Time for Some Catching Up: Smallish Projects of Late

Hi friends!

I've got a few things to share with you, so be prepared for an onslaught of posts from me.  :)

My Etsy shop had a record breaking number of orders in March, which meant that I was pretty busy for the months of March AND April (I even had to close my shop to catch up.  Even now only half of the listings are up).  But I am officially all caught up now and it's time to share a few non-Etsy projects I've finished since... well, December.  ;P

First up are these Vinyl Project Bags. I made these as part of a swap for our Guild back in November.  Check out the tutorial for these HERE:  Thimbleanna Vinyl Project Bag.
I couldn't stop at just one, so I made four.

Funny story - I knew I wasn't going to be able to make it to our November guild meeting, so I dropped these off with a friend to swap for me.  When I went to pick up my new bags from her, I was a little surprised to see one of my own bags (since we were swapping) in my little pile.  I didn't think much of it, though.  I just figured it was because I made so many bags and there weren't a lot to swap around. I was actually pretty happy I didn't have to part with all of mine in the end.  Several months later, I went to use said bag and discovered I had somehow sewn the zipper in wrong, so that the pocket part was completely closed off!  Ha!  I think my friends must have had a good laugh over that one when it came time to swap.  :)  Luckily, this was a pretty easy fix with a pair of scissors.  ;)

Next up is another swap from December.  This time we were swapping Red and Green Mini Mini quilts.  Here is the one I made (if I'm remembering right, it measures about 6.5" square).  I've been dying to try these cathedral windows style hexies for awhile.
I got a cute little wreath shaped Mini Mini in return and I love it. 

My mom has been hinting that she wants a non-Christmasy winter table runner for awhile.  So I whipped this up for her and it was so much fun.   I was inspired by THIS photo on Pinterest, but other than that I just sort of went for it.  This one was a little hard for me to give away...

And finally, I made this football pillow for our family Superbowl Party.  Looking back, I probably should have made the laces much shorter, but there you have it.  My Grandma used to make one like this every year for her Superbowl parties (which were a big deal - Grandma had 7 sons, 1 son-in-law, and a whole lot of grandkids).  Then we would all bet on the final score and the winner got to take home the football pillow.  As luck would have it, I was the winner this year.  ;p

And since I feel the need to document, but not so much the need to take pictures - I want to mention that I also made a few pillowcases (Batman for Jaxson, Superman for Bronx, and Frozen for Adele - the little girl I babysit once a week), a dinosaur crayon roll for Noah, and a car mat (from a panel) for Noah.

The End.  For now.  I'll be back soon with a few bigger finishes.  :)

A Few Things - Mini Mini, Kitchen Set, and Some Fun Quilting

I've been busy lately, believe it or not! I decided to take a few weeks off from my Etsy shop. Mostly so I could go on vacations (one to our cabin at Island Park, and another to the Virgin Islands with just the hubby), but also so that could work on some just-for-fun projects. And now I have more works-in-progress than I've ever had at one time. Haha. Ah well, they will be finished soon. Soon.
For now, I want to share a few smaller projects I made at the beginning of the sumber.
First up is my mini mini quilt. We were challenged by our local quilt guild to make tiny mini quilts to swap. The rules were that they had to be less than 10 inches square. I think mine ended up about 2.5" x 7".
Here's the sneak peak I shared on IG to show just how tiny it is:

And the whole thing.   I used a cathedral windows tutorial from Moda Bake Shop and I think I halved the measurements.

The back:

And some close-ups:

Next up is a set of hot pads and hanging kitchen towels I made for a cousin's wrong. I finished binding these in the car on the way to the reception. :)

It's always hard sewing for people who have different tastes in colors and fabric. I got a little bit of advice from the mother, so I hope these went over well!

And the last thing I wanted to show you is this little charity quilt I volunteered to quilt for the guild. The nice thing about charity quilts is that they are good for trying out new skills. 

For the pieced section, I tried out some Baptist fans: 

Then in the negative space I had lots of fun trying out some graffiti quilting:

I think I'll be using these FMQ motifs in the future!

Be back soon!

2015 Swaps

I participated in my first swaps in 2015!  The first was for the Nebo Modern Quilt Guild (see more of that one HERE).  It was so much fun I promptly signed up for two more.  The #schnitzelandboominiquiltswap, and the #pillowtalkswapIGstyle, both on instagram.

I blogged about my SchnitzelandBoo swap HERE.


Here is what I made for the Pillow Talk Swap on IG:

I'm stealing Patti's photos because they are WAY better than mine.  She asked for a Christmas pillow and I was more than happy to oblige.  :)  I pulled out my long hoarded Kate Spain "12 Days of Christmas" charm pack and went to town.  The trees and pinwheels are 3D!  I used Moda's free "Jovial" quilt pattern (find it HERE) and made my blocks half size.  Try as I might to come up with a different idea for quilting, I just had to go with pebbles.  I like how the quilting looks like snow.  :)

For the other side, I cut the rest of my charms into 2.5" squares and pieced them together randomly, with the exception of the white section.  I tried to copy some of the many cute fonts from the fabric for the "Fa la la la la."  Then I quilted the two back panels with petals.  I love how the back turned out!

This pillow was pretty hard to give up, but I scored an AWESOME pillow in return!

This picture does NOT do it justice, but my partner totally made me a Christmas Cathedral Windows pillow.  And she sent me some awesome extras - my favorite being the ornament stuffed with the trimmings from this pillow.  It's darling.  :)


For my last swap of the year, I made this little Wide Open Pouch for our guild Christmas pouch swap.  Since I'm pretty much obsessed with Dresdens still, that's what I went with. 

Wahoo!  These were finishes #8 (pillowtalk swap) and #9 (pouch), from my Quarter 4 Finish-Along list!  Linking up:

Blogger's Quilt Festival: Spinning Dahlia in Bloom

Welcome visitors from the Blogger's Quilt Festival!

I almost didn't enter anything this time around, because I've been so busy sewing things and don't really have anything ready to share yet.  But I just finished this mini and I'm so excited to share it with you!

I made this for the Schnitzelandboo mini quilt swap on IG, and it was SO MUCH FUN!
My partner is a big fan of rainbow color and also loves hearts.  I wanted to challenge myself a little this time, so I took on curved piecing for the second time ever and I think it turned out awesome!

I used THIS paper piecing pattern from Shape Moth for my Dahlia petals.  Then I set the large circle inside the white background using THIS tutorial by Cut to Pieces.  The inspiration for this particular color layout came from THIS amazing photo on IG by birchandbirdsong.  I meant to make the outer edge of my Dahlia look more star-ish, like hers by using all white pieces for the very last section of each petal.  BUT, as things tend to go - I messed up a little by using colored pieces for half of my last sections (does that even make sense?). So I decided to call my mistake a "design element".  Now my Dahlia looks more like a flower and I love that it is it's own design now.  :)

For the quilting, I went with pebbles and swirls in the white section because it just felt right.  For the petals, I stitched in the ditch going the opposite direction because I'm cool like that.  Then I added a little bit of cross-hatching to the very center because it was still a little poofy.  I thought about adding more dense quilting, but my IG friends told me to leave it as is.  I'm so glad I did.  :)
Here's a shot of the back:

I used a charm pack (Meadowbloom by April Rosenthal for Moda - LOVE) for the front of the quilt and since I used nearly every piece, I had to dig through my stash for something to bind it with.  I hope this blue bias stripe/dot print works okay!

 Then I got to use my scraps to make this little mug rug!

 Aren't those little tiny geese so cute?

 I've been a little obsessed with matchstick quilting lately and finally found the perfect project to try it out on.  Of course, this piece is only 6" x 9" so it was really easy.  I LOVE the texture!

Thanks for stopping by!  Since this mini quilt is on the large side (for a mini), I'm entering it into the Small Quilts section of the Bloggers Quilt Festival.   Check out the rest of the entries HERE.

Quilt stats:

Started: September 2015

Finished: October 26, 2015

Fabrics: Meadowbloom by April Rosenthal (Solids are Kona white and Bella Steel)

Batting: Pellon Nature's Touch 100% Cotton

Thread:  Aurifil

Finished size: Approx.  24" x 24"

Recipient: THAT'S A SECRET FOR NOW!

Methods used:  Curved Piecing, Machine Quilting on my home machine

Binding: Bias binding hand stitched to the back; Mug rug - backing sewn by machine to the front

This quilt also happens to be #7 on my Finish Along list.  Yay!

My First Mini!

So... Back in August, I participated in a mini quilt swap with the ladies in my guild.  It was SO FUN.  In fact, since then I have signed up for two more swaps - something I never thought I would do.

Anyway.  My partner for this particular swap said that she loves pastels.  This worried me at first, because I am SO not a pastel person!  But I found a charm pack that I liked - Windham Basic Pastels, and decided to figure out how to use it.  After stewing for awhile on what design to stitch for my partner, I came across THIS MINI QUILT one day in my blog reading and decided that's what I was going to do.

Here it is!

 

My partner happens to be a long arm quilter, so I was a little nervous about the quilting, but I love how it turned out.  The orange peels in the border are a little wonky, but I love the little row of pebbles.  :)

And here's the back.  I just pieced together what was left of the charm pack.  I did remember to add hanging sleeves, although I regretted it later because the binding was really hard to sew around all those layers in the corners.  :s

And here's the mini I received!  My partner knows I love bright, happy colors, so this is PERFECT!  Also, I love this star pattern.  :) 

Doesn't it look great on my sewing room wall?  It's so cute!

Now, onto the next mini.  I have HUGE plans!


This was Finish #7 on my Quarter 3 Finish-Along List.  Wahoo!
 

Mini-Quilt!

Last week I made a commitment to Amy that I would finish this project.  I wasn't sure if I would be able to do it, what with the three month old twins and all.  But it turns out that all I had to do was step away from the computer and just work on it whenever I had a few minutes.  And I finished it with a couple of days to spare!  Wahoo!  To see what other people finished last week, check out the link:

And here's what I did last week:

I made a mini!

I'm thinking of trying the quilt-as-you-go method for quilting my Fandango quilt, since it is going to be another huge one.  However, I've never done it before so I decided to make a mini quilt to test my skills.  It was also a good chance for me to try a couple different quilting styles to see which one I liked best.  So I made mini "out of the box" blocks to practice on, using some fabric from my stash. 
I knew I wanted to quilt straight lines in all the neutral fabric, but everything else was anyone's guess.  These are the designs I tried:

Feathers and pebbles.  I really wanted these to work, but I think it is just too busy.

This one has wavy lines in the border box.  Then for the solid box I just traced around the design on the fabric.  I think I like this one the best.

Loops, meandering, and swirls.  

All straight lines.  Too poofy.

Here is the back.  I think it looks kinda cool.   Even though the four sections don't meet too well in the middle.  Oh well.  One can't be too picky.  I think I like the "wonky" look.

I bound it in this green because I just so happened to have a whole bunch of it already cut and folded.  I've been practicing my machine binding.  Check out my corners!

I found several tutorials for the quilt-as-you-go method.  Two of them were for attaching one block at a time - here and here.  One was for attaching larger sections - here.  And then I found this tutorial after I had already started - genius!  I'll definitely keep this in mind for next time.
I decided to try the first technique and attached each block one at a time, then attaching the rows.  One tutorial suggests putting the overlapping piece on the front, the other suggests putting it on the back.  I tried mine with the overlapping piece on the front, so I could stitch it down by machine and not have the front look funny.  Now that I look at it, I think I will put the overlap on the back next time and try stitching it down by hand to avoid the "strip of fabric sewn on top of everything else" look.  I don't know though.  I'm not too good with hand stitching.  It takes forever.  I think I might also try making my sashing strips just a tad wider, to cut down on bulk. 

The final product is 16 x 16 inches
Fabric is "Pumpkins Gone Wild" by Sandy Gervais - I THINK.  (This fabric was part of a giveaway I won a long time ago.  Who knew I had Sandy Gervais fabric in my stash all this time?!)

Now that this is finished, I have NO IDEA what I'm going to do with it.  What does one do with mini-quilts?