NEW FO REPORT AND 3 DJ BLOCKS DONE

I have a picture on my side bar for the NEWFO CHALLENGE THAT Catpatches started for this year.  It's kind of fun, because you don't have to finish anything - just start them and report what you have started on the last day of the month.  Last month I forgot to do it, so this month I'm reporting 2 New FOs.

First, is February's New FO:

As most of you know, I started the Dear Jane quilt last month and after Saturday's meeting, I got more inspired to get some made.  Also, I needed a break from quilting a large quilt.

I decided not to do them in order, but I'm not just picking out the easy ones to work on first, either.    Didn't need to paper piece!  This is a super easy one but I made a hard one too.

B-13

 This next one was super easy as well and I reverse appliquéd the circles while watching "Midwife" on PBS last night.  This is one of the color change ones as well.

B-1

This last one is a difficult paper pieced one.  I picked out some fabric that I thought would be pretty and didn't have much of the off-white, but luckily, had enough.  I had to unsew a few seams as well as add a piece for seam allowance where I had cut it too short, but on the whole, it came out pretty nice.
Notice that it is made at 5" unfinished and will be 4 1/2" when put into the quilt.  That's a lot of tiny pieces!!!  I hope after doing a lot more PP blocks I will get more comfortable doing it.  I've done it before, but never really enjoyed it - except for seeing how nice the blocks turn out.

This shows the side pieces already PPed and the middle section, which is only 3" square, with lots of tiny pieces.

A-9
(See where I added a piece on the left side of the middle bottom section)

March's New FO:

This is a Quilt A Long from Randy at Barrister's Block.   It's a scrappy Bulls Eye quilt with raw edges.   Very fun and easy to do!

I just happened to have this ruler "WonderArc" which I bought at a quilt show several years ago.  I have used it, but not a lot, so this gives me an excuse to use it.

You fold the fabric two times and position it in the middle.

Cut close right at the 3" line for a 3" circle (duh!) and on the other side of the space for a 3 1/2" circle.  It works really neat.

If you go over to Randy's blog, you will need to scroll down past some retreat posts to get to her Bulls Eye quilt posts.  She is giving us time to work on it.  (I haven't really been working on it very much due to deadlines, however).

Have a good week and enjoy the spring weather!  And the flowers!

QUILTING, QUILTING AND MORE QUILTING

I have spent all my sewing time this week quilting the 25th anniversary quilt and finally yesterday I finished...not the whole quilt, but all the brown, which is most of it.  I'm taking a break from it today to get some Dear Jane blocks prepped and seeing what fabric I want to use for them.  I discovered I have LOTS of pink and purple, and not as much brown as I thought.  Hmmm.  I may need to get more fabric for this quilt.

Here are a couple pictures of my quilting.

Back

I still need to quilt all the navy blue squares and setting triangles.  There are 31 9-patch blocks with 4 blue squares each, but I don't think it will take too long.  I think I know what I will do in them, but we shall see.  Sometimes, it doesn't look as good as you thought it would and you need to change to Plan B or C.

Yesterday was a meeting of "Janiacs" from my guild.  Would you believe there are about 20 of us who are seriously starting the Dear Jane quilt?  Just from our guild?  It's kind of crazy.  I finally finished the A-7 block - I cut the first one too small and had to remake it.

A-7

I put the fabrics that I might use in the DJ quilt in this old wood bin that I got at a garage sale.  Of course, they are all civil war reproductions.

I got about six blocks prepped this morning.  Some are super easy and others are difficult paper piecing blocks.  I think I'll try to get a couple easy ones done this afternoon.  I want to try to do at least 3 per week, I think.  I don't have a deadline, but if I don't put some priority on it, it's too easy to let it slide.

I decided I'm going to "kind of" follow Jane Stickle's colors, except I will put in some other colors for some of the browns.  There are so many brownish blocks and I want to have more color and use some of the purple fabric that I have.

Come back tomorrow to see if I got any DJ blocks made.

HANDMADE CHRISTMAS CHALLENGE AND QUILTING

My entry for the Handmade Christmas Challenge is a notebook cover.  I used the journal cover from Moda Bakeshop for the directions.  

I added a pocket on the front

I got the pinwheel quilt basted this week as well as my basket quilt (but just took pictures of the pinwheel quilt.  I have been using Cindy Needham's method of basting the quilt on one large table and it has been working quite well for me.  I use picnic table clamps to keep the fabric tight.

Yesterday I started quilting and after quilting some large free motion feathers that I planned to do all over the quilt top, I decided I didn't like them, so I will be ripping that out.  Luckily, it's only about 18" square.  Now I am quilting some skinny fern-like feathers in the sashing and some lines in the pinwheels.  I still haven't figured out what I will do on the navy squares.

I don't know if you can see what is quilted in the sashing or not, but both of these pictures show it.

Thanks for all the lovely comments on my last post.

BASKET TOP FINISHED AND ANOTHER KIT FOR SALE

I'm so happy to have my Baskets for You quilt top finished!!  All the 128 baskets are appliquéd!  Yippee!!  I can't believe I hand appliquéd a whole quilt top.  I never thought I would do that, but I'm glad I did.  I plan to baste it later this week.

 
Another first for me will be the scalloped border.  We shall see how that goes…..

I have another quilt kit for sale.  It isn't really a kit, but is a pattern with the fabrics that D's aunt had picked out to use for the quilt.  Pattern is by Valori Wells, from the Stitchin' Post in Sisters, OR.

There are lots of bright fabrics in this kit in various size cuts.  I looked at all of them and I think there is enough here for the smaller size quilt in the pattern, which is 52" x 52".  The larger size is  70" x 70" and it calls for 14 different fabrics, which is the number of fabrics in the bag, not counting the backing piece.  The pattern is one of the nicest patterns I have seen lately, with a page to paste swatches of each fabric so you can keep it all straight.

Most of the bright fabrics are from St. Jude's Hospital Quilt of Dreams line.

Others are from Hancocks.  There is also 2 fat 8ths bundles.

This green is Quilters Crayons by Hancock fabrics is probably for the backing and there is about 3 yards, but it's in 2 pieces.

Price is $80.00 for all the fabric and the pattern.

Shipping $11.30 Priority Mail

We were lucky to have DS#1 visit us for 24 hours over the weekend.  He was in Houston for his yearly job training and testing (he's a pilot) and stopped here on his way back home.  

Thanks for visiting!

QUILT KITS FOR SALE

This first kit is Stars On the Prairie with Moda fabric and it's a complete unopened kit from Stitchin' Heaven in Quitman, TX.  The backing fabric is separate - 9 yards.  The kit makes a 104" x 104" quilt and includes the pattern.

back label of kit showing price of $129.99.

SOLD  On Sale for $80.00

SOLD  9 yards of backing fabric for $50

Prairie Paisley by Minick and Simpson for Moda

Shipping for the kit and backing fabric is $15.00, but you don't have to buy both.

 Prayers in Pink is another kit from Stitchin' Heaven.  Complete unopened kit wrapped in cellophane includes pattern.  Size of quilt is 85" x 105".

Original price $159.99

On Sale for $95.00

9 yards of backing fabric for $45.00

Tiny Treasures by RJR Fabrics

Shipping for both kit and backing fabric is $15.00, but you don't need to buy both.

I also listed some fabric on Ebay which you can see here.  Thanks for visiting!

PILLOWCASES AND A SALE

My quilters' guild lost a member last week and she was the star of donations - both small quilts and pillowcases.  In honor of her memory, we have been asked to make two pillowcases for each of the next three months.  Here are my first two and I have four more ready to sew together.  We will miss her.

The death of a friend's aunt is my reason for having a sale.  My friend, D, is not a quilter and she is responsible for selling her aunt's stash, so I told her I would help.  I'm going to be posting fabric and kits on my blog in case any of you are interested.  Let your friends know about this as well.  If I don't sell it on my blog, I will post on my Etsy shop or on Ebay.

First item:  Sherman's March, A Civil War Inspired Quilt (82" x 93")  - a Complete quilt kit, not including the backing.

5 yards tan, 2 1/2 yards black print for border, 1 1/4 yard red

3/4 yard each of 6 different black fabrics

Original price $150.00

SOLD  On Sale for $100.00

Shipping $11.30

Second Item:  Moda Sonnet Collection by April Cornell Fat Quarter Bundle of 26 FQs

SOLD  On sale for $48.00

Shipping $9.00

Please email me if you are interested in either of these items.  I can send you a Paypal invoice or if you prefer, you can mail me a check or money order.  I will add shipping to each item.

I have a lot of other items that I will be posting for D, so be sure to come back and tell your friends about this.  

ONE TOP AND ONE BLOCK DONE

I finished the pinwheel quilt top that is going to be turned into a 25th anniversary quilt for DS/DIL on July 1.  The size of  85" x 108" is quite large so it can hang down and tuck in pillows on their full size bed.  The blocks are 12" on point so I had to I make it 5 by 4 blocks and because of having sashing instead of alternating blocks, I needed 32 of the blocks plus 205 pinwheels.  That's 820 HSTs by the way.  Actually, it didn't seem to take too long to do them.  It's not going to have a border.

This is a corner section - I don't know why the color came out so strange.

I haven't been doing very many Dear Jane blocks lately, but I did finish this one by hand.  After making two of them by hand, I think I'll opt for paper piecing!  Hee Hee!

A-5

Last night at my guild meeting, the guild president said she wants to start a Dear Jane quilt and asked if any other people were interested, so I think we're going to start a "support" group.  That should be an encouragement.

Spring is arriving in Texas!  I noticed our neighbors forsythia bush is starting to bloom on the other side of the fence.

DALLAS QUILT SHOW, 2014

Friday I was a volunteer at the Dallas Quilt Show and I took some pictures of the quilts that were my favorites.  There were 400 quilts hanging in the show and I just took pictures of some of the ones I liked best.  Most of my favorites were traditional quilts, but not all.  

After taking the pictures, I noticed the "Show Rules and Etiquette" column in the show booklet.  It said that we need to get permission from the quilt makers if we want to post them on the internet.  So, yesterday morning I started emailing the makers of the quilts.  I only had the guild directory to go by and since a lot of the quilts I liked were made by non-members, I wasn't able to email them for their permission.  Therefore, the number of pictures that I can display is greatly reduced.  I hope you enjoy these few anyway.

2nd place in the same category as my quilt

First place in the same category as my quilt.

This was one of the "Judge's Choice" quilts.

All the quilts were amazing, however, I am sad that I am not able to show two of my very favorites.  The Best of Show quilt was "out of this world" amazing!  If anyone wants to see it, I will email it to you.

Thanks for so many lovely comments on my winning quilt!