A Quilt for Lily

When the going gets tough, the tough start a new quilt project. Our Thursday Girl meeting was once again cancelled due to lack of air conditioning, so I went home to see Mike and the Pug Pack. This week, I spent Tuesday and Wednesday in Pittsburgh for work, so it was nice to have an evening at home. Mike made a quick steak dinner complimented by our lovely heirloom tomatoes. After we took the pugs out for a walk, unbelievably it was only 7:30pm, so I decided to go to the Studio for a bit.

Despite the fact that I have eight zillion projects in progress, I decided I would cut out a new project. I'm making a flannel owl quilt for my friend Lily.

I bought a yard of this owl flannel several weeks ago on clearance at JoAnn Fabrics. At the time, I thought I would make Lily a pillowcase for Christmas.

This became my inspiration fabric for an entire quilt.

Then, on a different shopping trip, while innocently shopping for buttons in the clearance bin, I found these...

Owl flannel charm packs!

 And I happened to have just purchased this magazine...

Disappearing 9-Patch!

Inspiration struck, and despite the fact that I had to go to two different Joann Fabrics to get the four charm packs I needed (and I may have been forced to buy a whole bunch of other stuff), a quilt was born.

I added a green flannel pindot for my background and a mottled green flannel for my connecting squares. Can you guess that Lily's favorite color is green?

These are the six fabrics in the charm pack.

Laying out a 9-Patch for motivation

Everything is cut out and ready to go. I will confess that I didn't bother to iron any of the fabric, and just smoothed it out with my hand before cutting. Typically I would wash flannel before I make a quilt with it, but since I'm using Charm Squares, which are precuts, I can't. I figure the quilt will shrink proportionately since none of the flannel is washed.

Here I am with my two favorite 5-year olds, Lily and LarryPug. Lily is my friend Jeff's daughter. Jeff, Lily, and I have been going out to lunch together since she was an infant in her car seat. Even though I don't get to see Lily that often, she just picks up with me as if she had seen me the day before. The last time we had lunch together, she and I had a lot of fun making animals with raw bread dough. Lily admired my talents in making a turtle as well as a snowman.

This photo is from 2013 when Lily and LarryPug were
my favorite 4-year olds. Check out Lily's rockin' leopard pants!

Hopefully I'll get Lily's quilt done for Christmas, while she still likes owls and the color green!

Linking up on Friday to Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Richard and Tanya Quilts, Patchouli Moon Studio and Crazy Mom Quilts. Thanks for visiting!!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

A Studio Double Header

September is National Sewing Month! Hooray! Today I celebrated by sewing in The Studio with Marion in the morning and sewing with Joannie in the evening. In between, Mike and I went to a cookout at Beth and Judi's house (part of the Thursday Night gang), so I got to talk about quilting some more. I try never to skip a party at Beth and Judi's house, they are both great cooks. Plus, this time Judi sent us home with fresh from the garden cucumbers and hand dipped chocolate marshmallows! Naturally I will eat the marshmallows and Mike will eat the cucumbers...

Joannie and I are busy with secret sewing. She was making Birthday Blocks (you can read more about our Birthday Block exchange here) and I completed the last row for our six month secret Row by Row exchange, which will take place this Sunday. I LOVE my final row which is for Pat's quilt, but I can't show it to you because Pat will see it here. I will give you one clue... it goes with Pat's beach theme and the colors I used were hot pink, turquoise, and orange, with a tiny spark of lime green.

This is the row I started with in May. Soon I will see the finished top!

Happily, I can show you Marion's projects. Marion brought her newest project and her second to oldest UFO. She finished the center of her batik quilt, which was her newest project in progress. She is going to add an outer border to make it a little bigger. Right now it is about 50"x60".

Aren't the colors pretty? They look like rainbow sherbert.

Here is Marion with her Round Robin quilt. Our Brown Bagger quilt group did this exchange at least 20 years ago. Marion finally put the binding on it. She just needs to sew it down to the back. Unlike me, Marion likes to finish her bindings by hand. It is hand quilted. Mine is long gone. I donated it to a charity raffle at work. The person who got it really wanted it and was thrilled to have won it.

Although I took two photos, I managed to get Marion with
her eyes closed both times. If you look at the photo above,
you can see what she looks like with her eyes open.
Next time, I'll take three photos.

I am three Birthday Blocks away from being caught up with all my sewing obligations! Then I can do some selfish sewing and work on my two Scrap Wave quilts.

Remember, you get to celebrate National Sewing Month all month long! I recommend lots of fabric buying and chocolate, not necessarily in that order.

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

September Quilt of the Month

My husband Mike suggested that one of the quilts that I made for him should be the September Quilt of the Month. This is especially appropriate since September 22nd is Mike's birthday. This quilt was in the blog briefly here, but many of you may not have seen it. It's not quite bed size, but it should be fine for September which is usually not a cold month here in Massachusetts.

Mike actually picked out this kit when he took me to The Maui Quilt Shop when we honeymooned in Hawaii in February of 2012. This February we will celebrate our 3rd wedding anniversary! After I assembled the top, I ordered additional bark cloth for an outer border. If you're interested, the kit is still available, click on the link that says "kit" above.

LarryPug obligingly wore a Hawaiian lei to add some tropical flavor to my photo.

This is a really simple quilt with large squares and black sashing, but both Mike and I really
like the graphic qualities of the fabric design. It doesn't quite go with our beach cottage style bedroom,
but it brings back many happy honeymoon memories.

LarryPug is a wonderful quilt model and the fact that he (and his pug brothers)
won the recent Pets on Quilts Contest hasn't gone to his head in the least bit...

I finished this quilt on May 25, 2013. It was professionally machine quilted by Kate and Justin Mitchell with an all over palm tree design. There is a cute tiki god fabric on the back that I bought for under $5 a yard at Fabric Place Basement.

Linking up on Friday to Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Richard and Tanya Quilts, Patchouli Moon Studio and Crazy Mom Quilts. Thanks for visiting!!
Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

More Hoffman Challenge Eye Candy Quilts

If you didn't see my original blog post about the terrifically talented Pratt sisters, go right back here and read it now. Both Kim and Karen use the Hoffman Challenge as an opportunity to try out new quilting tools and techniques.

This post is the sequel, containing Kim's previous Hoffman Challenge entries. To see her sister Karen's previous entries in the Hoffman Challenge, visit Karen's website here.

Kim's 1999 entry, Starburst, which is paper pieced.

Kim's 2003 entry, Cherry Blossom Festival, her own design.

Kim's 2004 entry, An American Symbol, featuring fusible applique.
This pattern was designed by my friends Kim G. and Lynne G.

Kim's 2006 entry, Cats in Baskets, which is paper pieced and has free motion applique.
The pattern is Peekaboo Cats by Love Quilt Patterns.

Kim's 2007 entry, In the Garden. This quilt is a traditional design featuring curved piecing.

Kim's 2008 entry, Endless Ribbons. This quilt is heavily quilted with a
mirror image of the leaf design and uses the Xblock ruler.

Kim's 2012 entry, Branching Out, an original pattern by her sister Karen.
This quilt features a hand embroidered tree with hand buttonhole applique and buttons.
You can purchase this pattern here at QuiltLily Designs.

I hope that Kim and Karen's quilts have inspired you to enter the next Hoffman Challenge! The quilting gauntlet (aka white glove) has been thrown!

Thanks for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

Checking in with my Thursday Girls

I haven't seen my Thursday friends for at least a month. My kimono jacket class took up several weeks, and on more than one occasion, the air conditioning was broken at our quilting location, so our get together was cancelled.

Beth was trying out a tutorial for a Double Friendship Star that she had seen at the Missouri Quilt Company. She is planning to make this quilt for a friend, so she made a sample block to try the technique and see if she liked her color choices. It's always a good idea to make a sample block!

The colors are just lovely. They remind me of wine.

It's a winner in my book! Beth was pleased with her finished block. The actual quilt will use smaller, 2.5 inch strips. You can watch the video below.

Karen, who is one of our fastest sewers, whipped up this cute little bag for her stepson's girlfriend. The bag is from Amy Butler's book, Style Stitches. Note that Karen enlarged the pattern by 140% (this was the largest setting on her copy machine), the one shown in the book looks more like a change purse.

This darling little bag has a zippered top.

A couple of the girls were getting ready for the holidays (apparently there are only 18 Fridays left until Christmas!). Nancy Q. is making an adorable applique for Christmas with these cute little mice riding on a train. Nancy's grandson, Ethan, loves trains.

The pattern is called Christmas Express and it is by Holly Hill Quilt Designs.

Ginny is starting a cross stitch pattern that quotes Thomas Jefferson, "I cannot live without books." It will be a Christmas gift for her son.

Ginny is doing her third annual Susan G. Komen 60 mile Breast Cancer walk next month. Go Ginny!

Here is Toni helping Aggy with her table runner.

Here are Judi and Toni sewing away! Judi was working on
tote bags and Toni was making a baby quilt.

Do you ever wonder why sometimes our seams are not straight?
We do sew in a bar...

I worked on my Pink Lemonade Scrap Wave that you've already seen several times, here and here. I have two more panels to finish before I assemble the top. I'm ready to finish it so that I can start work on my blue and purple one.

We missed Pat who was lounging at the beach instead of quilting.

In other exciting news:

Romeo and Elvis are suffering no long term side effects from their experimentation with marijuana.

Elvis on the grass, instead of eating grass.

Romeo (ditto)

I got new sneakers! (I bet you can hear them screaming my name!)

Thanks for visiting.

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

Am I Blue?

You bet I am! And Purple too!

Remember this blog post? I finally got around to cutting out all these little lovelies! I'm bringing this project with me when I go on vacation in a few weeks.

All laid out on the cutting table

I am going to make a Queen size reversible quilt that I am keeping for me, me, me, and Mike. One side will be a Scrappy Bargello, the other side will be a Yellow Brick Road. All of these fabrics came from my Stash and it didn't make the tiniest dent. Who cares?

I cut out a bunch of strips with Joannie on Monday night and then finished the rest of my cutting last night. Mike made the most delicious egg white omelets for dinner with home grown tomatoes from our garden.

Handsome husband who cooks! Does it get any better than that?
And check out his fabulous apron!

    

We have six different kinds of heirloom tomatoes in our garden.
They are all different colors: red, orange and green.

Here is some more fabric porn if you can't get enough of the jewel colored batiks like me!

I'm a sucker for anything with a bow, even if it's my own fabric!

Can never get enough blue and purple!!!

All boxed up and ready to travel!

Maybe this is the best photo? It's hard to get 44 batiks in one picture!

I'm really curious to see what this quilt looks like when it's completed. As you may have noticed, my favorite color value is medium. I did throw in a couple of almost solid dark batiks and a few on the lighter side for contrast. Overall, I'm hoping that it is just a jewel colored cascade of loveliness.

There are a couple of very special fabrics in this quilt. I made my parents a pair of quilts 12 years ago for their 40th anniversary. My Mom and I picked out the fabrics together. I bought half yards instead of fat quarters, so I could keep half for a future quilt for myself. So there are a few of those fabrics in my future quilt. The only photo I have of my parents' quilt was in the blog several years ago, but it is extremely blurry. I'll take a new one when I visit them in Florida this winter.

Linking up on Friday to Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Crazy Mom Quilts and Richard and Tanya Quilts.

Thanks for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

10 Quilty Little Secrets

I first read about 10 Quilty Little Secrets on Tanya's blog and was pleased to see that she had included the original source for this sweeping web phenomenon, 13 Spools, who has now added a Linky Party! I'm having a blast reading everyone's true quilting confessions and I encourage you to add your own.

Here's my top 10. Remember, what happens on the blog, stays on the blog.

1. I like big rotary cutters and I can not lie. I use that 60 mm blade for everything! Cutting is one of my favorite quilting tasks. I also love gadgets, especially rulers.

2. I'm a thread snob and converted to Aurifil a couple of years ago. It is expensive, but it takes me a while to go through a spool. I use the basic grey for all my piecing.

3. I re-read my own blog. Otherwise, I can't remember what I did the week before...

4. To quote my friend Margaret, "I don't do hand-jobs." I sew all my bindings by machine, front and back. Life's too short to stop and hand sew. That's why I have no buttons on my pants.

5. I don't quilt anything larger than a baby quilt, and even then I am limited to straight lines using a walking foot. I've never mastered free motion quilting, although I admire it, and I send all my quilts out to be professionally machine quilted. Yes, this can be an expensive hobby.

6. I think that current fabric prices are crazy. I'm not about to start de-boning plaid shirts from Goodwill, but I've stopped buying fabric on "spec", unless I am buying it for under $5 a yard.

7. Despite quilting secret #6, I have more fabric than I will ever sew in 10 life times. I also have enough UFOs to go to the moon and back.

8. I don't "get" mug rugs. Really?

9. I've taken a class with Kaffe Fassett. I still love his fabric and his books, but he's not the nicest guy. Brandon Mably, however, is a great big teddy bear. Remember, this is my blog and my opinion, you're entitled to your own.

10. I don't like to fuss around and make individual quilt blocks with a zillion pieces. I prefer strip piecing. Two of my favorite patterns that use this technique, that I make frequently are Yellow Brick Road and Scrappy Bargello. Scrappy Bargello is a free pattern on Bonnie Hunter's Quiltville website. I LOVE Bonnie Hunter (and yes, I've taken a class with her and she is VERY NICE!). That being said, Bonnie does have a passion for scrap blocks with a zillion pieces...

Sorry, I'm on a roll and I can't stop.

11. There are always LifeSavers and chocolate in my Studio. Every artist needs fuel.

Fess up fellow quilters! What are your 10 Quilty Little Secrets!

Linking up to 13 Spools, Freemotion by the River, and Sew Fresh Quilts. Linking up on Friday to Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Crazy Mom Quilts and Richard and Tanya Quilts.

Thanks for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy