Blogger's Quilt Festival: Why, Hello!

Welcome new people!  Welcome back old friends!

Last year I felt bad that I never thought to share these little minis as part of Amy's Blogger's Quilt Festival.  So I'm sharing them now, even though I made them almost a year ago.  Because they are still one of my most favorite projects EVER.

This is my entry in the "Wall Hanging Quilts" category in the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  Check out the other wall hanging quilts HERE.
Check out the whole festival (it's amazing, people) here:

Actually, this is a set of 13 wall hangings.  Those of you who have been here before have probably seen them already.  They were SO much fun to make.  I made these for my sister who lives on her own and is always looking for new, cute things to decorate her house with.  She has always been a sunny person to me.  She's always happy, she loves yellow, and her favorite thing to say is "Why, hello!"  (in various accents, of course).  So when I discovered April Mae's "Hello Sun" block of the month quilt along I just HAD to play along (she has now made these into patterns - you can buy them HERE).  Instead of making one big quilt, I made 12 minis - so that my sister could switch them out each month.  Then I designed the extra wall hanging for her to keep up all year long and tie everything together.  Here they are!

First, the big one that I designed:


All of the minis together:


And some close-ups of each wall hanging:

January:


February:


March:


April:


May:


June:


July:


August:


September:


October:


November:


December:


I love these because each month is different, yet they all follow the same theme.  I even made another set for myself.  :)


Beginning Nov. 1st, you can vote for your favorite quilts in each category!

Thanks for visiting!  Now go check out all the other entries. 

Shapes Quiet Book

I made another quiet book!  Hurray!  Now I kind of need one more to keep the number even (you know, because I have twins and everything must come in even numbers).

I want to make a series of books that focus on one concept, so I started with shapes.

I wanted to have some sort of shape matching element, but I also wanted the pages to be a little more interactive.  This is what I came up with:

Circle - turn the wheels on the car;  Rectangle - open the door to see the kid.

At first I attached ribbons to all of my loose shapes so they would NEVER be lost from the book (like THIS book I found on Etsy).  But after trying to use the book for one day the tangled ribbons drove me insane so I cut them all off and attached sticky velcro dots instead.  I'm a huge fan of sticky velcro dots now.

Heart - weaving practice;  Star - slide the "shooting star" along the string.

Can you see the error on my "Square" page?

 I didn't.  After all the time I spent sewing, photographing, and playing with it I finally had to have the error pointed out to my by a potential customer in my Etsy shop.  GAH!  So embarrassing!  I had that listing up for days before someone noticed it and pointed it out to me!  Normally I am quite proud of my spelling and proofreading skills.  But the good news is, this customer decided to buy a book anyway!  Wahoo!  You can bet everything will be spelled right this time around.  :)

Square - turn the pages in the book;  Triangle - open the tent flaps to see the bear.

EDIT:  I made a new Square page, but I have to leave the old pictures up here to remind myself to proofread a little better next time.  :)

Some of the pages in our other quiet books are starting to get a little fuzzy where the velcro sticks to the felt, so I tried something new this time.  I sewed a Ziplock baggie (name brand, not the cheap stuff - I didn't want it to rip) to the back for storing the extra shapes.  This way the sticky side of the velcro won't catch on the felt.  So far it's holding up pretty well.

The boys love it.  Especially once I taught them how to match the shapes.  They are both surprisingly good at it!  I LOVE it when my projects pass the toddler test.  :)

Next up:  Colors, letters, and numbers.  :)

This book is for sale in my shop HERE.  (With the correct spelling, of course!)

BYU Growth Chart

I made a new growth chart!  (See my original growth charts HERE).  I love this one even more than the originals.  The Hubby is a little jealous that we don't get to keep it.  I made it for our nephew - his mom requested something a little more grown up, so that he will still love it when he's older.  It was Connor's Daddy who suggested the BYU theme and I think it turned out awesome.  I'm going to start selling these college themed growth charts in my SHOP.  Thanks to my brother and sister-in-law for the inspiration!

It's a little hard to photograph, since it's so long and skinny.  And my yellow walls don't really help much...

So I got a little creative with the photography.  :)

Here's a shot of the back.  I used some of the leftover BYU fabric from the front strip.   I stitched the applique down AFTER quilting, so that it would pop a little more.  That's why you can see the backwards stitching on the back. 

Some close-ups of the Applique:

It's really hard to tell, but I used a light gray ("silver," actually) thread for the quilting lines in hopes that it would stand out a bit from the white.  I think it maybe worked... sort of.

I considered binding this by machine, since machine binding is a tad bit sturdier and MUCH MUCH faster.  But in the end, I've kind of turned into one of those people I always mentally referred to as "binding snobs."  :)  Hand binding is just so fun to do!  And it really does look WAY nicer.  It doesn't feel like work to me when I get to do it in front of the TV.  I think I'll be binding most everything (probably with the exception of baby quilts - since they spend so much time in the washer) by hand from now on.  Coincidentally, I bound this one during the last BYU football game (GO COUGARS), which we WON!!!
I even remembered to include the hanging tabs this time.  Go me!

p.s.  Still loving that walking foot, Mom!  Best investment EVER.

One Block Wonder Quilt Top

I finished my One Block Wonder quilt!

I'm joining in the One Block Wonder Quilt-Along hosted by Jen at Quilter in the Closet.  Check out her blog for more information on how to make a quilt like this:

Basically, this quilt is made from a single fabric, strategically cut and sewn back together.  I cheated a little bit, because I didn't have any cuts of fabric on hand that were big enough.  So I used two similar fabrics from the same line.

First I made 14 hexagons from this African Mask fabric:

Before

After

Isn't amazing how much it changes?

Then I made 12 more hexagons using this African Patchwork cheater print:

Before

After

I did bend the "rules" a little bit on this one.  The book recommends staying away from fabrics with straight lines and angles, but I think some of the blocks turned out pretty cool.  Initially, there were a lot of blocks like the one in the middle that looks like it has a border, but I ended up changing the orientation of the triangles in a few blocks to get more variety.  There were SO many possibilities with this fabric - I wish I had taken more pictures for you...

When I had all my blocks ready, I mixed them all up and sewed them together!

I was going for a sort of gradual "black to white" look

Since I ended up using less than a yard of fabric total (as opposed to the 3 or 4 yards recommended for a full size quilt), and the fact that I cut my triangles smaller than the size given in the book (in order to get as many repeats as possible) my quilt top is pretty small.  About 20 x 24 with 24 total Hexies. 

 

Just a little glamour shot in our gorgeous fall back yard...

I'm really not sure what to do with it at this point.  I could add a border to it (I'm thinking a solid black border, then another border using leftovers from the same prints) and make it a throw quilt.  Or I could turn it into a big pillow.  I think I'm going to do something I rarely do - put this one aside for awhile and let it simmer while I think about what to do with it.  What do you think?

The black and gold gives it kind of a Halloween look, doesn't it?  Especially when you notice the block towards the bottom with the creepy eyes...   Happy October!

This was a really fun quilt to make and I would love to make another, larger one someday.  Thanks for the inspiration Jen!

Check out the link-up HERE.  It will be open until October 30th, and then VOTING BEGINS!  I can't wait to see what everyone else has come up with!

WIP: Taking Stock

I've learned over the past few years that I'm not the kind of girl who likes to work on a whole bunch of projects at once.  I hate leaving things unfinished, so I'd rather finish one project before moving on to the next one.  However, these past few weeks I have been trying to balance several different types of projects - sewing for ME and sewing for my brand new ETSY SHOP.  I think it's time to take stock of what's in the works!

First of all, I got sucked into Jen's One Block Wonder quilt-along.  It's been a good in-between project while I wait for new fabric to come in the mail.  :)  Read about my beginnings HERE.  I'm almost finished with my second set of hexies and then it's layout time!  I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to do with this quilt, but I needed to sew something just for fun.  This is going to turn out really cool.  And the finished product photos will probably be about a million times better than these...

I recently listed custom quilted growth charts in my shop and I'm so happy to have my first order!!!
I'm making a BYU themed growth chart that's going to look awesome when it's finished (GO COUGARS).  I'm just waiting for more fabric to come in the mail.

I'm also making a blue/green/gray growth chart for a little boy who will be arriving soon!  It seems like I need to go fabric shopping again... oh darn.  ;)

But seriously, these are going to be super cute.  I'll keep you posted.

A few months ago (ACK!) I was lucky enough to win a giveaway from Sew Lux Fabric (through Blossom Heart Quilts' Kate Spain blog hop).  (Great service at Sew Lux, BTW.  Super fast shipping too!)  Geez, I think I have a love hate relationship with gift cards!  They are the best kinds of giveaways to win, because you get to choose whatever you want with them, but I sat on my gift card for like three months before I finally decided what to use it on!

I'm thinking about making a puff quilt from these to list in my shop.  But who knows.  Maybe I'll change my mind.  Maybe I'll make a few more bibs/burp cloths for the shop.

I've already got a girly car seat canopy listed in the shop, so I've decided to make a boy version.  I'm thinking of using this fabric with brown minky, mostly because I have SO MUCH of it:

Most of my time lately has been spent on Quiet Books.  I've decided to list a few in the shop and I'm working on samples.  I'm planning to do four different books.  I've got about 1 1/2 in the works right now with the other two in planning stages.

I picked up these flannel chevrons awhile back - I'm thinking more baby items.  Maybe these will be part of a giveaway soon?

And of course, my poor neglected Storm at Sea quilt.  It has been a WIP for a LOOOONG time.  Which is kind of sad, because it's going to turn out AMAZING.  Maybe I'm just nervous about quilting it.  Either way, I've set myself a deadline for this quilt, but it's still pretty far away.  I've designated this my "Sunday" project, so that I'm not tempted to stress over Etsy stuff on Sundays when I should be resting. ;)  I'm about halfway finished with my Snail Trail blocks.  I can't wait to show you what they will look like all together! 

Well, I guess this turned out being a post mainly about fabric.  And my Etsy Shop, which I'm sure you're tired of hearing about.  Yeah, sorry about that.  I promise my next post will be all about quilting!  I better go sew some fabric together!

The Beginnings of a One Block Wonder

Have you heard about the One Block Wonder quilt along happening over at Quilter in the Closet?

When I first saw Jen's quilt in the Blogger's Quilt Festival, I was floored!  The whole thing is made from ONE cut of fabric!   Seriously, you should check it out.  It's amazing.  Luckily, Jen got such a big response to her One Block Wonder quilt, that she decided to host a quilt-along!

I was pretty excited about it at first, but then realized that I might not be able to participate right now due to my current fabric diet.  This quilt requires a large amount of one single fabric.  Finally, I decided to go through my stash and see what I had that was at least a half yard and fit the design requirements.  This is what I came up with:

In the end, I let the Hubby pick for me and he picked the masks:

From that, I cut groups of 6 triangles from exactly the same spot in the print and started putting them together.  It works!  My cutting isn't perfect - I don't have the fancy ruler or pins called for in the book, but I think it's fine.  :)

All 14 hexies are ready for me to decide where to put them in my layout. Cool, huh?  And these all started out as one big cut of the same fabric.

Here's the thing - 14 hexies isn't really enough for a quilt.  Maybe a big pillow.  I'm thinking about making another set of hexies using the other African fabric from my first photo and mixing them in.  What do you think?