Wonky Stars finished

Right after I finished last weeks entry I went to my sewing room and started working on my Wonky Stars quilt. I decided to use my standard ‘meander’ for quilting and just ‘get it done’!

A few hours later (including breaks) the quilting was done!

Now to pick out binding… I wanted something to carry the halloween theme so I searched my stash and found this black & white stripe – Perfect!!

I quickly cut the 2.5 strips, pieced them together and ironed it in half. I had the quilt up on my design wall so I pinned the binding on to make sure I knew where to start the sewing so no piecing seams landed on the corners (I learned that lesson the hard way many years ago!!)

After a break for lunch and to watch some football, I finished off the binding later that afternoon and now I have a finished quilt!! Yay!!

Of course I no sooner got this one finished when I got the itch to start something new. Sarah of Confessions of a Fabric Addict always has plenty of ideas posted on her blog and one of her most recent projects is making a Christmas quilt using her postage stamp tutorial. I’ve made one of these before in random scraps and it really came together fast. I went searching for all the red & green Christmas fabrics I could find in my stash and wouldn’t you know it I found a FQ bundle of Holliberry by Corey Yoder!! What? When did I get that? Oh yeah, it was from the FQ club at Fat Quarter Shop – ‘Doh, I completely forgot about it!

Sarah is making her quilt with 2.5 strips but I’m going to use 3.5 strips like I did on my last one. To make a 60×72 quilt I’ll need approx 24 FQ’s, this bundle only had 12 pieces… and two of those pieces are a gray colorway that I don’t want to use. Luckily I have enough ‘other’ Christmas fabrics that will make up the difference – whoopie! I plan to get started today – wish me luck!

That’s all for now… have a great rest of your weekend!!

Village quilt – Tada!

I FINALLY started quilting the Village quilt Friday evening and finished binding it late yesterday evening – after all the ‘hemming & hawing’ it feels really good to have it done!

I snapped a few pictures to document my progress – this is a picture of the quilting a quarter of the way done, it shows up better on the backside. I used two pieces of yardage to make the back.

Here’s a similar shot half way done…

The quilting is done…now on to squaring it up and binding

And here’s the big reveal… front & back

Here’s a close up of the binding, I wanted something multi-colored – I found this in my stash for the WIN!!

I used a different spray baste product this time and although it went on well I had to keep re-ironing the backing before quilting each section to ‘reactivate’ the hold. I was so hopeful about this one because it’s by the same company that makes HeatnBond and I’m not sure if it was the spray baste or the fabric that was causing the issue. The yardage was from Connecting Threads and it had a slinky, slippery feel to it so I’m thinking that may have been the issue because I didn’t have any problems on the top. I’ll try it again on my next quilt and see what happens!

That’s about all for now…have a great rest of your weekend

Another quilt done

I finished up the Bonus Blocks quilt yesterday and I’m really happy with it. I struggled for several hours about how I wanted to quilt it and finally decided on a variation of orange peels… or I think that’s what it’s called, lol

After I squared it up I realized I had enough backing scraps to make the binding so that’s what I did. Since a few of the strips were already sewn together I just went with a straight seam instead of bias seams for the binding strips. I really like how the gray frames up the top…and it might just be my new favorite for binding in the future!

I also got the backing made for the Criss Cross quilt, I’ve had this print in my yardage bin for far too long and it seemed perfect for this quilt since the words are colors! I plan to get outside today to spray baste it so it will be ready for quilting when I get back from my business trip (see below).

In other non-quilting related news…we still don’t have all our furniture in the new house yet!! I’m getting really good at ‘minimalist’ living – ha! I have a business trip to Chicago next week and will be gone Monday – Friday, UGH! So, no quilting for me and no furniture either 😦  DH promises we’ll get it moved the first week in May – yeah, right…we’ll see!!!

We have our first guest planned for a visit May 20th…that should give him extra motivation!

We’re getting used to the area and ventured out last week to a Mexican restaurant on the beach called Banditos. The food was really good but the views were even better!!

And yesterday was so beautiful, DH took the Corvette out of the garage for a ‘top-down’ drive to the beach for lunch at Bummz. I could get used to this!!

That’s all for now…have a great rest of your weekend 🙂

Quilt for Pulse – done

I finished up the #quiltsforpulse quilt this evening, Yay…just in time for the fireworks!

I pulled this lovely, almost rainbow striped fabric from my stash to use as the binding and I tried a different technique for sewing it on…I wish I could remember whose blog I saw it on because I would so totally give them all the credit they deserve!

Essentially, after you sew the binding to the front, use a ruler to mark a 1/8″ line on the back – beside the line of stitching you just did to sew it to the front. Then when you turn the binding to the back you line up the edge with the drawn line and sew close to that edge. Of course I’ll need a little more practice to get better but I’m really happy with the results. The binding is even on both sides and the stitches almost don’t show on the front side (except for where I got off the mark two times and sewed into the binding – I didn’t take any pictures of that!!)

I’ve got it in the wash now with 2 color catchers just to be on the safe side. I’ll  mail it out this week, hoping it brings someone a little comfort…ttfn…

 

 

HST Sampler done!

I put the finishing touches on the binding this evening and I’m calling this done (save for the label)!

I made this quilt following along with Amanda at 3and3quarters who started the QAL back in October. This is my second quilt made with Amanda – I just love her designs and her teaching style is easy to follow, never intimidating.

I purchased a layer cake of Michael Miller Happy Dots from Missouri Quilt Co and used Kona White from my stash for the background. When I was almost done making all the blocks I bought the backing and the binding fabric from 5bucksayard.com. She offers good quality fabric at very reasonable prices (as the name states).

I’m just so tickled with how this turned out!! I did free motion stippling in the blocks and used a straight stitch on the sashing and borders to create a frame for each block (thanks for that suggestion Amanda!). I decided to cut the binding on the bias to add a bit of movement on the edges…this was quite nerve wracking as it was my first time cutting & sewing with bias binding but I think it worked out very well.

Now I just need to decide if I’m keeping this one or offering it for sale…either way this definitely gives me confidence to pull out one of my unfinished ‘sandwiches’ and do more free motion quilting…weeeeee!

ttfn and…G’night

Patchwork Pumpkin table runner (#1) DONE!

I finished off the table runner this evening. As I mentioned earlier, I extended the binding seam on the front so when it wrapped around the back there was more equal distribution of fabric…and I like it much better!

I decided to use Pat Sloan’s method for sewing the binding by using a blanket stitch and the ‘mirror’ button on my new machine. In the video she stitched her binding to the back and wrapped it to the front…I did the opposite. It came out just fine because I used a dark brown thread and you can’t hardly see it on the front or the back (that helps hide mistakes too!).

Here are the final pictures…sorry for so many but I’m really tickled with how this turned out!!

I just love how the pumpkin and FMQ is echoed on the back!

close up of binding stitches on front…you can’t really see them…

you can probably see them a little better on the back

The really cool thing is I no sooner posted finished pictures to Facebook & Instagram and I got an order to make one for my friend in California! And another friend called to tell me how great it looks and said she’s going to go buy fabric so I can make her one.  I’m extremely flattered!!!

I played around with some other fabrics this evening and made another pumpkin, this time using a single fabric instead of patchwork…I think this may become another table runner, for no one in particular…yet  😀

That’s all for now…G’night!

Almost done…almost

I’m entering the final stretch in finishing the Quilt-Along-With-Me from 3and3quarters.

Tonight I finished all the quilting by putting some simple straight lines in the black sashing and the border. Then I cut off the excess backing and binding and squared up the quilt…don’t tell my husband but I used our dining room table as my work table – I just couldn’t crawl on the floor any more!

I have no idea what that weird yellow circle is in the middle of the table…must have been caused by the flash!

Here’s a shot of it all squared up…squeeee!

While I was finishing up the quilting I decided I would use a scrappy binding of the yellow patterned fabrics that I used in the top. It should frame up the black border and make nice contrast for the soft yellow polka dot backing – at least that’s how it looks in my head!

The blanket is 56″ square so I calculate I need 224″ plus 12″ extra for joining, then divide that by 40″ (WOF) which works out to 6 strips (the fabric is approx 44″ WOF but I like to use 40″ in my calculations that way I always have enough!). I only have three of the yellow pattern fabrics left over so I cut two, 2.25″ strips from each and pieced them together using a diagonal join. Finally, I pressed it in half and wound it up into a nice ball, now I’m ready to attach the binding – tomorrow!

I’m so excited to be ‘almost’ done. After the binding I just need to add the label…hmmm, what am I going to use for the label? Oh boy, now I need to start thinking about that!

That’s all for now…G’night!

Whoop Whoop – Feathers is all done!

As I’ve said, I just love doing the binding because it means I’m almost done – and since it’s been raining all day I was able to focus and “get ‘er done”!

Here’s a couple shots of my successes and issues with my first attempt at ‘stitching the binding from the top’ – ha, I’m sure there’s a more formal name for it but I can’t seem to find it. So to sum it up, you sew the binding on the front as usual but instead of stitching the binding on the back side you fold it over to the back but stitch ‘in the ditch’ of the binding on the FRONT. The trick is to catch the binding on the back without being able to see what you’re doing :-s

I was pretty successful on the straight away – I pinned it like crazy!

And two of the corners turned out well – here’s one of them (sorry, it’s a little blurry).

The problems came on two of the other corners – I guess I didn’t pin well enough because I missed in a couple of places. Not only did I miss once, but I tried sewing over it a second time and I missed it AGAIN! LOL!

Here’s the other corner where I missed. I decided to just sew these few areas by hand as I stitched up the mitered corners.

Here she is all done!

I’m a little bummed that I didn’t get the binding stitches lined up in this corner…so…after it comes out of the washer/dryer I may undo this section and try again.

I’m pretty darn happy with the overall quilt and can’t wait to offer it up to my friends on Facebook.

That’s it for now…I’m off to watch the ACMs!

G’night!

Quilting done…on to Binding

I stopped while I was quilting last night to grab a picture. I’ve been meaning to mention how much I’m LOVING my walking foot – it has made all the difference when quilting to keep my fabric from puckering. Wow, something so small can have a huge impact!!

You can see in the picture that I’ve marked my quilting with pencil lines – no worries it’s water soluble so it’ll come out in the wash; actually some of the first lines I marked are barely noticeable now. I used the blue Clover Water Soluble Pencil.

I finished up the quilting this morning by adding a few rounds of framing stitches on the tangerine border. Next, I laid it out on the floor and squared it up to so it’s ready for binding.

Here’s a better shot of the quilting – simple straight lines mimicking the center diamonds, which created their own diamond pattern…pretty cool!

I plan to use the same fabric as the back for binding which will create a contrast on the front but will blend in on the back.

This is the part I love the most…Binding…it means I’m almost done! I’ll machine bind this quilt; I’ve tried hand binding (once) and didn’t really love it so I’ll stick with the machine. This time I’m going to try stitching the binding through the top – check out this post for a better explanation. Since the binding matches the backing fabric it’ll be a bit more forgiving if I should mess up

It’s been raining all morning and it’s supposed to keep doing that for the rest of the day…so I guess there’s nothing else to do but stay in my sewing room! 🙂

ttfn…

Jungle Babies Finished

As I stated yesterday, I needed to go to Hobby Lobby to get fabric for the binding on Jungle Babies and shortly after posting that I hopped in the car and went.

I was looking for a leafy green print of some sort that I thought would help balance all the red on the top. I only brought a photo of the quilt with me so it was a little hard to match the color and as luck would have it, the fabric I bought turned out to be a few shades brighter than I really wanted, ugh. I also got a 1/2 yard of Kona Snow for making labels and of course while I was there I just HAD to look at the remnants and clearance bins!

When I got back home I immediately cut the green fabric into binding strips and pieced them all together. I then sewed the binding to the top and decided I would try my hand (no pun intended) at hand stitching the binding to the back of the quilt.

Again I made the mistake of using straight pins to hold the binding in place as I sewed – jeez you think I would’ve learned that lesson already! After a few ‘sticks’ it dawned on me that I should be using the binding clips I bought! duh! I was getting tired and my eyes were starting to get blurry so that was my cue to stop for the night.

This morning I got up, replaced the pins with clips and finished the hand stitching. Now the real test will come when I wash it!! I’m so worried it’s all going to come undone!!! lol

Last but not least, I added the label. I first had to go to the store and get some freezer paper so I could print the label on the Kona Snow using my inkjet printer. I had a few false starts but I finally got it to work right (helps when you load the paper/fabric in the right direction!!). Finished measurements are 31 x 38.

Now I just need to figure out where this little blanket is going. When I finished Bunnies & Owls I posted pics on my Facebook page and offered it ‘free to good home’; one of my neighbors snatched it up for one of her granddaughters. I guess I’ll do the same thing with this one, although the odd colors might mean this one gets donated. That’s ok, as long as someone ends up with it I’ll be happy 🙂