

The Boys’ Sailboat Quilts

Last night I realized something. While I know I was excited about the boys’ sailboat quilts being finished, and getting them shipped out to be quilted, I don’t think I ever even wrote about them. Today that is remedied.

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I was beyond pleased with how they came out. So much better than I thought they would. They’re the perfect size on top of a twin bed, with good overhang and placement.

The names took a bit of work to do. I didn’t have stabilizer to do the applique stitching around their names, which resulted in a bit of puckering, but once they were ironed it worked out ok; I ended up holding the fabric extremely taut while I stitched, so that it couldn’t pull the fabric. I had to do a few of the semaphore blocks a couple of times, because my measurements were off.

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And yes, those odd looking things at the bottom of the quilts are the flag call signs for their name spellings.

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I ended up not having enough of certain fabrics and having reorder quantities to finish the quilts, which ended up getting a bit pricy, but for counting the rest of the fabric was bought 2 years ago {at least} I wasn’t getting too worked up about, I was just glad to be able to find the fabric I needed!

I also found this awesome fabric for the backs of the quilts. I chose another print from this line, Northcott’s Sail Away, to be the binding. It’s a white anchor on red background. Now I just need to figure out how to cut fabric for a bias binding: No idea on that one.

I have enough of this left, that if I really want to I can make throw pillows or curtain valances for the boys’ room. It was just too perfect to pass up! Makes me excited for renovations and getting the boys and girls in their own big kid rooms!

I really can’t wait for these quilts to be back home. It’s perfect handing sewing weather for quilt bindings! Put a movie on, climb under a quilt and stitch away….

Wednesday, September 18

W.I.P Wednesday

DSC_0277editI’ve actually made some progress these past few weeks on the baby quilt that I started at the beginning of the month. I’m actually almost done with the top, just need to put the borders on. Then comes putting it all together!

I still have a good month before this little one is due to arrive, so I’m not too worried about not finishing it in time.

I’ve been patiently awaiting my other quilts return from the quilter, but boy, with it getting cooler I’m getting antsy to climb under a quilt and put a binding on!

I’m heading to our quilt shop’s Quilts and Casseroles next Friday night, in hopes that someone there will be able to help me figure out how to do a bias binding.

I got a super cute white on red anchor fabric, that I’m going to use for the binding on the boys’ sailboat quilts, but I have no idea how to cut a bias binding. I’ve watched several videos online and all those folds just leave my brain feeling all folded and tumbled.

But, in the mean time, the fabrics sit ready and waiting.
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Linking up with Lee at FreshlyPieced for this week’s WIP Wednesday.

Wednesday, September 4

W.I.P Wednesday

If you follow me on instagram, you probably saw a stack of fabric a while back, hash-tagged #BWBBdeepseaquilt : That’s what I’ve been working on. One of Matt’s cousins is expecting a baby in the beginning of November, so a new baby quilt was on the schedule!

SeaBreeze-Bundle-450I decided to pick a pattern from one of the many that I’ve pinned on Pinterest: Boys Will be Boys from CraftFoxes.com. It was fun! It was different than what I normally do! It was perfect!

I ended up using Sea Breeze by Amy Shaw for Wilmington Prints, from FatQuarterShop.com {my favorite online fabric shop!}

The pattern had me a bit confused, but ended up going together easier than I was thinking it would. Although I wish patterns would show not only tell you what fabrics {a…b…c…} etc, but what colors are going near what. I always end up having to cut extra blocks, because my colors end up not being matched up nicely.

I still have to finish my sashing and border, but I’m pleased with how it’s coming out. I’ll do by usual double cotton batting and hand tie it. But, boy, do I have an adorable backing planned for this quilt!

Sea Breeze Quilt

Linking up with Freshly Pieced.

What projects have you been working on? Anything slated for the Fall and Winter?

Wednesday, May 29

W.I.P Wednesday

Linking up with Freshly Pieced for this weeks W.I.P. Wednesday!

The past few weeks {here and here} I’ve been posting about the Heartland Heritage Block of the Month kit that I got from FatQuarterShop.com, eons ago {seriously I think I got it at least 5 years ago…I know it was before I was pregnant with Ave}. Well, today I am pleased to say that I have finished the top: YAY!!!!

Over the weekend I was working on the borders, sashing and cornerstone blocks. I spent most of Monday then piecing it all together. I was not going to NOT finish it before supper time. Fortunately, the kids were very agreeable and all 4 napped at the same time for 3 hours: WOOHOO!!!!!

Here it is…..

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Yay! {It’s actually hanging upside down in the picture, but oh well} Yes, those are mini pinwheel blocks amidst the sashing; each of them finished at 3”, talk about tiny pieces. I woke up on Sunday, wondering why my wrists hurt so much, then I remembered.DSC_0763

I don’t love all the blocks, but it was a good challenge. Some of these blocks I would have looked at before and thought “No way…I can’t do that”, but I did. It was a good step out of my comfort zone in quilting. Plus, I now have some 12.5” sampler patterns that I could always use to make other quilts…there were a good 5 or 6 blocks here that I really liked and would do again…all of them a variation of stars or pinwheels.

This is the first quilt I’ve ever made for myself. I made Matt’s quilt and our Christmas bed quilt, but this is the first one that I will be saying “MINE!” I plan on sending it out to be quilted, but I need to enter negotiations with the lady who has done my quilts in the past. I want this to be very cuddly, warm and soft. I’m thinking a flannel backing {in a dark red or blue}, with a higher loft wool batting, and a quilt pattern that doesn’t have too much to it {I’ve noticed the more quilting the harder a quilt feels}.

Of course with this quilt finished, I now am jumping onto the next 2. I started the boys’ Sail Boat Quilts a long time ago and never got around to finishing them. The blocks are all done, but the putting together was, is, daunting. You see I’m not just making them a simple quilt with their names on it. Oh no. That would be too easy. I decided to make the Nautical Flags that spell out their names as part of the quilt. Yea.

I spent some time last night going over the different flags with Matt {since he did go to school for Marine Transportation and had to know all of these things} and figuring out how to go about this. Then I sat down with my EQ6 program and deciphered out how to do each of the blocks, in honest-to-goodness-stitched-together-quilt-blocks, that will measure 7” square.

Flag NAmes copy

Now to just figure out the rest of it. These quilts are so close to being done it’s ridiculous, but it will probably take me another month just to finish them.

What have you been working on? Whatever it is, I’d love to hear about it, whether it’s sewing, crafting, construction or a good book :-)

Tuesday, April 30

Hi, my name is Jessica…..Nice to meet you.

It’s been crazy around here….and I’m not even sure why. I know I had a few guest posts that went up last week, but they only happened, because they were written weeks ago. If you missed them, here they are: Meal Planning at the PurposefulWife.blogspot.com and Infertility Changed Me at NatashaMetzler.com .

This week isn’t shaping up to be much better. I feel like I go-go-go all day long, night comes and I look around and it seems like NOTHING was accomplished. Sunday, the kids stayed a few hours at my in-laws, which was great, for Matt. He managed to get a lot of outside work done: Apple trees trimmed, seeds planted in the garden, things done with the bees, and some other stuff. I’m not even sure what I accomplished, because there seemed to be just as much stuff before as after.

I have decided one thing though; the reason for my having to have projects, whether quilting or DIY, is because I need to have SOMETHING that has an absolute start and finish, otherwise I would go out of my mind. Laundry never gets “finished”, dishes never get “finished”, cleaning the house never gets “finished”: It’s entirely never ending. Sewing projects and other things at least give me a sense of accomplishment, once they’re done.

On top of the household to-dos, this weekend is Matt’s sister’s wedding, which means I’ve been doing whatever wedding stuff I can to help her out. Throw in a bit of kids not sleeping at night or during the day, and mommy is not having much time to blog, which stinks, because I so miss being here!

A brief run down of other things that I haven’t blogged about:

*Ellie is officially walking
*I started a Moms’ Night Out group, and we had our first get-together
*Went to (in)RL
*Started a project for the back yard
*Been busy planting veggies
*Finished a couple of books
*Got a haircut and color {realized how easy it is to straighten my hair with a curling iron}
*Bought some new fabric
*Finished a few more of my quilt blocks
*Have 50 chicks that we’re raising for meat, with another 50 coming today, and  more in the future {we’re doing 300 total}

I’m hoping that things slow down, at least a little bit, because we haven’t even gotten to the summer yet and I’m ready for Fall.

  April CollageIf you’re missing me here, I am pretty active on instagram if you want to follow me there :-) or on Facebook

Don’t forget about the Ultimate Homemaking eBook Bundle sale going on right now!
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Wednesday, April 10

W.I.P. Wednesday

WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced

I actually have something to share, and since I posted the other day about my creative juices, I thought an appropriate follow up would be showing you what I’ve been working on.

It has to have been at least 4 or 5, maybe more, years since I received a couple of BOM projects as Christmas gifts. For those of you not in the quilty-know, a BOM is a Block of the Month quilt kit. Every month you receive a pattern with the necessary fabric to create that block, and then at the end of a year, you have a quilt to show for it.

The first that I received was ‘O Tannebaum’ {a Christmas quilt} from Keepsake Quilting, that I did not realize was paper piecing. That one will be sitting in a drawer until I actually learn paper piecing {I pulled it out and quite frankly it scared the bejeezers out of me}.

The other one that I received was a Mystery BOM from Fat Quarter Shop called ‘Heartland’, which works the same way, but you don’t know what the finished project is going to look like. This is the one that I decided I should work on.

I don’t know what took me so long! I’m loving it! If you follow me on instagram, then you’ve probably seen each one of the blocks as I’ve been finishing them.

The blocks are slightly more intricate than I’m used to, but definitely not beyond my level of non-expertise. They’ve actually been really good…kind of pulling me out of my usual and getting me to try something that I probably wouldn’t have, whether the actual pattern or color placement.

So far I’m halfway through the blocks.

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What I’m loving about doing a BOM is that I’m able to work on an entire quilt, but in a way that I feel productive, not overwhelmed {and it doesn’t take over my dining room…where we actually need to eat at least 2 of our meals each day}! I can usually get through a block in an evening, or at least get one of the more intricate ones cut or stitched together. It’s been great!

There’s another Mystery BOM on Fat Quarter Shop right now that I love, but I do not have the funds necessary to purchase the said kit.

I can’t wait to get this one finished though. I think I’ll back it in flannel, so that I have an extra cozy quilt to curl up with on the couch next winter. Depending on how it comes out, I may even send it out to be quilted!

Tuesday, January 29

“A person who never made a mistake, never tried something new.” ~ Albert Einstein

I tried something new; actually a couple of something news. Can you see them?DSC_0177

Rounded edges and bias binding.

The rounded edges were pretty easy…they would look more impressive on a wider border. All I did was trace a small bowl, cut down the edges, after the whole thing was stitched together.

The bias binding didn’t go as easily. I found a couple of video tutorials online, all of which showed some sort of weird origami folding with your fabric that I completely did not understand. It probably didn’t help that I was trying to use up a bunch of scraps to finish the binding.

I ended up doing some sort of weird cutting on an angle thing, then I was confused with how to put together all of the pieces into one long strip…so I just kind of cob-jobbed. It turned out looking good in the end. I do want to learn the right way to do a bias binding, because I did like working with it, particularly with the curved corners.

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And I tried a new way of presenting a baby quilt. Rather than just folding it up and sticking it in a bag I rolled it up, turned down the corner with the label {baby’s name, birth date, and stats}. Then tied it with a strip of matching fabric. Tada!

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What is something new that you would like to learn how to do?

Tuesday, December 4

The Winner is…

PicMonkey Collage

Thank you so much to all of you who entered the giveaway. I had such a fun time doing this, as well as getting to read all of your comments; it was such a blessing!

I hope you had fun too, and found some wonderful new blogs to read. I also hope to see you back around these parts again :-)

Wednesday, October 24

Whoo Loves You?

Another finish to the pile!  Friends of our’s just had their first baby, a boy, last Sunday. I had been feverishly working on finishing the quilt and actually managed to finish it, quite literally as this handsome bundle of joy trounced his way into the world. {On a separate note: I guessed both the due date and the gender right. I’m now 5 for 5 in the gender-guess!}

Whoo Loves you

I had seen this design on pinterest, but couldn’t find the original site for the pin {I hate when that happens!} Once I was almost done with the quilt I finally did find it. I freehanded the owl, branch and leaves, then appliqued them on the quilt. I also did double batting, to give it a bit more thickness and warmth, as well as a hanging sleeve on the back.

I was quite proud of myself and how it came out. Now onto the other baby quilt, table runner, ipad case, Christmas clothes, and Christmas jammies that are on my list. Oy!

Tuesday, October 2

W.I.P. Wednesday

It’s been a while since I’ve linked up with Freshly Pieced and WIP Wednesday, probably because I haven’t really had any thing to show.

I’ve been working on a baby quilt for a friend (whom I hope doesn’t click over here and see her quilt). A while back I saw this cute quilt on pinterest, but I’m a cheapskate and I didn’t really feel like buying a pattern for such a simple quilt. I pulled out my trusty Electric Quilt computer program and started playing around with measurements.
I managed to scrimp together the entire top with fabric I had, except for the border, which resulted in a major splurge of $4.03 for fabric. I’ve been really trying to use up some of the fabric in my stash this year, rather than spending money on more.
Anyways.
Here is my interpretation…

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I’m really liking it. I still have to sandwich and hand tie the whole thing, plus binding, but I think I’ll get it done in time. Of course, then I have another baby quilt to start and the kids clothes for Christmas….oy!

Have you been working on any projects? This time of year I’m always “hankering” to start being creative again.

Wednesday, May 23

W.I.P Wednesday


The other day I posted asking you to guess what I was working on. It was going to be my WIP post for this week, but I actually managed to finish it before that happened. Presenting Miss A’s dress for this Sunday’s festivities {the babies are being baptized}!

I had a bit of an unfortunate revelation last week. I paid the bills. Which of course made me face the fact that there really wasnt’ much room to buy Ave a dress. I decided it would be more prudent to use some of the fabric that I already had to make her a dress. But I needed a pattern, which can cost a lot of money. So I started googling for “FREE Little Girl Dress Tutorials”.

I found this awesome, AWESOME tutorial {Seriously! Go visit this blog, she has fantastic patterns and tutorials}.

Oh my! I am so proud of this dress! The entire thing is lined, there isn’t an unfinished seam in it! If my grandmother were alive today she might actually have told me I did a good job on it :-)
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A couple of Christmases ago my mother-in-law bought me a serger, which I promptly thought to myself “What on earth am I going to do with this!?” I’ve changed my tune. Any seam that was visible I was able to finish with the serger. If I were to buy {or sell} this dress it would probably go for around $60 or more, that’s how professional this pattern was and what a difference using a serger makes.

The directions were easy to follow (I am not a clothes-maker) and I was able to figure it all out. I thought it was going to take me the better part of a week to do this, thus my WIP Wednesday post. I did it in 3 afternoons, with a total of about 4-5 hours of work.

Onto an actual WIP!

I’ve been working on this for a while and just got around to doing some more work on it.
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This is the boys’ sail boat quilt. I had finished all of the boats a few months ago, but just finished all of the “Thrifty” blocks (left). Now I can start piecing them together. But there is a lot more work to go on this quilt. I’m planning on changing the crib size to twin size, which means adding in some stuff. I’ll be adding a border between rows 1 and 2 and 4 and 5, on which will I’m going to appliqué their names, both in letters and in the call flags for each letter. That alone is going to take a while.

  If you’re interested head over to FRESHLY PIECED and see what others have been up to.

Wednesday, February 22

W.I.P Wednesday

This week I decided to join up with Freshly Pieced and take part in Work in Progress Wednesday. I've got a couple of things on the drawing boards, but I actually managed to finish something that I started!

I've been working on the boys' baby quilts and then decided that I might as well do a twin size quilt, so that they can actually use it once they have their own {nautical themed} room. Here's the idea: The middle section is sailboats and nine patch, then there will be a top and bottom border. The top will be their name appliqued on, the bottom will be their name, appliqued, spelled out in flag-signs (Matt's helping me with that).



This finish got me the crazy lady award! I found out on 2/11 that BIL and PP were coming to visit the following weekend with our new nephew, so I had to get this quilt done. I managed to start and finish a 46" square quilt in 1 week with 4 kids....needless to say I didn't sleep much last week, but it was done. I love how it came out too!

The fabric was Baby Safari, the pattern was from my latest APQ magazine cover: I just adjusted the pattern from 9" finished blocks to 13"...took a lot of math to figure that out. In my latest form of baby quilts I backed it in flannel and hand tied the quilt. I really feel this just makes a nicer quilt; it's warm, it's soft, it's super cuddly.



Tuesday, January 10

"The best kind of sleep beneath Heaven above, Is under a quilt, handmade with love."

The Wednesday that I went into labor I received a really awesome package in the mail: Our Christmas quilt! I was so excited to see the quilt (and then didn't even get to sleep under it!). It came out really well and it is so warm and cozy.

I had asked the woman who does my quilting to just stitch the binding on and I would hand stitch it down: She finished the whole thing. At first I was a bit "annoyed" (for lack of a less strong word) that she had finished it, but she knew me better than I did. There was no way I would have finished the quilt, especially since the babies arrived less than 24 hours later. It was so wonderful to take the quilt out of the box, shake it out, and put it on our bed...FINISHED!

Tuesday, November 8

We are the Face of Quilting!

Jennifer at SewHooked.com is challenging quilters to throw off the preconceived notions of what a quilter is, and show the world how broad a spectrum of people we are!

I started quilting when I was 25, to distract me from the dealing with our infertility. My grandmother started teaching me how to sew when I was little. I've always loved fabric, but would get frustrated when sewing clothes: They never fit and always looked terrible on me. Quilting? Now that was something to try.

At my old job I was told I was the "grandma" of the group because I quilted (by someone my own age). My boss at the time was also a quilter and she was my mom's age. Many people assume I'm a boring, fuddy-duddy (which yea, I guess I am, but I was before I started quilting) because I quilt.

I've been scoffed at because I enjoy spending my free time cutting and stitching fabric to make a quilt, particularly when I could "just go to Walm.art or Bed.Bath.andBey.ond and buy one".

Regardless of what people may think a quilter is, I'll take it, because I know what a quilter is: It's one of the most varied, kindest, and generous group of people I know. I'm proud to be a quilter!

Monday, October 10

Another one {partially} done!

I managed to get another stocking top partially done. I'm actually surprised by how much I liked this one. I always like log cabins, but have never done one (don't ask me why). The one difficulty was that to really be able to play with log cabin variations you need to have at least 4 blocks across and I only have 3.
(and it looks a lot blue-er in this picture than it really is....I think the mat is making it funky)

Only 3 more stocking tops to go! Then the fun part comes...figuring out how to put them together :-\

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