Wow!

I've been nominated for the MQX 2010 Machine Quilting Teacher-of-the-Year award!

They are accepting additional nominations through Tuesday, February 1. Head there immediately.

Sunday Stash Report

fabric purchased this week: 0
fabric purchased this year: 0
fabric used this week: 23 yards
fabric used this year: 31.75 yards

Head on over to Judy's blog to see how everyone else is doing.

Friday finish -- Mom's bedspread

You probably remember that I've made my mother a lot of tablerunners. What I haven't made for her are a lot of bed quilts. Over the past 25 years I've only made her three and I think she should throw one of them away -- I scissor-cut the squares from my leftover clothing fabric, sewed it with 5/8" seams, backed it with a cheap bed sheet, and tied it with embroidery floss. It's the first quilt-type-thing I ever made. It's falling apart and I'm embarrassed by it. Shouldn't she throw it away? Leave your vote in the comments.

So last fall Mom sent out some serious hints that she wants a new bedspread. She likes bright colors. My solution to Mom's shocking lack of bed quilts:



I used my Dream a Little Dream pattern. It can be made from layer cakes, fat quarters or yardage, but I made it from bright fabric scraps that I had on hand. It is 99x98 inches, very easy to piece and slightly time-consuming to bind (it's a huge quilt!).

(If you look at the background of the photo you will see patched drywall. Yes, that's my bedroom. It's seriously under construction.)

I entered this quilt at Gen X Quilters. Check out the other entries:



Check out some other great finishes at

Sunday Stash Report

fabric purchased this week: 0
fabric purchased this year: 0
fabric used this week: 3 yards
fabric used this year: 8.75 yards

Head on over to Judy's blog to see how everyone else is doing.

Friday Finish -- Sharon's Shams

Last fall my sister let me know what she wanted for Christmas: new pillow shams to match her quilt. Well, I made her quilt BB (before blogging) so I don't have a photo of the quilt. I remember that it was made with 30s reproduction fabrics, though.

I had a notion of sewing ruffles to the pillows and after a lot of work, here are the shams:



The ruffling process went something like this:

1. Borrow ruffler sewing machine attachment from friend.
2. Spend a few hours figuring out how it worked.
3. Spend another few hours trying it on the actual fabric.
4. Decide that I didn't like the look of it.
5. Attempt machine gathering with a basting stitch.
6. Realize that the fabric was really thick and the thread was just going to keep breaking.
7. Thread a needle and start making the ruffles by hand.

So simple, even a child could do it!



Check out some other great finishes at

Sunday Stash Report

Fabric purchased this week: 0
Fabric purchased this year: 0
Fabric used this week: 2.75 yards
Fabric used this year: 5.75 yards

Head on over to Judy's blog to see how everyone else is doing.

Friday finish -- Sweet & Sassy Bag

Last summer, my daughter-in-love and I started making quilted tote bags. We worked on them for one or two days and then life got busy. For Christmas, my daughter-in-love got a new sewing machine (from whom, I wonder?) and we promptly resumed work on our tote bags.

Although both of us finished our bags, only mine is shown below:

The pattern is from Quilts and More Spring 2010. I tweaked the pattern a bit to secure the outer pocket, add inner pockets and simplify the handles.

Whatever shall we make next?

Roll Roll Cotton Boll, clue 7

I'm making progress on my Roll Roll Cotton Boll, Bonnie Hunter's latest mystery quilt.

For clue 4, I made log cabins instead of string blocks. I think they turned out quite well in this nearly-finished quilt:



Next step: piece the outer border!

Design Wall Monday

When working with applique, the changes in the design wall are subtle.

Progress on Meadow Breeze:



I finished the applique on the inner white border. Next step is another white corner block.

Head on over to Judy's blog to see what everyone else is doing.

Sunday Stash Report

fabric purchased this week: 0
fabric purchased this year: 0
fabric used this week: 3 yards
fabric used this year: 3 yards

Head on over to Judy's blog to see how everyone else is doing.

Friday Finish -- for Jean and Victoria

More Christmas presents:



The bag is Terry's Tote from Happy Hour and the wallet is a Wonder Wallet.

If I had more of this fabric, I definitely would have made a set of these for myself. Is this one (or two) of the cutest sets ever? Or is it just me?

Design Wall Monday

You may not notice the change, but I did make progress on my Meadow Breeze quilt:



Did you know that there are 87 separate pieces of applique on that white border? I have only 8 more pieces on that border before I start to work on another corner or side block.

Slow progress is still progress!


Head on over to Judy's blog to see what everyone else is doing.

Sunday Stash Report

I'm starting this year with a whimper:

Fabric purchased: 0
Fabric used: 0

I'm only going to count the fabric as used when the project is complete and I haven't officially finished anything this week.

Head on over to Judy's blog to see how everyone else is doing.

Friday finish -- Three Fluffy Scarves

My husband and I drove from New York to Florida for a family wedding in April. I took along some knitting for that long, long drive. Did I mention the drive was long? I finished three soft and fluffy scarves in the car.

The white one is for my graphic designer, the orange one is for my sister-in-law (this is my only sister-in-law and it's her first Christmas with that official title!), and the scrappy one is for my daughter-in-love's friend that I've adopted as a third daughter.

They were Christmas presents, so I delayed in posting the photo until after the ladies received them.

Argyle Bag Tutorial, part 4

Here's where we left off last week:



The diamonds are filled with contrasting color, but they don't quite pop. We're going to fix that this week.

Details:

Top Thread: Spagetti from WonderFil (12 weight Egyptian cotton)
Bobbin Thread: InvisiFil from WonderFil
Needle size: 20, since I'm using a very thick thread
Stitches per inch: 11

I will be using a ruler again this week, so my Ruler Base is on for safety!

Using Turquoise thread (Tiffanys!), I retraced the lines I stitched in the first step.



The thicker thread makes the line stand out and separates the diamonds:



Tune in next Wednesday when we will finish the Argyle Bag!

Design Wall Monday

The blizzard that left us nearly two feet of snow also left us with power so I can post this morning. We are quite grateful!--(for the power, not the snow)





Meadow Breeze by Pat Sloan is coming along. I'm working hard at hand appliqueing all of those little pieces. I'm having so much fun working on this quilt! I'll be sad when the quilt is finished, but I'll be happy to see it on my kitchen wall, the one that has been waiting for a quilt for almost nine years now!

Head on over to Judy's blog to see what everyone else is doing.

Argyle Bag Tutorial, part 3

Are you ready to add more color to our Argyle bag?

Here's how we left it last week:




It's time to fill in the rest of the diamonds, half-diamonds, and quarter-diamonds.

Details:

Top Thread: Konfetti from WonderFil (50 weight cotton)
Bobbin Thread: InvisiFil from WonderFil
Needle size: 16
Stitches per inch: 20, since I'm going to make tiny curves

I put on my micro-handles to make the tiny stitching easier:



I also put on my Ruler Base. I like to drag my fingers while I quilt. I feel like I have more control that way.



I chose white thread for top and bobbin, tested my tension, and then quilted little pebbles to fill in the unquilted areas:



Pebbling is a slow process, and it uses a lot of thread. I sit down at my machine when I pebble, and I set an alarm so I will stop every ten minutes to stretch and rest my eyes.

This is really starting to look like something!



Check back next Wednesday for the next step.

Roll Roll Cotton Boll, Clue 5

Last week, I was current on my Roll Roll Cotton Boll, Bonnie Hunter's latest mystery quilt.

Not so, this week. Our task was to create 600 red and neutral 1 1/2" finished half square triangles.

Does this look like 600 to you?:



Me neither.

I'm enjoying the heck out of this mystery and hope to be caught up again by the weekend.

Design Wall Monday

My design was has changed drastically. Maybe that means I'm making progress?



The top block is from Ping by Pinwheels. After I finish squaring each block, there's still a pieced border and more applique to go.

The large quilt is Meadow Breeze by Pat Sloan. I'm running way behind on this one, but I adore it! Hopefully it will hang above my kitchen table some day, after hundreds of little pieces of applique are done, of course.

So, maybe I'm not making progress, but I do have an awareness of how much I still need to do!

Head on over to Judy's blog to see what everyone else is doing.

Friday finish -- Gretchen's napkins

I made my daughter-in-love some placemats and napkins for her wedding shower last year. Remember?

I designed the placemat and made the napkins from the pattern Table Graces. The napkins were very nice, but very huge -- about 19 inches square!

My daughter-in-love wanted some more napkins and I said I'd make them for her birthday. I found some fabric that would match, since all of the fabrics I used 18 months ago are long gone. I designed a pattern for the napkins that gave the look of the original napkins without having to sew the mitres and position the inner square to topstitch. I also made the napkins smaller, about 14 inches square.

One finished napkin:



Compare in size to a store-bought cloth napkin:



And see how well they match the original placemat:



If you feel the need to sing "Happy Birthday" to my daughter-in-love, please know you are a few months late, just like me. I did buy the fabric before her birthday. Doesn't that count for something?