Brittney's quilt for Alyssa

My Granddaughter Brittney has been wanting to make a quilt for her little sister for a while now.  We've even had the fabric bought for a couple of months.  We've had the darndest time getting a sewing machine for Britt to work on the project at home, or getting her over to G&G's to work on it.

The other day, Britt's little sis Alyssa was at the store with her Mom and spotted this Sponge Bob fabric.  She was actually hugging the bolt of fabric till her Mom bought her some to hold for herself!  When I heard this, I had to tell her that was the exact same fabric Britt had picked out.

 

Here's another view - Alyssa had just been woke up from her nap and it was a little hard getting a good picture of the both of them.

And matching dolly quilt

Here's another shot of the new baby quilt top - along with the complimentary dolly quilt. Granddaughter will have a new quilt for her doll when Mommy and Daddy have the new little brother wrapped up in his quilt!!

Now I 'just' have to get them quilted, put the binding on, and get them to Virginia in time for the baby's arrival. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

New Baby Quilt

I've got a new grand-baby coming, and I got busy making a quilt for him! While DD#2 was home for Christmas she approved the new quilt pattern I'd gotten and wanted to try from Quilt in a Day called Day and Night.

She picked out the colors, and I got to pick out the fabric. You can see in the close-up below that the blue / black fabric looks almost like water, and I think the yellow / gold secondary fabric compliments it nicely. I've even got the binding all ready for when it comes back from the quilter.

While both of these fabrics came from the nearby Wally World - they are both very nice fabrics that worked up really nicely. I know some quilters wouldn't dream of putting 'cheap' fabric in a quilt, this pre-washed very nicely, sewed up just great, and it just doesn't make sense to me to spend $8-$10 for Quilt Shop fabric when you really can find good quality material like these for so much less. I figured with the 5 yards I bought for this and an upcoming project, I saved a good $25 - $30!!


I will agree that not all the fabrics found at discount stores are quilt quality, if you look closely, buy smart and check it by pre-washing and evaluating the fabric along the way, you can make some good smart decisions when it comes to buying fabric.

I'm heading back to the sewing room to work on the second project for this fabric. Stay tuned!!!

Christmas Tree Wall Hanging

Once again I saw something on someone's blog, maybe it was a pattern, or someone's picture on a quilting board, but I saved a picture of a primitive Christmas tree that I really liked. I I kept thinking about it - and the other day I decided I wanted to make it - NOW!! I'm impulsive like that..... to the right is the inspiration piece.



I discovered it was a tree in a Leisure Arts book of wall hangings. Since I didn't have time to get the book and get the wall hanging done, I decided to do my own style.

This is 30 X 11 inches. I first took a 26 X 7 inch piece of muslin and layered it over batting and muslin backing. I then sewed down 2.5 inch strips of the border fabric, flipping and pressing each piece in turn. This secured all 3 layers together.
Next I picked out several green pieces of scrap and applied Wonder-Under to each of the wrong sides. With a pair of scissors I cut random 'layers' of each and began layering them on the top. I also had a piece of tone on tone brown that I used for the trunk and bits in between the branch layers. I found a bit of gold to use for the star.


Once I had everything where I wanted them, I removed the paper backing of the fusible and fused it all down.


Simple and quick zig-zag machine quilting secured the pieces and accented the edges. My machine skipped and wandered in a couple of places but I left it - adding to the prim look of the piece.



I used gold metalic thread around the star.
Two bias strips of the border fabric were used in the upper corners of the back so it could hang easily.
Binding was cut and applied and it was finished!

Though I like how it turned out - I want to change it up some too. I think I might make a companion piece or two with some of the remaining pieces....maybe try to get closer to the inspiration piece.  Those will have to wait for now though....I've put off cleaning the house too long already!!

I couldn't help myself when I noticed all the small scraps of the above project - so I began cutting them into little pie shaped pieces and assembled them on another panel of muslin, fused, satin stitched them down and echo quilted them for this cute little mini forest.  It became a gift to my twin.

Christmas Table Topper

I saw a show from Quilt in a day for a small wall hanging. Later as I was looking through some of my Christmas fabrics I found some Santa fabric that just called to me to be fussy cut. This is the result.

Most of it is machine quilted in the Quilt as you go style with gold metalic stitches through the 4-patches and criss-crossed in the middle square.

There are 9 pieces that were layered and quilted, then all were put together with the green sashing/joining strips. It was super easy to do. The 4 patches were made first - with the decorative stitches along the seam lines creating the quilting.

The Santa squares were centered on top of the batting and backing and the white frame was added via the stitch and flip method, then the corner triangles were added. I lost a tiny bit of the points on the frames, so next time I will make the frames a bit smaller to prevent this.

I think it needs a bit more quilting to help it lay good and flat so I will probably add some hand quilting too - but later. I'm thinking some hand quilting on the white frames around each Santa, and maybe even some squares inside each of the 4-patches.

12 days of Christmas

The 12 days of Christmas was an early tradition in my hubby's and our family. At the time, we had aunts and uncles enough that we each drew a name out of the hat and that was to be our part in singing "The 12 days of Christmas". Ages ranged from the 70's down to our youngest who then was about 6 or 8 years old. We had a lot of laughs as Aunt Eleanor, Uncle Buddy, or our young ones would miss their cue for their part, or even forget their part all-together. But each year we made it through and were only then rewarded with being able to open our gifts.


When I discovered that Nancy Halvorsen had designed this panel - well I knew I had to have it to remind me of our past tradition.

I am gradually embellishing the panels with crystals, beads, buttons and stitching, and imagine each year (for a while anyway) will be adding to this panel.

I have since discovered that Shelly Rasche has also designed a panel.  I may have to try to find that one as well.

Cell phone case from HGTV Pajama party

The girls at the HGTV board had a pajama party last night and we made cell phone cases. I had a blast.  Here is the cell phone case that I made with the butterflies.  It fits the phone nicely and will protect it from those nasty scratches.    After I was done with that I still wanted to do something else and I'd been struggling with wanting to do another needle case for take along projects.  The second pic is the result.  I made the pocket only about 2 1/2 inches up from the bottom and put magnetic cards that I cut up from a larger sheet.

 These hold my needles that are threaded. I could fit cards of 8 - 10 colors. There is a folded pair of scissors under the tan needle flap held with elastic (extension of elastic holding the seam ripper). It all rolls up just right. The green felted material I used for the lining is a bonus thread catcher!! 

Nativity Backdrop

Ever since I got my Willow Tree Nativity set, I've had this piece in mind, wanting to make a backdrop for the set. Today I finished it. I saw a picture a year or so on the internet that gave me this idea. I'm sorry I can't give credit to whomever inspired me, but I want to Thank them all the same.


These are 3 different panels - They are basically envelopes with cardboard inserts to make them stand up. Two of the panels are just plain fabric. The Third is layered with various neutral fabrics cut to make houses or buildings representing Bethlehem.


These will sit on the shelf above the TV which is 51 inches across. By assembling them in panels, I can change where the buildings are, and with a different setting, I can have the background be anywhere from 19 inches across to 57 inches! You can see on the right hand picture where I've just taken 2 of the panels, and set them in a V - so the nativity figures can go right in the foreground.  Click on the photo to enlarge it.


I don't have my set out of the storage just yet, but I will soon and I will show you an update on how it all looks together.
I still want to figure out how to get the star of Bethlehem in there.....so I'll keep thinking on that.

My Willow Tree Nativity set is in place - I Love how it looks.

There's a great contest over at Piece N Quilt with more links to great holiday Ideas.  Click on the button below to see more.

Twisted Table Topper

I've been working on this for a while now. I'm still so slow (or maybe it's because I've got too many projects going at one time). It's done enough to count now and I can show it. I enlarged the Twisted Table Topper enough to better fit my oak table. Each fabric is quilted differently, but all with the 'big stitch' quilting. I'm pretty tickled with it and wanted to share.

Update:  I've added some raggy strips around the center circle to give it more the appearance of the sunflower that I wanted.  I'm very happy with the results, but making a mental note that the batik I used for this didn't ravel quite like I expected.  Still a positive result.

D9P Done!

Well, it's sure been a long time since I've updated this - I have been working on items as I can, but kept thinking I'd have something actually finished to show - and now I finally do! This is Brian's own quilt. It turned out 60 X 80 so it's plenty big for snuggling in the recliner or even stretching out on the couch and no cold tootsies!
I used warm and natural batting and a found flat sheet for the backing. The focus fabric was from Stuff n' Such http://www.stuffnsuchdowns.com/ and I knew I had to have it when I saw the woodworking print. The girls from the HGTV Quilting board helped me figure out the colors to put with it way back when.

This is the first time I've tried hand quilting with 'The Big Stitch'. I was experiementing, learning and discovering with this. I tried both with a large hoop and without, with 3 different threads, and several different sizes of needles. I found that I preferred using a hoop, a size 7 emroidery needle worked the best for me, and there really wasn't a lot of difference to me whether I used the perle cotton or the floss, but I much preferred the perle cotton on a spool than messing with the skeins of floss. I also learned there is a lot of variety in hand thimbles. Some I liked, most I didn't! I finally settled in on the Comfort Thimble that is the most comfortable for me.