Friday, February 28, 2014

February Finishes!

February has been a productive month!

I have been very busy with custom orders lately. Here are a few of the recent one I haven't blogged about yet:
A baby quilt using my Mother Goose pattern in Bonnie and Camille's Ruby fabrics.
A cute patchwork quilt using a custom mix of elephant, giraffe, chevron, grey, orange, green and blue fabrics!
A twin size Aviary quilt in my Hip to Be Square pattern.
Another Vroom quilt!

And finally, I'm happy to report that I finished the quilt that my students created (originally blogged about here).

Linking up to Finish it Up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts, and Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation.

 

Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Work-in-Progress Wednesday

Today's work in progress is actually a group project!

Earlier this year, some of my high school students approached me about helping them create a raffle quilt to raise money for hospice. They wanted to help create the quilt, too, so in January, we met three days after school for about an hour and a half each day.

I've organized several group quilting projects at school, so I thought I'd share some of my tips. First of all, since these group projects often involve people with little or no sewing experience, choose a project that has opportunities for lots of different skill levels. I almost always select a block that involves drawing and/or sewing on a pencil line, such as the snowball block we used for this project. You don't have to worry about quarter inch seams, and the job of drawing diagonal lines is perfect for those who don't want to sew.

(Excuse the blurry faces in the photo above!)

A successful group project involves a lot of prep/set-up. Before we met, I cut all of the 6 1/2 inch blocks and 2 1/2 inch corner blocks because I didn't want to have rotary cutting involved in the skill set! I also made several samples of the various steps so the kids would have an example to look at while they were working. The participants who were drawing the diagonal lines got to match up the fabrics and pin the corner blocks for the sewers.

At first, the kids were hesitant to do the sewing part, but once I encouraged them to try, they were pretty excited about it! We had trouble keeping up with the sewers after a while -- we were drawing diagonal lines and pinning as fast as we could! I had three machines set up (another tip is to set the machine on the slowest speed setting if your machine has this option!). I had the kids chain piece, because this really cuts down on the frustration of thread getting caught or fabric getting eaten by the feed dogs. They worked on two blocks at a time -- since each block had four corner pieces and everything was pinned, this worked very well.

It was really fun watching them work on the layout -- they kept moving things around to try to distribute the various fabrics evenly!


They helped me stack the blocks in order, and I brought them home to sew together. The snowball pattern and variety of fabrics really help disguise any variances in seams!

The kids really enjoyed the process -- by the last day, they were sprinting to the machines to get sewing. I'm looking forward to quilting this and bringing it in to school to show them the finished product!

Linking Up to Work in Progress Wednesday at Freshly Pieced and Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation.

 

Tuesday, February 18, 2014

Tuesday Finishes

I have two quilt finishes to share today (thank you, Olympics and snowstorms!)
The first is a baby quilt featuring the adorable main print from The Fox and the Houndstooth by Andie Hanna for Robert Kaufman fabrics. I paired it with the small black gingham by Riley Blake fabrics, and a large print chevron for the backing.
And, speaking of chevrons, I finally made a new version of my Chevron Chic quilt pattern, using the lilac palette of Shelburne Falls by Denyse Schmidt.

Love this palette -- it actually goes quite well with the Pantone color of the year, Radiant Orchid.

Linking up to Quilt Story's Fabric Tuesday (who gave me a lovely shout out for my Pinwheel Sampler quilt, by the way -- thanks so much!)

Saturday, February 15, 2014

Valentine Finishes

In keeping with the colors of Valentine's Day, here are two finishes from this week (these just needed binding, so they were pretty easy to finish!)

The first is in the "Twice as Nice" fabrics collection by The Quitled Fish for Riley Blake fabrics.

The second quilt uses a combination of Ruby, Bliss and Vintage Modern, all by Bonnie and Camille for Moda fabrics:

I am loving all the pink, red and aqua!

Linking up to Finish It Up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts and Whoop Whoop Friday at Confessions of a Fabric Addict.

 

Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Pinwheel Sampler

I finished my pinwheel sampler quilt while watching the Olympics last night! I used the tutorials from Rachel's pinwheel sampler quilt-along at p.s. I quilt.

I am excited about the way it turned out! I especially love the mini pinwheel blocks used as cornerstones in the sashing.

I had a hard time choosing the backing, but since I loved the teal colors in the top, I went with a blue and green Kaffe Fassett print ( the bonus was that I got it on sale for about $7.50 a yard).

I also had a couple of small finishes. Last week, I made a custom quilted pillow sham out of the Set Sail collection by Birch Fabrics, and I had enough pieces leftover to make two 16 inch pillow shams:

Linking up with Quilt Story's Fabric Tuesday!

 

Thursday, February 6, 2014

Tumbler Quilts

I finished two quilts this past week that have something in common -- tumblers!

The first is from an older Riley Blake collection by Doohickey Designs called Fox Trails -- still one of my favorite boy or gender-neutral collections! Love the color scheme and the prints! I still have more in my stash, but this might be my last tumbler quilt from this fabric line!
The second tumbler quilt is from a newer Riley Blake collection called Sasparilla by October Afternoon. I purchased a set of half yards almost as soon as the collection was released, but the fabric has been sitting in a basket waiting for me to cut it ever since! I had a break between custom orders last week because I was waiting for materials to arrive, so I decided it was time to sew some Sasparilla!

How cute is that cowboy/ cowgirl print on the back?!

I even added a few extra rows of tumblers to the back! (By the way, all the tumblers were cut using the Accuquilt 6 1/2 inch tumbler die -- one of my favorites)!

Linking up to Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation and Finish It Up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.

 

Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Work in Progress Wednesday

Remember last Wednesday when I blogged about these?

Well, in the space of one week, they have become this:

Ready for trimming and binding!

The blocks are very addictive, and once I got started, I just couldn't stop!

The pattern to make this quilt (in multiple sizes) is available in both my Etsy and Craftsy shops.

Here's my latest WIP:

The fabric is from the Shelburne Falls collection by Denyse Schmidt. Yes, there is more triangle trimming on the horizon!

Linking up to Quilt Story's Fabric Tuesday, and Work-in-Progress Wednesday at Freshly Pieced!