Posts by admin
Too Much Country? Not Enough Rock ‘n Roll?
I bought a stack of Denyse Schmidt’s Katie Jump Rope fabric months ago on a whim but without a plan in mind. The prints aren’t my usual style but I was so attracted to them that I broke down and bought them regardless. I finally saw a quilt in a blog posting about a Teen Vogue photo shoot of all things and decided to use the fat quarter stack along with some fabric from my stash and scrap bag to supplement and to make sure it wasn’t too matchy-matchy and to make it a little less country. I am not so sure I was successful. Because my inspiration came from a picture, I didn’t have a good idea on how to approach making the quit top. I kicked around...
Read MoreSecret Wedding Quilt – Part 3
So here is the wedding quilt. I finished the quilting yesterday and now just have to make the binding. I can’t believe that I am in the home stretch. It took a lot of time to make all of the blocks but once that was done, things really started moving. Here is a close up of some of the blocks – they are wonky log cabins. I tried to keep a balance of size and color but didn’t worry too much about it. All of the blocks were improvised. Here is the back. Although I didn’t need to, I added the orange stripe to break up the orange and to make it reversible.Here is a close up of the three little blocks I added to the back. There was a brief moment when I...
Read MoreThe Secret Wedding Quilt, Part 2
I was really worried that this quilt would become my great white whale, especially after how I left things last time. The first thing I did was take a break. I was getting frustrated with how the blocks weren’t lying flat and the time apart was just what I needed. I realized that I was making mistake with the first round of blocks by not using my rotary cutter to make a straight edge as I built each side of the log cabin. Once I started doing that, the blocks looked so much better. After I finished all of the blocks, I ironed the hell out of the first round of blocks and only had to redo a couple to get them to lie as flat as possible. I also knew that I could have...
Read MorePinwheels!
I have been meaning to try out a pinwheel quilt for ages and finally had the reason to make one this week. I had this fabric in my stash and knew that it would a perfect fit for the pinwheels. My friend wanted to have the name of the recipient embroidered on the quilt. I went a pink that matches the fabric but sadly doesn’t show up that well in these pictures. You are just going to have to take my word for it that it looks super cute. Inspired by all the great embroidering I have seen from my quilting bee ladies, I traced a butterfy from one of the prints and embroidered it next to the name for a little...
Read MoreA Very Productive Couple of Days, Part 2
So knitting was my gateway craft. I learned it from a co-worker in 2003 and took to it really quickly. Sadly, I plateaued at an advanced beginner stage that I can’t seem to shake, especially now that I am so obsessed with sewing. I don’t have a huge stash of needles but have enough that they could benefit from an organizer and shouldn’t be shoved in a tote bag, getting caught in my skeins of yarn. And now that I am conquering my to do list, this project got the time it deserved. I used some fabric from my stash and some lovely twill tape I received as a Christmas present for the...
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