Easy Street Update

I have gotten a little sewing in while doing some shopping, decorations, and cooking. Bonnie's first clue was out on Friday and I was glad it was not too difficult to finish. She has said this is not as piecey as previous quilts but we will have to see.   Just had to make 192 4 patches.  That seems simple enough and it was but always takes a little more time than I think, but they are done.  Yeah, step one complete.  I love grey and used up a bunch of strips from previous projects plus some white, black and grey prints I collected over the last year.  Here is the post with the colors I picked.  I have replaced the purple with orange and am super excited to see how this one turns out.  I love all the colors and fabrics!

Now on to gifts for Christmas.  First up is a sewing machine cover for a quilty friend.  She has a serious love of batiks so I picked a few out and then took the zig zag quilt from Crazy Mom Quilts blog to start on that.  I just down sized it to 1.5 inches by 2.5 inches.  I was able to measure her machine on our sewing weekend. So here is hoping it turns out like I think it will in my head.  I really wanted a bright zig zag.  So far so good!

Next will be 3 holiday pillows.  I am just taking one task at a time and hopefully will keep checking things off the list with out getting too overwhelmed. 

I did get the quilt for my grandma done but totally forgot to take pictures of it this weekend so I need to do that this week yet too. 

Linking up to Quiltville and Plum and June !

What I have been up to

 

This post is heavy with pictures.  I kept thinking that I would have time to post some progress but no go this past week.  I should have had the week of Thanksgiving off but work just did not cooperate so I worked Monday and Tuesday, long days but had off the rest of the week off. That was great but when you host Thanksgiving there just is not enough time to sew too! 

 

So there was some preparations for the best holiday ever and my oldest was home from school.  Which always makes for a great weekend. When he was home, I was able to give him his T-shirt quilt.  He slept with it all weekend and it made the treck back to school today when I drove him back!

 

 

 

 

Dinner was great.  I love cooking for Thanksgiving.  Everyone brings something and the DH cooks the turkey on the grill.  It is alway so good. He received lots of compliments!  Our house does not have a dining room so we make due in the kitchen and squeeze around the table. 

 

 

Every year we take a picture with the turkey.  We almost forgot and had to put the turkey legs back in. 

Here is my mom with a photo of each of her grandkids. There is only my brother and I, so three very spoiled grandkids for my mom. 

 

There always seems time for a nap and a little head rub!

So on the sewing front I have picked my fabrics for Easy Street which is Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt.  I did one a couple of years ago to use up some scraps and loved the fabric selections this year and she said it is not as piecey as the last couple so decided I should do this one.  I am not sure if I will be able to keep up but I am going to sure try.  Bonnie's colors were the same except for the orange, she has purple in there instead.  Since I don't have a whole lot of purple, I went with orange. I am really excited to start on this one.  I only had to buy one more yard of the grey, not bad. 

So now I need to get back to sewing!  I have a lot of gifts to make as well as keeping up with the mystery quilt.

 



Friday Finishes

I finished the t-shirt quilt for my oldest son.  I had planned on making him one for a long time so when he cleaned out his room when he was leaving for college I stacked all those t-shirts up and there they sat. He is in his junior year at college and thought I better get this done. So I cut and interfaced a lot of shirts!  I had over 30 and used most of them. 

He made sure all of the ones he wanted were in it and that each year of High School was represented in the quilt.  You will notice that there are clumps of color together.  Well, I had laid this one out distributing the color asked him what he thought and rearranging he went. The shirts front and backs had to be next to each other.  So I put it together as requested. 

I thought I would send it out to have it long armed but really didn't want to spend the money so I decided I would quilt it.  I found the design after spending some time over at Leah Day's Blog.  Lots of ideas and videos of how to do it.  I also thought tackling this one block by one block would be helpful.  I liked the way it turned out.  Still need to work on staying on the same stitching line and lining up my stitches when I start and stop.  They always seems to jar off. But you I am getting better each time I do it and once you stand back and look at it.  it looks pretty darn good!

Recently, I had just finished a quilt for our bed at our cottage.  The room has all paneling (hate it) so this definitely will brighten the room up.  I started it back in March at a retreat.  The pattern was from Moda Bake Shop and was call Ruby, Pearl, and Opal Quilt.  I had this quilted at my LQS.  I loved the daisy like flower.  I put Kona butter on the back.  I had picket up a layer cake of Terrain by Kate Spain and then a few pieces of what I could find along with some Good Fortune as well.  When I decided I wanted it bigger I added the solids in as well.  I am not real good an keeping fabric colors or names of what I use.  If I like it I buy it and use it. I love the bright colors in this one for sure. 

Let's hope I can get another quilt finished this weekend!  I have linked up for the first time at both places!
Can I get a Whoop-Whoop?
Finish it up Fridays

WIP Wednesday

Just got back on Sunday from a 4 day sew weekend so I did get alot done this last week. So here is a quick run down of where a few things are at.
Quilting the t-shirt quilt which is a large twin on my home machine. That was a little overwhelming at times but I just kept going one block at a time and it is coming along.  I have it finished for oldest when he comes home from school next weekend so will need daylight and some long arms to hold this up to get some good photos over the weekend.

I also started a cute Moda Bake Shop pattern with this Kona Solids Bright charm pack.  I love how pretty they are.  I need more Kona white to finish up the blocks.

I have 3 quilts I would like to have quilted before the end of the year.

• Grandma's Quilt for Christmas- should be able to do this year
• Summerville Patchwork
• Moda U Sampler - going on two years for this one 

Thanks for taking a look!  Linking up at Freshly Pieced!

Retreat sewing

What a fun great weekend.  I love sewing for long periods of time and with friends how great is that? 

We headed out on Thursday morning first with coffee at Starbucks.  Then we headed to the first quilt store which was Primitive Gatherings.  They had beautiful quilts displayed. They have a lot of wool and civil war fabric.  I had that stage a few years ago and since I have not been using it no buying any more.  I still love the bubble gum pinks.  However, I did find the Swoon Pattern there.  I had been eyeing that up since last summer.  Then we headed to Piece by Piece.  This was a really nice shop and they had a lot of patterns with lots of bag samples as well.  Just a couple pieces of fabric here. In the same strip mall there was an Artist shop and a wine store. So we checked both of them out. Then lunch and our ride to "The Cabin".

We have to set up but doesn't take long with five of us so we were sewing well before dinner.  Nice sewing area with a large TV and fireplace.  Then a huge bar area with a pool table topped with a ping pong top.  That makes it super easy to cut or lay out and pin/spray baste a quilt.  Love no kneeling.

Thursday night I worked on sashing my Summerville patchwork, which I was able to finish that night.  I would have could have finished faster if I pay attention and did not have to rip!  Oh well, just pay a littler closer attention!

I then started on making blocks for my grandmothers quilt as well and had a good chunk of blocks done before bed and an all day Friday Sew I finished the top! I am happy how it turned out and I know she will love it! 

I then worked on the baby quilt.  I had planned on a solids baby quilt but in my bin from last year were rainbow batiks from the Warm/Cool quilt I made the year before.  So I sashed in white and finished it up. I just quilted in random lines.  I found the binding shopping on Saturday. 

We were able to go to a  couple more stores on Saturday.  The Cotton Thimble was first up.  I had found a stripe to finish up the baby quilt. Then we headed to Antoinette's Quilt Shop.  This shop just opened in the last year and I really enjoyed it.  Great staff and owner and some really cute lines with some good variety.  I did some damage here!   They also had a Bistro in the same strip mall and a great gift shop.  I know I will have to head back there sometime soon. 

We were gone all day so we didn't start sewing until late but we did get more done.  I then started on the solids charm pack and white for the Wiggly-Whimsy Quilt. I ran out of Kona white or I may have stayed up to finish those as well.  Well, at the least the blocks.

Sunday only gave us a few hours so I made 2 drawstring bags from In Color Order. Love those!  Then I had bought two fat quarters for one Swoon Block but of course I said no extra fabric so I have to cut right but I didn't so they are sending me a new one. Hate that when that happens but at least I can get a new fat quarter!

Oh my that is one long post!  I didn't get all things on my list done but I got a lot done and am really happy with them!  This weekend should be good as well since the hubby and son will be deer hunting.  I love these two weekends every year!

WIP Wednesday

This is my first link up to WIP Wednesday and only my second post.  I have lots to learn about blogging, linking and taking pictures but figure no better way to learn than to just do it! I have been following and seeing all the great projects people are working on and what a great way to stay on task.  I also hope then I will get some things accomplished.

This weekend is a a quilty retreat with a few friends at my mom's house a couple of hours from home, so now I need to get ready to spend 4 days sewing. 

I am starting with a quilt for my grandma.  I am doing a really easy pattern from Quilting in the Rain, Rainy Day Quilt.  I had pinned this awhile ago and am using all fabric from my stash. 

I need to make a donation baby quilt by Thanksgiving weekend.  I think I will use a Kona charm pack and either white or light grey and do a simple coin quilt.  Not sure which background I will use so I may need to bring both.

I would like to finish my Summerville quilt. The patchwork blocks are done just need to sash them.

I also want to make some small projects.  I bought the drawstring bags pattern from In Color Order.  Then a maybe a sewing machine cover, iPad cover, and a binder cover.  So I will just bring some fabric and cordinates and hope to get a few of them done.

I currently have 8 projects on my list.  I know there is no way I will get all this done but you have to have a list right?  Well, at least I do and I will love checking them off too!

We'll see what gets finished.  If you have visited from WIP Wednesday, thanks for stopping by! 

First Post

I have been faithfully reading blogs for the past year and comment on occasion as well.  I kept thinking it would be nice if I would have a record of what I have been working on as well.  I really want to be able to look back see what I made and why I made it.  I want to remember the details. 

I have been procrastinating about the first blog post since I had no idea where to start.  So I figured I would just write something, anything.  That first step always seems harder than it is.

I wanted to post one picture (really just to see if I could figure this out!)  Here is a picture of my mom and I from a couple of years ago.  We have been going to a quilting retreat once a year for a really long time and recently we just added one weekend to her "cabin" quilting with some friends.  Sewing, shopping, eating with friends is always fun.

Well the first post is done and it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be! On to quilty posts in the near future and learning how to blog!