Design Wall Monday

I've got a busy week again, but I did take time to work on something and it's ready for me to sew, even if I only have a few minutes.

The pattern is Totally Tulips from Missouri Star Quilt Company. 

I'm not making mine as large as called for in the pattern, so all of my blocks are made. I need to add the small sashing strips between the vertical blocks and then add the long vertical sashing. I haven't decided what I'm going to do for borders yet, and won't until the inside is sewn together. 

This was fun and easy, but I have to say that I will be more careful if I make this again. I basically did what Jenny Doan did in the video and pressed willy nilly and didn't pin. I found myself getting lazy and some of the blocks show it. 

I've got a couple more Jelly Roll Rug strips put together and even have another "rope" ready to start sewing the rug. These really addictive. My justification is that I've had to make some for class samples and really perfect the technique before I can teach it. (With a quilt, I have to make a bunch of blocks, but not with this.)  That's my story and I'm sticking to it.  :-) 

Here are some pictures of the last two that I completed.

What are you working on today?

Check out the quilting eye candy at

Judy's Small Quilts and Doll Quilts 

and

Beth's Monday Making 

H2H - Tips, Tutorials ,and Recipes

It's time to start prepping for the 2018 Hands2Help, if you haven't already done so. I've got one quilt complete and ready to go, and I've got another one kit up and ready to sew. Yippee!!

One really neat thing that Sarah does at the beginning of the H2H Season, is create a post/link-up for us to share our favorite tips, tutorials, and recipes. The goal is to help out each other and make creating our charity projects easier, and more fun. Check out Sarah's post HERE.

My all time favorite tip, and one that I share with my students is to get yourself organized for whatever project on which you are working. (I realize that organize is often a bad word for many of us, but it doesn't have to be. I am NOT the most organized person by any means, but if I do the following with each project, it keeps me on task and much more productive.)

Basically you are "kitting up" the project on which you are working. I cut the pieces and label them. I clip or bag each piece and place them inside a larger bag, along with the pattern. Even if I only have 15 minutes to work, I can pull out a bag and start working. I put a post it note or check mark next to each step I complete so I don't have to waste time figuring out what I've done and what I need to do. 

My favorite tutorial is one that I posted a few years back on flange binding. Since many of the donation quilts I make require that the binding be machine stitched, I feel that my bindings look better if I use this technique. Click HERE for the tutorial.

And finally, since I don't want to spend a lot of time thinking about meal preparations when I'm on a sewing mission, I have a couple of "go to" links for crock pot and instant pot meals.

Check out the other tips, tutorials, and recipes on Sarah's blog  

Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Have a great week!

Through the Woods - a Rachel Rossi pattern

I've been busy working on a variety of projects lately, but don't have pictures to show.  😞  I'll try to rectify that in the next day or so.

In the mean time, I'm thrilled to announce that Rachel Rossi has released the Through the Woods pattern that I helped test for her. Remember this post about my Secret Sewing Reveal? 

This was a fun quilt to make and I was honored to test it. Here's Rachel's blog post about the new pattern, including some really awesome pictures. 

The pattern is very well-written and a pleasure to make. Don't let the paper piecing scare you. A number of the pattern testers had never done it and they all raved at how easy it was. Not only does Rachel include very good instructions, she includes a cutting chart for the background pieces as well as minimum size cut pieces for everything else. Ahhhhh...no guessing involved and no swearing when I've cut something too small.  I even fussy cut for a few of pieces and knew exactly what I needed. 

I like the feathers in this narrow house and even played a little to try and match up the blue dots on the bigger house. I wasn't totally successful, but it's not bad.

In the picture below, it's easy to see the feather in the door of the narrow house, but not so easy to see the words on the church. (I'd take a better picture, but the quilt is up at M&E Quilt Shoppe because we're going to schedule a class.) Right above the door it read, "Hope is the thing." and above that (although it's not complete due to size restraints), it reads, "Feathers that perch in the Soul." Along the sides of the door are words such as "Silent song". I placed the words "Best" and "Never Stops" in the steeple. They aren't together on the fabric, but I liked them for the top of the church. I really like this block, even though it's not a strong contrast with the background.  

I quilted this on my domestic machine and it was quite easy because the finished quilt measure 40" x 62," although you could easily add borders and make it larger if you want.

Taking a cue from the background fabric, I quilted small swirls in the background and then stitched in the ditch along the blocks. There really is no rhyme or reason to the swirls, I just dropped the feed dogs and tried to fill the spaces evenly. :-)

I quilted a diamond grid in the large sashing pieces and think it works well against the wavy horizontal lines of the fabric.

And because I know that many people like to see the quilting on the back (me included), here is a picture.

I think I fell in love with this backing fabric when I saw it and knew that it would be perfect for this quilt. A bonus is that I bought it during a store-wide sale. How cool is that?

It's too late to make a long story short, but I enjoyed making this quilt and know you will too. You can purchase this pattern, along with Rachel's other patterns HERE. I know you won't be sorry!

Stay tuned for a table runner that I'm making using some of these blocks. It's going to be so fun! 😍

Design Wall Monday

I'm late posting this, but it's still Monday, so I'm calling it good. 😊

Here's what's on my design wall and a few other things that I've completed recently.

This OSU Champions Quilt is ready for binding. This is the fourth or fifth one of these that I've made because they are very popular with Ohio State Buckeye fans. There are four size options on the pattern from which to choose and it is made using squares and half square triangles. I like to make them scrappy, and I made this one as a leader/ender project. This is the small lap size and it measures 50" x 66".

This is a king size Breezy Quilt, minus the borders. I tested this pattern for Rachel Rossi and am very pleased with the results. I had a border sewn on to this but didn't like it, so out came the seam ripper. I've come up with alternate border options and in conversations with the other testers, we all like the new border idea. I hope to get those sewn on later this week and get this ready to quilt. Stay tuned for updates. 

Here are some close ups of the blocks and fabrics. Jack chose these fabrics because he wanted something a little more masculine than what I had picked. It took me a while, but they've grown on me and I now like them. Oh why do I doubt him when he picks fabric? He's right most of the time!

Rachel has some wonderful tips and hints on making these pinwheels, and I know you'll love them. I'll keep you updated on the pattern release date.

I finished this Jelly Roll Rug, made from Quill by 3 Sisters for Moda Fabrics. I think it's pretty and love the colors.

There are definitely some rough spots in this (mostly around the center when you have to make some sharp turns), but it's really not too challenging to make this. It's time consuming, but not challenging. Using one Jelly Roll yielded a rug that measures 30" x 44". Love it!

Here's a picture taken outside, to try to give you a better idea of the fabric colors.

And finally, here's a 12" Hoop Quilt that I made, just because I wanted to do so.  😄  I love the colors in this and have enough fabric to make at least one more; but I'll use a different outside ring fabric. I have an idea of who I want to receive it and know she'd love these colors.  

What are you working on today?

Check out Judy's Small Quilts and Doll Quilts

and

Beth's Monday Making