Baby quilt is finished just in time!

My daughter had her beautiful baby four weeks early!  Luckily I had just finished the baby quilt and took it to the hospital to welcome my new granddaughter, Saydee.

I made this improv butterfly quilt for my daughter to hang over the changing table.  Nice and bright, right?  I used the brown dots to match the curtains my daughter made for the room.  The back is interesting, too, in case they feel like changing the scenery.

This is the biggest quilt I have machine quilted.  My free motion quilting is coming along (in other words, I finally got the tension figured out!).  I figure a newborn won't look too closely!  I washed it and I love how soft and crinkley it is.

I used bright pink thread, too.  (Be bold!)

I am joining in on the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  Click the link and you too can spend hours of fun with beautiful quilts!

I linked up to Fabric Tuesday at Quiltstory, also.  More fun finishes to check out!

My Brown Bag Fabric and Surprise

Here are the fabrics I am sending to my very patient partner in the Brown Bag Challenge.  They are all nice calicos but not what I am attracted to now (bright? dots? stripes? no?)  I should be in about fifty more of these to get rid of some of my stash.  I also made a little pincushion to include in the package (which I swear I am mailing tomorrow!)

Sunday Stash

These beautiful fat quarters are the brown bag fabrics from my partner!  I was thinking I would get some funky fabrics and look how lovely they are!  The piece on the right is the one fabric I think I will add into the quilt.  I have until March, I think!  It may take me that long!

This box of great fabrics also arrived this week.  I got one of those rulers that sharpen your rotary cutter blade as you cut and the fabric was very reasonable (so I got a bunch!)from My Notions Online.
I also stopped by my LQS to get some thread and picked out some various prints. 

Although I do not seem to be getting much done, I am making quite a mess in my sewing room/dining room.
I have several projects going on at once (of course).  The end of the month I am having a shower here (eek!) so I guess I will need to tidy up (a little!).

Modern improv quilt

Another small quilt project to practice my free motion quilting. I tried out some swirls using pink quilting thread. I like the charcoal grey Kona much better after quilting. My quilting leaves a lot to be desired but it is a lot of fun and my friend Susan doesn't mind. I love this kind of piecing, too. Lots of color, lots of fun!
The binding is large polka dots (it looks like stripes in this picture, though, doesn't it?).

I linked up to Lush Friday and Confessions of a Fabric Addict's TGIF! Head over to find more Friday finishes!

Bee Pillow

Here is a quick project I finished this week: a bee handprint pillow!The back is soft flannel covered in tiny bees.

Don't you love the pom poms?

Okay, so I have been trying to practice my free motion quilting by making some small projects. I found this block in my stash when I cleaned up a little. It is from four years ago, made by some of my Kindergarten students and not included in their quilt, I think, because it was the wrong number of bees. We remade the block for the quilt and I just could not throw it away. So now those kids are fourth graders. I quilted the block and made a cute pillow for my rocking chair at school.

I am linking to Quiltstory Fabric Finishes.  Go over and see all the sewing greatness!

Autism Speaks Donation

My friend Maggie asked if anyone would be willing to donate to a charity auction for Autism Speaks. I was happy to volunteer a quilt. I made it using a jelly roll and part of a layer cake. The back was harder to decide upon than the front. The auction is next weekend so I finished it just in time. I used wavy straight line machine quilting. I washed it and now it is all crinkly and lovely.

Jump over to Quiltstory and Trendy Treehouse to see more fabric finishes for the week!

Giveaway on Quiltstory

Head over to Quiltstory to win some gorgeous fabric! Ladybug Quilt Shop has patterns and fabric and a cute logo!

A free motion quiltalong!

I am so excited! Just as I am trying to learn how to machine quilt, here comes A Few Scraps with a fun quiltalong to help me out! I have now made three little quilts to practice but I am still not very good at meandering. I am hoping to get some tips. Jump over there for the quiltalong and a giveaway!

This is the little quilt that I gave my daughter for her birthday. I am still much better at the straight line quilting.

A week in review

This is one of my daughter's cats, Teddy, enjoying her new kitchen sink. She has been very busy with renovations of her townhouse this summer (taking nesting to the extreme!). You can see the transformation here at her blog, Cara's Catch All.

Well, I didn't get to all the things on my goal list this week but I did pretty well. Here are my new kitchen curtains.

The dress is done, the skirt is done, I have gifts made for the shower, I made a hostess gift for my sister in law, and started another gift for my daughter. I didn't get any of the bathroom project done (although I did enlist a helper!). Now all I need to do is pack! I will be in sewing withdrawal for a week!

Goals!

I keep getting distracted by all the ideas I find online. I have a pinterest page to save all the great ideas I find. Have you discovered Pinterest yet? Here is a link to my page if you want to check out what I am drooling over. I also love love love the 15 minutes of play from Victoria at Bumblebeans, Inc. I have been sewing all kinds of scraps together to make blocks. I have some of them up on my design wall and I adore them! I am currently making the little wonky star blocks to make a border for them.

Have you seen the posts where bloggers set goals for the month? Or Amy over at Amy's Creative Side asked people to decide on one thing and try to finish it this week. I seem incapable of doing only one project at a time! I have seemingly endless time this summer and yet many more ideas and projects than I can possibly get to before school begins! I have one week before we leave on our trip and this is what I want to get done:

1. Mini quilt hostess gift

2. Dress for Cara

3. Skirt for Cara

4. Baby shower surprises

5. Kitchen curtains (need new curtain rods and hardware but I bought the fabric today).

6. Order new kitchen/laundry room floors

7. Remove wallpaper, mirror, sink and toilet in powder room

hmmm... not sure this will all get done!

Scrappy House Quilt Finish

I made this little quilt for a friend I teach with. She and her husband own a small house they are renovating that they call the Love Shack. She spends many weekends on hands and knees scraping and sanding. After a few years of weekends, it is finally coming together. It was her birthday last week but she was in Australia! So I delivered this little gem to her today. It is taking the four hour trip to the shore with them right now!

This was a fun project and I am half way through making another one for my sister-in-law. I am practicing my machine quilting (and I have a ways to go) and it is lots of fun. I was able to write the words "love shack." How fun is that!?!

I am excited to have a follower (finally!).

I am linking this to AmyLouWho's Sew and Tell and Show and Share at Just a Girl and weekend wrap up at Tatertots and Jello.

New Kindergarten Quilt

Here is the new quilt made by my class, my assistant, Janet, and myself. We make one every year and this year I decided to use their handprints to illustrate one of the songs we sing. Kindergarteners are fascinated with rainbows!


We started by making a paper quilt to see where the handprints would end up and how big the rainbow would turn out. Then we laid the white cotton over the paper template to recreate the rainbow. It is hard to get small children to only make one print! They are very tempted to print until all the paint is gone (we watched them very carefully and this was a great group of 22 five and six year olds).



My friend and assistant, Janet did the quilting. We shared it with all the parents at the end of the year program and it will hang above my chalkboard for next year's kids to enjoy.


This is the back of the quilt. I let the kids make the dot with fabric paint markers and draw around them to make bugs, faces, rainbows, houses, and flowers. I think they did a great job!


I am linking this up to Amy's Sew and Tell Fridays. Go now and see the many great finishes this week!

Upcycled man's shirt to maternity shirt!

My middle child is expecting in November so I have been sewing her some new clothes. For this shirt, I stole a man's shirt from her brother (he actually has outgrown it) and added some black dots. I decided it was a little plain so I made the flower pin to brighten it up. It was easy to cut off the sleeves and use the binding around the armholes. I made the ties to so she can adjust the fit. I hope she likes it!

Spring sewing....

This week, I am starting the Kindergarten quilt with my class (it has to be finished by the ice cream social with the parents on June 7th!). We are making a rainbow of handprints and adding a buggy border. My teaching assistant, Janet, is a wonderful help with all my projects. She is much better at machine quilting than I am. This is a picture of our quilt from last year.




The kids drew the critters with paint markers and I traced around them with sharpies. It is hanging in the hallway outside my classroom, near the entrance to the school. I pieced it and Janet did the quilting and binding.
I made this skirt from the bottom of the tshirt I used for my dress. It is for my daughter and her expanding beautiful belly (she is 15 weeks pregnant and rapidly outgrowing her clothes). It was so easy to make, I started one for myself.
These wonky log cabin blocks are all quilted and ready to be a quilt as soon as I make 6 more! They are really fun to make but each one takes over an hour because they are so closely quilted. I put more pictures up as soon as I get them made.

I also started a wonky log cabin house medallion quilt. I love the ones at House of Krom. So adorable! I may end up making more than one.

Sewed all Morning!

I made two dresses today using old t-shirts and two yards of fabric. Nice, comfy Spring dresses! I was so happy to find they were so easy to make. I used two t-shirts that no longer fit, I took them in, removed the sleeves on the white one, seamed up the fabric, and sewed it together. I let the stretch of the shirts gather the skirt fabric for me. Now all I have to do is hem them. I was inspired by the dresses at Lil Blue Boo and other sites that showed upcycling t-shirts.

I was so pleased with my wonderful self that I went forward with the next item on my mental list of things to make: a baby bib for a baby shower that my daughter is going to tomorrow. Her friend from high school is now a teacher, too, and she is due in June. I thought the bib would take about 10 minutes to make but it turned out to take about an hour and a half (had to rip out all the binding and start over!) Grrr! Next one I make will be flip and sew! Stupid binding!
Here it is:


Linking to Show and Tell Friday on amylouwho and Get Inspired at sewdangcute!

My Latest Wall Quilt

I went to my local quilt shop and wandered around for an hour lusting after the gorgeous fabric. Seminole Sampler has all kinds of beautiful selections. I fell in love with the Folklorica by Julie Paschkis for In the Beginning. I bought some fat quarters and this week I put them all together in a quick top. It is very intense! I am thinking I will put a white or cream border next.

First, I cut out 3 1/2 inch squares and sewed them together randomly into groups of three.

Next, I attached each group of three to another rectangle, 6 1/2 by 9 1/2.
























I arranged the resulting squares on the floor until I liked the arrangement. I am guilty of rarely pinning anything. I sewed the squares into rows and then attached the rows.

I like it so far!