WIP Craftsy baby quilts

As I promised in my last post I took some pictures of my works in progress blue&white baby quilts I'm making with the Craftsy block  of the month  blocks.

Quilt #1 (doesn't have a name yet) is sashed and the top is assembled. 

I finished piecing the squares for the backing on Wednesday night. I didn't have enough fabric left from the ones I used in the blocks so I had to improvise :)

Quilt #2 is in the to be sashed status. I laid out the blocks on the bed because of the lack of a design wall. :) Here's what they look like, with one of the helpers on the side:

I'm home today so I'll be working on the sashing (it'll be the same as #1) and then I have no idea what's gonna be on the back... I have some blue  squares cut for another quilt and I might just use those. Who knows? :)
Also, any suggestions for names? I am totally stuck and  have no imagination in naming my quilts. It's good I don't have any children, we're having a hard time even naming our kitties :)
Hope you have a lovely weekend and thank you for visiting! Come again soon! :)

Linking up to

'Til we blog again! :)

Easy Street fabric choices & Chopsticks paper piecing

Some of you who follow me on Twitter might know that I decided to do Bonnie Hunter's Easy Street mystery quilt this year. I've never participated anything like this and would like to have it under my belt.  I'm pretty sure it'll be fun since I lot of people I keep in touch with are doing it. It'll be my largest quilt made so I'm looking forward to that too!

I was too lazy to take pictures of my fabric choices blaming the sun for not shining, but  now I got over myself and took some photos. I picked pink, orange, purple, and lime green for the colors, and haven't decided if I'll do black &white or just plain white for the background. Probably b&w, but I didn't have enough so I ordered some and they're not here yet.

Here they are all together:

Pretty pinks:

Fiery oranges:

Pretty purples (the one on the right is my very favorite):

And the greens:

 Helper of the day, Sleepy:

My cyber friend, Kristy @Quiet Play is into paper piecing and selling her patterns on  Craftsy. She asked for volunteers for pattern testing and I'm glad to help. She had 4  new ones coming out, I got the Choptsicks pattern to be tested. I think it turned out pretty nice despite the fact that I messed up the colors, but  oh, well :) Please visit her Craftsy shop, She has  some pretty cute patterns for paper piecing. I particularly loved the last one  She posted in her blog here about her  dream sewing room.

Here's how my chopsticks pattern came out:

Since it's only a test piece, I didn't pay attention to have enough of the same white background so it looks kind of scrappy. It served the purpose so  I'm not stressing about it.

I'm still working on the blue  and white baby quilts, one of the top is assembled and just finished piecing the backing last night. Pictures will be in my next post so stay tuned!

'Til we blog again! :)

Quick baby quilts

Hey Everyone,

Welcome back! I'm so glad you're here :)

Today's post will  be about a few pictures of the "whole cloth" baby quilts  my friend asked me to make.

She gave me 2 weeks  notice, we went to pick out the fabrics together. She picked 2 adorable ones, and a very soft flannel for the back.

I was kind of considering if  I should do a regular quilt, or just quilt the top and the batting together and sew the back on pillowcase style with no binding. I decided it  would be better for the flannel to be quilted with the other 2 layers so that's what I did. Her friend is expecting twins and was going to have the baby shower on the Saturday after Sandy. She gave me the fabrics on Thursday before the hurricane came so I hurried to baste,quilt, and to sew the binding on  thinking I can do the hand stitching while we lose power. And that's what I did. I finished both bindings while the power was out, only for 2 days thank goodness. She called me and said the baby shower was postponed because of the storm so I put the quilts aside. The only thing I had left to do was to weave the thread ends.

She called me last Thursday again and said the  shower will be held on Saturday so She wants to swing by to pick up the quilts. I told her to hold her horses because I still had a few hours of work that I needed to do to  have them finished. I worked  on them  on Thursday night and finished them both.

Friday morning we took the photos, Fiance helped because there was not so much light. So he was holding up the quilts while I took the photos. They're not the best quality, but they'll do for now. My only regret is that I was kind of rushing and forgot to take close-ups. Ooopsie! :)

Here they are!

Front I:

Back I:

Front II:

Back II:

I didn't have a chance to wash them and I'm hoping the new owner will  send me pictures of the quilts washed and wrapped around the new babies!

That's all for Today, next time I'll  post  about a block I was testing for someone, and my fabric choices for the Easy Street Quilt Along hosted by Bonnie K. Hunter. Also I'm still working on sashing my Craftsy BOM blocks into 2 baby quilts. Pictures are coming up! :)

'Til we blog again! :)

Hurricane Sandy aftermath and relief blocks

Hi Everybody,

I'm glad to be back! Literally! After Hurricane Sandy storming through and losing power for a few days it's nice to be able to post again.

When they started to forecast the storm I was busy getting ready to have some handwork to do while we lose power which only lasted for 2 days thank  goodness! We had very strong winds blowing through, but not many trees or power lines down. The only annoyance I had was not being able to reach anybody via cell phone since the nearby tower was also down.
We had to go over to our friend's house to bring our frozen food to put in their freezer which they were using with a generator. They live a few miles away and on the way there I was taking some pictures to show the destruction.

Tree fallen on the power line

Mostly pine trees suffered the damage

At this property every single pine tree was rooted  up and fell across the drive way on both sides.

Another one down...

I also shot some videos  which we will upload to Youtube, I'll link them in later.
When we got the power back and we saw the news for the first time in 3 days it was devastating. We were listening to the radio all day while we didn't have power, but when you just hear about it you can't imagine what people are going through. I have friends in NJ close to the beach who I haven't heard from for a week, just got a phone call this morning that they're OK. It's really sad to see all those neighborhoods gone, people who were left with nothing.
One of our fellow quilters Jennifer from Knotted-Thread has family and friends in the area that was hit by the hurricane. She's reaching out for help to make quilts to be donated to people who need them.
I made these blocks and will mail them tomorrow so She can get working.

Black and gray blocks:

Multicolored blocks:

She'd set up a Flickr group for people who want to help. Please consider signing up, She's still collecting blocks for the multicolored ones. She'd like to get them by November 25 to be able to deliver the quilts by Christmas. The blocks are easy to make, only Half Square Triangles. Thank you for your support!

'Til we blog again! :)

Christmas QAYG progress

Hello, and Welcome back!

I have a few pictures to share with you guys. Friday night and Saturday afternoon I had time to  sit down and start the Free Motion Quilting I wanted to do on some of the Christmas blocks. I even got out my walking foot and put it to use in a real quilt for the first time. If you're following my blog you read my post about my problems with the walking foot. Thankfully I don't have that problem anymore! It included to order a brand new walking foot through Amazon.com.  When that arrived I could compare it to my original Singer walking foot and noticed that the plate itself that pushes the fabric down was missing from mine. No wonder why I couldn't get the stitches working. DUH! So now I have and extra walking foot :)

I got all excited and decided to quilt one of my blocks on my Christmas Quilt with straight lines. I can't remember if I mentioned it at the FAL blog post, but this quilt is partially made with block swap blocks from back in 2007. It mostly includes my blocks, but there were a few that were close to the size I needed (and we agreed on) so I decided to use those. Someone made a very pretty star block in which the fabrics I love and left the background just blank white which called for the straight line quilting I longed for. I think it looks really pretty now! I had to put a frame around the blocks to be able to size them up to be uniform.

Let me just say it while I was working on this block I was in loooooove! With my walking foot of course! Now I can't wait to make a quilt with just straight line quilting.

The next block I pieced myself because I love pine trees. A lot! :)

On this block I was going to practice the swirls I really like from Angela Walters' Craftsy class. Well, I still need a LOT of practice for sure! It's a lot more easier to just draw it on paper.

Close-up of the background quilting:

And the final one that was also pieced by  me:

With this block I was practicing pebbles for the first time. Not-so-perfect, but I can live with it :) It's kind of stiff right now, but I'm hoping it will get softer once the quilt is together and I can wash the whole thing. I love this look because it reminds me of snow falling. If you know me well, you know how much I LOVE snow! :)

Here's a close-up of the pebble quilting:

That's all I have for today, I'm hoping my Amy  Butler Weekender bag pattern will arrive shortly so I could start that project too! Like I need more projects to work on, LOL!

'Til we blog again! :)

The Long Weekend project

Hello Dear Readers,

I'm glad you joined me again!

Today's post will be a short one, I just wanted to put the word out that I'll be doing The Long Weekend sew along hosted by Heidi and Lori H..

We'll be making Amy Butler's Weekender Bag. I bought all my supplies last night at Jo-Ann, they had the home decorating fabrics for 50% off. Actually all the supplies were on sale except the cording, which was a pretty good  deal a 100ft for about $5. I got extra from everything and managed to spend  heaps amount of money. I was joking with someone that this will be the most expansive bag I've yet to have :) If you feel like it, come and join the fun! The kick off post was on the 15th with the schedule of the guest bloggers and sponsors so it's not too late. I joined this sew along because I want to see if I could rise up to the challenge. I'm not a bag maker, only made a few Easter baskets and a tote bag so far, so it will be a big bite for sure! :) If it turns out OK, I'll be making another one for someone.

These are the fabrics I'm going to use:

The bottom fabric I'll use for the exterior and the blue one will be the lining.

In the mean time I started to work on quilting the Christmas blocks and  have cut up some scraps from my scrap drawer. Pictures will be posted later.

Now I have to run to make lunch.

'Til we blog again! :)

4th quarter Finish Along goals

Hello everybody,

It's so nice to be here again! I can't believe how fast time flies and it's time to make new goals again.

Here are the projects I'm working on and wishing to finish this quarter:

Christmas Quilt-as-you-go quilt (have no idea what size, still have to decide. I have lots of extra blocks from a Christmas star block swap)

Chocolate pink monkey quilt (need to check if I have enough fabrics left to add another column to make it a little wider, then piece backing and go from there)

Plain squares (which I may just cut up and use it as backing, but not sure. Started out  as a duvet cover about 10 years ago...)

Double wedding ring top (which I'd like to make as a cat mat and practice free motion quilting on it)

Tote bag (needs handles and lining)

Craftsy Block Of the Month quilt (I'm planning to make 2 baby quilts out of the 20 blocks)

And the bonus project I haven't even started yet so it  will not count are 4-5 shopping bags and another tote bag (from the pretty flower fabric)

I'm realistic and if I don't finish everything it won't be a big deal.
I'm linking up to Rhonda @Quilter in The Gap for the 4th Quarter FAL linky party.
That's all for today, now I'll have to get working! :)

'Til we blog again! :)