February Quilting Accomplishments

February has been an extremely productive month for me! I feel elated to have finished so much and to have worked on a bunch of tops that will become finishes in the next few months. I spent a couple Sunday afternoons quilting, which really helped get me closer to finishes.
I quilted this Modern Rose Garden quilt for Emilee.

I quilted up my Briar Rose quilt and finished the binding on it, just in time for the trunk show I did on February 16th.

I quilted this Frolic charm square quilt and finished the binding on it on February 18th, just in case I got to see the new baby I made it for. I'm excited to have it done and ready to gift.

I also quilted up this Frolic quilt to have on hand for another baby gift. It's super cute, but I don't have a baby to give it to just yet. It's another one off the UFO list.

I quilted and finished the binding on the Let it Snow batik quilt in time for the trunk show as well.

In addition, I also made this pillowcase for a throw pillow to match.

At the quilt retreat on Feb. 16th, I finished up the blocks for this Unwind baby quilt which uses the lazy angle ruler. I'll get it quilted up next month for another baby gift.

At the retreat I also pieced the top for my challenge quilt for a store sample. I need to get the borders on as it needs to be quilted by the end of March.

I've been basting and sewing Hexies like crazy, so I made some cute little needle books to hold my needles in my hexie bags.

I also quilted a couple quilts for my friend Andrea. This is a flannel baby quilt in Sage King Tut & bottomline

An older flimsy of hers with the same sage combo, which worked very well.

I also quilted this table runner for her with a yellow/green/blue King Tut and blue bottomline.

I made this cute little table topper from the leftover blocks of my Briar Rose quilt. I quilted it up quick one night and put the binding on it. I'm working on the hand sewn binding.

I quilted up this little scrappy beach balls quilt top and sewed the binding on for another UFO finish. It's a doll quilt.

I also quilted and sewed the binding on this flannel Pink Animal Crackers quilt made with leftovers from mom's stash. Another UFO checked off the list!

When I made the pillowcase from the Let it Snow batik, I had a big rectangle left, so I added a zipper and made a little zippered bag.

Another UFO finish was this Farmyard Friends baby quilt for Mathew. I quilted it at the beginning of the month and finished the binding on it this week.

I had some leftover triangles from the 60* table runners I made last month, so I sewed them together and made a table topper. I quilted it up quick the other night and put the binding on and finished the hand sewing on it yesterday.

At the end of retreat and during the last week I have sewn this little baby quilt together from the scraps of the Noah's Ark quilt I made last week. It turned out super cute and I can't wait to quilt it and finish it for my class in the next quarter.

Since February was so productive, I can't wait to see what I accomplish in March. I'm going to shoot for at least 2 UFO finishes and finishing the store challenge quilt.

Quilting Up a Storm

This weekend I pulled the quilt frame out and worked on several quilts for a friend. I quilted this flannel baby quilt with a sage green King Tut and Bottomline. It turned out so nice and cozy.

I also quilted up this pink/green baby quilt she had made several years ago and wanted to get finished.

I spent the most time on this small table runner. It gave me lots of headaches because each of the leaves is loose, think prairie points and I had to really watch so they wouldn't snag. Plus there there extra layers there and I had a lot of problems with skipped stitches. I slowed down, changed needles, used sewers aid, but it was only in the thick spots it skipped, so I am sure that had something to do with it. I

Here's a close up of the quilting, yet it is hard to see. I used a yellow, orange, blue, green King Tut with a blue Bottomline.

I've also been working on putting together this quilt top since quilt retreat. It's really a fun quilt to sew because the seams match up so perfectly! I couldn't believe how easy it was to get them to match. It's using up scraps from a sample I made at the beginning of the year. I'll hopefully get it quilted this weekend as I plan to teach this class in the next quarter.

This is the last remaining pieces of the border print I used for the Farmyard Friends quilt. I made a little table topper that I quilted up last night. Now I just need to put binding on. I've got a lot of projects that just need binding finished, so that may need to be my March goal.

Last night I also quilted up this little table runner made with the leftover pieces from Briar Rose. I made a whole bunch of pieces wrong, so instead of throwing them away, I just made them into a table runner. This is squared up and the binding is cut, so I just need to put it on now.

It's been another very productive week and I feel great. I also am working on my ahhhh's 2 & 3 which are English Paper Pieced. I got them all prepped and basted at lunch today and now it's time to sew them together.
Find time to enjoy your passion and everything else will fall into place.

Busy February

This has been a busy month, but I feel like I have accomplished a lot. I don't have a lot of finishes yet, but I still have a few more days to finish up some binding on projects.  I spent Saturday of President's Day weekend at the Shrine Club quilt retreat. I layed out the blocks and put together this quilt top for a store challenge we are doing to show the use of color. The picture isn't good, but it's all shades of blue with a fairy frost blue background. It just needs borders and quilting. I hope to get the borders on this week, so I can get it quilted.

I also put together this baby quilt top made with scraps. I had intended to make it bigger, but I just wasn't caring for the scraps or the way it was looking, so I decided finished is better than sitting in the UFO box. The other 2.5" strips can go back into the scrap box for another quilt. It would be okay without the black, but that's what I started with.

Since it was also my birthday that week, Heather brought a birthday cake for the banquet Sat. night. I just love how it turned out! Her friend did an amazing job making it. I also gave a trunk show of 40+ of my favorite quilts. My dad and Ann came and watched and my dad proudly says "And that's just what she brought, she has a lot more". I only brought large quilts, but I could do a show of just bags I've made too.

I've also been hexie making up a storm. I took a little time to work on my Buggy Barn hexies this week. I also made these cute little Hexie needle books using Jen's pattern. I'm really impressed with how they turned out and may make a few more for my quilty friends.

I have finished binding on the Briar Rose quilt and the Let it Snow quilt as well. The pillowcase for Let it snow is done as well.
This weekend I quilted 3 quilts for a lady and made 2 small table runners that need to be quilted. Since I finished so much, I also started cutting on a scrappy Swoon quilt from a quilt along. Emilee and I didn't find out about it until recently so we won't finish by the end, but we'll have fun working on them.
I also got my ahhhh's in the mail, so I am looking forward to working on them. I got a few fat quarters to do them in, but need to get them cut and basted before this weekend. I've been recruited to go ice fishing again.
I'll try to get up Mathew's 3 month pictures soon. I can't believe he's so old already!

Christmas Scrap Exchange

This year I invited my quilty friends to participate in a scrap exchange instead of exchanging gifts with everyone. We each pulled a gallon size bag of scraps together and then I exchanged them among everyone in October and in the middle of December we had a Christmas party at Murphy's to exchange the gifts we had made each other out of the scraps. Mathew got to come because he was only 10 days old and Jenn held him as did others as well.

Emilee received a batik sewing machine apron made by Heather.

Heather received a table topper made by Gaila.

Jenn received a notebook cover and a few other little items made by Nicole B. Gaila received the lime green quilt and table topper I made for her.

In the picture below are Nicole H., Nicole B., Jenn, & Gaila.

Jenn made Nicole B. a scrap sack and some other little bags.

Nicole H. received this wall hanging from Heather.

Heather's husband Tim is holding up the other table runner received by Heather and made by Nicole H.

I received the cutest little bag that I put my most used sewing supplies in from Emilee. It's never far from my sewing table.

Emilee also made the cutest apron for Mikaela and put the churn dash block on it. It was so ironic that she googled mini churn dash block pattern and came across the one my friend Jen B. designed. It's a SMALL world!

She also made me this beautiful doll quilt out of granny squares that is hand quilted. It's absolutely beautiful and found a place right near my sewing table. I love it!

This was one of the best exchanges I have ever participated in! Not only did we get our own scraps used up, but in a way we maybe wouldn't have done ourselves. I love the granny square block, but have never made one myself. We really had a great time visiting and enjoyed our party. We're even thinking about doing it again this summer. It was nice to have all those scraps gone, but yet they were made into something beautiful and we all got a bit of a challenge to step outside our box and maybe work with something we normally would not have used.

Mathew is 2 months old

Mathew turned 2 months old on February 5ht. He's growing up to be such a cute little boy. He's definately got his own personality, but he's a lot like his dad and pretty laid back.

He likes to spend time with his big sister too. She loves to watch him and "play" with him. She's very protective!

Productive weekend

This was a very productive weekend! Saturday Paul and I left the kids with grandma and went ice fishing. Well I should say he went fishing and I kept him company. I spent the day in the warm ice house basting hexie's for our challenge. I finished about 50. When we got home I worked on the binding on Briar Rose and got about one side finished. Sat. night we went to a big mount competition and live auction. While we waited I basted another 30 hexies. I felt very productive for not being home all day!
Sunday we had a snow day, except it forgot to snow and it was just cold and blowing. While the kids slept I quilted this pink flannel animal crackers quilt. It's a big baby size. I also got it trimmed up and the binding cut out.

I also loaded this BQ2 quilt on the frame and quilted it. I ended up with enough backing to quilt the extra block and a small scrap of fabric to make a pillowcase.

The pillow case will be put together and binding added.

Here's a close up of the quilting. I just did a small meandering on it.

Sunday night I started packing for quilt retreat and got a few projects together. I also trimmed up and added binding to the Farmyard Friends quilt and trimmed and put binding on the Let it Snow batik quilt. I got the pieces cut for the pillowcase and hope to get the binding done tomorrow night. I feel like I really got a lot accomplished. Now I hope to get the binding hand sewn down on both of these this week. It's going to be a very busy week!

Friday recap

This week has been very productive! I finished the hand sewing on 4 poinsetta table toppers. I finished the hand sewn binding on a wolf family wall hanging I made several years ago and I started the binding on a snowman wall hanging.
Monday night I worked on the layout for the batik Let it Snow quilt. I sewed it together on Tues. night. It's long and skinny, but will look great on the back of the couch.


Tuesday night I also quilted the barnyard friends quilt for Mathew. It turned out really cute and Mikaela loved helping me. She told me what all the barn animals say.


I also layed out the tumbler quilt I hope to get sewn up this weekend and pulled the backing and batting for the batik quilt. I added the binding to the Briar Rose quilt. I also trimmed and cut binding for barnyard friends.
I've been working really hard to update my quilting journals and get all of the pictures in them. So far I have the list of all I've made in the last year and a half done and most of the pictures printed, so I am off to a good start. I've also made a list of the quilts for the trunk show next weekend and will work on getting them all together this weekend. It's a good thing we don't have much on the agenda for the weekend.
We have my work party tonight and dad is baby sitting the kids, so he'll get to spend some time with them, so Paul and I can enjoy a good meal and entertainment.
Have a great weekend.

Super Bowl Quilting

Yesterday was awesome! I cooked, I cleaned, I shopped, and I quilted! It always feels so good to get so much accomplished. I had prepared 6 quilts for quilting and I got 4 of those done, plus one for Emilee, so I feel great. I love evenings where my family entertains themselves and I can hole up and quilt.
I started by working out the tension issues on this little Beach Balls doll quilt. It's from scraps and will work for something.

Then I quilted Emilee's quilt since I had the thread already on there. It turned out beautiful and I love how the white thread just works with it.

Then I quilted Briar Rose. This is one of my favorite quilts so far, both in piecing and quilting, although I noticed more issues when I was quilting than I was aware of. I still love how it turned out and I love the jewel toned batik scraps I used.

Next it was on to a baby quilt for my cousin's baby due in the next few weeks. I don't think I'll be gifting it any time soon, but wanted to have it done. It's a Frolic charm pack and yardage.

Then I quilted the Frolic panel quilt. It's another baby quilt I'll have on hand for gifting. I also loaded the farmyard quilt and hopefully I can quilt it tonight. I didn't get to the flannel pink quilt, but that's okay because I still feel very accomplished. Now to get bindings on all of these!

It's also time to start preparing for retreat. Only 2 weeks until the Shriner's retreat and I'm doing the trunk show. I'm excited and nervous at the same time. Does anyone have any advice? How many quilts? How much info? What do you like to hear? Do I do them in chronological order or easiest to most difficult? Do you like to see the same pattern in different fabrics? Inquiring minds want to know!
I'm also planning a retreat for the first weekend in May and if anyone would like to join me, let me know. It's sure to be tons of fun since I already have 3 friends going with me.