Color Fix

Mostly pics.

Canyon, and an intact roll of Good Fortune sitting with them.

  I needed some color, so I ventured into the LQS (not the smelly one!) and cruised over to the jelly roll display. I chose "Canyon" by Kate Spain for Moda. It was the last they had in stock. I've been saving a jelly roll of "Good Fortune" by Kate Spain for quite a while now, pondering just what the right project was for it.

Coral perfection.

 Well I think I've got a project in mind, but for now, I'll just enjoy their prettiness.  

I really do enjoy seeing all the colors laid out. And it covers the stains on my ironing board cover.


Best,

Heather

Grow Curcurbita maxima! Grow!

Wow, my last post was in February. Sheesh.
Well, I've got a good excuse. I went back to work. I haven't sewn much at all.

But I needed to get cracking, the baby shower is next weekend! Got to get this little bundle in the mail asap!

Outdoor artsy shot on the big boulder. As I started taking these pictures, it began to hail. No kidding.

Here's the scoop. Grandpa grows ginormous competition pumpkins. Last year he grew the biggest pumpkin in their state. It weighed almost a ton! When I say almost, it was 1,997 lbs. That's a heck of a lot of pumpkin.

I googled the state pumpkin weigh-off, and found an image of Grandpa's winning Curcurbita maxima. I sketched it out on freezer paper and my applique was born.

my version of C. maxima

I don't know what pumpkin whisperers say when they talk to their plant, but I suspect "grow" is probably near the top of the list. It's applicable for babies, too. So grow it is.

And the backing.

Technically, the pumpkin is not a vegetable, it's a fruit. That's ok, Grandpa can set the kid straight for me. I'm claiming artistic license here.

Best,
Heather


Linking up to confessions of a fabric addict and Lea Anne who I know will be proud I got my applique on.

Picots, Prairies, And Pffffs!

Confession: I never knew what a picot was, until just a few minutes ago. Our son has a quilt his grandma made him when he was a baby, quilted by hand and bound with prairie points. He's always referred to the points as "picots". I just thought they were a funny name he'd given them, but he says that is what his grandma always called them. So, I looked it up, and a picot is a decorative loop edge in embroidery or lace. Well, what do you know!

Pinned and ready to go.

I've totally snuck this little quilt in, and whoo hoo! it's actually finished! My mom asked me to make a little baby quilt for a friend of hers who is a first time grandma.

I showed the flimsy to my husband who said it was nice, 'and you know the baby would like those little pointy things to stick his fingers in'. The little pointy things being picots, or prairie points, depending on your perspective. I did have a pile of leftover scraps from the front of the quilt, and suddenly they had a purpose! I could use them all up as the "little pointy things".

Sewing these on was much easier than I anticipated.

Everything was going great, and then, I got to the end of the scraps. I needed 58 points, I had 55 and I was 12 square inches short. Now, I knew I could go back to the LQS, and find one more FQ. But... This particular LQS, which I love because they've expanded and they carry tons of great stuff - has now put in a little heater gizmo in the back that pfffffs out a scent every 45 seconds. After five minutes in there I had a miserable headache that stuck with me all day. Later, when I ironed the pfffff smell was still embedded into the fabrics! Needless to say, I chose not to go back and deal with more pfffffs. 

When there is no clothesline, use a fence. The quilt is ~ 35" x 40" before the addition of the prairie points.

Instead, I raided the stash for 12" of something similar. The little quilt was cute to begin with, but the prairie points really added some fun factor to it. A great suggestion by the husband. So I've been pondering, do husbands actually know best? Hmm mm...

Photo shoot outtake with Curly!

 Best,

Heather

Linking up to Amanda Jean @ Crazy Mom Quilts and
Sarah @ Confessions of a Fabric Addict!

A windy, windy day

By some miracle, we haven't lost power at the house today. This morning's weather report called for "a weak system to move through the area this afternoon, and clear out by this evening." Umm, no that is not what happened - at all. It is SO WINDY! two power poles fell down, one just north of the house, and one to the south, and somehow we still have power. Thankfully! because I have a pot roast in the crock pot. 

Awwww skunky HST's

Anyway, I've been making some progress on the next baby quilt. I even ran out today and picked up fabric for the backing. The unusual (for me) aspect of this one is that I'm doing a little applique. And boy did this quilt need it!

It's cute, sure, but it was really lacking in the pizzazz department.

It's a pumpkin!

I really like the way the applique extras are coming along. It's adding so much to the quilt! Every time (it's rare) that I do applique, I think how awesome it is, how I can make any shape I want, and why don't I do this more often?

Then I get to the blanket stitching. Ah, yes, the blanket stitching...

Looks pretty good... but...

How tedious is the blanket stitching? Will it ever end? Why did I do this? I mean it just goes on forever. And I'm not even doing a lot of it.

Ben totally agrees, blanket stitching is soooo dull. 

Curly's OK with it.

Best,
Heather

HST Baby Quilt

We have another baby coming in the family, and I puzzled for quite a while as to what to make. I wandered into a LQS and saw the cutest little fabrics in the fat quarter sale bin. They have skunks! Any fabric that is cute and that has skunks on it is aces in my book!

I matched the print with some solids, some of which are also new additions to the stash. 

Center = Woodland Tails Owls in Cream by Sheri Berry for Riley Blake

Everything else is a Moda Bella solid, with one *exception*. They are from clockwise, Amelia Apricot, Parchment, Celery, Soft Yellow (? I think), Betty's Teal, *American Made Brand* Periwinkle, Little Boy Blue, and Breeze.

I decided, as usual, to make this up as I go. So I made up a bunch of HST's. There are as many ways to make HST's as there are ways to arrange them! I decided to use my trusty ruler from Fons & Porter.

That's right, I used a pencil. This is straight up old school here.

And I pinned. I figure that the amount of time it takes me to pin is less than I would spend constantly checking the alignments as I chain pieced. Off I went...

..and had a few trimmings to show for it. (Always with HST's, right!)

The big reveal will have to wait. The HST's are not the end of things though. I plan on getting my "Podunk" on, and doing some... applique. Dum dum dummmmm. Lee Anne makes it look so darn easy, and I need it for this quilt. So. Stay tuned. It could get real crazy up in here.

In honor of my cute new woodland additions to the stash, I'll be linking this post up with the Glittering and travelin' Molli Sparkles and his guest host for Sunday Stash!

Oh - and this quilt? It's patiently laying out on the guest bed waiting for it's last border to go on.

Best,
Heather

Finally - A WIP. WIP it good!

Did you make a New Year's resolution? I sure as heck didn't. I could tell you that my lack of blogging was due to a resolution to unplug from social media, which sounds all noble and highfalutin, but that would be oh so untrue.

The reality is I was really just blahed out by quilting. There had been hints that this was coming, which I should've paid more attention to. So I set out to beat the blahs. I tried it all. I ogled fabric online. I went thru my stash for inspiration. I looked at my free download files of quilt patterns. (I have hundreds.) I looked at my quilting notes on my iphone. I looked at the UFO's. I went to fabric stores. I pulled bolts of lovely fabric, stared at them all, and tired to imagine what could be. Nope, nada, zip, zero, zilch. Nothing inspired.

And, I think that maybe that's ok. Quilting is an art. There is just no way I can imagine an artist being productive all the time. So I decided to take a break. And then I worried about my lack of production. I worried about the growing UFO's. I worried about what I was missing on all the quilty blogs. I worried my loyal readers (Hi Mom!) would never look at my little blog again.

I thought about all the textile artists whose work we admire, the painters, the sculptors, the musicians, the writers. This has to be normal, right? Once I gave myself permission for it to just "be", I stopped worrying about it. I let it go, and the nagging worries faded.

I didn't worry about the requisite 'holiday' quilt, (basted & rolled in a bundle on the floor, awaiting finish), projects for this person, projects for that person, that weren't always to my taste, but were something I imagined the intended recipient would like. I let it all go. Eventually, one thing kept popping back up into my head. Something that I'd really wanted to do, but all the other things got in the way first. It was my carrot project, the one at the end of the stick, where I'd tell myself I'll finish these first, then I'll do this one.

To heck with that! If I was getting my groove back, I was damn well going to get my groove on my terms. I had the pattern tutorial. I needed the right fabric, and there it was all along, in my stash, a little layer cake waiting for it's day in the sun.

Oh yeah, there's a light at the end of the tunnel. And it's the LED illumination on my Bernina, baby.


Linking up to Lee @ Freshly Pieced!

Retro Finish - "Parker's Ducks"

OK, I fully admit to dawdling when it comes to finishing my November goal for the Lovely Year of Finishes over at Sew Bittersweet Designs.
Or as my dear husband says, I dawdle dawdle dawdle. But I have my reasons! 1) I threw my back out and have been hobbling around for almost a week, and 2) I hate quilt basting. I use the pin & floor method, which is a topic for another day. Don't even start me on my hatred of spray basting.

Since I have no current progress elsewhere, I thought I'd search through my photos and share with you some projects I completed pre-blog, aka a Retro Finish.

Little boy baby blanket

 This was a little baby blanket I completed for a cousin's firstborn, and the first great-grandchild for my aunt and uncle. Although the top is pieced, I used the concept illustrated in this tutorial for completing it - except my top and bottom were the same size. What makes this one special is the fabrics used. The solid blue sheeting and patterned brown/blue cotton were used as tablecloths at mom's baby shower. The duck fabric remnants came from a quilt I made for baby's great-grandpa, who passed from cancer. Little Parker won't remember his great-grandpa, but he'll know his blankie was cut from the same cloth as his great-grandpa's.

Dramatic artsy shot draped over the rock wall. (I have no quilt holder-upper helpers!)

 I decided to fussy cut the ducks, and what ever height / width I needed to form rows, I'd just make up a block or two as needed. There was no agonizing or fussing over which blocks to create, I decided to keep it simple, and I think it turned out great. Best I can recall, this ended up being about 35x45-ish. There is no batting or quilting, and the back is made up of the solid blue sheeting. It turned out as a very nice, lightweight summertime baby blanket, great for car or stroller outings.

Linking up to Krista for Throwback Thursday!

Best,
Heather