Rainbow Afghan Finished

The whole thing is together. Now all I have to do is finish weaving the ends in. I can't believe that I forgot to post a picture. 
In total there are 16 blocks. They're each bordered with white, then stitched together in white.  Then there is one row of a white border done in double crochet and the last bit is dark blue for a border wave design.

Its been so cold we've slept under this for a few nights even without having the ends woven in.

Convergence

I found a fat quarter pack while I was cleaning out one of my bins.  Put it on the table for a few days and waited for inspiration to hit.

It took a few days but I settled on a  technique and style of quilting used by Ricky Timms,  called Convergence. 

As a top before any quilting it measures approximately 26.5x26.5 inches.

Since I literally just finished the top I'm going to take a day or two to think on how I want to quilt it.  Currently I'm thinking just a stitch in the ditch because the center is busy as well as the fabrics. 

Any thoughts?

Something For Me?

I finally had some inspiration to work on a little something for me - a new wall hanging for my sewing area.

I found an awesome fat quarter of a blue sky and cloud print and a little bit of a red and cream print sewing themed fabric   I paired the red and cream fabric with one of the fabrics I purchased my last trip to JoAnn before it went out of business in my area. The fabric I picked is a cream music print.  Its very subtle.

Then I used my favorite Dresden Plate ruler to cut the blades. When the whole plate was made I discovered that the fat quarter was slightly too small to applique the plate. 

So I added strips of Kona white to each side of the fat quarter.  This gave me enough space to applique the Plate.

Currently I'm in the process of hand appliqueing the plate to the background.  I have four of the 20 blades done.

After its all appliqued down I still need to figure out how to quilt it.

When everything is done my final touch will be to add my fathers buttons to the points of the blade. Daddy passed in 2007 and I've been holding onto buttons I pulled off his favorite clothes.  They've been living in a baggie in my desk drawer.  But I think this will be the perfect use for them. 

So... any suggestions on how to quilt this one up?

Looking at the sky

I took this with my cell phone camera the other night. Sometimes I just feel in awe of Mother Nature.

Teacher Gift #1

This quilt will be for the main teacher in kiddos classroom.  Its slightly different than the other because her name is longer. 

A few errors on it but its ok. Now to trim, label and bind by Wednesday.  :(  I'm not getting much sleep I figure.

Teacher Gift #2

I opened up my big mouth that I quilt. Guess who got volunteered to make two quilts as end of year teacher gifts.

This girl.

Here's the quilt for one of the teachers. 

Kiddo is in Pre-K, so I asked each parent to trace their child's hand print. It took forever for 25 hand prints to come in. I asked in February and got the last of the handprints LAST WEEK!!

Now to finish quilting, trim, label and bind by Wednesday.

Shades of purple

So this is for my friend Sandi. She loves purple and hates pink. So.. Shades of purples it is.  Not one drip of pink to be seen. 

I'll have to quilt it over the summer when I have a bit more time to dedicate to the custom quilting I want to do. :)  I do have a few different shades of purple thread, but haven't decided on the specific color to quilt it with.  I'm thinking that I may want to quilt some feathered hearts in the large squares, or maybe some feathered squares. Oh the decisions!

Please excuse the bad cell phone picture.  

Coast Guard Lone Star

My mom has a big birthday coming up this year, but she's sworn me to secrecy about her age.

So, I won't say her age, but I will say that she's getting a quilt for her birthday - and it features the super hard to find Coast Guard fabric!!

I've been looking for Coast Guard fabric forever, and finally got my grubby hands on some.

Now, all I'm waiting for is the stencil of the Coast Guard emblem so I can quilt that in the large squares and anchors in the triangles.  This still has to be trimmed up, but I'm waiting for daylight to do that so I don't screw it up.

And I'm still trying to decide on the thread color to quilt it in, I'm looking for a varigated thread, perhaps in red, white and blue.  Still undecided on that.

This is a close up of one of the points in the lone star.

 

And here is the whole star.  It really is flat, I'm just lazy and didn't want to lay everything out perfectly, when I'll just have to press it again before I trim. :)

For the Saints Fan in my life

My husband is a Saints (American) football fan.  Its funny that he's a Saints fan because he didn't grow up in the US.  When he moved here to the States, I gave him a year to learn the rules of American football and another year to learn the different teams. 

So the one year, he watched all the games and declared that "Whoever wins the Super Bowl will be my team." 

 2009 - Saints won. 

And that is the story behind this quilt. 

I'll be quilting it with a fleur de lis this summer.  I'm also not sure if I'll be adding another border or two. Perhaps a skinny solid black, a medium size yellow border and then a wider Saints border.  :)

 

And here's a close up of one of the blocks.  I fussy cut the helmets so they'd be the centers of the stars.  Can't wait to see my guy cuddled under this one watching football this fall and winter. 

Can't pass up a bargain!

Our local Joann Fabrics is closing down and moving to a location that's not in my "normal" driving route,  so from now on I'll be working from my stash of fabric and ordering online.  I will really miss touching the fabrics though.

But.. here is my glorious fabric.  All the remnant pieces had to be rung up separately (why I don't know) so that's why there's two receipts. 

Before all the discounts this would have been over $400. After all discounts were taken I spent.... $98!!!  Seriously.  :)

Early Birthday Gift

I got an early birthday present. :) I've spent hours just looking through it deciding on the first project to make from it.

So far, these are my favorite projects that I hope to make this year.  Ambitious huh?

Harvest Star, Delectable Mountains,  Amish Inspired Shoofly,  Prairie Baskets,  X's and O's, Feedsack Flags, Use A Napkin Only For Your Mouth (and the best part is I have a charm pack I've been saving for the perfect project. So I'll use that for this project)

Rainbow Crochet

In honor of my late mother in law,  I've been crocheting. Every stitch I make I think of her. Now, I'm not the best at crochet but I'm trying. 

I love rainbows and figured that I could make some granny squares using rainbow colors.

I'm using red heart yarn in red, pumpkin,  bright yellow, paddy green, royal, soft navy and medium purple.  I'm planning on making 16 blocks, and I'm on the green rounds on 12 before I ran out of the skein. So I moved on to the royal blue.

If you plan on doing this like me you'll need one skein of red, pumpkin and yellow.  You'll need two skeins of paddy green, royal, soft navy and medium purple.  I'm crocheting two rows of each color using a 5.5 mm hook, using US terms double crochet.

I haven't joined the blocks yet (and they still need to be blocked) but I purchased a pound of yarn in white. That should be enough but I'll keep you updated. :)

I've completed one full block so I had an idea of what everything would look like.  The block hasn't been blocked yet and to give you an idea on the size the newsprint pad its shown on is 18"x24". :) nice and big.