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Showing posts from March, 2014

Monthly Block of the Month Update

Here are my Block of the Month Blocks. First up is my Farmer's Wife blocks 82-90. Blocks 82-90 Not too many holes to fill.  Only 2 more months.  Here are my Fall BOM Blocks. And then my Fat Quarter Shop BOM. And last but not least, my Pat Sloan Globetrotter block. And in a few days, Aprils will be due! Thanks for looking.

Loose Threads Art Group - Design Board Exchange - Round 1

Tonight we showed our round 1 quilts from our design board exchange challenge.  We each created a design board of things we like, things that inspire us. Then we will exchange them every two months and we are to find something on each board and create a quilt within the size of 16  x 20 or 18 x 24 (roughly).  Then we bring them back and then we discuss techniques and critique in a positive manner.  Offer suggestions.  That kind of thing.  Some of it is hard for me to do.  I have a hard time with abstract. For my board, I took a lot of things that I found on Pinterest.    Here's my board. Karen Taber got my board and this is her piece.  She used the colorful doxie picture and the lizard (under the words in the middle). Barbara Sawyers Board. Which Sara got and she is working on an iteration of quilts (series) but it's a new word we learned tonight so thought I should use it in the blog post  ;)  So here are 3 of Sara's quilts.  She was inspired by the feather.

Table Runners for my In-Laws

Last year I made my mother-in-law a few Crazy Eight quilt tops for her to give to her friends, with a promise that I'd make her one.  Which I finally did.  When I showed her the fabric earlier last year, she wasn't thrilled with a few of the fabrics, but I tried to explain you only see one inch of the design and that it would all work.  She ended up liking the finished product. And every year they attend and help organize a reunion for Orange Cove schools.  And the last few years I've made quilts and donated it for a raffle.  This year on our way to Road 2 California, I found this great orange fabric.  They are just getting a little runner this year.  And they are just as happy with that too.  Thanks for looking.

Retreat Time

A few friends and I took a quick trip to Cambria for a retreat.  Quilting retreat.  We sewed, we watched movies and we ate...a lot.  At least I did.  I got a lot done, but no finished tops.  I turned my Material Girl House challenge pieces, I cut some fusible designs for the design board challenge for Loose Threads, and turned and pressed some pieces of my Baltimore Christmas Block of the Year block.  I also hand sewed the binding down on these 5 little Easter Runners (1 for each of my 2 sisters and sister-in-law, one for my step-daughter and one for me.  (Pattern from Shabby Fabrics.) See that beautiful portable design wall?  My friends gave it to me as a thank you for opening up the house for our little retreats.  It sure is big and came in handy.  I'll be able to use it at home since I don't really have one here. So my friends got a lot done.  Deolinda finished the most tops. Kathy finished a huge quilt for her husband's friend who is in the Elks and a cute

Needle and Scraps

A funny thing happened on Saturday after my husband and I went out to lunch.  We ran to Michael's to get clock works for a clock of ours that was broken and we heard some puppies barking at PetSmart, which is conveniently located next to Michael's.  I asked my husband if we could stop and look, (he wants to get a Doberman) but we saw this sweet little girl dog and I asked Jeff if we could keep her.  We went home and discussed it some more and we decided that if she was still there after I ran some more errands then it was meant to be.  So meet my new little baby.  The rescue people had named her Noodle but as a quilter, I felt Needle was better and sounds a lot like Noodle so she won't get so confused. She's fitting right in.  She has a collar now, and she has been rid of all her fleas and is clean and fluffy.  We've only had one pee and one poop accident so far (that I've found).  The boys, Walter and Guy, are coming around to accepting her.  They have all s

Blankety Blank Blanket (and a little Strawberry Shortcake)

I know quilters hate when someone calls a quilt a blanket, but this name is just too good to pass up.  This quilt is made up of all scraps of fabric from the fabric company Blank fabrics.  Except for the blue and the fabric on the back.  Those all came from my stash or my mom's stash.  (She didn't have much but she had enough for this border.)  On June 29, 2014 I posted about cutting some scraps using Anita Grossman Solomon's no waste way to make a square in a square block.   See this post.   I used this as my leader and enders (a la Bonnie Hunter).  So it took a while to finish the inside of this quilt.  I also wanted to keep it scrappy and had some more scraps to use up so I took my Nickel Border book (by Pat Speth) and decided on this border using 5" squares.  So truly a very scrappy quilt that took a while to make. I spent most of my day yesterday traveling to and from my granddaughter's first birthday.  It was cute and so was she.  She was so good - never