Quilted Jonquil

I received a wonderful gift.  It’s hand made, selected just for me and took a lot of time to complete.  A.  LOT.  OF.  TIME.  Which means I must be very special   So what do you think of it?  Isn’t it wonderful?  My DSD (dear step daughter for the uninitiated) made this as a birthday/Mother’s day present.  Thank you so much….it means so much to me.

So where might I hang this?  Well, I spend a lot of time in my office at work, so what better place for something that was made especially for me and makes me smile when I see it?  (And don’t even comment about my messy desk )

And here’s the other gift – the last of the 600 half square triangles for Roll, Roll, Cotton Boll waiting to be trimmed.  Woo hoo a great gift to myself

Aviano, Italy

Aviano grape vines

Reason for traveling to Aviano  Italy, priceless!

Absolutely beautiful!!

Lily & Grandma in Venice

And how about some quilt-y content?  Like a finished quilt?

Lily’s quilt (pattern here) (check out the blue Aviano sky!)

Ciao!

I was supposed to get this completed in Feb to meet Judy’s 2011 UFO Challenge for February.

What I got done was this:

Again, I’m just going to be happy I’m working on this project again and I’m farther along on Feb’s block than I was on Jan’s block by the end of the respective months.

Last night I finally tried my hand at making folded flowers from these instructions.   Here’s the result so far.  Cute, huh?  I was hoping to make some for the AAQI quilt I have in mind but this one, made using 3 1/2″ & 2 1/2″ squares, is too large.

I’m still plugging away at the RRCB half square triangles with 345 of the 600 now sewn and trimmed.

Happy Quilting, Cherie

I don’t know why, but I sometimes start a project and then let it languish.  The itch to resume usually strikes but you never know how long it will take.  I don’t remember when I last hooked on this small project but the date stamped on the canvas was 2002!  I have to bind the edges and I’ve not done that before on linen, only with burlap.  I enjoyed the burlap because it was stiff and was easy to handle…..not so sure about this “floppy” canvas.  It may be awhile before the mood to finish this……or not

I took advantage of the MLK sales and bought some Kona solid (bone) for the sashing and border for the animal blocks.  It is officially a flimsy and I can report ~2.5 yards out on the next stash report.   I’ll be able to report another 2.25 yards out when I finish the backing (which is almost done)!  My design wall is the same color as the Kona bone, but trust me, it’s a flimsy   I love it!

Happy Quilting, Cherie

In my post yesterday about making the book style Kindle cover using the  tutorial from One Pearl Button, I mentioned the changes I made for the smaller Kindle.  Here they are:

2 pieces of fabric for the body of the cover, 15 x 10.5 13.5 x 9.75

2 pieces of accent fabric, 6.5 x 9.25 5.75 x 8.25

2 pieces of sturdy cardboard or book-board, 5.5 x 8.25 5.5 x 8.75 I know this is not smaller but it’s what worked best in mine.  I happened to have some heavy duty plastic, the kind that was an insert in a craft carrying case, and it worked quite well.

I added the elastic before the accent piece on the right side was sewn down. I cut my elastic longer (about 3″) and folded the excess ends under the accent piece and sewed it down at the same time as the accent fabric.  To accomplish this I sewed a scant 1/8th inch from the outside edge.  As I mentioned in my previous post, the Steam-A-Seam was fantastic and was helpful in keeping the elastic ends turned under.  I measured only 2″ from each corner versus 2.5″ for the elastic placement.

Another change I made was to put a layer of batting (13.25 x 9.5) on the wrong side of the outside body fabric to add a little padding.   Next time I will add some fusible interfacing on the wrong side of the outside body fabric where the button will be sewn to give it a little more stability.

Happy sewing,  Cherie

I’ll be traveling over the holidays so this will be my last 2010 Design Wall Monday post……and it’s not my wall, it’s my floor

I made Kindle covers using the tutorial from One Pearl Button here.  The Kindle I was making these for are smaller than the Kindle the tutorial is for so I had to reduce the sizes (I’ll post the sizes in a post tonight, in case your are interested).   I used Steam-A- Seam for the first time and, boy, is it terrific!  The tutorial had you sew down the contrasting fabric then whip stitch the elastic ends.   I thought it would be sturdier to fold the elastic ends under the contrasting fabric so it would be sewed down with machine stitching.   Using the sticky trait of the re-positionable  Steam-A-Seam, I was able to turn the elastic under and have it stay in place.  If you start sewing the contrasting fabric in the middle of a side, you’ll be able to sew all the way around without starting and stopping, nice

Be sure to stop by Judy’s Design Wall Monday post and check out the other design walls, or floors, or beds, or tables!

Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas & Happy New Year to you all!  Cherie

My wall looks suspiciously like last week….with some added bits   I’ve starting working on the backing for Crumbs.  It looks kind of messy but click over to Judy’s DWM post to see neat stuff on other quilter’s design walls.

I also took a couple of 15 minutes to play in between cutting shirts for a quilt that I’m taking with me to Shipshewana for a quilt retreat this week.  More crumb parts….I just can’t stop!!

On a completely unrelated to quilting note, a couple of weekends ago we went to Girard, IL to their Pumpkin Festival.  The main attraction was the pumpkin chunkin’ machines and a trebuchet. Here’s a picture of the Fireman’s cannon right after launching a pumpkin.

There were six total pumpkin cannons….quite the experience!

Have a good week!  Cherie

Last year at about this time Art, the IBOL Guy, put out the call for some bundles of sewing (or knitting) supplies to be distributed to women in Iraq, Iraqi Bundles of Love, IBOL.  Well, he’s organized it again this year…..and he’s not even stationed in Iraq any more.  Way to go Art!  There are two types of recipients this year, directly to the women and, new this time, to sewing co-ops, yea!!   Here’s a picture of one of my bundles from last year.

If you are moved to create a bundle, which you can send in a flat rate USPS box to an AP address, go here and leave Art a comment.  He’ll send you the AP address.  The only catch….bundles must be mailed by Oct 1, 2010!  On the right side, under Pages, there’s a link to suggestions of what to include in the box…..fabric, of course, but also buttons, scissors, pins, thread, beads…..

Just this past weekend I was thinking I’ve never won a blog giveaway.  Some of the giveaways are so wonderful they make you really want to win.  Well today, I did win !!!    !!!  Yippee!!!  THANK YOU, THANK YOU to Scott Hansen of Blue Nickle Studios.  I won the giveaway on this post.  I love that I won the post with the pictures of nickels being painted blue   Here’s the goodies from Market I won.  Looks like a purple bag….I LOVE bags….you can NEVER have too many bags

And here’s a picture of those goodies with the bag of fabric I won!!! You can never have too much fabric either.   WOO HOO!!

I’ve picked up the Folk Style Sampler applique project again.  This is a project from the Australian Patchwork & Quilting magazine.  Here’s the magazine cover with Part II of the two part series.

So I’m busy working on my 6th block which happens to be the block in the top row left or bottom row right.

I’ve completed the other 2 blocks in the both the top and bottom rows as well as the block in the middle since starting this quilt in August 2007.  No typo there, I started this in 2007!!!  Anyway, here’s the progress I’ve made on the block and the block from the completed quilt above.  Notice anything?

I doubled checked the pattern and sure enough, there are two sets of leaves!  At first I thought maybe I’d mismatched the stems from another block….could easily have happened with so much time gone by since I started this project   But no, there are definitely two sets of leaves.

WARNING:  Immediately following the two pictures below is a picture of something dead so don’t page down if you’re squeamish!

I showed a picture a while back of the spike-y plant the squirrels attacked.  Well, here it is now, recovering nicely.  I think I’ll try to hang this on the tree again, but I’ll watch it VERY carefully.

I also showed a picture of a nest in the hanging fern on my front porch.   We’ve since determined it’s a house finch nest.  There were three eggs laid and now we have baby finches, woo hoo!!  Can’t tell yet if there are two hatch-lings or if there’s a third as well.

Here’s to a great Memorial Day weekend!  I know my DH started his off with a bang since he caught a mole this morning that has been VERY busy tunneling up our yard!  THIS IS WAR.  DH has new grass growing in the huge bare spot where previous mole tunnels finally killed off the grass.  Look at those digging feet….talk about specialized!  They are so destructive to the yard but their fur is amazingly soft.  Check out that pointy nose….hey the nose and tail are about the same length.    If you stuck with me to the end, have a fabulous weekend>