Polaroid Quilt Block

I made stacks and stacks of polaroid blocks to swap via the Flickr Picture Perfect Polaroid Swap.  Then I lost half the blocks (no joke).  But I got my mojo back and cut out a new stack.  Then I sewed a few together to see how they look.  I followed the tutorial found at capitolaQuilter.

I found that you can use 2” strips to make the background, and I have one tip for making your blocks tip (ha ha).

Whatever direction you angle your ruler, your finished block will tip the opposite direction.  Leave 1/2 inch at each corner so you will have at least 1/4 inch seam allowance.  Don’t angle your ruler too much (see my block above—look closely at the tomato—it’s too tippy and a little corner was sewn off), or you’ll sew through the corner of your picture.

Now trim to 4 1/2 inches the other way.  Again, make sure you leave 1/2 inch at each corner.  Then you’ll end up with a perfectly wonky block like this.  And yes, I use a broken ruler.  Also, it is not the only ruler my kids have broken in half.  

I try to be organized, and I found that it was easiest to sort my pictures into two stacks of blocks—ones I wanted tipped one way and ones I wanted tipped the other way.  Then I just remembered to tip my ruler the opposite direction.  Sometimes I would get confused (especially since I had all 3 kids in my sewing room) but I’d just remember it would go the opposite from how I cut.

I finished up two blocks with 12 pictures each today and also my bee block for July’s Beejeebers.  Here’s a sneak peek, but I want it to be a surprise.

I also mailed out this vendor apron I made as a custom order for a local jewelry seller.  She saw my apron at the Maker’s Market last summer and asked me to make one. 

The front is separated into three pockets and the back is lined with denim. 

WIP Wednesday

I don’t normally link up to this since I am never organized to have a blog post on a Wednesday, but I just finished up my Colorblock quilt last night and wanted to share a few pics.  The finished size for me was 40.5” x 55” exactly, which is the perfect size for Veronica.

I am going to use this quilt as my entry for the My Precious Quilt A long.  If you haven’t seen this on another blog, you should check it out.  You don’t have to make a quilt for an entry (pretty much anything sewn is fine), and the fabric doesn’t necessarily have to be HTF, just special to you.

This quilt is made from DS Quilts fabrics that I have been collecting and some Hello Pilgrim prints.  I bought a Hello Pilgrim fat quarter bundle recently, and after using up most of the butterfly prints for this quilt, I ordered a half yard of the dark blue and aqua butterflies to replace the ones I used.  Not the best practice if you’re trying to use up your stash, but I love them so much I don’t ever want to be without!

The back is one of my first sewing fabric purchases ever.  It felt good to finally use it (most of it).   I fmq’ed squiggles all over with light aqua thread on the front and back.  Currently my walking foot is out of commission and I need to buy a new one, but the $50 pricetag is holding me back.  Why is it that I *must* buy new fabric, but I can just fmq until I finally get around to purchasing a walking foot???

I can’t wait to look at all the WIPs on Freshly Pieced when the kiddos go to bed tonight.

Overwhelmed!

In a good way…by fabric!  My cousin is learning to quilt, and we’ve volunteered to test a pattern called Colorblock by Holly at Bijoux Lovely.  My cousin has already picked out her fabric, but I thought I’d make one for Veronica and I am completely overwhelmed by my fabric choices, although I have narrowed it down considerably.

Never in my short-quilting-life have I ever had so many choices!!!  And this is the first time I have enjoyed trying to put different fabric collections together.  The pattern only uses 7 fabrics for the top (not including sashing), but I have accumulated so much great fabric that it’s so tough to eliminate some of the prints.  I have definitely decided to use that leafy print on the bottom left for the backing.  It is one of my first fabric purchases ever—and from Joanns.  It feels thinner than the designer fabric, but I distinctly remember getting it on a half-off red tag clearance sale, so I didn’t pay more than $1.50 a yard for it.  It is high time I used it and it really coordinates well with the other fabrics.

I am overwhelmed in other, not so wonderful, ways.  My husband has been on business travel this entire week, so I haven’t done any sewing. at. all.  My oldest is home on spring break this week, which has mostly been really helpful,  but it also has been crazy…a lot.  Last weekend I finished quilting my Flora quilt, and I cut strips for the binding one night after the kids went to bed.  But when I held it up to the quilt, I hated it.

The quilt has a yellow lattice print border, and the binding against it looks green.  I am really disappointed at how it looks together, so I am just going to use the rest of the border fabric I had left over to make matching binding and leave it at that.  

So, I don’t think I’ve ever shared that I am into my SIXTH year of breastfeeding. Yes, you read that correctly. I am only 34, so I have been breastfeeding 17% of my life.  I know breastfeeding is a beautiful thing, etc etc, but I am ready to have my body back. 

Overwhelmed is definitely the way I have been feeling lately!  I’m hoping to get some sewing done this weekend and have a quilt top and a finish to share next week.  I hope you all have a happy Easter!!!

Overindulgence of the best kind

No, I’m not talking about Jamaican Me Crazy at Bruster’s Ice Cream.   The mail lady just dropped off three parcels for me!

The yellow in the upper left is for a Rainbow Charm swap I joined, and I just joined another one but haven’t gotten my color assignment yet.  The fabrics are Half Moon Modern and I already used a charm pack of them to make something, but I can’t remember what!!!

The fanned out fabric is a fat quarter pack of “Hello Pilgrim” by Lizzy House.  And the yellow in the upper right corner is a cute coffee cup print (although I only drink tea so I like to think of it as teacups) and I think the other is called Metro circles.  I was on a yellow kick after searching for yellow fabric for the charm swap.  And I got a yard of Kona melon pink.  It coordinates really well with Ruby.

The Walk in the Woods fat quarters are to round out the fabrics for a quilt I am in the process of making.

The pattern is called Twirling Around and it’s designed by Melissa of Sew BitterSweet Designs.  Double the purchase price is being donated to a charity that helps mothers in Haiti.  When I saw that, I had to buy the pattern!  I am using a Little Apples charm pack, a Walk in the Woods charm pack, and some scraps I bought on Etsy of Sherbet Pips.  I just love the colors!

This quilt top is going together amazingly fast.  I got myself organized and have chain pieced everything, which I have never done before.  I’m not sure why I waited this long.  Wow does it work!!!  So that is my new thing I have tried this week. 

And then this arrived today too.

I’m not exactly sure why I bought them, if just to have a piece of quilting history.  When I first started reading blogs regularly, I saw the “Flea Market Fancy” quilt on Crazy Mom Quilts and really thought the fabrics came from flea markets.  I had no idea there were “lines” of fabric out there!!! 

So, would it be heresy to mix these fabrics with my all time favorite fabrics, Alexander Henry’s “Farmdale?”

Don’t they look good together?????!!!!!  What kills me is that my Joanns sold all the Farmdale floral prints for a long time and I never bought any.  Instead I paid about twice as much for them months later.

Finally I picked up this pattern for a new pincushion. 

My green tomato pincushion has never turned up.  I did, however, find a tap shoe filled with pins in the drawer of the bedside table in our guest bedroom.  How did that happen?  Esther is my best guess.

I can’t wait to make this turtle!  If it turns out nicely I plan to make this as part of my “Pay It Forward” debt (lol).

My sewing room is almost completely reorganized and painted.  It will probably be another month until it is ship-shape and I’ve painted the ceiling.  All the walls save for a little alcove are painted, my desks are put back,  my stash is in its place, and my machines are plugged in, so I am ready to go for the Friday Night Sew In.

Bea has been home sick for the past 3 days, so I haven’t been able to get out and buy any white thread to quilt my Flora charm quilt.  Now that we skipped completely over spring and it’s summer in full swing here in southern Maryland, I won’t be needing that quilt anytime soon anyway.  My plan is to finish up all the blocks for my Aneela Hoey fabrics quilt and do my two bee blocks.  I’ve been talking up “movie night with dad” all day to get the kids excited about spending tomorrow night out of my hair.  How about you?

I’m linking this post up to Trying New Things Thursday.  Melissa has a great tutorial on making lazy HSTs, which came just in the nick of time because one of my bee blocks requires an awful lot of them, and I love to be lazy!!!