The baby quilt is finished!

I used a pattern from the book "Big-Print Quilts" by Karen Snyder. It was originally made with racing cars and bright fabric. My husband suggested this pattern and I'm glad because I like the way it came out. If you notice the three duck blocks are a little different. The printed blocks were given to me a while back from a friend and when they were cut they were not all even. So you make lemonade with lemons, right! The ducks were a little too small so I trimmed them down smaller and added a tiny blue border and white border then squared them the same size as the others. The fact that I used three makes it work. I'm real pleased.

This is the back. You can see the quilting I did around each shape and block. I used some new batting that I wanted to try. It is "Dream Green". Put out by "Quilter's Dream Batting". It is made using recycled plastic bottles. I thought it would be great for a baby quilt because it gets washed so much. I like the fact that it is thin and it feels soft and not real stretchy but when I had pin basted the quilt and started to quilt it the batting did not grab onto the fabric the way cotton batting does and so there was some slipping of the fabric. That is why it looks wrinkled. There are no puckers but I'm not convinced that I will use this batting again. I think I will stick with my cotton batting.

A close up of the back.

Close up of the duck block. You can see I did a continuous line quilting around the ducks and the wheels. It was easy using free motion quilting.

Close up of the center rabbit block.

This is my label. I had this idea to use grosgrain ribbon and my machine's monogramming program. It took me a little while to figure out I needed a stabilizer on the back and the size of my letters but I'm happy with it. I sewed it into the binding by hand.

Now off to work on another project!

Top finished...

The Christmas quilt top is finished. I got the pattern from Bonnie Hunter's website. I love this pattern. It was so easy and so fast. I'm not even bordering it. I will put a black binding on it and call it good. It measures 66 x 90. The person it is for is tall and I wanted him to be able to cover completely. I'm glad for this to be done. I'm also putting fleece on the back and no batting. It will be cozy and not heavy. The fleece will be a novelty sports print. It is his favorite team. I like to make it personable if I can. Now I need to get busy with a baby quilt. A family relative asked me to make one. Her friend is having a baby. She needs it in 2 weeks. I don't know why I always say yes to these things but I do!

I have been working...

despite the fact that I have not been posting about it. This is what has become of the 4-patches. I have all the blocks assembled and I laid them out on my design board then stacked them up and numbered them. They are ready to be sewed together into rows. This has really been a fast and easy quilt. And I love how it looks all laid out.

This is a quilt I quilted last week. A friend of mine owns a Tin Lizzie18 quilting machine. She offered for me to go over and quilt a quilt on it because she knows I want to purchase one. I was not blown away by it. I guess my expectations were too high. There are a couple of things I really liked about it and a couple of things I didn't like about it. I am rethinking buying one. I have done some research and I'm going to Houston Quilt Festival at the end of this month, I will try several machines out and see what happens. I may end up just staying with what I have. Which is a shortarm system using a B-line frame and Juki TL98E.

Here is a closeup of the quilting. I hope you can see it. I did big loopy flowers in the outside border and inside border. I also did a small loop-d-loop around the blocks. BTW, the center is a panel and the borders were added on. I purchased this several years ago and it was just sitting in the stash so I put it together earlier this year at our guild retreat and thought it would be the perfect project to practice on. It is not finished however. I will do some more quilting in the blocks around the redwork and flowers.

And last but not least this is a christmas gift for a member of a small group I belong to called the Woolie's. We, of course, work with wool. I will show a finished picture when it is done. I did the embroidery and added the pieced borders. Now I'm adding wool accents with the buttonhole stitch. I have not decided if it will be a table topper or wall hanging and I'm not sure how I will back it and if it will have batting or not. Any suggestions?

What is this?




Could it be?------Yes, there is piecing going on!

See the long chain of black and white?

It became 120 4-patches! Too bad that's only half of what I need! What is it for, you ask? Check this quilt out from Bonnie's site.

And...I also pieced this zig-zag block. I got the inspiration from Material Obsession. Check them out! I want to make this quilt but it will have to wait til later.

Well I better get back to making 4-patches. Lots more to go!

2 posts in one day! Wow!

I must have way too much time on my hands. Actually I do have other things I should be doing but thought I would take pictures of my last two paintings from paint class for you to see. Last night was our last class and I'm sad and happy. I learned a lot and built up confidence in my abilities to paint but I'm really glad to have my Thursday nights back. I'm very much a homebody and getting out at night to go to a class across town was not my cup of tea!

This is a painting I did from a picture in a magazine. It is not finished but this is as much as I got done last week in class. I have not made the time to tweak it. I think his mouth looks like the "Joker" from Batman but the paint would not dry fast enough to add the color for his tongue. Overall, I'm happy with it. The teacher was very generous with his critic and said this was good enough to be entered in one of the art contest going on right now. NOT what I am interested in doing. Just like my quilting-It is all just for fun!



This is what I painted last night. I can not tell you how much I was dreading this class. We were doing portaits and I don't usually do people as I stated before. But this teacher pushed me to do what I did not think I was capable of. He handed out a drawing of a man's face and said paint this or use a picture you brought. I had brought pictures but was less intimidated by the picture of this man. I started painting and at first it was not much to look at. The colors were wrong ( I used grey and browns for the shading) but after I started to put some flesh tones and add detail it was looking ok. After I did the eyes then he came alive to me. I am most proud of this painting because it is something I did not think I could do. It makes me think what else is possible. Now, can I do it again? That is the question.
The teacher said it was a very strong portait. A great compliment (at least as far as I'm concerned)!

Quilt stuff...finally

I haven't posted anything quilty for a while and I finished the labels on these two quilts yesterday and took some pics. These quilts were made for my husbands Aunt. She is a nun and they do a lot of charity fund raisers. She sent me the embroidered blocks (done by her and a friend's Mom) and asked if I would make these into quilts for a fund raiser. No rush, just whenever. I got them last year around Sept. or Oct. and you know how it is, other things come up and these got pushed to the back burner a couple of times. But they were always in the back of my mind. My best friend and I worked on these together and we got them finished. We pieced them together and I quilted the smaller one and she quilted the bigger one (she had the harder job, that was a lot of blocks to custom quilt). I'm glad they are done and we will have to get them to her soon.

This is the larger one that my friend quilted.

Here are close ups of the quilting in the sashing and blocks. She uses a Juki TL-98Q sewing machine set on a table. It is hard to do some of these designs but she is getting good at it.

Here is a close up of the quilting in the border. I hope you can see it. It is quilted with e's and l's that have one echo stitch all the way around.

This is the smaller one that I quilted. I also use a Juki-TL98E set in my sewing cabinet. At first it was hard to decide how to quilt these. I knew we would have to quilt in the embroidered blocks but had never done that before. These were vintage blocks. That made me nervous but, I'm real happy with how they turned out. They are not perfect but they are quilted as my friend likes to call it "Machine quilted by Hand". Every block is different. It is not stitched by a machine so that they all are the same. You move the fabric and so sometimes it is not stitched exactly perfect. But you know what? It doesn't matter. The overall look is good and it is done! Sometimes I think that is the most important thing. To finish the quilt.

Here is a close up of the quilting in the blocks and borders. The border is quilted with e's that are echoed.

Here is a close up of the quilting in the sashing. This was something new to me. I did the small flowers and culi-cues. I usually do straight line quilting in the sashing. I like the way it came out.

I'm also starting to work on some Christmas gifts. I have a small table topper that has embroidery on it and some wool. I'm working on the embroidery right now and will get pics when it closer to being finished.

Every year I make a quilt for one of my in-laws for Christmas. I started this in 2001. The year I learned to quilt. The quilt this year is for one of my brother-in-laws. Making quilts for men and boys is fun and different. Using a different color arrangement to make it more masculine.

My friend is really good at choosing colors and knowing what looks good together so she will come and help me choose the fabrics, from my stash, of course. I'm really trying to use it up. Although, as much as I use it never seems to go down, instead it seems to multiply. Why is that? If anyone has any theories on this I would like to hear it.

Paint class...

Tonight is paint class. On the day of paint class I always try to do a little painting. Today I tried to fix the house I painted in class last week. I didn't like it then. I like it now. I realized I like a lot of detail. Which I find hard to do with watercolor. You have to be patient and let it dry (or use a blow drier) then add more paint in a darker tone.

Tonight we will be working on painting people. Something I'm not good at and don't like to do. I usually have a problem with proportion. As you can see her chin needs some work and I will continue to work on this picture tonight in class. Over all I'm happy with it. I painted from a picture that the teacher gave us to practice with. It doesn't look anything like the practice piece but it does look like a woman. So I am ok with it so far.

Below is a painting I did last week of a photo my daughter took on a trip they took. I love the picture and thought it would make a good practice piece. I'm happy with it. There is one tree in the photo that has red-orange leaves in it and that is what I tried to capture. I'm happy with it. The road is not in proportion. It should be smaller at the top than at the bottom but that's ok. It was a learning experience.


Looking forward to class tonight! I am learning so much. The teacher is good. He is willing to let us do our own thing and just guides us.

Hi All, it's Friday, my favorite day of the week! I don't have any big plans this weekend but I'm still looking forward to it. I have had to be out of the house everyday this week for one thing or another and I'm looking forward to staying home today. Tomorrow I will be having some of my quilty friends over to hand quilt and a quilt that was made to commemorate the 250th birthday of the Marquis de Lafayette. It has already been quilted but does not have enough quilting in it. When we put it up on the wall it sagged at the bottom. I love to hand quilt. It is so relaxing to me. My thoughts can run wild while my hands are kept busy.

Here is a block that I made for a project that my mini group was working on. We decided to make a Louisiana quilt. There are 12 people that are making a block and the only rules were to make it about Louisiana. It could be any technique and any size as long as it is divisible by two. I did one on Louisiana music. The saxophone for the jazz music and the accordion for the cajun and zydeco music. The blocks were collected and all the names put in a hat and a name was drawn to win them. I did not win but that is ok because a friend won. We will help her to put the blocks together into a quilt. It will be fun. I used machine appliqué with fusing and I drew the notes with my pigma pen.

Finally done!

This is what I have been busy doing. I've been finishing my Louisiana BOM. I pieced all the pieced blocks together first then I fused all the applique blocks. I kind of fizzled out after that and I wanted to put them away but my friend encouraged me to continue and challenged me to finish the machine applique in a week. I took the challenge but had my doubts. I had a lot of other things to do this week including planning a birthday party and make cakes for my honey and my son. I grabbed every spare moment I could and I finished these up today (one day late). I'm so glad to be done. I'm listing all of them here even though I listed the first three months before in other posts. I wanted a record of all of them together. It is also easier to view them all.

The designer of this BOM had little paragraphs written about each of the blocks and what the names meant. I will scan these and they will all go on my label. To me that is the best part. You get a little history with the blocks and it is all about my home state.

This is the January block. The pieced block is called Shrimps on Point and the appliqué block is called Mardi Gras Krewes.

This is the February block. The pieced block is called Peach Festival (the color in the center is peach even if it looks orange in the photo) and the appliqué block is called Gaston Gator.

This is the March block. The pieced block is called Catahoula Leopard Dog and the appliqué block is called Crawfish Gumbo.

This is the April block. The pieced block is called Mardi Gras (the colors are green, gold and purple, the colors in photo are deceiving) and the appliqué block is called Go Ragin Cajuns.

This block is the May block. The pieced block is called Cajun Spice and the appliqué block is called Hot and Spicy.

This is the June block. The pieced block is called Sweet Potato Pie (the color is a bright orange not red) and the applique block is called Bayou State.

This is the July block. The pieced block is called King Cake and the applique block is called Pierre Pelican.

This block is the August block. The pieced block is called Cajun Two Step and the appliqué block is called Cotton Boll.

This is the September block. The pieced block is called Sun Flower Trail and the appliqué block is called Dixie Land Jazz.

This block is the October block the pieced block is called Blueberry and the appliqué block is called Sportsman's Paradise.

This is the November block. The piece block is called Fried Green Tomatoes and the appliqué block is called French Quarter.

This is the December block. The pieced block is called Strawberry Jam and the appliqué block is Magnolia Blossom.

That's all of them! I'm so glad to be finished these blocks. I will put these away and set them together at another time.

Yesterday I did some repair work on a crocheted afghan that belongs to a friend of mine. It is old but has sentimental value to her. Some of the yarn had deteriorated and I cut it out and crocheted with new yarn and sewed it back together. I will tell her to put it away and not use it because there are other yarns that look like they will not last if it is continued to be used.

My class last night went really good. They both made 12 of there Cobblestone blocks in the light colors. They are doing really well. Fast learners. They make my job easy.

Today I think I will make myself work on a BOM project. I have not felt like working on them and I'm falling behind again. I really need to catch up.

And because I really don't like posts without pictures, I'm posting pictures of a clock and valance that I made for my sewing room a couple of years ago when I remodeled and cleaned out the room. The clock and valance have the same fabric. I made shoofly blocks for both. I used Mod Podge on the clock to glue the fabric down then cut the shanks off the buttons and glued them down. It was an old clock that needed a new look. I like the way it turned out.

I wasn't happy with the effect of the shoofly blocks when sewed together. I made a secondary design I didn't like. but I like the overall effect. I used the stash for these projects. Gotta love that! I really like the fabric with all the vintage sewing supplies on it.

I have finished the step 5 of Orange Crush Mystery. Yeah! It was alot of fun working with that orange fabric. It is not a fabric color I deal with too often. This whole project has been fun! I have enjoyed learning alot of new things.

Tonight I am teaching a class. My SILs wanted to learn how to quilt. Neither of them owned a sewing machine. They each bought one and we are starting from the beginning. Last week we had a good time talking about quilting supplies and fabric. Tonight they will start cutting strips and sewing their blocks. We always have a good time when we get together and this is no different.

Whew! I'm glad that is done!. That was a lot of work. I'm glad I had the four patches made already. This is the first block in the Orange Crush mystery on Bonnie's site. The first picture is the work in progress. There are 30 blocks and I had to make 120 half squares to go with the four patches.


Here they are all finished! I like the way they look. All scrappy and yet the red and black pull it together so it is not too busy. I can't wait to see the next step. I still have my orange fabric and light blue fabric to cut into. I know it will be big. Bonnie does everything big.

I also made a few more blocks for my Combing through your scraps quilt and this is what I came up with. It is a Crown of Thorns block that I used for the setting and I like it. I will try to get this pieced together before the end of the week. The blocks are on my design board and I have to stand back to see the design. It shows up really good in the picture but in person some of the fabrics blend into the others. I have to look at it in my reducing glass to see the whole affect. This was a lot of fun. I used some scraps (even though it doesn't look like I touched them) and I learned a lot about value.

Now I need to focus on the rest of my BOM's or my boss (aka..friend who is coaching me) will tan my hide. I still have my Thimbleberries for April and May to do and a Houses BOM I need to check on and see where I stand. That's it for me today. I'm off to run some errands before bringing my youngest son to his guitar lessons.

Busy

I can't believe it has been almost a week since I blogged! I have been so busy. The quilt above is the one I'm doing in my Hand quilting class from Quilt University. I got it together on the weekend and just marked the quilting and basted it yesterday.

This is a close up of the center quilting design. You can't see it that well but the center grid is 1/4 inch and there are wheat stalks and leaves with a 1 inch grid on the outside of the feather ring. There is also wheat stalks in the red borders. It was the first time I marked a quilt design using my light box. It worked quite well but the freezer paper design had to be made before I could do the marking and that took a little longer than I thought it would. But I'm happy with the results.
I'm quilting it with red thread so the quilting will show up good to take pictures for my class. Since the class is online that is the only way for the teacher to see our work.

I am also working on my Louisiana BOM for May. I will post pictures when they are done. And I'm ready to start on Step 4 of the Orange Crush mystery quilt on Bonnie's site. I will have some sewing time today so I think I will split it up between hand quilting and the Orange Crush.

Things just don't seem to slow down around here and I'm trying to figure out what to cut out to make things simpler. I love all that I'm doing right now but can't seem to spend the quality time on each individual thing. It is just a moment here or there that I have to give to it and it seems not enough. I will have to give it more thought. I don't want to give up my teaching of quilting. I'm enjoying that so much. It is overwhelming at times but rewarding. I have two classes on Thursday, a morning and night class. I guess things will slow down after my QU classes are over and my own beginner quilt classes finish at the end of this month. I'm looking for the slow lazy days of summer. Is there such a thing? I will find it. I have to. Well enough rambling. On to sewing. Have a wonderful day everyone.

Here are the split nine-patch blocks that I made for the "Combing through your scraps" class I'm taking from Quilt University. I love the idea of using a block (in this case the Variable Star) to make the whole quilt. I really liked using my scraps and the split nine-patch were easy to put together. I used the Easy Angle Ruler for the half squares. I did find out that I don't have a lot of really light fabrics. I have more mediums. I did as the teacher suggested and used the backs of several of the light to mediums that I had. It worked. I think I will make some more of these and make a different block. I have my eye on an Ocean Waves block and for that I need 48 split nine-patch blocks. It will be an on going project. That's what I worked on this weekend. I am also working on my April and May Louisiana BOM. I had to redesign one of them. It was for LSU in Baton Rouge and I had to do ULL for the university in my city. I now have to do the machine applique on it. I will get to it later this week. Hope everyone is having a quilty day!