Thursday, February 26, 2009

Panel Quilts


Do you do panel (aka cheater) quilts? People seem to either hate them or love them. I have picked up a few panels at various sales but have not made to many of them up. I put a couple of borders on this one last year and there it sat till last week when I finally got it quilted and bound.

I figured with the economy the way it is I might go ahead and make up the ones I have. When I do the fall craft shows they can be a less expensive alternative to my pieced baby/kids quilts and this will also get them out of my stash once and for all.

Kathie

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Shelly's Quilt


I have to give you some history on this quilt. I started quilting a little over ten years ago. Shortly after that I found a group of yahoo quilters and started daily communications on-line. Several of us seemed to click and we broke off and formed our own private club. We not only have discussed quilting but shared our lives. We have been there together through illness, births, deaths and other major life events even though we are spread out from Texas all the way to New Hampshire.

Several years ago, shortly before I was going to have the opportunity to actually visit her in person, we lost one of our members to cancer.

Sue in Texas is going to be involved in a relay for life this spring. She made the center block of this little wall hanging and we each added a simple border to it. I quilted it yesterday and it will be winging its way back to Texas later today. The wall hanging will be sold to help raise funds for relay for life in Shelly's memory.

Here is to you Shelly, we still miss you and think of you often.

Kathie

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Christmas Quilt #2


The last few days I have been finishing up the second Christmas quilt top. This is another one made scrappy. I love scrap quilts, my only problem is that I always way over cut the number of strips or pieces I need. I probably have enough squares left over to make another one of these. Guess I will put the squares along with my drawing of the quilt into a bag together so I will remember what I was going to make out of the remaining one.

I also managed to get one backing pieced in the last few days. Not the number I had intended but something about making backings is boring and I tend to put it off. At least I have a couple of quilts with backings now so I will have a choice of what to work on the next time I load something on the frame.

I decided to take a quilting class through my guild early in March. There is a lot of prep work required before the class so I have started cutting the 100 (all different) two inch strips required for the class. Since I have so much Christmas fabric I decided to make this another scrap Christmas quilt so I won't have to purchase any fabric.

Kathie

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Happy Quilt #2


Completed the binding on Happy Quilt #2, I loved making these blocks and see more of them in my future but like everyone else have to many other projects going on right now.

This will be donated to Project Linus tomorrow.


Kathie

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Hang Ups

What is your hang up

Everyone seems to have one part of the quilting process that is their “hang up.” Some people have a hard time getting started on a new project, others get the main body of a quilt done and then never get it bordered. Some people have many many tops done that never seem to get quilted.

My hang up tends to be backings. Once I get a backing pieced I usually get the quilt done, I just don’t seem to get backings done ahead of time.

So this week instead of making a wish list of what I would like to accomplish I am going to try and spend some time getting backings together. I have already found and cut fabric that will become two backings and have it ready to go in the wash. One of these backings will be for the Christmas Snowball quilt that I recently completed the top and the other is backing for a Heart Linus quilt top I completed several months ago.

My daughter has been home sick the last couple of days so have not accomplished much other than see to her. She might be a teenager but she takes full advantage of being sick and becomes totally helpless. I did sew a few minutes at a time working on the second Christmas quilt. You can't tell it from this picture but it is going to become a poinsettia scrap quilt.



Kathie

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Broken Bricks

I have accomplished several things this week that were on my list.

1. Complete broken bricks quilt top - done
2. Quilt at least 1 quilt - Two were quilted
3. Piece a backing - didn't get around to this one, maybe next week.

As one of the two quilts I quilted this week I got the broken bricks quilt quilted, bound and just finished hand stitching down the binding this morning. Now when I watch TV tonight will have a brand new quilt to snuggle under.



Kathie

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Do you know

Lori over at Dakota City Quilter blog posted as part of being tagged about five addictions she has and 10 things you don't know about her and challenged readers to do the same. Thought I would give it a shot anyway.

Addictions:

1. Fabric (of course)
2. Coffee - a must have first thing in the morning, my eyes won't open till I smell the coffee.
3. Sleep - I am one of these people that get very cranky if I don't get enough sleep.
4. American Idol. My daughter and I started watching Amreican Idol during season 3 and it is one of the few shows we still enjoy watching together (she is now 14).
5. Dance movies. You know those cheezy dance movies that have hardly any plot to them. My daughter is a dancer so I love to watch any dance movie because I so admire the skill involved.

As for things you dont' know about me:

1. I am an only child.
2. I have two step grandkids older then my daughter.
3. I am originally from Seattle, WA.
4. I made my first quilt in high school and then didn't sew again for 26 years.
5. I moved to the East Coast in 1976
6. I hate to drive at night.
7. My favorite food is anything pasta.
8. I can't stand the heat and humidity in the summer, spring and fall are my favorite times.
9. My favorite color is purple.
10. Like to read murder mysteries.

Kathie

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

This is a purse???

At a quilt guild meeting last week I saw some really cool purses and the guild is going to have a workshop on making them next month. I am usually not into making purses or tote bags but this one intrigued me as it is just made from a square of quilted fabric.

I decided I couldn't wait till next month so am going to try and make one. The examples were made with the double sided pre-quilted fabric but decided to use fabric from my stash.

I pulled out this blue and yellow floral. Its funny how some fabric you remember exactly where you bought it. This fabric I purchased while on a bus trip to the Mid Atlantic Quilt Show many years ago (my guess 6 or 7 years ago) because I HAD TO HAVE it. Of course I didn't have to have it because all these years later I still have not used it. Anyway I thought I might as well use it for the bag and pulled some yellow for the lining and got this piece quilted this morning.




Now to cut a square out of it, bind it and see if I can figure out the next step.

I finished quilting my broken bricks quilt yesterday and got the binding made and on the quilt. I will post a picture of the finished quilt in a few days when I get the binding all hand stitched down.

Kathie

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Weekly completions and goals

Sunday Already!!!

It has been a busy few days with attending two high school basketball games Friday night (I KNOW the bleachers were not THAT uncomfortable when I was in high school), Sewing with a group of friends yesterday followed by renting a movie and ordering a pizza with my daughter.

This week seemed like it has zipped by quickly. I did do pretty good on my goals.

1. Quilt 2 quilts, 1 of them for Charity. I actually quilted three quilts this week and one of them was a Project Linus quilt.

2. Start on a quilt for ME. I am well underway on a broken bricks quilt for our living room sofa. I still don’t know if it is going to be as long as I wanted but the center section is now complete.

3. Make a backing for one of my completed tops. This I didn’t even get a start on it, but I did get my completed happy blocks sewn into top #2 instead.

4. Get January books entered on my spreadsheet. I finally got this one out of the way.

Here is a picture of the broken bricks quilt. The center section is complete, now I need to figure out how big of borders I can make with the amount of fabrics that I have.



Goals for the next few days:

1. Complete broken bricks quilt
2. Quilt at least one quilt
3. Put together a backing for one of my finished tops


Kathie

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

PIGS

Quilters have all sorts of names for things. One I enjoy is called PIGS which stands for Projects in Grocery Sacks. We all pick out patterns, buy all the fabric for it and then work, life, other projects etc. get in the way and we don’t make the project. We stash it in a bin, box, or grocery sack and there it sets for weeks, months or years.

I decided a short while ago that I really need a new quilt for the sofa. The ones I have were prior to my longarm quilting and leave a lot to be desired on their quilting, are getting old and the one I use is to short to cover me totally up while watching TV at night.



In an effort to use more of what I have and only buy for specific projects (that I am going to start in no more than 2 or 3 weeks) I started going through all my PIGS that are now located in one huge plastic tub. I found these fabrics and the pattern I had put aside. I am sure I have had them 2 to 3 years at least. They won’t be the “perfect” colors for my sofa but will look ok and the best part is that I shouldn’t have to buy anything else.

I was excited to get started on a project for ME but then realized all fat quarters (18 x 22 inch piece of fabric) are not created equal. The pattern I am working with uses mainly FQs with a background fabric and two border fabrics. I have found that after straightening up and trimming the FQs I am not getting as many strips out of each one as the pattern calls for. In addition to that I cut the first two pieces of background fabric wrong so lost a little fabric there.

I did toss in a couple more FQs but without any additional background fabrics or additional border fabrics I am going to have to see what I can come up with to try and stretch the quilt to make it a little bit bigger.

I guess if all else fails and it doesn't turn out as big as I want I can set the top aside and it can become a gift or a craft show item at a later date.

Kathie

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Christmas Candy


I finished the Christmas quilt top yesterday. I found this pattern in a 2002 magazine and it was called Christmas Candy and cut the article out to make some day. I resized the blocks to be able to use up the 2 ½ strips I already had cut and a couple of other changes as I rarely make a pattern exactly as written. The 2 1/2 strips were left over from a Bonnie Hunter class on Star Struck, and binding pieces from Christmas runners and quilts. I do like the way it turned out. I will put fold it and put it away until I make a backing for it.

I did pretty good on my goals for the week.

1. I completed the Happy Quilting binding
2. Pieced a backing and made the binding for Happy Quilt #2
3. Quilted two customer baby quilts
4. but…………..I did not transfer my January books to my spreadsheet. I am not the greatest as keeping up on that.
My goals for this next week are to:

1. Quilt two tops (one a charity top)
2. Start on a quilt for ME
3. Make a backing for one of my unquilted tops
4. And yes to finally get those January items on my spreadsheet.


Kathie