July Blocks Already!

Oh my! I am so lucky! I sent out the fabrics for my wonderful and amazing fiance's "man quilt" on Wednesday and two lovely ladies from the Sewn Together Bee are already finished! Paula just informed me that she put her blocks in the mail yesterday. And Mary posted these amazing creations on our Flickr group!

Mary's Amazing Blocks for Me - Photos Courtesy of Mary

I don't know about you but I think the turned out great! In fact they're better than I expected. As you know, I was nervous about how it was going to all come together, especially with the wood grain fabric as the backdrop, but so far I am liking how it is turning out. I forwarded pictures of Mary's blocks to my wonderful and amazing fiance to gauge his reaction and he really liked them! Yea! Success! I can't wait to see how the rest come out. Unfortunately I will have to wait to see them in person until the end of the month because I am on the road for work. Bummer.

Kitty Yoshida Giveaway... So Jealous!

I am blogging about this one because I absolutely ADORE Kitty Yoshida's Brooklyn Heights line. I have been trying to get my hands on it and it's always sold out! Ugh. So check out the amazing giveaway Jewel's Arm Candy is running HERE.

Photo Courtesy of Jewel's Arm Candy

I Actually Won!

I won my first giveaway and now thanks to the generosity of Stash Resolution I am now the proud owner of a fabulous Tula Pink Charm Pack! I love it! Can't wait to use these gorgeous fabrics!

Celebrate Mandy's Blog-A-Versary with a Giveaway!

Photo Courtesy of That's Sew Mandy!

Mandy is celebrating her blog-a-versary with a giveaway. You can check it out over at her blog, That's Sew Mandy!

So I broke down and told my wonderful and amazing fiance what I was planning for the Sewn Together Bee this month. I decided it was better to let him in on the process for a couple of reasons. Mostly, I want to make sure he likes what we make for him. He has a very specific design asthetic that sometimes conflicts with my own and since this quilt is for him I want him to be happy with it. Also, I want him to know that I care and I am excited about making something for him, finally.

The funny thing, as we were looking at different quilt blocks he ended up liking this circle block that I had been planning to use for my other bee in October. I don't know why I had ruled it out for this quilt. Then I dragged my wonderful and amazing fiance to the fabric store (the sale is still going on!) to look at some fabrics that he would like. At first it didn't go so well. Nothing was calling out to him. It was all too girly so he just said to do whatever I wanted. Not what I wanted to hear! I offered to go to another fabric store - his idea of a perfect Saturday - but then he spied some faux wood Moda fabric from the Modascape line. I have to admit that at first I was a little nervous when he showed it to me. I was racking my brain trying to figure out how to use it but I got an idea.

I'm going to use the faux wood fabric as the background 12.5" x 12.5" square. Then we picked out more "manly" fabrics for the stripes. When I got home I edited out a few of the fabrics and then picked up some Kona solids to help break up the patterned fabrics. The girl helping me at the fabric store was very encouraging about my fabric selections. I don't know if she was just blowing smoke but it eased my mind a bit because I am still working at building my confidence when it comes to my fabric selections. Fingers crossed she's right and it will come together well!

Adhering to the Process Pledge Here is my Dilemma...

Okay, so I am new to quilting but I have decided to take r0ssie's Process Pledge. I have tried to share about my process with my new blog and now here is my promise to continue to do so and more so. Even though I am a new quilter, and a new blogger, and don't have many followers (...yet!) that doesn't mean my process is any more or less important than a quilter with more years under their belt. I am facinated by the process in general no matter the experience level. There is always something to learn and inspiration to be found in another creative process outside your own. So I am taking the Process Pledge.

Here's the latest... When I was in Guatemala in April I bought some beautiful woven fabrics. Then I started kicking myself thinking about all the wonderful an exotic places I have been where I should have bought fabrics but didn't. So I took a vow to myself to start collecting fabrics when I travel and one day I would make an awesome quilt that reflected all the amazing places I have been.

So when someone in one of my virtual quilting needed to trade months I volunteered. It made perfect sense. I am going to be traveling for work the entire month of July so I figured it was better to sit back and let others make blocks for me since it's going to be a crazy month on the road without a sewing machine. And I had my awesome fabrics from Guatemala all ready to go. But when I pulled them out I realized that I wouldn't have enough to do what I really wanted with those fabrics. When I bought them, of course I should have bought more, but my intention was to create a quilt with fabrics from all my travels not just one trip. Sigh. So now I am faced with trying to pull everything together and get fabrics sent out for my bee before I leave town next week. I found two patterns I really liked. One was the plaid block that's the new block featured over on the Block Party! blog and the second is quatrefoil block I saw on Modify Tradition's blog.

I decided this quilt was going to be for my wonderful and amazing fiance since he always complains that I never make anything for him so I chose a block I thought he would like. I finally decided on the quatrefoil block and I started looking at fabrics that were his style but every fabric I liked for him was out of stock and on backorder. Rats! Then to top it all off I decided to show the quatrefoil block to him last night and I was met with a very lukewarm response. Ugh! So now I am faced with scrambling to try and figure out a new plan of action. I suppose I could do one of two things...

1) Make a quilt for my wonderful and amazing fiance and choose a block I did for another bee that I know he likes and run out to the fabric store tomorrow to find fabrics.

2) Make a quilt for myself. Use the quatrefoil or plaid block that I like and run out to the fabric store tomorrow and find fabrics for me.

What to do? What to do? Any suggestions?

I went a little crazy yesterday. My favorite neighborhood fabric store, The Urban Craft Center, just got in their shipment of new summer fabrics and to celebrate they kicked things off yesterday with a week-long fabric sale! Music to my ears. I used it as an opportunity to stock up on some of those yummy fabrics I have had my eyes on for months. All fabrics in the store were at least 15% off and some up to 60% off. I couldn't help myself. And my wonderful and amazing fiance supported my sale-induced craziness by getting me a cup of coffee and enjoying the sunshine while I did some damage. And as an added bonus, the lovely ladies gave me a little gift bag of crafty goodness on the way out!

Don't tell Marc, but I might have to make one more trip over there before the sale ends!

Dan & Sara's Quilt Top is Done

I finished the quilt top for Dan and Sara's baby quilt. I decided to be a little "wonky" with the strips and set them off slightly asymmetrically. I am kind of digging the way it came out. I ended up adding more rows than I had initially laid out because it was looking a little on the short side as it was coming together. The only problem was that the piece I had for the backing now is on the short side. But I have a solution! I took a few strips of one of the polka dot fabrics and created three strips on the backing to extend out the fabric to the proper length (and give it some character).

A Baby Quilt for Sara

Our friends Dan and Sara are having a baby girl this summer so I started on a quilt for them. I did a little investigative research to find out their color scheme. Basically, I looked at their baby registry and saw that Sara was registering for accessories in the green tones. Lucky me! Green is my favorite color.

I decided to do a strip quilt for them so once I picked out my fabrics I cut a variety of strips in different widths and lengths and laid out the strips for the quilt top. I don't know if the way I'm putting this quilt together is the correct or best way but it seemed like the right way to me. I'm flying blind here. I saw a strip quilt I loved on a Flickr group and that was my inspiration.

After I laid out my patterned strips I cut strips from plain green cotton to frame out the quilt top. Here's to hoping my little experiment works!

Yasmine's Quilt is Finished!

I started this quilt for my friend Yasmine back in February. I got the top pieced together fairly quickly but when I started to quilt the issues began. My dear little machine, which I love, was having issues with the new walking foot I bought. The two just couldn't agree. It was time for a tune up so I took her (and the walking foot) into the shop but new problems arose when I got her back home. She started breaking needles, as I blogged about earlier, and it was quite frustrating!

I ended up finding an amazing deal on a new machine, complete with all the quilting bells and whistles so I bought it. Thankfully this little workhorse did the trick and I was finally able to finish quilting Yasmine's quilt!

The only drawback was I didn't get the quilt finished before Yasmine had her baby. Yasmine and her husband Benoit welcomed their second baby boy, Maxim, into the world in March so I really should start calling this "Max's Quilt". Better late than never, right? I'm giving it to her when I finally meet Max this weekend. I hope she likes it!

Making baby blankets has been a long tradition of mine. It started when I was living in New York City and my friends Christine and Kevin were having their first daughter. That has to be almost 12 years ago now. Forever I crocheted baby blankets for my friends, and I'm not going to completely abandon crocheting but now that I have discovered quilting I've found a new way to express myself creatively and make awesome gifts for friends. And it doesn't hurt that it's faster to sew a baby quilt than crochet a baby afghan.

Another Great Giveaway

Check out this awesome giveway!

Red & Aqua Part 2 June Block

In the mad dash to get my blocks done before I went back to work I finished up two Wonky Log Cabins for Donna in the Red & Aqua 2 Bee.

She wanted a slight wonk and I hope I delivered for her. The first block need to be all her own fabric because she is combining these blocks with blocks from another bee that she is in to create her finished quilt.

She said if we felt so inclined we could make a second block for her and we could incorporate our own fabrics into this one. I ended up running out of fabrics when I got to the outer edge so I added fabric from my own stash. I must admit, I have lots of aqua in my personal stash but unfortunately no red at the moment so a quick run to the fabric store was in order. (Like I need an excuse!) I could have sent it back with all aqua on the outside but I think it needed some red. And, yes, I could have sent it back to her unfinished, but what's the fun in that?

I was so determined to get red fabric to finish the block that I didn't even realize until I was looking at the pictures of the finished block much later that I ended up adding one extra (unnecessary) strip of red. And here I was wondering, as I cut it down, why I was cutting so much off one side. Silly me! I still like the way it turned out.

I must say, I have now made several wonky log cabins now but the tutorial Donna sent along taught me something new and I wish I had known it when I made the Laker's Log Cabin for Sorrel. Thankfully I am a habitual reader. I'm the type of person who will read the manual to the vacuum cleaner if it's lying about, so I scanned the tutorial Donna sent along even though I thought I already knew "how" to make a wonky log cabin. And I do! But reading the tutorial I learned to use 3" strips for the last layer so when you cut the block down to size you don't end up cutting to the seam or end up with super thin layers. Awesome!

Sewn Together June Block

I finally went back to work yesterday after a two month hiatus but I got a head start on the blocks I needed to make for June before I went back to the office. In the Sewn Together Bee Mandy asked for a Kaleidoscope String Block. Since I am very new to quilting and piecing (and bees) this was my first String Block. There was also an interesting choice of fabrics that came our way, not your traditional quilting cottons, oh no! Mandy sent us an awesome array of satins!

Mandy's Fabric Choices for June

Paper piecing this block was so much easier than my other two attempts, mainly because it's an extremely easy block to paper piece. I did have one mishap along the way. Mandy wanted the green fabric to be our starting piece. She thought it would unify the quilt when it comes together. Well, I finished my last square and was getting ready to put the whole block together when I discovered that I had laid out the middle green strip incorrectly and it was at a slightly off angle. I freaked. At this point I had already cut the square down so I could salvage some of the strips but there was no way I could salvage the most important fabric, the green. Thankfully I discovered that I had enough of the green left to make one more square - but just - so I was able to save the block. Phew!

Mandy's String Block for June

I really hope Mandy likes the block. It was a lot of fun to make and I really enjoyed working with the satins. This block is now on it's way home to England. I can't wait to see the whole quilt put together.