Say It With Flowers

Welcome to my stop on the hop!  I was inspired to finish up a quilt top from the Starburst Quilt Along earlier this year.  The top was completed in February, so it didn’t sit around for too, too long before quilting…

This is the second time I’ve tried other free motion quilting designs besides stippling.  I used wonky diamonds along the outer border & stippling in the negative white space.  Inside each star I quilted a swirl and then rays emanating out toward the points of the stars. 

I used Angela Walter’s Free Motion Quilting book for design inspiration.

And where are the flowers?  On the back!

Normally I like to take photos before washing the quilt, but this time I washed and dried it because I am donating this quilt.  I wanted to make sure all the seams went through the washer and dryer with no problems. 

I also used a flower print for binding—House and Home by Bernatex.  I love these happy little flowers!

This quilt is going to a group who provides quilts for breast cancer patients.  I didn’t have any specific person in mind when I started the quilt along, so hopefully it will provide comfort to someone who needs it.

Make sure you check out all the other stops on the hop today!

May 31^st

Squawk That

How Art You?

A Little Bit of Lorene

Handmade By Mama

Blooming Where I Am Planted

Jane’s Quilting

Just Quilt It

busybeequilts

Lisa In Port Hope

Les Quilts

Quilts My way

Thanks so much, Carol & Madame Samm, for organizing this hop and cheering everyone on!

Festival of Strings Part II

Last Friday when we were cleaning up the sewing room, Esther found a bag of Halloween fabric cut into 2” strips and some squares.  I had cut these almost 3 years ago and never sewed any together except one block.  We sewed all afternoon on Friday.  Esther learned how to press the blocks and she arranged them all on the design wall.  Then on Saturday she sewed a few of the blocks together herself on my sewing machine!  I had to keep reminding her to watch the fabric feed through the machine, but overall she did a great job lining up the fabric with the 1/4” foot.  So this is her quilt as much as it’s something I made.

I’m thinking of having this one professionally quilted with some kind of cute Halloween pantograph.  It’s the perfect size for the couch and will certainly be finished by this Halloween (I think)!  It only took 3 years and a determined four year old to get the top done…

Linking this to Stitched In Color’s Festival of Strings.  Take a look, there are lots of beautiful quilts to admire!

Festival of Strings Part I

Rachel at Stitched in Color is hosting a string challenge.  When I saw the original post and the rule that strings had to be 3” or narrower, I knew exactly what I would make.

These are leftover strips from a quilt I made from a 1/2 yard bundle of Indian Summer.  I had a few inches of each print left over from another quilt I made, so I cut the pieces into 3” strips and used my design wall to try to balance out all the prints in a somewhat improv kind of manner. 

I used Kona Essex linen in natural for the background.  As an aside—the Kona linen in natural is a slightly lighter color than the wide Kona linen in natural, but just a tiny bit.  You might be able to tell in my photo that some of the linen looks a shade lighter than the rest.  I ran out of linen about halfway through the quilt and ordered the wide since it was only a dollar more than regular width.

At first I didn’t want to repeat any of the strips, so I cut a few other prints from my stash, but I ended up repeating anyway.  This quilt is destined to be a gift for a birthday boy on June 15th, so it can’t languish for long!  I’m not sure what the exact size is, but definitely twin or larger.  It’s so big it doesn’t have enough room to hang down from the clothesline.  I’ve got the backing already made, just have to get it basted now.

I hope everyone had a wonderful, long weekend!

Strawberries in season

Local strawberries just appeared at the farmer’s markets in our region and they inspired me to make a little mat for our dining room table.

I just cut 2.5” squares from an assortment of “strawberry” fabric and some of that sweet birdie fabric from these baby shoes.

These mats make great protectors for your dining room table.  You can put warm dishes on the table without the fear of ruining your tabletop.  I like tablerunners, too, but this size is much more practical for our table.  It finishes about 11” x 19”.

The back is this sweet apple and cherry print, so it can be reversible.  The binding is machine attached, which hopefully will give it a little more durability since I figure it will be washed a lot.

I wish I could have taken a photo with a bowl of fresh strawberries on top, but every time I’ve bought strawberries they are gone within the day—not enough time for me to snap a photo.

Have a wonderful day!

It’s For the Birds {plus a giveaway}

The giveaway is closed.  The winner was Rina Mason #106 (Crickets Corner) and has replied to my email.  Thanks everyone who entered and left a comment!!!

Thanks for checking out my stop on the hop today!  When I saw a bird-themed hop it was a no-brainer to jump right in.  I have a serious love affair with birds ever since I started staying home with my kids.  The first winter we got a bird guide book and a bird feeder and it’s just exploded from there to multiple bird feeders, birdhouses, every kind of hummingbird feeder, mealworms for the birds (yes, mealworms!), and even a month long adventure of raising a baby robin last fall.

When we found “Lucky” he was a pinkie, which meant he didn’t have any feathers and had to be fed every 20 minutes from sunrise to sunset.

We took him everywhere with us those first few weeks, including to the pool in his shoebox home.  We’d just sit him on the table in the shade, keep him fed and clean with a toilet paper trick we learned from a helpful rehabilitator, and no one was the wiser that we had a baby bird with us while we were splashing it up!

Once he was a fledgling and did a lot of flying around the yard, we were able to find a licensed wildlife rehabilitator to take him.  You see, when they are so small and require so much care around the clock, places that rehabilitate animals cannot meet those sort of demands with volunteer schedules and the fact that many people who do that kind of work also have regular jobs they have to go to.  So we kept him for a little over a month until he didn’t need to eat so frequently and required less care.  What a meaningful month we had taking care of him!

So what did I sew for this hop?  Well basically I’ve tried to incorporate birds into nearly everything I’ve sewn since I signed up for the hop.  I started a Mooshka quilt for my daughter, but it’s not finished yet, so I am sharing two other sewing projects today.

With the explosion of friends who are having babies this year, I’ve made quite a few pairs of reversible fabric baby shoes.  This sweet bird print (no idea what it is) looks darling paired with pink polka dot fabric.

I’m not sure which photo I like better.  I had a lot of fun staging the shoes for a photo op.

Here they are with their “friends.”

Then, the DC Modern Quilt Guild had a nametag challenge last month, so I thought I’d pick something with a bird in the design, of course.

It took no time at all to stitch up.  The pom pom trim was a little tricky to pin into place (I have a really hard time with fiddly things like that), but overall it was pretty simple to make and I had fun wearing it around the entire day (like even into the Chinese restaurant to pick up carryout, and at the dinner table at home much to my husband’s amusement). 

So there you have it!  Now if you follow me regularly you might have seen that our squirrel-proof bird feeder stopped working last week.  I took a few photos of an especially daring squirrel with strong teeth and sent it into the local newspaper, and they printed it!

Our new birdfeeder arrived yesterday and the girls and I put it up today.

It must work because I’ve seen about a dozen squirrels checking it out intently but never touching it.  I picked it up on Amazon here.

I ordered a few more new feeders from Amazon, you know, while I was already looking...

No birds at this window feeder yet.

But I’ve seen a couple hummingbirds at this one already.

Be sure to check out the other stops on the blog hop today!

http://ssparrowinflight.blogspot.com

http://Hillvalleyquilter.blogspot.se

http://mcsqrd.blogspot.com

http://loveitsewit.blogspot.com

http://piecepeacenc.blogspot.com

http://grammieq.blogspot.com

http://meadowbrook-Kristen.blogspot.com

http://scrapbook-ChickADoodle.blogspot.com

www.craftyshenanigans.blogspot.co.uk

http://Stitchingbythebeach.blogspot.com

www.thebusybeequiltshop.blogspot.com

http://morestarsincomanche.blogspot.com

http://lesquilts.blogspot.ca

http://suebeesworld.blogspot.com

http://mtnmommy2.blogspot.com

www.thatlookslikeitneedsstitches.blogspot.com

http://www.freshcutquilts.com

And a huge thank you to Madame Samm and Mary Winegar (rhymes with vinegar) who put this hop together!

I have a little giveaway today…a charm pack of Winter’s Lane by Moda that features a lovely cardinal print perfect for bird lovers.

The North American Cardinal happens to be my favorite bird.  What’s yours?  Leave a comment to be entered to win.  Open to anyone anywhere.  Followers of my blog can get a second entry.  I’ll announce the winner this weekend.

Have a wonderful Friday!!!

Hungry Caterpillar

The quilt is finished!  It is washed and dried and my daughter is sleeping under it as I type.

I tried so many different free motion quilting designs on this quilt, many from Angela Walters’s book.  My two favorites were the flower and the wonky diamonds.  I could see myself getting pretty good at both of those. 

I really like the way the back of the quilt looks with all the different quilting designs.  The pebbling was difficult but I love the texture it adds to the front and the back!

My daughter was thrilled to see the quilt when it was done.  She loves The Hungry Caterpillar book and it’s that time of year when caterpillars are making their appearance.  Every year we order Painted Lady caterpillars.  She was old enough this year to help release them.

I hope you have a wonderful week!

Hungry Caterpillar in Progress

This quilt is perfect for attempting new free motion quilting designs.  I have been wanting to try new designs besides stippling for a long time.  Unfortunately, every time I’ve tried something new, it hasn’t turned out very good.  (Disclaimer:  By no means is this free motion quilting very good, either, it’s just not hideous!)

I think the saving grace is that the drawings have a “scribble” quality to them, so my quilting can be scribbly too.  I quilted all over this butterfly and then did pointy stippling around it.

I also did some outlining and lines on this caterpillar.  I had the crazy idea to try pebbling for the first time and outline all the little circles in the center of this quilt.  I think it might have been a little harder to “stay in the lines” by outlining rather than try pebbling on my own, but it’s all pebbled and I love the texture it gives the frames around the center panel!

My favorite design is this flower.  How easy it was to do and looks okay, too!

A couple things I did this time to make free motion quilting more of a pleasure than a pain:

• taped down the supreme slider
• wore my Machinger’s gloves
• remembered (after just a few minutes of quilting) to set the speed control on my machine to a much slower speed than I use to piece
• used Aurifil 50 wt. thread which runs so smoothly through my machine
• changed out my bobbin case and throat plate for a special model made specifically for fmq for my machine that I’ve had for years and forgot about

The basic premise of a Malcolm Gladwell book I read a few years ago was that people become “experts” in their field after putting in 10,000 hours of practice.  So, I have about 9,997 more hours to go!

I also wanted to share this funny photo from this morning.  Our squirrel-proof bird feeder needs to be replaced! 

Have a great day!