Homemade with Love Baskets

Lately I’ve been obsessed with making fabric baskets.  After making the first few in the same sizes, the last go-around I tried to make baskets that would nest together.  And voila, it worked!!!

Thee of the baskets were gifts for friends and my sister, and my daughter claimed one of the strippy baskets for herself.  It is the perfect container to hold all her ponytail holders and hairclips on her dresser.

My sister had a birthday this past Monday and so I thought a scrap basket would be a fun addition to some beginning quilting books I sent her for her gift.  She’s sure to have plenty of scraps soon because we are doing a quilt-along together!  Stay tuned to see the fabrics we picked.  They are going to arrive tomorrow.  Bea is going to make the same quilt my sister is making, so we just ordered half yards of all the fabrics and I’ll cut them up, add in a few from my stash, and mail them to her.

The lining fabric of this basket is one of my favorite prints, so pretty for summer, which by the way it was still summer when I sewed this thing! 

And last month Bea went to a birthday party for a friend who loves horses.  We picked out some store-bought gifts, but then I decided to make her a basket for her hair ties, to0, and I just happened to have these great carousel prints.  I picked the polka dot handles to give the fabrics a little edgier feel since recipient turned 8.  My oldest will be 8 next year.  I am not ready for that yet.

I did have a little hiccup getting the lining to fit perfectly this time, so I remedied that situation with a little “handmade” tag in the back of the basket.  Yay for little victories like this one.  It just worked out the fold was perfectly centered.

I also wanted to thank my friend CeLynn for the handmade flower headbands she sent my daughters (and all the other goodies, especially her caramel apple jam which was such a treat on toast).  I took a few photos of Bea wearing them to school the past couple days.

This purple flower headband is her favorite!  (and mine too…purple is a popular color at our house)

And pink is always a safe bet too!  Bea and I made the mistake of getting matching haircuts on a whim the day before school began (never, ever, ever do this, just don’t!), so we are both in the process of growing out bangs right now.  These headbands are the perfect accessory for taming those locks till they grow out.  Thanks, CeLynn!!!

Linking up to Quilt Story’s Fabric Tuesday, WIP Wednesday, and Finish It Up Friday.

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! 

Pinwheels

In honor of spring finally showing herself around these parts (sorry people who just got snow), I wanted to make a bright and cheerful quilt using Happy-Go-Lucky.  I started with a layer cake and subtracted out all the red fabrics.  Added a few 10” squares of Ruby to make up the difference.  And sashed it in a red Vintage Modern print.  I think it all adds up to bright and cheerful Bonnie & Camille medley!

This blue pindot and floral is my favorite block of the bunch.  Not the most flashy, but it has a classic, clean look I am drawn to.

I did learn something about making pinwheels from constructing this quilt top.  I didn’t pay attention—or rather I thought I was paying attention and I wasn’t—to the direction of the darker print in each pinwheel.  Next time I’ll get it right!

Linking up to WIP Wednesday.  Have a wonderful day!

WIP Wednesday

Three projects are at various stages of completion.

Garden Walk (actually called Pave the Way but I couldn’t remember the name of the pattern when I put it on my UFO list) is quilted and ready for binding.

My Madrona Road challenge project is almost done! 

And I started a Valentine’s pillow I put on my “Just Three” list for January.  It won’t be done by the 31st, but at least I have all the squares cut out. 

I love checking out what everyone is working on.  Linking up to WIP Wednesday.

Donuts and Doorways

First, a little WIP Wednesday.

I have 42 blocks for the Scrappy Stash QAL sewn and squared up to 9 1/2 inches.  I’ll be working on it more tonight and hopefully can get it done within a week for the linky party.

I saw on Debbie’s blog A Quilter’s Table that she would be posting about donuts yesterday, so we made some in the morning since my oldest was off from school and we were just hanging out.  When I went shopping last week, I picked up a tube of biscuits so I could make donuts like my mom did when I was a kid.

This method of donut making is fun for the kids, too.

There’s really nothing too it.  Just heat veggie oil on high.  Divide each biscuit in half so it’s not so thick, pinch out a hole, and brown on both sides (it only takes about 4 minutes).  Then cool on a few paper towels and let the kids cover them in cinnamon-sugar.

A few hours later, after we ran some errands and before going to the polls, we stopped at Dunkin Donuts and had donuts a second time and hot chocolate.  So yesterday was definitely a donut day! 

I have one last thing to share.  When I first started the Scrappy Stash QAL, my scraps were a hideous tangle of fabrics smooshed in a basket.  I gave it some thought, and since I don’t have any free shelf space in my sewing room, I decided to go with a hanging shoe holder to organize everything by color.

I would have preferred clear plastic, but Target didn’t have much selection and after sorting everything and hanging it in place, I am really pleased with the organized result.  It was a pretty inexpensive storage solution.  I think I read this idea in Sunday Morning Quilts, which has a pretty comprehensive section on scrap organization. 

Have a happy Wednesday!  We might have snow on the way this afternoon, which we are all really excited about.

Linking up to WIP Wednesday and Tuesday at the Table.

Baby Grace’s Quilt

 

A friend just had a little girl last week. So I whipped up this quilt from the scraps left over from the hourglass quilt top I posted about here.

I used some leftovers to applique her name to the back.  Fun!

It was a miracle I found this backing fabric in my stash.  It is from a Connecting Threads collection called “A Sip of Summer.”  I told you I am loving orange lately.  The binding is Denyse Schmidt.  It measures 30.5” square.

I ran out of batting while making this little quilt, so I used a yard of white quilter’s flannel I had on hand from fabric.com.  I crossed my fingers when I put it in the wash because I was nervous everything might shrink badly (I don’t prewash anything anymore) but it turned out just right!  I love the soft feeling of the linen and hope baby Grace does too.

My next project will be for Grace’s big brother.   I just received all my Polaroids from the swap a few days ago and am putting them together in 12” blocks geared for boys.  Luckily I have about 200 Polaroids to choose from! 

Linking up to WIP Wednesday.

WIP Wednesday

Two projects waiting to be binded (bound?).  I’ve got them quilted.  All of my kids went to bed early last night.  Can I hear an AMEN???  I had about four hours of sewing time to myself last night.  I got through three Law & Order episodes on the Roku.  It was bliss!

The sashing fabric is from Joann’s.  I’m pretty sure it’s called Kona celery.  I just had it in my stash and thought it worked—it’s a kind of greenish yellow.  I think I’m going to use a black on black print for the binding. 

This is the fabric.  I borrowed this photo from the Windham Fabrics gallery from the “Tea for Two” line.

And here are the two quilt tops I’ve made in the past week or so.   Interestingly, both are inspired by fabrics I’ve seen on Maureen Cracknell Handmade and both are made with hourglass blocks.

Don’t forget to enter my giveaway here.  I’m heading to the DC Modern Quilt Guild meeting this Saturday.  I can’t wait to meet some other modern quilters!!!

Baby Elephant Dance Reprise

I had so much fun making the boy version of my elephant quilt that I just had to make it in girl colors.

I used pink and green and then added some orange because I am really digging orange lately.

The elephant print is also Kharma Baby in the girl colorway.  The other fabrics are mostly Riley Blake and DS Quilts fabric with Kona white sashing.  Of course I went with striped binding!

Don’t they look so cute together?  If only I knew someone who was having girl/boy twins!!!  Now I just need to sew labels to the backs of them. 

I’ve got some blocks made for my newest project with Summerlove that I can’t wait to share put together.  I am using linen for the sashing this time!

 

Linking this up to WIP Wednesday.

Greek Cross Quilt

This past weekend I showed my cousin how to do machine binding and used this quilt as demonstration.  I started it last year as part of a quilt along.  I got the top done, but never went any further.

I’ve seen a few quilts with black/white binding so I thought I’d give it a shot on this quilt.  It looks fab!

I had a few crosses left over (actually I found one more after I’d already made the back) so I put them in a scrappy backing.

Some of the backing fabric is a DS Quilts print and the pink is a cheap Joann’s fabric that I got a loooooooooooooong time ago when it was on clearance.  It has glitter in it.  This quilt truly is a WIP!

I used my quilting bar to try to quilt straight lines.  For some reason, though, the quilting bar seems to go on the right which dictates that the quilt has to be squished under the arm instead flowing of out the side.  I tried to use the quilt bar backwards, but that wasn’t as successful as I hoped.  The binding is a black/white floral print from Bernatex.

This cute little fox fabric is my favorite block.  The finished quilt measures 44 x 70.  The background fabric is Kona ash.

Now, here is the quilt my cousin made!!!

I am a bit jealous of how fantastic her quilt turned out.  Look at her first time ever FMQ!

I am linking this up to WIP Wednesday.  Have a great Wednesday!

WIP Wednesday

I finished up a quilt a few minutes ago.  It’s a WIP from a few years ago…maybe three?  I let my oldest daughter Bea pick out the fabrics at Joann’s from their “snuggle flannel” fabric section.  I have to be honest, I’m pretty sure she didn’t pick out the backing since it’s purple and purple is my favorite color and has never been anything she likes.

A good striped binding is always my favorite.  I had this one in my stash.

I just did criss-cross quilting with purple thread (three different shades that were close enough to use together) and used up two whole spools from my stash!  Woo-hoo!

I’m also going on a fabric fast.  To keep my favorite shops in business and at the same time encourage you to use your stash, I’ll be giving away a $25 gift certificate to some online shops I frequent over the course of the next year, with a grand finale next August to see how much of a dent I’ve made in my stash.
Anyone who wants to participate can add a link to a finished project to my linky party starting August 7th.  You need to either have a blog or Flickr account and link back to this giveaway on either.  Open to US and international entrants.

To be entered for the prizes, simply look at your stash, then sew something—anything—from it. Past projects cannot be entered. Then either mention this blog post on your blog or in your Flickr description, then link it up. You can enter any finished project that uses fabrics from your stash.  You can purchase Kona white, thread, batting, basting spray, or notions, but no additional fabric.   I won’t be checking up on you, but you get the idea!
For myself, I will abide by the same rules but I can buy fabric needed to meet the requirements for the bees I am in—but nothing extra!!!  I can swap with others.  Also, I will continue getting my two monthly club fabrics.  I want independent fabric stores to stay in business!
What will nearly kill me?  Missing out on Sew Mama Sew.  But I’ve been living my challenge for the past week and it’s been a little tough but I’ll live.  When I decided to challenge myself, I made a frantic & desperate fabric.com purchase of a bunch of Kona solids, Laurie Wisbrun’s Brrr, and some Essex linen.  Now I will be only sewing from stash fabrics. 
I can’t wait to see what people make!  Are you working on a stash project now?  Link it up on the 7th thru the end of the month!
Linking up to WIP Wednesday.