Chenille

One of my favorite projects of 2011? I'd say yes. This was definitely in the top 10!

A very good friend of mine had a baby girl, and I knew I wanted to make her something special. I wanted to do something different than I've ever done, so that I could learn a new technique. I came across a great tutorial on Pinterest (here) for making 'Heirloom Cheenille Baby Blankets.' It was just the 'cool & unique' that I was looking for!Whew! It was a labor of love, but the outcome was fabulous. I honestly can't wait to make another! I was prepared, yet still shocked at how much thread it took to sew so many lines. This quilt took me as long to make (actually even a little longer) than most of my pieced infant quilts.
Once all finished and given it's first wash and dry, the texture of this blanket is DELICIOUS! No other word can describe it's yumminess!Making one of these quilts is not difficult, just time consuming. If you can sew somewhat of a straight line, than whipping one up is easy as pie. I'd give it a 'Beginner Sewer' rating, as long as said beginner can be patient and avoid going cross-eyed from sewing line after line!

Zoe Quilt

A friend commissioned me to make this quilt for her new beautiful niece. She chose the color pallet (brown, green, cream, and coral.) It's one I haven't necessarily worked with, but I LOVE it, and see myself using it again for sure.
It is quilted with an all-over meandering stitch (stippled).
I hope that it gets lots of love and use at it's new home!

Summer Vacation project!

Hey! It's been a little while since I've checked in. Not because I haven't thought about it often, but because I've been on vacation...like all summer! I'm not home quite yet, but will be in just a few days.

I don't know about any of you, but I have a hard time going anywhere for any length of time without taking a project to work on. I came across this "Yoyo along" and knew it would be the perfect 'take a long' portable project for the next few months.I've made what feels like a ton of these little babies over the past month! It's a great scrap buster project. The crazy thing is that I'm like just over a tenth of the way to 1000 yoyo's. This is one of those projects that I see as a marathon, rather than a sprint! It may take a year to get all the yoyo's sewn, but who cares! I'm just loving the process.If you've never made a yoyo, they are so cute and fun to make. Go get yourself one of the handydandy yoyo makers and give it a go! This will be a great fall-time project too, very portable to take along to all those little league soccer practices and games!

new quilt start

What I've been up to yesterday and today...I got a bee up my bonnet yesterday to start a new quilt. I'm using this tutorial from Elizabeth Hartman as my inspiration, but taking it to a direction all my own! If it turns out even partially like I see in my mind, I think it's going to be pretty cool.This is my first attempt at a 'artsy fartsy' / improvisational / abstract quilt. I'm actually really excited. (I came to terms a while back that I am as much of a crafty nerd as my awesome husband is a computer nerd. I get oddly WAY excited over random new projects.)

I've given myself a deadline of the end of the month for this quilt, so hopefully I'll have a finished product to share in a couple of weeks!

First finished quilt of 2011!

Okay, so I confess that I started the quilt the last week of December, but I can still call it the first quilt of 2011, right? Afterall, it wasn't completed until just last night.

I'm not sure what to call this quilt. I was thinking 'Spots & Dots' or maybe 'Spottydots'! What ever the name, It ranks up in the top three quilts I have ever made. I think it is something about the combination of colors and the simplicity of the pattern that draw me in.
When trying to decide how to quilt this, I played with a couple different ideas from just stitching in the ditch to stippling the white space or possibly quilting in circles. Then, for some reason I decided to do something that I've never tried and straight line quilted the whole thing. I am really loving the outcome. This is one of those cases that the quilting adds a TON of personality to the quilt.

The quilt measures about 38"x38". The perfect little size for a baby. I can't wait to deliver it to it's new home!

*The fabric used is Make Life... by Moda.

Frost Bite Quilt

Isn't this quilt adorable? (I can say that because I didn't make it! *wink*) My mom finished this quilt top a few months ago. For her Christmas gift she asked me to quilt it for her. It was my pleasure!The thread I used blended so well with the top of the quilt that it was actually really difficult to quilt. Not being able to see where I had already sewn posed quite the challenge, it was kind of like quilting blind. Although, a quick peak at the backside shows just how it was quilted...
I didn't get any direction from my mom on how she wanted it quilted, so I hope she likes what I came up with!

New Wave Quilt

When I saw this quilt back in March, I knew I just had to make it for somebody special. Lucky for me, my sister-in-law announced on Mother's Day that she was pregnant. Fast forward seven months, and here it is...
My take on Elizabeth Hartman's New Wave Quilt. I am happy with the outcome. It was dicey there for a while though. I was in love with all the prints, but had a tough time deciding whether to sash it with yellow or white. As you can see, I decided on yellow. I didn't love it at first, but after it was quilted and bound, I think it was a success.One of my new favorite things to do is piece a small portion of the back of a quilt, to give it a little character of it's own. I used scraps left from the front of the quilt to piece the back. The crazy thing with this back is that it can almost stand on it's own as a front...It's like two totally separate quilts in one. (Which I haven't decided is good or bad, there probably should be a little more continuity, but what's done is done!)
As you can see, I stitched in the ditch along the sashing lines with one line down the middle of the solid yellow, and then I did a pretty tight stipple through the hour-glass shapes. All in all, a success!Sweet Baby Ella was born just a few days before Thanksgiving. I didn't have the quilt finished and sent off quite in time for her arrival, but it found it's way there this week. Hopefully it can provide lots of years of warmth and love for my sweet new niece!

Fall Quilt

So my mother-in-law finished this quilt top last fall. She promptly sent it my way and asked me to quilt it.I put it on my to-do list...and there it sat. For almost a whole year. Oops! Now that fall is officially on its way, I knew there could be no more procrastinating. Just this last week I got it basted, quilted, bound and sent back to Utah!

I had a really tough time deciding how to quilt this, which is a great part of the procrastination. I LOVE free-motion quilting, but the inspiration on how to go about this quilt kept alluding me. I finally had to just jump in. Here's what I decided to do...

I 'traced' each of the pumpkins and leaves on the panel and stippled the dark brown 'background'. Then I decided to straight line quilt through the blocks bordering the panel, and then stipple the far outside edges. It's a little crazy, but I think I'm happy with how it turned out.

I'm excited to hear what my mother-in-law's reaction is to it. She didn't give me any direction on how she'd like it quilted, so I just hope she's happy with it.

Since she's family and all, and since I had the top in my possession for so long, I decided to bind it for her too, so she could get a finished quilt in the mail.

the first few blocks

I was hoping to have a few more blocks done by this point, but this is what I have so far...
Selvage quilting is as fun as I hoped it would be. I'm a huge 'shabby-sheik' fan, and I think this totally falls in that category. If nothing else, it's 'green'! (using up the part of the fabric that is always discarded.) So, I've got four down, and 44 to go. Whew! Oh, and I am loving the aqua color as my base, I think it's going to look pretty cool once it's all sewn and put together.

On a different note, I'm leaving on Thursday for a vacation (if you can call it that, it's just me and my two boys - hubby has to stay and work) to Utah. All my family lives there, I can't wait to see them! I consider Utah one of the crafting/quilting mecca's of the US. Seriously, there are at least five quilt/sewing shops within ten miles of my parents house. I won't be doing a lot of sewing or crafting while I'm there (although sometimes my mom and I play around a bit) but I do plan to visit my favorite quilt shops. I figure I'll do a mini quilt shop hop and take you along for the ride! Photos and tidbits about my favorite Utah quilt shops. Stay tuned!

my Mom's quilt

My mom made this quilt top last year. I felt honored when she asked me to quilt it for her. I mentioned a few posts ago that my favorite part of making a quilt is the actual process of quilting it. How fun is it that I got to avoid doing everything else and just got to do the quilting! I did a simple large stipple and am happy with how it turned out. (I am definitely no pro, but the more I do it, the better I get!)I really hope that she's happy with the result.

Gift Set

Isn't this a fun layette/gift set?
I've been working on it for a bit and finally finished the bib today. I've been excited to post it but wanted to wait until I had the complete set all done. It's for a very special baby boy...MINE!!

I'm always making things for other people and to sell, it is so much fun to make something for myself. My mom was concerned that the baby wasn't going to get anything his mommy made, but it's been taken care of folks, this stuff is for him! (his arrival is only 8 days away!)

I got this Michael Miller Kids Toile panel a year or two ago on sale. I bought it with the intention of making a quick top for somebody as a gift. Turns out I ran out of energy to make anything too ambitious for my own baby and came across this material. Luckily I love it. It is SUPER simple. All I did was quilt the panel, but I love the simplicity and how it turned out. I 'framed' each picture and then quilted around each of the scenes.I had half a yard or so of material left over from the quilt back, so I made a few other fun accessories to match the quilt. A sleep-sack, burp-rag, and bib. All stuff that is totally necessary...why not make it cute?Now all we need is the baby!

My Productive Weekend!

Scott and Kyle have been away this weekend on a fun daddy/son trip. I took full advantage of the opportunity to craft my little heart out!

I was able to finish the top and quilt a quilt that I started a week or so ago. I can't say it is completely done, because I am still finishing the hand-sewing part of the binding, but you get the gist! I got the pattern and inspiration from the Moda Bake Shop (http://www.modabakeshop.com/2009/02/bettys-baby-bowtie-quilt.html) I thought the quilt was adorable but didn't love the colors they chose. I went with a different charm pack...Snippets, and fit the base colors more to my liking. The quilt is going to be a gift for someone, but it's a secret!The instructions suggested to do a grid pattern for the actual quilting, but I didn't love the look, so I went with a big stipple instead. I just stitched in the ditch around the small red border, and then in the yellow border did a fun loopty-flowery pattern.

I also took the time to do some scrapbooking. Another favorite past-time of mine! I didn't get a ton done, but enough to fully enjoy myself and make a big ole' mess of the kitchen table!

It's been a fun productive weekend!

Ribbit!

One of my latest nap-time projects!!

This frog was SO much fun to make! It was a quick project that I literally finished during one of Kyle's nap-times.

Teresa - thanks for sharing your pattern with me. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be the sewer/quilter that I am today without all of your inspiration. Thanks for turning me over to the 'dark side!'

Mom - does the material look familiar? I LOVE that you pass me down your scraps and left-overs. Thanks for keeping me going with lots of fun scraps.

What was fun about this project was that it mixed piecing, quilting, and sewing all into one project. I think this is going to be the new baby's (due in early June!) first stuffed animal.

Side note...My sister-in-law Teresa fill hers with the little hard plastic beady things that you would fill bean bags with. I SEARCHED around here for that stuff and couldn't find it. I ended up filling my frog with the little micro-bead poly-fill foam balls. It made a horrendous mess, but after cleaning up a few times with my vacuum all is well and I am super pleased with the outcome. Because of the light weight of the filler I used, it'll be way more suitable for a small child's toy.