Walk in the Park, part deux

So guess what? I just finished my first commission quilt, how cool is that? See, custom work is nothing new to me, since that is what my “day job” is, but this was my first custom quilt.

And look at how good it turned out? I think I shall call this baby…hmm…Second walk in the park. Tee hee! This is my Walk in the Park’s baby brother; it is only 36”x44'” finished size.

I used my square in square method (again) for these blocks, then added a border, and voila, a super cute quilt that is on its way across the country to live in a little boy’s nursery!

I backed it with this lovely fabric from Kate Spain’s Verna (oh Verna how I love thee!), and I used an Amy Butler dot as binding. And wow do I like binding smaller quilts! They take so much less time!!!!

And since this quilt is destined to be a wall hanging, I added a rod pocket to this cute thing. And I had my wonderful assistant (aka Spencer) help me model it too. Thank goodness he was home while I was taking pictures! It’s hard to tell, but I have a clear acrylic tube through the pocket in the photo. That’s what I had available at the moment :)
So overall, I declare my first commission quilt a success! Oh, and I have a new project on my wall right now, more on that one soon!

Handmade Christmas

Yeah I know, Christmas was weeks ago, but I couldn’t post these BEFORE Christmas, lest the recipients spy them out!

See, I have four awesome sisters that are all either teens or very close to it. And what does every teenage girl need? That’s right, a cute purse! And oh guess what? I have lots of fabric sitting around begging to be made into cute things, so I found out favorite colors and got to work!

I wanted to keep every single one of these bags! But I was good and actually gifted them :)
The far left and center right bags were made with the buttercup bag pattern from Made by Rae, and the far right and center left were made with the Juliet Bag pattern from Me and My Sister. I did shrink the Juliet bag to 70% size though, cuz I wanted a cute little bag. But now I think I’m going to make a full size one for myself…time for a new purse!
And while I was thinking about my handmade Christmas stuff, I realized I made another gift but TOTALLY forgot to get pictures! Luckily, it was for my mom, so I will get pictures to post soon! It’s not cheating to “borrow” someone’s scraps to make them a gift, right? Tee hee!
Have a great weekend all! I am feeling much much better today, so I am off to enjoy naptime the best way possible…quilting!

Awesomely Amazing

Sooo, I am sitting on my couch wishing that this nasty cold I caught would have chosen someone OUTSIDE my household to attack…And since the kid is definitely not letting me sleep, what better way to pass the time ‘til the relief aid gets off work than to write up a blog post?


These are the awesomely amazing quilts I made for the awesomely amazing twins, Logan and Jaxson! Their mom has been my friend since high school, and was my roommate for a few years during college. So of course when they announced they were having twin boys, I started getting to work on some quilts!

When I started planning these twin quilts, I had no idea what to do. When I thought twins, I thought matchy matchy, but then I thought well that’s no fun! First, what’s the fun in having the same exact quilt as your brother? Second, what better way to spark fights in kids? “That one is MINE!” “No it’s not, it’s mine!”

My solution? The same quilt pattern, but with completely different fabrics! That way there is never a question of whose is whose, but there is still that element of similarity.

And I think it worked out pretty well!

Here’s my favorite part! This was the last scrap of this turtle print I had, and I knew I had to include it, but there wasn’t enough left for a large center block, and if I made it the small size it would cut the poor turtle up! So, this one block is a different size. AND the surrounding blue fabric is the only fabric that is in both quilts.

I totally would have had these quilts done BEFORE the boys were born, but as is the nature of twins, they came 10 weeks early (right Joanna?). I think I was partway through quilting when they were born. But that’s ok, I didn’t gift them until the baby shower almost two months later :)
So there you have it; the awesomely amazing twin quilts!

What I got for Christmas

Before I show off the awesomely cool twin quilts, I decided I would share all the cool stuff I got for Christmas this year! My loved ones really do love me, cuz check out all the cool sewing/quilty stuff I got!

 

Kona Coal and White, some Martinique yardage to make myself a skirt, A Verna jelly roll that my mom has been hiding from me for SIX months, enough thread to last me a few months(tee hee), and some various notions. Oh, and if you are wondering what the package with the sticks and tubes in it is, t is the COOLEST thing ever! It is called a Turn It All, and it makes turning fabric tubes super easy! Once you use one, you never want to mess with a bodkin or a big safety pin or any other turning method again!

Anyways, I was pretty dang spoiled this Christmas, and wanted to share :)

A New Year!

Is it really 2011? Does it seem like 2010 just raced by for anyone else?

So, to start off the new year, I am showing off the last two newest additions to my shop. They have only been listed for what, a month? :) Then I have a pair of awesome, adorable quilts to show you that went to my good friend who had TWINS at the end of October, and then I can finally show off all the good stuff I made for Christmas! A little late. Oh, and I might have a current project or two :)

Anyways, this first quilt was born from a desire to do a plain old patchwork quilt, and a desire to use that super cute car print you see in there!

Ironic that now that it's done, I wonder if it would have looked better without that print included!

The hubs said this quilt looked vintage-y to him, so I named it the "throwback quilt". Or he might have called it that...I don't remember. But he is very helpful throughout my quilting process! If he is home while I am basting, I get him to come look and tell me how to quilt that particular quilt if I am having trouble deciding. And he is usually right on the money for choosing the best way to go!

So this one ended up with vertical line quilting. It's not over-quilted, so it's still soft and snuggly :)

I love this backing fabric. When I bought it, I had NO idea what I would use it for, since at the time I didn't have any fabrics that remotely went with it. But look at that, it totally worked for this one!

This one finished up at 41"x45", and it is listed in my shop.

I will spare you the long story of how this quilt came to be, and why it ended up in my shop, since this post is getting rather long and wordy...Suffice it to say, it's cute and it's here!

The solid blue is Kona Royal Blue I believe, and most of the other fabrics are Animal Party.

I went with a solid brown binding, and now can't remember which kona it was! Need to start labeling them when I buy them...

I found this cool stripe in an end of bolt bin at a LQS just as I was finishing the top, and knew it had to be the back! Luckily, the piece was just big enough :)

This one has some straight lines sort of outlining the bricks, and finished at 34"x40".

So here's to the new year with some (hopefully) more consistent blogging!

Another finished quilt and a tip!

Wow look at me, two blog posts in a week! Maybe I am finally getting back on track!

Today I want to share another of my recent finished quilts. Now, this is soooo not my normal color palette, but when I ran across a Martinique honey bun on sale at my LQS, I couldn't resist! It was just so PRETTY! Not me at all, but so feminine and pretty!

I went with super simple and just sewed all the strips together. I have wanted to do this with a honey bun for AGES, and that was the plan when I purchased this particular honey bun, but it had been sitting in my stash for 6 months before I finally got to it.

Since the top piecing was fairly basic and straight, I knew I wanted quilting that was more elaborate than my normal free motion or straight line abilities. I had tried to free motion quilt flowers before, but I was REALLY bad at it, mostly because I couldn't figure out where to stitch next fast enough and messiness ensued...Then I had a BRILLIANT idea that I will now share with you! Before I basted the quilt, I ironed freezer paper onto the ENTIRE quilt top and drew my quilting lines on first! Then I pin basted straight through the paper.

It worked AMAZINGLY well! I knew exactly where to go to stitch, so I have stitching that actually looks like flowers on my quilt! Now, quilting was a pain, cuz the paper made the whole quilt a little stiff, and I had to tear off chunks of paper as I quilted so I could stuff the quilt under my machine, and at the last bit most of the paper wasn't ironed on anymore, but it was still held on with the pins, so I will definitely NOT do this on any quilt bigger than this, but for this size and smaller, it was SO worth it!

I love this flowery print I used for the back! I am still debating going back for more (in any of the colorways!) to make myself a skirt!

This one finished at 43"x43". That seems to be my average quilt size lately...it's so nice to not have something ginormous to work on!

I used a pretty polka dot from the line for binding. There were so many good choices to choose from for binding fabric, but I finally decided to stick with dots :)
This one is listed in my shop, and will also be available at a local boutique this Friday and Saturday. Actually, I guess this is a good time to inform you about said boutique!


I would like to invite you all to {Handmade} Boutique, happening this weekend here in Gilbert, AZ!

We have some super talented women contributing to this boutique, and I would love to see you there!

Walk in the Park

Alright, I promise I'm not dead or anything, I am here!
I have mentioned that I am a terrible blogger, right? I have? Oh good :)

So I did finally get to photographing that stack of quilts that was sitting around, and I think I will share one today! (Finally!!) And instead of starting with the one that has been sitting neglected the longest, I'm starting with the newest, because it is just so dang pretty!

Spencer has named this one "Walk in the Park", since it's kinda nature-y and flowery and leafy and whatnot. I once again used my square in square block method to piece this one. But, once again, as much as I love these blocks, I got bored and antsy after making 20. Since I wanted to have a larger finished size, I added a pieced border, something I don't do very often. Yeah, I will be doing that more now, because I like it!

It ended up finishing at 48"x58", and is a great lap quilt size.

And have I mentioned I love a pieced backing? Well, let me mention it now! The main blue in the backing here is a print from the Verna line by Kate Spain (I love her fabric!!). I also had a good size chuck of this awesome large scale floral that I used a bit in the front, but couldn't bear to cut up any more. Ta da! Awesome backing fabric!

I straight line quilted this one because I really didn't want to wrestle it around in free motioning, and because well, it just looks good :)

 

I used a fun wavy line print from Amy Butler's Midwest Modern for the binding, which looks great(at least I think so!). This pretty pretty quilt is now listed in the shop, and will also be available this weekend at the Handmade Boutique in Gilbert (at a discounted price!) for any of you who are local. Come on out and support some local "crafty ladies"!