Beautiful Quilt Received!

I found a wonderful SFRR quilt in my mailbox this morning - what a great Christmas eve gift! The back is just as fun as the front, and the workmanship is beautiful. Margaret hosted a wonderful swap and I really appreciate all her hard work, as well as the work of Susan, Valerie, Margaret and Jeanne who created my beautiful quilt. I have it on a small table right by my front door now, but it may be destined for my daughter's yellow room.


I've been working with my Gwen Marston - style borders and blocks to add to my center, and I decided these 16-patch blocks didn't add anything great. However, when I laid them out all by themselves, they look pretty good. I may now have a new center and work on 2 quilts at once. It seems one or the other or both might need a bright zig-zag border.



The Christmas jammies were finished in plenty of time ... photos of the completed project soon. I love the rocket on the front of my son's - I hope he does as well!

Instant Gratification

Even though I have some bigger projects in mind, I always come back to the instant gratification of comfort quilts. I was playing with my 2.5" strips and whipped up this Chinese coins top and a bordered box quilt. Fun colors that I hope will give a child something fun to look at.
















I recently purchased Gwen Marston's Collaborative Quilts book and am very inspired by her whimsical style. I pulled out a small friendship start quilt (30 x 40) that I had made from some leftover half square triangles. I started adding borders and lots of brights and black and whites ... I really like how it's coming along! However, I have some Christmas eve jammies I need to finish (a tradition in our house), so I'm putting it aside while I finish those.

SFRR completed

I am pleased to have finished the quilting and binding on my spring fling round robin. All the pieces I have received to work on have been beautifully crafted, and this was no exception. I'll only post a peek of a photo until it is received by its new owner. I was glad to find some fabric in my stash that was just the perfect color for the binding ... I knew buying that fabric on impulse would serve some good purpose!

I just saw that Margaret is hosting another of her wonderful swaps - four seasons quilt swap number 5. Now that this little quilt is checked off my list, I'm signing up for another fun swap!

Where did November go?

As I enjoy reading other quilter's blogs tonight, I realized I haven't posted in weeks. Where did November go? I have finished up several tops and quilts for my Linus group as we give a 75 Christmas quilts to a group that has a special Christmas party for sick kids.

I have also been teaching a kids after school sewing class, so every Sunday night I dash around madly getting things together for Monday's class. It's a great group of 7 girls, one of whom has taken every after school class I've taught. She always finishes quickly, so I need a spare project to keep her going and inspired, although she likes "free sew" as well.

I need to finish the quilting and binding on my SFRR quilt ... I started with some folk-style hand quilting, but I've pulled that out since I think some machine quilting might suit it (and my time frame) better. After I finish up Thanksgiving dinner for 16, I need to get back to that project! To add a little photo interest to this post, here's a picture of my variation of Bonnie's Tobacco Road. It's a cozy couch quilt, and a fun way to use some of my browns and reds. I finished up the binding last month.

Finally, some photos!

I finally finished the binding and snapped a photo of my crayon box quilt. I love the bright colors and memories that a lot of the fabrics hold. Although my mother is not a quilter, she always saved all the edges from clothes she sewed for me or others. I can look at this quilt and remember dresses from my childhood or those my mother wore. Thanks, Bonnie, for another great pattern!


I also finished the binding on a bento box quilt I finished for a friend who recently got married. I just have to figure out how to send it to her in the Bahamas, and it's only 2 months past the wedding! This is a fun pattern I may do for one of my Linus quilts soon.

sewing but not blogging

I've actually been getting things done in my sewing room, but don't have many photos to show for it. We got out the Halloween placemats at our house, and I love the freestyle letters inspired by Tonya that I added to this one. Our guild is having a song quilt challenge, and I hope to make something with freestyle letters for that. Speaking of Halloween, I have a fuzzy black dog costume and a shiny red robot costume on the top of my to-do list. I have the dog almost complete, but the flying fuzz makes me sew with the vacuum by my side.


Here's a photo of my finished quilt from our guild's Throw Me A Curve mystery workshop with Mark Lipinski. We all made the same blocks, and then saw many different quilts created with the varied arrangements. A fun idea! He suggested I over-dye it with tan, add fluffy batting, tie it and embellish with buttons. Since I was not wedded to any ideas, I decided to do it a-la-Mark just as he suggested. It's a nice snuggly quilt, but not my favorite. But it's done, so I can share it with the other workshop participants at our next meeting.

Playing with strips

Not that I needed another project, of course, but I had been wanting to try the Crayon Box pattern from quiltville for awhile. I've been making some placemats for a town harvest festival, but was a little bored with the repetition, so I dipped into my strip bin and played. It's so bright and unmatched, but it makes me happy!


There are lots of little bits of fabrics with great memories. Even a bit from a dress my mother made for me in high school. I think I'll add a dark pink border, and quilt it on my friend's gammill with simple swirls and such. It will be a nice cuddle quilt for the sofa.