Blush in Progress

I've disappeared from the blogging world a bit this fall. I'm taking classes to renew my teaching certificate and trying to keep up with the family comings and goings. Not a ton of sewing going on but with a retreat in September and sneaking in a few minutes here and there, I've made a little progress. 

I've been struggling with deciding on a plan for this Blush fabric for a looooong time. I finally came up with this and I love it. The background is my favorite shade of Basic Grey Grunge fabric. I'll piece some blocks for the back next.

The bird on the text print is a favorite. Actually there are several favorites in this quilt. I can't wait to get it quilted. This one is for me! Jumping back into another class tomorrow though. Perhaps I can make a little progress at the KCMQG retreat this weekend.

Playing with Quilting Modern

Every time I hit a bump in my quilting plan, I tend to

stall...

procrastinate...

wait...

I don't know why I find it so easy to loose my momentum. When I hit the bump on my A Stitch in Color Quilt, I decided to pull out Quilting Modern and some of my scraps to play a bit.

There's a whole section about the Stitch and Flip technique so I just picked one and jumped in to make a few blocks.

Then I tried a layout.

And another. I like how this is going and I think I'll play a bit more until I get the white fabric I need for the other quilt.

As fun as all of these are, I have a third quilt in my head that I can't wait to start. I can picture it completely except for the fabric choices. So much fabric and ideas but only so much time! Anyone else with that problem?

Fall Begins

A very fun summer full of family, swimming, carnivals, camping and time with friends has come to a close. School started and we're beginning to find a new routine while I catch up on so many things that were set aside during our busy summer activities. My sewing room has been a bit neglected except to open the door and pile up some fabric purchases from my summer travels.

During the last week or so, I've been able to sneak in and start sorting through the piles and put some blocks on the design wall. I started this quilt at the KCMQG retreat at the beginning of April with some quarter square triangles made from A Stitch in Color fabric and a little bit of Laura Gunn fabric mixed in. Just hours before the retreat, I'd sorted though a pile of magazines and patterns looking for something I hadn't tried before and something pretty simple. I found a pattern in an American Patchwork and Quilting magazine that had quarter square triangles alternating with a nine patch block. Right off the bat, I knew I didn't want to cut all the triangles out individually like the pattern directed and used a different technique instead. I recently started making the nine patches and after just a couple of those blocks were added to the design wall, I knew I needed to make a change. There was just so much color and patten happening that I felt like my eyes needed a place to rest. I debated what to do and starting throwing up small squares in the empty spaces. I instantly loved it and thought the white space balanced all the color nicely.

So now I just have lots of white to cut and sew together. After I find my floor!

Here's a photo for my family. My girl on her first day of First Grade. I miss her already but she is having a great time at school. As a former First Grade teacher, I know how much she'll learn and grow this year and I'm so excited for her! 

Pips Napping Quilt

While it's been quiet here on the blog, I've been slowly but surely sewing away. This little quilt was finished at the beginning of the year. I'd started it in the fall for Jenna to use during her kindergarten napping time. However, not long after school started, the teacher decided to have the kids just put their heads on their desks at nap time. Without a deadline, I wasn't in a huge hurry but picked it back up again after the holidays.

Even though this was a simple quilt I wanted to try a few new things. I knew right off the bat I wanted to start with a Sherbet Pips charm pack and add other fabrics from my stash. I found a couple of other prints and some Kona solids to mix in. 

My favorite print from Sherbet Pips is the girl on the swing. I had a tree swing in my back yard when I was about that age and I remember swinging when my mom put laundry on the line or worked in the garden or the flower beds. It's Jenna's favorite print too and I just happened to buy more than enough yardage when my sister was visiting last Easter (miss you sis!). 

One of my other goals was to try finishing my binding with the sewing machine instead of by hand. I almost changed my mind when I started and then almost ripped it out after I did the first side. In the end, I went ahead and finished and while I don't love it I'm still glad I tried it. My mom and friend Darcy gave me a few tips I'll try next time. I can see where it would be handy for quilts that get washed a lot. I'm just impatient and want to be as good as my mom is at making it look so nice.

I made 2 1/2 inch binding instead of my usual 2 1/4 to give myself some extra wiggle room. In some places it was way too much but I still managed to miss the binding in a few other spots and had to go back and stitch it down. 

 

Jenna and I tried to chase the sun for several days back in January but kept missing it! So we gave up and took photos anyway and she we a great helper. 

 

It's been put to good use in the mornings before school and as small as it is, I've seen her and Roy cuddled under it together watching television and I've even read a little with my feet tucked under it. This is our Valentine tea after school in February. I surprised Jenna with her little friends waiting for her when she came home from school. She was so tickled!

Happy Thanksgiving 2011

Hello, everyone! I hope those of you here in the US have had a great Thanksgiving and that everyone else is having a great week so far. We've spent our day very quietly with just the three of us at home after visiting family in Texas last weekend. We had some very simple meals and just enjoyed being together. Watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and some football was high on the agenda. I'll treasure the memory of teaching Jenna to do a little needlepoint with a plastic canvas and needle while I worked on a cross stitch project. She was so disappointed that it wasn't finished before she went to bed tonight. So sweet! I hope she'll be eager to pick it up again tomorrow. 

I thought I'd share my very first and looooonnnngest quilt project. The pumpkin wall hanging you see above was started in the fall of 2001. We had just moved in with a friend since our house had sold while we were still building our new one. September 11th had just shocked us all. And I had just started my first year as a Reading Teacher after teaching 1st grade for a couple of years. 

I took a class at Quilting Bits and Pieces in Eudora, KS and the fabric was included in the class kit. I remember being so thrilled that it had some purple in the fabric. The teacher was wonderful and patient and very knowledgeable. I do remember my mind glazing over while we were standing at the ironing board and she started talking about fractions...1/4, 1/2 inches, seam allowances, etc. I just have to laugh at myself now. 

The pumpkins, stars and vine were all hand appliqued...over the course of a few years. I was busy teaching and each fall I'd take it out and stitch a little more. Then it would find it's way back into the closet. I finally finished the top in 2009 and got stuck because I didn't know how to quilt it. Luckily, I met Angela Walters not long afterwards at the Kansas City Modern Quilt Guild and she agreed to quilt it for me. I just love the pebbling she did inside the pumpkins!

There's some of that purple fabric I thought made this stand out from other traditional fabrics. While it's much more traditional than what I love now, I'm so happy to finally have it finished and displayed because I learned so many skills working on it and it was the beginning of my love for sewing and quilting.

Have a great weekend! Anyone braving the craziness of Black Friday? I have to say that late night hours of shopping interests me more than getting up early on Friday but it's just not my thing. If I lived closer to my sister I'd go with her to cheer her on because she loves it. Have fun Viv!!

Take care and I'll be back soon with some Christmas fun! 

Improv Block for Jacquie

Many of you know our Kansas City Modern Quilt Guild President, Jacquie, and I could go on all night about what a fun, gracious, kind, inspiring, organized, giving person she is. Well, we got the news that she was moving to Chicago and leaving the Kansas prairie behind. I was shocked and sad yet so excited for her and all the possibilities waiting for her. Within moments of the news, Shea was organizing us all to quickly create blocks for a special quilt.

Jacquie loves orange and Shea asked the guild members to make blocks that had orange, grey, white and black and be made in an improv style. Lucky for me that Jacquie had made me sit up and notice that orange wasn't really so bad and I'd actually been on the look out for orange fabric that I could love for about the last six months. I was surprised that I had accumulated a nice little orange stack in my stash.

I had to laugh taking these tiny little cuts from quarter and half yards of fabric. I'd made an improv block before but I used a tutorial so the training wheels were off for this one. I loved creating it! It was so much fun to just sit down at the sewing machine and play. Shea, her mom Mary, and Angela worked together to get pull it all together beautifully.

This is Mary unveiling Windy City for the first time at our guild meeting.

And here's Jacquie all wrapped up.

We'll all miss her but we're in wonderful hands with Shea leading us and I can't wait to hear about Jacquie's adventures in Chicago.

Read more about the creation of Windy City and see some great close up photos over on Shea's blog. Thanks for the photo's Shea!

If you want to see some more awesome quilts, make sure you check out Quilts on the Quad this Saturday on the UMKC campus. It's the KCMQG's first quilt show!! Get all the details here.

Wrapping Up the Summer

Hello! I'm finally getting a chance to sit down at the computer and look through some pictures from the summer. It was a a whirlwind and now I'm trying to get caught up at home. The list seems endless but I'm making some headway. My sewing room is next. I don't even know where to start in there. I've been sewing in the bedroom to escape the chaos!

I have a few things to show you from this summer and thought I'd start with this Dresden Plate. After teaching the hexagon class at Mountain Stitches, my mom taught me how to use the ruler and stitch these up. She got me started and I finished it up while I was there. I'm such a visual learner and she made it look so easy. And it was!

I used invisible thread for the first time to applique it onto the background. I definitely see more of these in my future.

And here's my sweet girl on her first day of kindergarten! How did five years go by so quickly? She loves school so far but is incredibly tired every night. We are still transitioning with half days but she has already asked why she has to go every day. Preschool had us spoiled. Play time and exploring time is limited now but she's excited to see her friends at school and is enjoying the new experiences there. Full days are coming soon and I'll miss her so much!

I remember when she wasn't quite a year old and we were attending our first year of MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers), she had terrible separation anxiety. It was so difficult but we worked through it and the whole time I kept thinking the reward and goal would be for her not to be screaming down the hall trying to escape kindergarten like some of the new children at the school where I taught. Well she LOVED MOPS the second year (and beyond) and she was confident enough to tell my husband and I that we didn't need to walk her into school her first day. (We did anyway :) ) YAY!

Seeing {Pink} Squares

Well, here it is! I finally got to see it in person tonight when Shea handed it off to me at the Kansas City Modern Quilt Guild tonight. This is the pink version of the Seeing Squares quilt that I made for Jenna. You got to see a little peek here and it's so nice to be able to share it with you now.

Angela Walters quilted it in a beautiful flower design that's flowing and feminine. I've had fun hunting for the squares that she put a special little design in. I can't wait to wash it up and see it in all of it's wrinkly goodness.

It's 48″ x 56" and I think it will make a great sized quilt for Jenna to cover up with on chilly mornings while I make breakfast. I hope it will live in our family room for a while and add a touch of sunshine while we wait for spring to arrive. It'll be interesting to see if Jenna agrees with that idea.

Shea is featuring this little pink quilt on her blog today.  When you visit, make sure you take a look at the other three versions of the pattern. They are all very beautiful and yet unique in choices of fabric. Enjoy!

Seeing Squares

I'm so excited to introduce you to a new pattern that my friend Shea recently released. Shea was the first person that I met when I visited the Kansas City Modern Quilt Guild and her friendly, warm personality made me (and everyone else) feel right at home. 


I was just tickled when Shea asked me to test Seeing Squares. I found it to be very clear and concise, with helpful hints along the way. I suspect that Shea's experience as a teacher helped her communicate the directions in easy to understand illustrations and graphs. She's made whats looks like a complicated pattern into one that was so fun to put together. I'm amazed at the care she puts into creating her patterns before they are released.  Shea made the pattern twice. Paula made the gorgeous quilt on the cover and I made a small pink one that you'll see later this week. Shea even included measurements for a pieced back which is a huge time saver!


Shea's been sharing the different versions of this quilt this week on her blog and I know you'll love seeing them. Get started here and make sure to read through the past few days of posts. She'll feature my pink quilt tomorrow.

And I have to share a photo of her first pattern just because I think it's brilliant and adorable! This will be a perfect Christmas gift for a friend who has several little kiddos running around. No noise makers, provides hours of entertainment and can store easily when needed. 


Shea's offering FREE shipping on both patterns until St. Patrick's Day!

 

Something for Santa

Here's a little peek at something I've been working on for Christmas. I started it at the retreat and have a little more of the piecing to do. I'm not sure how far I'll go with embellishing it. The pattern I'm using has some applique and needlework included but I may make some modifications. I love the holly/peppermint fabric.

And before anyone is amazed by how on top of things I am to be getting ready for Christmas, let it be known that this was going to be gracing our home for my sweet little girl's first Christmas. She's three now.....I had all of it cut before she turned one but had stopped because when I was ready to cut the last part (the binding), I got stuck. I didn't know whether I should cut it on the bias or straight. So I put it away until I could figure it out. Now, I'm not sure why I was wondering that but I must have learned along the way that bias binding is for curvy edges. It was obvious to me when I pulled it out to work on again. But I still haven't cut the binding. I just got started sewing.

In the process of sewing, I discovered that I have either put back on my original non-1/4 inch foot or my 1/4 inch foot is not really a 1/4 inch foot. I decided to leave it on and continue as I was so that it all turns out in the end but I discovered it when one of my borders turned out too long. I was also getting frustrated that my corners were not aligning. One of my lovely new friends inspected my project and decided I was overcompensating in my attempt to make the seams match so they were overlapping a bit. UGGG! It's so hard for me not to pull that seam ripper out of the little box it sits in. I'm going to keep going carefully and keep learning and live with my progress and little mistakes. I crave that precision piecing though that I need to to some more intricate work.

I may try to just do my piecing with my walking foot on so that the fabric feeds evenly on both sides. I think my mom does this and several of the other gals at the retreat do the same thing. But I really like using the edge of the foot as a guide so I'll have to experiment a little

Pumpkin Update

I got to go with the family to the local pumpkin patch over the weekend. I just love this time of year! The air is cool and crisp and the leaves are changing. We have such fun picking out just the right pumpkins. I like to find something unusual each time. I might have to sneak back soon and get some corn stalks for the front porch.

I did finally finish the applique on this pumpkin quilt. I know I blogged before that my goal was to finish quilting and binding it at the retreat but that plan changed. My mom had suggested I hand quilt this a while back and I couldn't even imagine doing it. But I've had some other people also say that since I put the effort into the hand applique that it would be nice to hand quilt it. So I'm considering it. Actually leaning towards it. We'll see...I'll keep you posted.

Faded Glory

This is the second project I worked on at the retreat. It is a smaller version of the Turning Twenty pattern. I had completed the middle and just needed to add the border and corners. It's amazing to me that I got so far and then let it sit for so long (maybe 2 years? - gasp)! I met some wonderful quilters at the retreat who confessed that they don't often get to quilt either. One even said that she takes the same project to her quilt group once a month and works on it for 2 hours, then puts it away until next time. I'm starting to suspect that there are perhaps more quilters like me that I thought...ones that let house work, trips, playing with little ones, etc. come before quilting.

Some of the stripes look wonky in this photo and I think it's because the wind was blowing the quilt around. I tried to snap the picture when it flapped back down but I think maybe it was still moving.

This one gets named Faded Glory because it has a dark blue piece of fabric in it that must have been exposed to some light through my craft room window and has a faded spot. I left it in. Wasn't about to take stitches out. I will be using this to top a table during July and probably Independence Day festivities so it will get a lot of use and washings. Now I won't be afraid to use it.


I'm not quite sure how I'll quilt it yet. Any ideas?

Quilting Retreat Projects

I thought I'd share a few photos of the quilts I worked on at the retreat. I started this one in Tennessee this summer when I went to visit my family. My mom cut a huge stack of these squares for me to sew together. The plan was for me to finish the top and then learn how to use the long arm quilting machine but I didn't quite finish. I had it chain stitched all in one direction and needed to finish stitching the other direction.

The way I pieced this went completely against how I normally do things. I like to lay everything out and rearrange until it's just right. But I picked up all the squares pretty randomly, just making sure I didn't have two of the same fabrics right next to each other. It sure made things come together quicker and I like the result but I don't think it broke me of the urge to plan.

I was very surprised when I showed my husband. He liked it quite a bit which is nice because it will be big enough for our queen size bed. So now it's ready to take to Tennessee in a few weeks and hopefully I'll get a chance to try the long arm.

I'll show you a few more projects over the next couple of days. They are all pretty simple but I think the fabrics are fun!

Picking Up the Pumpkins...again

I am in the very exciting process of preparing for a quilting retreat this fall! I have quite the stash of projects that need to be finished but at the top of the list is this pumpkin wall hanging. I believe this began back in 2001. I had just changed teaching positions, was building a house and feeling ready to spread my creative wings. I took a beginning quilting class at Quilting Bits and Pieces in Eudora, KS and this was the kit that was offered. The pattern is called Pumpkin Stars and is found in American Patchwork & Quilting's October 2000 issue.

As you can see from the fold line across the middle, this has been in and out of my basket quite a few times. I loved how quick the piecing came together. Hand applique is a different story. I've always loved needlework but I tend to make tiny stitches and it takes me forever to get around a shape. I love the result but it's taken a while considering all of the time it's been sitting in my basket.


I only have about 4 inches of this vine to finish and my goal is to quilt and bind this at the retreat. I have just the spot waiting on my dining room wall.

Simplicity Baby Quilt

I decided to whip up a quick baby quilt for my best friend's baby just before the baby was due. These are fabrics from a charm pack I picked up last year on a shop hop in the Kansas City area. They are Simplicity fabrics by 3 Sisters for Moda. I played with the arrangement on my foyer floor.
After I pieced it, I decided to try quilting it myself. With some help over the phone from my Mom, an issue of Quilts and More, and a visit to two of my local quilt shops, I quilted my very first quilt. The best advice came from my Mom who suggested I read my sewing machine manual. It helped me adjust the tension and thread the machine correctly. The grid pattern was easy to accomplish and I got better as I went along. Machingers gloves helped a great deal.
I bound the quilt by hand over the course of a couple of days. I enjoyed that part so much. I was able to sit beside my daughter as she played and visit with her while I worked on it. I need to investigate a thinner needle (I think) or a thimble. I had to finish with bandages wrapped around a couple fingers.
It was far from perfect but I learned so much during the process and I feel like a real quilter now! After I finished the last stitch, I threw it in the washer and dryer and quickly wrapped it before I headed off to the hospital to visit the new baby.

I can't wait to start a new project!