fnsi#10

abby's road, top complete

fnsi#11

playing around with the darning foot on my machine. not too shabby, but not exactly scaleable

fnsi#12

playing the "stuff on my kitty" game

fnsi#13

strips of leftovers for the binding on abby's road

fnsi#14

sorry it's sideways. one long, colorful strip of binding

fnsi#15

the backing material I found for abby's road...how perfect is it??? it turns out it's actually polyester though which I'm not crazy about. it's meant for scrubs though.

ninjas kick butt

the final pic of the first quilt for kids

all dressed up and no place to sew

finished putting the borders on this between pulling on a skirt and putting on makeup. go me! :D

first BOM

here's my first block of the month for mothertown!

Pics from Yesterday's Exploits

Nick walked into my sewing room a few minutes ago, took a look around (I expanded my doodle wall a bit) and said "You're so OCD, I love it."  I was confused, but then realized he meant ADD.  That I can't argue with.  Here's the day's rundown: 

Mai's quilt, a quick update.  I did a total of 5 blocks today, and that was enough to mull on.  I'm not sure where I'm going with it, but I have high hopes.  We'll see. 

Soaking the squares for Alishia's quilt so I could take the paper off.  This was the bulk of the day, and it took FOREVER to get done.  My fingers were pruney, but...

Eventually it started coming together. 

A quick close up of Mai's squares, rearranged a bit. 

Some of the paper I took off of Alishia's blocks. 

Taadaa!  All the blocks I have done for Alishia's quilt so far. 

And finally, my two favorite boys, in eerily similar positions. I love these boys.  One of them needs some teeth pulled though...unfortunately, not the human one.  :-(  

Anyways, I hope everyone had a great weekend!  

Pics from Last Night

Here are a few pics from last night:

I had Nick pick out the border fabric for me.  I think he picked just right...I don't know what it says, but Asian lettering seems perfect for a ninja quilt.  :0)

But of course, it ended up being too good to be true...

I used up all I had (I think this was a remnant), and came up literally inches shy of completing the thing.  *insert primal scream at midnight here*  Nick laughed and said he had faith I could fix it.  I ended up using a black & white flower thing that's about the same color densities, so it's not terribly noticeable.  I think.  I'll post another picture when I'm done with the whole thing and you can tell me if you can see it.

This one isn't from last night, it's from 5 minutes ago.  My first two Hunter's Star blocks!  I tried using my flying geese template, since I don't have one of the speedy ones, and tried my best to follow these directions. Of course, not having anything to base my sizes off of made it a little more of a challenge, but I think they turned out pretty ok for winging it!  The plan is to have the star points be fabrics that read black and red, and the middles to be fabrics that read white, with some black patterns for the darker ones.  If that makes sense.  The blocks ended up being about 9 1/2 inches (so 9 inches sewn together).  We'll see if I can keep it up.  I really like the star point fabrics.  The red one almost looks Hawaiian, when you see it all laid out.

Oh, and that's pinned up on my new design wall.  :-D  I like having stuff up there...I can see it and be inspired by it, but it's not cluttering up work surfaces.

Back to work!

just because i can...

first thing up on my new design wall! ok, it's really a sheet pinned to the wall, but still...it works! I wish i'd thought of this when I was doing mom's quilt!!

Don't Judge Me...

I got me some flannel bolt ends while it's on sale at joann. happy sigh.  All the stuff in the bag cost me around $17.  I am SO the bargain queen! 

Quilts for Kids

starting on the quilts for kids quilt tonight. the focus print is ninja stuff :)

Quick Update While I'm Waiting for a Towel...

I'm still in NZ, but didn't bring a towel with me...there's no point in buying one since I'll only need one (maybe two) more showers until I go home, so I need to borrow one...but the front desk doesn't open til 9.  It's still 830.  Quel fromage.  For now, you get an update of projects completed before I left the northern hemisphere:

The SAPD I Spy donation quilt, paired with Levi's baby blanket (the SAPD one was donated in Levi's name per my new year's resolution to donate one quilt for every quilt I make for a friend or family member...so far I'm up one on the donation front, we'll see how long that lasts):

Here are the two donation quilts I sent to SAPD:

The pink one is just fleece squares sewn together and cut rag-style, then bound with pink stuff I used on Mom's quilt.That's the "I'm one-up so far" quilt...that one is in Arman's name, who's Zain's kid, who's requesting my first commissioned quilt.  :-) 

There's a fabric store here (Dunedin), so of course I picked up a couple more fat quarters.  Not as interesting as the other ones, but still local and pretty.  Today, I'm off to explore the outer edges of the city, including Baldwin Street (the steepest street in the world) and the Botanical Gardens.  I'm excited.  :-)

new project!

of course as soon as I'm leaving, a new kit comes in! this is for quilts for kids...now I have 2 weeks to scheme about how to quilt this one.

WHIM number 1

all these are tshirts from high school that I'm going to make into a tshirt quilt...any inspirational patterns?

First Guild Meeting!

Tonight, I went to the monthly meeting for the Mothertown Guild, in Lancaster.  It was so much fun!  I learned to do English paper piecing:

Seems like it could be fun if I cut the pieces before a long road trip...not sure I can bring needles on a plane though, so I'm pretty sure I won't try this weekend. Actually...this makes it seem like I could bring needles but not scissors of any kind.  I'm not sure I want to bring sewing stuff to New Zealand, but maybe for the next trip. 

I had a lot of fun at Mothertown tonight.  Everyone was super nice, and they even invited me to their retreat!  I'm not sure if I'll be able to make it or not, but it would be nice to get away for a weekend...well, get away with other women for a change.  We'll see.

So some pictures of the latest projects:

Here's Alishia's quilt.  I was doing the numbers:

And figured out that, in order to make a twin-sized quilt it'd be best to add an inch of sashing between each block.  I was debating the darker fabric above, but I don't think I'll have enough.

Instead, here's the lighter fabric I like...it's cream/tan roses (called "tea time" I think).

Here's the pre-hand-stitched fleece blanket.  With any luck, I'll have this and the I Spy quilt done by Thursday, in time to ship to SAPD on Friday.  

Picture Update!

Finally, some pictures!  

The weekend's spoils:

This took less time than you'd think to iron and fold.  It's also bigger than it looks in the picture...this heap filled my hamper to the top and then some.  :-)

Now, the I Spy quilt for SAPD c/o Project Linus.

Starting the I Spy quilt:

More I Spy:

More I Spy:

 

The kitty spies (don't worry, I'll be washing this before I send it in...incidentally, if anyone has recommendations for what laundry detergent works best on pet allergens, I'm all ears):

 

The front done:

 I am TOTALLY in love with the blue stuff I used between blocks...it's a batik from the remnants bin.  God, I love the remnants bin!  :-D

With batting and backing:

 The backing is a blue flannel with tugboats and lighthouses.  <3

Also for SAPD, here's the fleece rag blanket:

 The top three rows are sewn together.  The bottom 5 aren't yet. The pink edging is the same stuff I used for my mom's quilt.  :-)

After a 3-day binge of daily Joann's visits (three different stores I might add), my closet looks like this:

Don't judge. :-D

So that's the wrap up for now. I'm taking a break from doing the binding on the I Spy quilt. I'm about halfway done...this is only the second binding I've done by hand (I did my mom's all by machine...epic fail), and already I feel way more comfortable about it.  I'm hoping I can get it done tonight so I can have something to show tomorrow night (maybe) at my first ever Quilters' Guild meeting...I won't be able to be a member, since membership is limited to 50 and this particular one is already full, but I really want to go make friends.


Oh!  Speaking of friends, I totally gave advice at Joann's today!  This girl was asking about batting, and she was making her first quilt.  I was so excited for her (she was about my age), I wanted to hug her and tell her to come be my friend lol.


And on that note, I'm off to finish this binding.  Night all!

Brilliance!

So while I was describing an I Spy quilt I'm working on to a coworker today, he wondered if there were any way of doing a Where's Waldo quilt.  Does anyone out there know of anywhere that I could find Where's Waldo fabric?  I'm sort of thinking of making something like this a trademark...like, hide something silly somewhere on the quilt.  I'm not sure what it'd be though.  I'll have to think about this some more. 

In any case, if you know where I could find this fabric, let me know.