WIP Wednesday

Sometimes I just feel like working on a project just for fun and this week I decided to go with the flow. I started a new quilt, just because!  I wanted to work on something easy.

Charming Squares quilt

I had some 6"x6" squares of Wrenly and added some solids squares with a slate grey 6" sashing. Unfortunately, I ran out of the slate, so I'll have to run to the quilt store to pick up a few more yards. Gee, don't you just hate having to go back to a quilt shop (said no quilter EVER)!

I also finished up this cute little pillow this week, made from an orphan block.

Front

Back

Here are this week's stats:
In-process: (3)
Express Your Love
Layers quilt
Grandma's Quilt
 

New projects: (1)
Charming Squares Quilt

Finished (1)
Pillow

I'm linking up with  Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday!

 

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

HELLO!!!! I'm BACK!

I have been struggling with trying to keep up everything going on in my life at the moment and I'm afraid blogging has taken a bit of a backseat. I have gotten a little sewing done, yesterday I finished this little pillow.

 I created this from a block that I made over a year ago. I realized that I had a pillow form almost the exact size. So I quilted up the front, pieced together a back and VOILA' !  I added a little detail in the corners, kind of a mod design (at least in my mind).

Anyway, hopefully I'll get a chance to blog a little more regularly for now on.

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Spiraling

This week is brought to you by the letter "S" for Spiraling. You decide if I'm "in" or "out" of control!

If you are looking for my Sew, Mama, Sew giveaway (Rainbow pack of fat quarters) click here. You can enter every day through Friday. 

More fun homework from Leah Day this week, Spiral Ornaments.  This was on a practice sandwich.

I really like the design, but I didn't have any sashing to put it on, then the light bulb came on and I realized I didn't need to stitch it on sashing.

I thought it would be perfect for the envelope flap of my pods pillow. (Isn't that the coolest Christmas fabric I got for the back of the pillow??)

And speaking of my pods pillow, I finished the FMQ on the front and got it trimmed down to size.

Pods pillow front

I didn't get a chance to assemble the pillow yet, but it really shouldn't take to long to do. It will make a great Christmas gift for someone.

Spiral Ornaments wasn't the only spiraling I did this week, I got all 20 of the blocks for my second Storybook quilt quilted with spirals.

The back of the blocks.

Now I need to get them trimmed up and start joining them. I just may make it in time for Christmas.

My stats for the week:
In-process: (4)
Purple heart wall hanging  (quilting and binding)
Elephant quilt
Storybook quilt # 2 - Join the blocks
Pod Pillow - assemble

New projects: (0)

Finished (0)
 
I'm linking up with  Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday and The Free Motion Quilting Project for QAL Wednesday

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Fresh Sewing Day December

Wow, last month of the year (and last month forever, if you believe the crazy Mayan Calendar interpretation). I wish my November work was a little more impressive, if that's the case, but at least I finished a quilt this month!

1. Flag/Buffalo Bills pillow
2. Storybook #2 quilt
3. Embroidered Towels (with cool spines)
4. Expanding Possibilities quilt - Yippee, it's done!
5. FMQ in pods for my Pods Pillow

I'm linking up today with Lily's Quilts for Fresh Sewing Day December!

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

P.S. For those of you in the Ithaca area, we have our second Ithaca Modern Quilt Guild meeting tomorrow at Quilters Corner from 1:00-3:00 p.m.

WIPping On Toward Christmas!

Do you realize it's almost December? That Christmas is less than a month away??? I am not ready. I thought that doing "less" quilty presents would make it easier, the problem is that those that I'm making are substantially bigger than the gifts I made last year. I need my head examined!

I did take some time last night to do something fun, my Leah Day "pod" homework. It's the perfect way for someone with a short attention span to quilt.

 This homework was so much fun, truly like doodling. I could definitely see doing a whole quilt like this. I'm not sure if you can tell that I used a slightly variegated green. It was King Tut thread with a 90/14 needle. It stitched really well and the heavier thread shows up nicely.  I think this may turn into a pillow - Pod Pillow.

On to other projects that I worked on this week. I did finish constructing and sandwiching all 20 of the blocks for Storybook #2 quilt. I've even started quilting them. This is a Christmas present so it will be petal to the metal to get it finished.

My stats for the week:
In-process: (3)
Purple heart wall hanging  (quilting and binding)
Elephant quilt
Storybook quilt # 2 - QAYG, quilting the blocks.

New projects: (1)
"Pod" pillow

Finished (0)
 
I'm linking up with  Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday and The Free Motion Quilting Project for QAL Wednesday

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Feeding the Fire and WIPping It Good!

I know that Leah Day called this week's design, "Snake Paisley", but it really looked like flames to me. Especially since I stitched it on bright orange.

This is the second week I decided to stitch out the design with matching color thread and I like it. It is gives amazing texture to the piece.  This little table runner I whipped up on Monday night was just perfect for this design. Now to figure out what to stitch on the borders and finish up this little project.

Wrinkled batting

I have kind of an odd question for Leah this week. How do you handle really wrinkled batting? The picture above, isn't really badly wrinkled. But sometimes I have pieces of batting that are much worse, especially a curl on the edge of the batting. Do you press it before basting it or do you just try to smooth it out the best you can as you baste?

I did work on some other projects this week. I started quilting my Library quilt.

I stitched in the ditch around the borders, and echo quilted the kids' applique. Should I continue to echo quilt and fill in the background or leave it as I have it? I find it a bit distracting to have some of the puffing areas, but I don't want my quilting to take away from the kids' designs.

I also finished up my bird pillow. I'm quite happy with how it turned out. And the best part is that it takes one off of the WIP list and into the finished list! Yippee, Skippee!

Front and Back of the Bird Pillow!

My stats for the week:
In-process: (5)
Purple heart wall hanging ( needs borders, backing, quilting and binding)
Expanding Possibilities quilt (Continue to quilt)
Storybook quilt # 2 - All embroidery is done
Geneva Public Library quilt - join and quilt (maybe make a block or two to even it out)
Sew Cal Gal June FMQ Challenge - Need to bind.

New projects: (1)
Flip and sew orange table runner.

Finished (1)
Sew Cal Gal's April FMQ Challenge - finished the pillow.

I'm linking up with  Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday and The Free Motion Quilting Project for QAL Wednesday

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

I Love It When A Plan Comes Together!

Woohoo! I finished my bird pillow. This bird has been on my WIP list since April. It really didn't take that long to turn it into a pillow, so why did I take so long to get around to doing it???!!

Front

Back

Now that this is done, I need to work on my library quilt. But for now, I'll link up with TGIFF (Thank Goodness It's Finished Friday) over at Where Jane Creates!

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Gilty Quilty Pillow is Done!

Thank Goodness It's Finished Friday! I love to join this linky party because it means I've finally finished something. Yippee Skippee!

Last Saturday I took a FMQ class from Molly Waddell. I took my practice project and turned it into a pillow.

The front is a FMQ sampler done with Yenmet metallic thread (tan Isacord in the bobbin). It sparkles a lot more in person than in the pictures. It was fun to learn new motifs and try them all with metallic.

I think I will hop over to see what everyone else has finished up this week at Quilt Matters (you REALLY need to check out M-R's quilt finish, it's SPECTACULAR!!!!) for TGIFF!



Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Making Christmas Grand Finale!

For most of the Christmas Season, I linked up with the fabulous Janine at Rainbow Hare Quilts for Making Christmas. Today is the GRAND FINALE where we all get to show off just how much we made for Christmas.

17 Christmas Stocking, all lined and with machine embroidered names
7 Machine embroidered hand towels
6 Wonky, quilted potholders
4 Machine embroidered, quilted pillows
2 Machine embroidered, quilted iPad cases
2 Machine embroidered, quilted dog mats
1 Pair of quilted oven mitts
1 63"x 63" lap quilt - the first quilt I ever FMQed!!!!

I think everyone enjoyed their gift (at least to my face)!  Thank you Janine for hosting such a great link that kept me on track and on time!  I would like to think that I will start making Christmas a little earlier next year, but don't count on it!

Linking up with Rainbow Hare Quilts to see a huge Making Christmas Finale!

Okay, Just One More Gift!

Well, I finished up one more gift that I wasn't sure if I would have time to make. I made some friends a couple of throw pillows. I finished the turtle pillow on Saturday and finished this fish pillow today. I hope to see our friends this afternoon. Nothing like finishing in the nick of time!  I am quite pleased with the result!

The embroidery design is from Embroidery Library. This is the same fish embroider that my machine died on the last color. I left it in the hoop and was actually able to finish it a month later when I got my machine back from being repaired!

Buttoned back. The bottom half is some of my hand dyed fabric.

On another note, Santa was very good to me this year. I got Electric Quilt 7, a Sew Kind of Wonderful quick curve ruler, a rotary cutter for circles, and a cute sewing box. I see a lot of quilting projects coming up this year! I hope that Santa was good to you all!

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Stick a Fork In Me, I'm Done!

Well, I only got one pillow finished, but that's the best I'm going to do if I want to be ready for guests in a few hours.  I am pretty happy with how this pillow came out, it's a little more vivid in real life!

Machine embroidery design by Embroidery Library

Buttoned back! (First time I made a pillow with buttons)

Merry Christmas to all my lovely visitors and virtual friends. You are definitely a gift to me. I can't even begin to tell you how you always make me smile and feel good about what I create.

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Making Christmas Progress: Co-Worker Christmas

It's hard to believe that a week from today, Christmas will be all over. I'm still stitching and have a few small projects left to do, but the big ones are done. Today I'm giving my co-workers their gifts, my husband is handing his our tomorrow. Sadly, I didn't have a chance to link-up with the fabulous Janine at Rainbow Hare Quilts last week, so I'm happy I can link up with Making Christmas this week.

First, I got the iPad cases done! I think they turned out pretty cool. I hope my co-workers think so.

iPad Cases (Embroidery designs are from Urban Threads)

I used Soft and Stable batting and lined it with the same brown fabric on the outside.

Mermaid Pillows to our Administrative Assistant, iPad cases to my supervisor and co-worker, and tea towels to my work-study student. PHEW! (Mermaids designs are from Embroidery Library)

Making Christmas List:
1. Quilt and bind my Cubic Rhythm quilt - Done (Really proud of this quilt and that I actually finished it in time for Christmas)
2. Mermaid pillows -Done
3. Purple Heart Wall-hanging - X (I have taken this off the list, because I completed the Cubic Rhythm quilt. This was my back-up plan)
4. At least 4 Christmas stockings - 17 stockings Done.
5. 2 iPad covers - Done
6. At least 6 potholders - 4 completed! 
7. 2 doggie mats -Done.
8. 2 pillows for friends embroidered - Still working on this
9. Table runner for Thanksgiving! - Done.
10. Several last minutes ideas that I haven't thought of yet! 
      2 Tea Towels embroidered for my work-study student - Done
      4 Hand Towels embroidered for my husbands co-workers - Done
      3 Tea Towels embroidered for family members
      4 Childrens' fleece scarfs
      1 pair of oven mitts

I'll be linking up with Janine over at Rainbow Hare Quilts for Making Christmas List

Color Me Quilty!

Pat