ENTERING THE BLOGGER'S QUILT FESTIVAL

I decided to enter the Blogger's Quilt Festival on the last day!  This is my Kaleidoscope quilt, a pattern by Becky Goldsmith and was originally named "Everyday Best."

A blogger friend from a block swap posted the quilt made by her mother on her blog and I commented that I really liked it.  I didn't ask her for the pattern or anything.  A week or so later, the pattern arrived in the mail.  I took one look at it and put it in a drawer - saying to myself that I would never make it!  As time went by, I would occasionally see it and really liked it, but it would go back in the drawer.

As I was getting ready to retire, we bought a camper so we could do some traveling.  I bought a Featherweight to take in the camper so I could sew in the evenings or other times when we were camping.  Getting projects to take in the camper, I realized that this quilt would be something that I could do easily with a bag of scraps and wouldn't take up a lot of space, so I started paper piecing the circles while camping.  It took a few trips to get the circles finished.  I used fabric from my stash for the whole quilt and I'm really glad I made it!

Quilted by me on my domestic sewing machine.  It measures 71" square.

There are hundreds of amazing quilts entered in the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  Click on the Festival box below to see them:

A NEW PURSE!

It was time to  change from my summer purse to a winter purse, but I was tired of the one I had been using for a few years.  I decided to make one and I had received a pattern a couple years ago from Barbara in a drawing.  I looked it over and decided it might make a good purse for me.

I had the pattern and I wanted to use fabric from my stash, so I started trying to find some fabric.  I picked out a piece of upholstery fabric that I either got at a garage sale or from someone in my guild - I didn't remember which.  Then I picked out some fabric that I liked - and that went with it - for the lining, pockets and handles.

Here is the outside of the bag done.  The only thing I purchased to make it was the magnetic  closure for $1.00.

Here I'm making pockets for the inside lining.

One side has a huge zippered pocket that is equal to the whole side.

Here it is finished.

View of the inside with stuff in it.

One inside section with pockets along the side. 

The two zippered sections, one is a divider for the middle.

When I got to the handles, I didn't think I would have enough of my cotton fabric to make them, but luckily I just barely had enough!  I will use one of the outer pockets for my keys and one for my cell phone.

As I was literally digging around looking for purse fabric in my sewing closet, I also found some other upholstery pieces and decided to make a couple of these little bags.  I like this for keeping just some money and a cell phone for when you don't want to carry the larger purse around.  They make nice little gifts, too.

I like these little zipper pulls that I purchased several years ago to use on little pouches.

This is the pattern I used for the little bags.

I think I'm going to really like my new purse.  It sure has plenty of pockets for different things.  I doubt I will even need all of them!  Do you make your purses?

OCTOBER FMQ CHALLENGE AND MOUNTAIN TRAIL

SewCalGal has been hosting a Free Motion Quilting (FMQ) challenge all year, so I am submitting October's entries.  Teri Lucas is the quilting expert for this month and she gave a lesson with lots of ideas.  You can find out more about Teri and the challenge by clicking on the SewCalGal link.

My first practice piece was done on muslin with wool batting.  I used a few different threads:  the dark red was Essential Pro Turkey Red 70/3 that I got from Connecting Threads;  the yellow is Isacord 40; the variegated orange/green/yellow is Signature size 40 cotton; and variegated blue is Gutermann 100% cotton 50.  I used Essential Pro in the bobbin.

For my second and final piece, I used some shiny grey fabric (don't know what it is - some kind of satin?) and the yellow Isacord thread.  I like the way the yellow shows up on the grey and I really enjoyed quilting the nautilus shells and the pebbles - it was fun!  Thanks for all the pointers, Teri!

Next, I just finished my QAL from Lori:  Mountain Trail reproduction quilt.  At first, I was thinking about hand quilting it (very briefly), but then I thought that I would like to have feathers in the rows and hand quilting them would take a lot of time (which I don't have), so I machine quilted it yesterday with feathers in the rows and in the 2 borders, I quilted a Swirl Scroll from Angela Walters book, Free -Motion Quilting.  I also used that border in a table runner that I made and found that it is quite easy.

close-up of quilted feathers

close-up of swirl scroll border

View of fabric and quilting on back.  The fabric is Jo Morton fabric that I had left from my Jo's Little Women class last year.

It's hanging in my front hall above my desk.

Do any of you have this pattern or know where to get it?  Barb is looking for it and can't find it anywhere.  If you know where to get it, please contact Barb through her blog.

Some of my storage shelves came down in my guest room, so that bed is piled with linens, fabrics, items I have bought for gifts, etc. etc.  What a mess!  Hopefully, DH can get it fixed soon.  He is at the hardware store right now.  

NEW IRONING BOARD COVER AND PINWHEELS

In my last post I told you I got some fabric to make a new ironing board cover but I didn't tell you how much I paid for it.  The fabric price was $5.99 a yard - not too bad.  With 60% off, it came to $4.19 for the piece I got and I can get 2 covers, so for one, the price is $2.10!  

A couple years ago I saw this idea on the internet, I suppose on someone's blog, but I don't remember where it was.  It gave these instructions.

1.  Cut off the casing with the string running through it to reuse on the new ironing board cover (IBC), with enough extra fabric so you can sew the new fabric onto it.

2.  Lay the old IBC on top of the new fabric and cut around it.

3.  I cut about 1/2" to 3/4" out from the edge of the old IBC.

4.  Pin the new IBC onto the extra fabric that is attached to the casing for the drawstring.

5.  Sew the new IBC onto the casing.  I used my serger, but a regular straight stitch will work just fine.

 6.  View of it after I sewed it on.

7.  Put on the ironing board.  I added two layers of batting.

Doesn't that look better?  It didn't take very long at all.

I love my old fashioned wood ironing board!

Before we went on our trip, I started gathering up extra HSTs and made pinwheels out of them.  There were all different sizes, so I sewed extra fabric on the smaller ones so they would all be the same size for a donation quilt that I'm going to make.

Oh no!  I just found some more!  They keep appearing out of nowhere!

After squaring up the HST's I put them in plastic baggies so I could use them as needed.

I'm not sure if I have enough for the donation quilt yet, but I'll try to keep working on them as I find them and hopefully can get the quilt put together before December.  My guild is planning a workshop in January where we will donate a big stack of quilts to the children's hospital in memory of our member who died this year - she was a doctor at the hospital until she got sick and she got us started making quilts for them.

Have a good week!

MOUNTAIN TRAILS

This morning I decided I wanted to get busy on Lori's quilt along named Mountain Trail.  She had already finished all the steps for it, so I was a few weeks behind because of our trip.  I got all 20 blocks finished and up on my design "door."  This is the 3rd QUA of Lori's that I have participated in.  Thanks, Lori!

This week I listened to American Patchwork and Quilting Radio and heard an interview of  Jennifer Paganelli.  I was impressed by the interview and looked up her web site.  She is a fabric and pattern designer, so I decided to order an epattern from her.  You can see what I ordered here.  I received the pattern by email and when I looked it over I was VERY impressed.  I have never seen a pattern with instructions as good as this one.  I made me think of my DIL who is starting to learn to sew and she wanted me to help her make a tunic.  The instructions for that one were deplorable!  Anyone who didn't know much about sewing would never be able to figure it out.  I'm going to tell my DIL about Jennifer's patterns.  I hope you will check them out as well.  These are patterns for clothing - for women and girls.  Each pattern has all the sizes included.

Yesterday I received a 60% off coupon for JoAnn's, so I thought this would be a good time to go and get fabric for my new tunic.  Well, as most of you know, the coupon is only good on a regular priced item.  I looked at the fabric and the only thing that I liked for the tunic was $12.99 fabric marked for 30% off, so that would make it $9.00 per yard.  That wasn't low enough for me, so I decided I would be better off using a 50% off coupon when the good fabric wasn't on sale.

I decided to look around and see if there is something else I can use the 60% off coupon on.  Then I remembered that I needed a new ironing board cover (see below).  And I saw some perfect fabric for it - a nice heavy duty muslin type, so I got to use the coupon after all.

Ironing board fabric

One of the charity projects for my guild is to make burial gowns for premature babies to be donated to children's hospital.  I got this tiny rosebud fabric at a garage sale and used it to make 17 of the little burial gowns and caps.  I just have to attach ribbons on them.

Hope you have a good weekend.  

POST TRIP REPORT

I guess I did quite a bit of sewing on our trip, but it doesn't seem like it to me.  Here is my recap of projects worked on.

32 finished log cabin blocks that finish at 5 1/4" (on right) - 11 almost finished - I ran out of light fabric.

These 2 stacks add up to 133 log cabin blocks that I already had from before, so that will make 176 blocks.  I don't know how big I will make the quilt yet.  I guess I will just keep making blocks until I am tired of them.

I made these quarter square triangles with a charm pack that I bought at Keepsake Quilting and plan to make a table runner out of it.  I have rearranged the blocks a little since I took the picture.

I'm planning on putting black strips between the rows and then a black border.

I started this doll kit that I had ordered from Keepsake Quilting back in June and I made the head and pantaloons before the trip.  During the trip I made the 2 outfits, which still need velcro added and buttons, as well as a hat for each.  The body looks like it will be fun!  Not!

I finished this panel of the Crab-apple Hill pattern "Over the River and Through the Woods.

And started on this panel.  I'm about half way with this one and then there's one more to go.

After we got home, I made this crazy quilt block for my quilt guild and turned it in on Monday (the first one I have ever made).  I took the picture before I finished it, so there should be 2 embroidered roses in the lower left corner.  The blocks from all the members will be put together and one of the guild members will win the quilt in a drawing in December.

I finished this doll quilt that I had started on the trip - it just needs binding.

Sunday we're participating in a craft show, so I'm busy getting ready for that.  Hope you all have a good week!

TRIP RECAP AND TWO WINS

We returned home from our 50th anniversary reunion with our sons, DILs and grandchildren and our trip to New England to celebrate on Tuesday.  Just a few facts:

Days away from home:  52

States covered:  17

National Parks/Historic sites visited:  7

State parks camped in:  3  (the rest of the time we camped in private RV parks)

Bloggers visited:  2

Relatives visited (besides our immediate family):  2

We had a wonderful trip, with beautiful weather most of the time, but it was very good to get home.  Now we are still trying to dig out from under the piles of mail and laundry stuff that needs putting away!

While on the trip I won 2 giveaways!!  The first one is this book Free Motion Quilting by Angela Walters that I won from Sewcalgal's free motion quilting challenge that I have been participating in.  There are many great FMQ ideas in this book and I can't wait to try some of them!  Thanks, Angela for your tutorial and for sending me the book!

I also won this wool and charm pack from Colleen - you can see her blog here.   I have some wool applique patterns that I will use the wool for - don't know yet what I will make with the charm pack.  Thanks so much, Colleen!

Thanks for visiting!  Now, back to digging out from under.