Friday, July 25, 2008

On hold....

I am officially putting all my projects on hold for now. Our house sold with us agreeing with the buyers on a price yesterday (during all the Pioneer Day festivities). We are now currently looking for a new home. Oh, yeah, the buyers want to close on August 11. That gives us a good two weeks. Mom and Dad, glad you have some extra room for us and our wild boys! Hopefully we will be able to work something out to get the house we have in mind and be in by the time school starts.

This does mean that I will have to withdraw from the scrap quilt challange. I will be finishing it sometime, but not in August. I am very glad I finished my star blocks for the Prairie Paisley swap early!

Happy quilting everyone!

Sunday, July 20, 2008

AF Quilt show



This is my favorite quilt from the quilt show this weekend. When I looked at the tag on it one of my ward friends entered it. Her grandma made it and now she has it. I just love it.

I also bought a jelly roll of Winter yesterday. Can't wait to start a new quilt. I may do it next and do a super simple pattern. I need simple right now. I also bought Black Diamonds which is a jelly roll pattern. I love it, but I'm not sure about the black. I think I'd like it in brighter colors. I was thinking I'd maybe do it in Candyland Christmas but I can't find the fabric in any of the stores I usually go to. If anybody's seen it in any of the Utah stores let me know.

Some of you have inquired of the fate of the Strawberry Lilies quilt. It's on my frame as we speak, but only has a few rows quilted. I haven't had the time to finish but, at least for now, it's still alive.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Oh, no, now what?



I feel like laying this quilt top on the lawn and running the lawn mower over it. I know that sounds violent, but it's been one problem after another. I know this sounds minor, but now I don't have quite enough backing. You can see the backing sticking out on the top and bottom, but notice you don't see anything on the sides. I think I have some extra red from the flowers that I can piece for some of the back, but still, it's one more thing. I've unpicked two of the boarders because I didn't set them right to match up with the corner blocks. Then there was the problem with the sashing. I don't know what I was thinking when I forgot to trim it before I put the blocks on to make it on point. Seriously, I think my brain totally turns off when it's time to work on this quilt. Hopefully I can quilt it tomorrow with NO problems. Then bind it. If you don't see it again, check with my grass clippings.

Sunday, July 13, 2008

Cherry Apron




I made another apron this weekend. I think I'm addicted. I have fabric for one more, but I don't think I can stop with just one. Maybe that's what my family, friends and the girls I visiting teach will be getting for Christmas!

Does anyone else have this problem? When I sew too late at night it's like my brain turns to mush. I'm not talking 2 or 3am, but I swear as soon as the clock turnes to 10pm all my brain cells go out the window. Last night was no exception. I wanted to try the ruffle and kept going. I should have stopped. When I looked at it this morning I saw all my mistakes, but at the time I kept thinkng I was fine and I could just keep going. Lesson learned. Stop sewing at 10pm.

Friday, July 11, 2008

Starting the Scrap Quilt


I got the center done of the Lady Bug Scrap Quilt. I just did by blocks in random order, not like the pattern. I hop I can find my black dot fabric. I have some left over from the butterfly quilt and need it for the lady bugs and the boarder. I moved a bunch of stuff around when I put stuff in my parent's storage unit so we could get ready to show the house (which is going very slowly.) Anyway, I'll search more later.


I should have enough of this fabric for a bigger boarder. I loved it when it was in
the stores so I bought a lot. It looks like over a yard is here. Now onto the lady bug boarder. I'm debating about doing the applique before or after I attach the boarder to the quilt. If I do it before I will be working with a much smaller piece of fabric and then I can do the corner ones after it's all on.

Thursday, July 10, 2008

I'm making a committment..... maybe


I think this is what I'm going to do for my scrap quilt. This magazine is from Quick Quilts May 2005. I loved this pattern as soon as I saw it. I've been wanting to make it in case I ever have a baby girl. Well...... I think I'm going to make it even though I don't have a girl. If I don't get a girl in the next few years I'll give it as a shower gift or something. I'm not going to make it exactly like the one shown though. I doubt I have enough of any red or white fabric to use all the same red, all the same white with red print and I don't have much solid white so it will probably be the white with red print. It will just be red and white and not just the specific pattern. Should be quick and easy though.

Most of this fabric is left over from my Sew Simple Baskets quilt. I did all red
baskets with white on them, but different fabric for each basket. I do have a few more smaller pieces, but lots of them are no longer squares and I cannot fold them up to look like squares and still have them recognizable so they are sitting in a pile just out of the camera shot.

I also just finished a quilt I made several months ago out of the Cherry Baby fabric and several other lines. Hopefully I can get it bound in the next day or two so I can take a picture blog.

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Cupcake Pincushion


So here it is...... my first cupcake pincushion. I made it out of scraps from my Cherry Baby quilt that has yet to be quilted (maybe I should do that tomorrow?). I
would like to make a few pincushions, one for regular pins, one for longer, bigger pins and one for applique pins.

My little boy loves to try on my shoes and apparently the new apron!

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Fruity Apron with a Little Less Rick Rack


Today during nap time I decided to make my first apron. I used my least favorite fabric so I could make the mistakes with it and hopefully have it perfected (haha) by the time I get to fabric I like better. I also decided to line the apron, which is not part of the instructions, since it seemed easier to do the rick rack that way. Things went well until I started on the ruffle.

I didn't have enough lining for the ruffle so I decided to try out my rolled hem foot. It took a few practices, but it's actually pretty cool. I'm excited to experiment a little more with it.

Then I started on the rick rack. I did the bottom and sides of the ruffle first. While I was pinning on the ruffle one of my children (who shall remain nameless) decided to "help." When I turned around he was cutting my rick rack into small pieces. When I gasped in horror he looked confused. He thought I needed it in little pieces. Really, how could I get mad when he was just trying to help. Needless to say, the apron does not have rick rack in all the required places. Can you tell where I left it off?

Now I need to start dinner. I feel like a new apron needs to debut with a great dinner. Too bad I haven't been to the grocery store in about two weeks. Maybe they'll be happy with peanut butter? Oh wait, we're out of bread.

Sunday, July 6, 2008

Prairie Paisley



I finished my blocks for my quilt exchange. I needed to make 12 12 inch star blocks out of Prarie Paisley fabric to share with my friends. The exchange is in September sometime. I'm glad to be done early! Can't wait to see what the others do.


This is my camera happy 2 year old. Whenever he sees me taking a picture that is not of him he jumps into it. Then he smiles his "pose for the camera" smile, which is not the same as his happy smile. He loves to be the center of attention and when he's not, he does something to make him the center of attention.

Now the bad news. I was taking off a short sleeve sweater on the 4th of July. I don't know if there was already a small hole or what, but I put my elbow right through the seam of the arm and body of the sweater. Now, can I just sew it back up again, or do I have to knit it up? I'm not good at knitting. Can I just do it with my sewing machine? It's just the seam that's ripped.

Saturday, July 5, 2008

The Centerville Quilt Show and a Rolled Hem Foot


On the Fourth of July Centerville has a quilt show at Centerville Elementary. It's not a contest, just a show. Last year I entered a few quilts I just happened to have with me when we slept over the night before at my parents house. This year I decided not to enter any, but had fun going to see them. Unfortunately, with my camera in hand, I forgot to take any pictures.

There weren't as many quilts as last year, but it's always fun too see what people enter. There were two quilts that were needle turn applique, a Baltimore album and a Hawaiian quilt. Some were quilted by hand and some were machine quilted.

My favorite three quilts were at the end. The first was a log cabin quilt. The quilt history was on a paper next to it. It was made in 1778. I couldn't believe it! All had pieced and hand quilted. Wow! Next to it was a quilt from 1880. It was a quadruple Irish Chain. It as very interesting to see that because it wasn't fabric I would have thought of if I were making a civil war era reproduction quilt. One of the colors was a bright orange solid, which I would not have thought of. I guess 1880 is a good 18 years after the civil war, however I was still surprised to see the color choice. Apparently I need to read up on quilt history. Next to that was a yo-yo quilt/bedspread made around 1940. The paper telling the information said how many yo-yos it had. I can't remember the exact number, but it was about 2,650. I love seeing old quilts that have been in the families for years.

In other quilt news I bought a rolled hem foot. My patterns for aprons use one on the ruffles. I have birthday money left so off to Nuttalls I went! I've never used one before and am a little intimidated. It will be a fun adventure though. The lady at Nuttalls gave me a little demo. It looked complicated so I may be reaching out to my quilt blog friends for tips! Let me know if you have any!

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Shop Hop

This weekend I went to three shops for Shop Hop. The first I went to was American Quilting in Orem. I love all their simple, but sooo cute quilts. There was one quilt near the front of the store that was appliqued flowers though that I love. However, I'm not much of an appliquer, so I did not buy the pattern. I am still thinking about that quilt though. It reminded me of something I'd find in my grandma's closet.

I did buy this fabric there. The peach is Fig Tree's Dandilion Girl. I will use it in the sashing and boarder when I make the Jelly Stars quilt. The three fat
quarters are because I love 30's fabric and my current 30's quilt has yellow. I love the yellow one with the cherries. It's quite old, but I have bought it several times in yellow, blue and pink. I'm almost out though and saw one last fat quarter so I bought it. I believe it came out about 3 years ago and I'll be sad when it's gone. Do any of you do that? Buy your favorite fabrics again?

The next store I went to was Corn Wagon. I love this store which seems to have a little of everything. I bought the blue fabric for the body of and apron and the
stripe for the ruffle. The ric rac for the trim. I loved the quilt on the cover of
the magazine. It has a y-seam though and I've never done that before. We'll see how and when that one comes.

I also bought this pattern for a stuffed frog. My boys will love it. I made my
oldest a bear when he was about 2 and cannot find the pattern anywhere. He loves it though, but I've been wanting to make another one. I'll now be making frogs instead.


Last I went to Cherry Tree Cottage in Spanish Fork. I bought more apron fabric.

At Corn Wagon I also bought a few more fat quarters of Prarie Paisley. I have 9 blocks done now of 12. I was hoping to finish this afternoon, but a realtor called to show our house so I cleaned instead.

Now to think about the stash quilt. Not quite sure what I'll do. Most likely a baby quilt. Either one of red and white fabric that I saw several years ago in a magazine or one of 30s fabric. We'll see.