varsity lawn quilt & giveaway

A nice finish.  This giant flying geese was shamelessly copied from a quilt I saw last fall at market in Houston

I think it was at the cotton and steel booth, but I can't remember.  Let me know if  you do.

"Quilt in a day's" ruler wasn't even big enough for what I wanted.  I attained the services of my "genius math quilter friend" (thank you mk) to help make those big geese.  (which means the process was painful and a big blur, so please don't ask :)

patiently waiting on the banister for it's turn on the hq sweet sixteen.

Do you remember the post back here about my trip to Mexico where I took pictures of free motion quilting ideas?  

simple log cabin design:

flagstone: 

graffiti:

 I kinda went a little crazy on the quilting but there's one problem with so much detailed quilting.  And I found that out after the washing.  It reminded me of when the maid accidentally put my sweater in the dryer and it came out a 2 T size :- /
 I lost probably 10 inches off the width and length.

What I ended up with:
 a rotation of pebbles, random squares and matchstitck lines, which quilts up nice.  I'll use that pattern again.

stats:
55 x 68 (washed)
fabric is varsity by sweetwater
geese are 6 1/2 x 12 1/2
batting is 80/20 comfort by Winline

GIVEAWAY - closed.  

 I seem to have an abundance of pincushions laying around from my recent pincushion fest.  I'd love to share one with you, it's even filled with walnut shells.  leave me a comment if you're interested.

linked:

crazy mom quilts

whoop whoop

frenzy friday

patchwork dish towel

Thank you for your comments last week.  Several of you recommended the linky party hosted by Lorna at "Let's Be Social" on Wednesdays.  So, that will be my new mid-week social hangout.

Betsy won last week's giveaway . . .  package is on it's way,  enjoy!


Flour sack towels are the best!  inspiration from Amanda Jean.  I hang them on my oven door.   They make a nice splash of color in my kitchen and are a good conversation piece.   They are mostly for looks cuz they're so pretty, but I'm not going to stress myself out by trying to keep them white.





I purchased these 33"x38" flour sack dish towels from amazon.  The seller had lots of good reviews.  I've since washed mine and love how soft and absorbent they are.

I wanted them to be a little more rectangular in shape, so I trimmed off about 6 1/2 inches off the longer 

This is a great scrap-buster project, or you can use a mini charm pack.

spread out your squares, these are 2 1/2, but any size will work.  

These are more scrappy, but I stayed with the 2 1/2 in wide strip.

Sew your pieces together

press 1/4 inch along one edge (this will end up being your top edge on your finished towel)

press 1/4 inch on the end of your strip.   Lay strip wrong side up along the bottom of your towel (shorter end of towel)  3 inches from the bottom.    Pin several places, measuring against the bottom to make sure you've got your 3 inches.

Since each towel and each strip are a little different in length, I wait to press the end until I've pinned the strip down, so that those 2  finished edges are more exact.  

sew a 1/4 inch seam from the end of the top of your strip.

Flip your strip up and press.  Top stitch close to the seam all the way around the strip.

These towels are a great scrap buster and make nice gifts.

linked:
bee social

butterscotch chips finished

This quilt has been finished for a while, just never documented.  I absolutely love love love it.

You can tell how long ago this start was because Butterscotch and Roses by Figtree has been long gone.





There are so many options with the log cabin design, that I had to play with it for a while before I saw my vision.







I love this pantograph design by Benay Derr from Beany Girl Quilts, so I made a stencil from it, you can see that process here.




Yip, it took a long time using my tiniest scissors to make a template.

With so much white, I knew I'd be sorry if I didn't take A LONG TIME and patiently cut all my threads on the back.

I marked 1 row at a time on my dining table then ran upstairs to quilt it before the ink disappeared :0

As you can see . . . my favorite time to take pictures seems to be late at night when the lighting is poor.

you can read about this quilt's wip here, here, and here.

"Tickle" is a popular pantograph design, you should ask your "go to" long arm quilter to get the pattern.  You can purchase it through Willow Leaf Studio.  

linked:

crazy mom quilts

whoop whoop

Salt Lake market, wip- giveaway

Who's missing this?

I am really lost without Lee's Wednesday wip linky party.  It's thrown me off my groove.  I keep waiting for someone to pick up that ball.  Has anyone found a good site for Wednesday wip linky parties? In the mean time, I'll wander, lost in the dark.

If you follow the quilt designers on IG, you'll know that this week is "set up" week in Salt Lake City where quilt market is being held this week-end .  I pulled the short straw this time :(   But I'm enjoying the building of excitement from the designers as  I sit calmly on my couch, reading about their runnings around using glue sticks and duck tape to throw things together.

And here is Moda setting up

(picture taken from Carrie's post on the Moda Cutting Table, this morning) 


Well, this is supposed to be a wip post, so here are my works in progress this week:
I've been working on this outhouse pattern by carolyn friedlander for several weeks.

progress is slow.  the beginnings remind me of the sloth in that movie I saw last month . . . S  L  O  W , as I was learning the basics of paper piecing.

 but now that it seems like I've made a million, I have the process down, I'm loving it!

 2 more left,  a good goal for today :)

In the mean time, I've got quite a nice collection of carolyn friedlander scraps for a give-away in the near future.

remember this mildew stain I posted about back here?

            

well, I've been working on that.  which basically means every 20 minutes, scrubbing it with one of the 300 hundred suggestions found online  (must use timer :)

That's it.  that's all I can get out. 

So, I've rounded up the fabrics needed to replace the stained squares, and I'm waiting for a motivating day . . . could be a while, those come far and few in between

I'm also still working on a mendocino circle quilt.  But that's also in the sloth category,   T A K I N G   F O R   E V E R.  (note to self:  need more light fabrics)

I am in desperate need of a finish . . . hope to have one by week's end.  Sneak peek:

GIVEAWAY - closed

I have some "Flow" fat quarters from Zen Chic that I'm not using.  If you're interested in them, leave me a comment telling me either about a paper piecing project you like or about a cool mid-week linky party you visit.

linked:

thread and needle

free motion by the river