Design Wall Monday - 5/21/12

Not the best photo but I wanted to show you that Pepper also gave his stamp of approval to the completed quilt for the cat shelter raffle.



I just added some straightline quilting to accentuate some of the diagonal seams and then used the same brown from the back to bind it. I hope the binding calms down some of the brightness to make it more palatable to possible winners.

 

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I tried a newwer-to-me method of machine sewn binding on this quilt. I still prefer to hand sew my bindings for personal or special projects and I generally start with 2" strips. The last method I tried included zigzagging a thin string down the middle of the strips and then using my stitch in the ditch foot against the string to make sure it was positioned right on the back. It worked ok for the sides but the corners were never right and I felt the zigzag was "scratchy." I didn't have any problem with this method other than I thought cutting the strips at 2.5" was huge compared to my usual 2" and the binding wasn't "full". I will probably try this again but with a 2.25" or 2" strip. 

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Design Wall Monday - 5/14/12

It was a busy busy weekend and I hardly got any sewing done. In fact, Saturday, I was so exhausted, I couldn't whipstitch the last 3 sides of a hexie to finish the diamond before I gave up and went to bed. Sad. I'll post later this week on our Saturday plant shopping day and Sunday trip to Genesee Country Museum where the highlight of my day was a Victorian Tea.



A little tail action rearranged some blocks during our photo session :)


I was able to do a little machine sewing this weekend and I was even able to finish the top for this charity quilt. It's brighter than I had first imagined but I really like the look and this block is super simple.
 

Midgie offering her stamp of approval – the quilt is for the New Start Kitty Shelter after all!!


I had seen another version online which I modified because I wanted a smaller quilt and only had 4 FQ of the floral fabrics to work with. Essentially I cut 5" squares and surrounded them with 1.5" strips cut 5" and 7" long to attach courthouse steps style. Two blocks were then stacked right sides together and 2 parallel seams were sewn diagonally so that they could be cut into half-square-triangles. Press them open, lay them out and sew them back together. Easy. Peasy.

Arrowheads and Tea

It's nearly the summer marching season and I should be thinking about fitting into my fireman's uniform after a lazy winter and no more Zumba classes but who could resist making a quick run to Sweet Sarah's for a Heath Flurrie on this warm and sunny day?! I really do need to talk to Sarah about selling some of my things in her evergrowing gift shop...but I keep stalling for some unknown reason.

This is the (large) doll quilt that I am donating to the library's American Girl tea party this weekend. The pattern is simple but that is exactly why I like it and I've made several over the last couple of years. This year's tea party theme is a garden party so I think the colors fit quite nicely. I'm looking forward to wearing my crazy straw hat decorated with large flowers :)

Not sure that I've mentioned it here before but I've also decided to make another quilt with these arrowhead blocks in only neutral fabrics, an absolute fav of mine. It was an idea that came to me laying in bed one morning looking at the RWB arrowhead quilt on my bed. I've got one block done and the others will probably only get done as I am cutting neutrals for various projects. Yet another long term project :) Did you expect anything less from me?

Garden Patch Cat

I finished my latest donation item with a whole 4 days to spare! Cheryl came to pick it up yesterday but with no sun there was no way to get a good shot inside the house. Check out my dandy dandelion crop - it's a bumper this year!

The chinese auction and plant sale is this weekend to benefit the local dog and cat shelters. Cheryl said she would make sure that proceeds from the wall hanging go to the cat shelter.

That was easy - should I start next year's now or wait? Hmmm...

Library Tea Party

This past Saturday was the annual tea party fundraiser for the Cordelia A Greene Library. This year's theme was a Hawiian party based on the American Girl doll of the year. I wore my big flowered hat and Hawaiian shirt with the other workers and attendees dressed similarly.

I didn't get many pictures during the event since I was serving tea - it was so fun to see little girls all excited about a cup of peach tea. Almost 60 girls and their moms/grandmas/aunts/etc attended the tea and each place setting had a different tea cup. The tea cup collection had been donated to the library several years ago and I think their individuality just made the table setting perfect.

Every person who bought a ticket (adult or child) goes home with a door prize. Just look at all these doll dresses. Left overs were sold for $10 apiece and they didn't last long. You can see my donated wall hanging at the bottom of the photo. There was also a table with doll quilts/afghans, candles, purses and other goodies.

This photo shows the AG doll that was the grand prize to one lucky young lady. Ray is also practicing his snow cones which were a real treat. Check out the flip flop cake in the middle - we forgot to cut into it!

There was a photo booth set up for everyone. Photos were printed immediately and mounted onto cardstock and decorated with flip flop cutouts and information on the tea party. What a great memento!

Oh and lets not forget the treats - this was just a small sampling. The painted cookies and (stacked) bonnets on the left were some of the prettiest. There were enough cookies for everyone to take several home.

Can't wait to hear what the theme is for next year's tea and hopefully I won't forget until the last minute to make my doll quilt...

Design Wall Monday - 5/9/11

It's been another little-of-this-little-of-that week...

I was out of town 4 days last week for a conference so I didn't do any machine sewing but I did work on hexies! Especially fun to hang in the hotel room with hexies, watching a Law & Order marathon, for 3 hours before my roomie arrived! I couldn't remember if you had seen all of them so far but this also shows an approximation of how they will be layed out. Some of the diamonds have a darker middle row (all have the same center/green) and I am still deciding if I will work that into the pattern some how. The newest diamonds are on the bottom left. Working with the stripe took a lot of "thinking" but I really like the effect.

I was also reminded of a donation quilt I had agreed to make back in November. Have you seen the cat patterns, Garden Patch Cats by Story Quilts, that look like veggies? Well, here we have Avocato! He looks a little demonic now but I promise he'll be better when he is quilted and the iris' are added to his eyes.

And since I couldn't get my laptop to cooperate last week to show you the final picture of last week's Dresden Plate donation quilt...let's try again...

I think those swirls in the blades are becoming a trademark...I seem to use them with a lot of different patterns. Of course, my lips seem to move side to side when I am "swirling." LOL! Do you do that? Really get into moving the fabric when you are quilting?