Green Bay Packers Quilt

Whew I made it! I finished my modern Green Bay Packers quilt just in time for the first game of the season. Green and gold fabrics are Cotton and Steel basics; I would use them again for another Packers quilt.

This football quilt was one of the most challenging quilts I've ever completed! I'd put it in the modern sampler category with the different sized blocks, asymmetry and traditional blocks combined with improv blocks.

I really like the football blocks - I didn't have a pattern but I was inspired by cluck cluck sew's Touchdown pattern so I just winged it. I also added one great big Swoon block, starburst blocks, and letters from the Spell it with Moda tutorials which are all over the place on the internet and sort of tricky to find. The rest of the blocks are random improv or simple pinwheels, HSTs and hourglass blocks. The flying geese blocks were made with the Quilt in a Day ruler in 4 and 8 inch blocks - this is the first time I have used the ruler following the instructions - boy did that make ALL the difference! I can't see using anything else for flying geese... I must acquire all sizes of the ruler now. Crisp points every time!

The tiny cross block is 3 inches finished, very small pieces in that block! I went with straight line quilting every 1 1/4 inches in a gold colored Mettler thread. Since I backed the quilt in chocolate colored minky I wanted something that would't give my machine lots of trouble due to the impending deadline. I also did a scrappy binding in solid green and gold fabrics. It measures 55x57 - great size for game day

Although I truly hate to part with it I decided to donate this quilt to Shorewood Cocker Rescue annual fundraiser this weekend in southern Wisconsin. The chocolate backing goes great with the footballs and also our beautiful foster Mya, who has been with us since May of this year waiting for her forever home!

We have a very busy weekend planned - Rescue fundraiser on Saturday, football on Sunday and today is my birthday so celebrating of course! Wine, cake and yummy food I hope! My hubby brought home an orange flower arrangement with gerbera daisies, roses, sunflowers, lilies and other things I can only identify as very pretty so we are off to a good start!

This quilt is an adventure and most definitely one of my favorite quilts of the year!

Link Parti's 

Take a look at the linki parti's I get down with here or by clicking on the Linki Parti's link above. Linking up to Whoop Whoop Friday What a Hoot! Sew Cute Tuesday Quilt Story My Quilt Infatuation and crazy mom quilts

Pillows and Patio Gardens

I’m still working on the third quilt from my Coquette fat eighth bundle but I did manage to complete a small triangle baby quilt and a zig zag quilted pillow! How much fabric has been stuffed in these little bundles?!

I used only the blues from the collection along with a bit of Kona white for the pillow top. I installed a blue invisible zipper and backed the pillow with white minky dot – minky is my go-to when I can’t decide what else to use.  Something with this blue… I just don’t have anything in my stash that ‘goes’ with it. Hard to believe I know! Tons of navy and tons of teal but blue is in short supply at my place.

The second quilt from my Coquette bundle is this baby quilt, smaller than the crib quilt I shared last week this measures quilt measures a square 31x31. 

Instead of quilting every seam I did only the diagonals which made a pretty cool diamond pattern on the back.

I’m a little in love with this purple lace fabric and I especially like that the white in this fabric line is not bright white rather a soft cream.

Three finished projects from the bundle so far. I still have quilt number three on my design wall….  And happily working on other projects at the moment! 

Patio Garden 

I still can’t believe it has been over four years since we moved to this area; but what I really can’t believe is that this is the first year that we’ve had a garden… a patio garden!  We used to have a huge garden with every vegetable you could imagine at our old place – I miss that. This year my hubby and I put together a patio garden with pots and containers of little tomatoes, jalapenos, lettuce, basil and cucumbers!  We have gotten a ton of rain and had a few warm days so everything is really taking off this week. Patio gardens are pretty simple to start and maintain. We spent half a day shopping for plants and planters and did the planting in a couple of hours – a weekend project. Now we, and by we I mean my hubby, just make sure that the pots are watered, no weeding required! Next year I’m hoping to add some zucchini and full size tomatoes.

And I couldn’t help take a photo of Peanut, our parti-color cocker spaniel. He’s getting very sleepy while he patiently waits for me to take photos this morning.  He has to stay awake so that he doesn’t miss a thing! After all, there could be opportunities for barking (!) at any minute... 

Link Parti's 

Take a look at the linki parti's I get down with here or by clicking on the Linki Parti's link above. Linking up to Sew Fresh Quilts Whoop Whoop Friday Quilt Story Sew Cute Tuesday My Quilt Infatuation and crazy mom quilts

Fabric Watchers

In addition to having a great Thanksgiving with family I was also able to get some sewing in with our niece who was visiting from Indiana. Together we made an American Girl doll quilt and pillow for her American Girl doll. She picked out the fabrics all by herself and I think she did a great job!

The backing fabric matched the fun white fabric on the little pillow we made. The white fabric was from JoAnns. She also chose fabrics from Riley Blake and Art Gallery. We did some free motion quilting with loopy loos and little flowers. He dog Sophie even got in on the free-motion action – I can say that I wasn't expecting that!! She stuffed her little pillow perfectly! 

Fabric Watchers

No, not like weight watchers for fabric addicts although I could totally use that! I was able to snap a couple of photos of my fabric watchers, Laci and Peanut, while shooting pictures for my fabric inventory just before Thanksgiving. This is Laci, the little princess of the house. 

And Peanut. As you can see, they take fabric watching very seriously!

They may actually have been watching these little birds! I guess they won't be getting paid for fabric watching this week... 

WIP

Speaking of dogs, I’m in the middle of more dog quilts! I've had a run on custom dog quilts for the holidays this week. Here are a couple of the fabric pulls for a pair of ‘dog siblings’

Hers. Art Gallery fabrics including Girly Girl, Rapture, Nouvelle, Nature Elements and Oval Elements Collections plus the pink heart fabric from Sandy Gervais Flirt by Moda.

His. More Art Gallery Oval Elements, Nature Elements, Modern Affair Collections, plus the cute plaid from Denyse Schmidt which goes perfectly with these! The light blue paisley is from Noteworthy by Moda. 

An Unrelated Dog. This particular quilt is actually a memorial pet quilt that will be gifted for Christmas. Fabrics from the Noteworthy line by Sweetwater from Moda. Plus the blue batik. These should probably keep me busy in between baking, shopping and decorating for Christmas! 

Link Parti's 

Take a look at the linki parti's I get down with here or by clicking on the Linki Parti's link above. Linking up to Stitch by Stitch Twelo Quilt Story Show and Tell Tuesday Sew Fresh Quilts Freshly Pieced My Quilt Infatuation and Blossom Heart Quilts

Pink and Teal Quilt

I usually give all my love to teal... But hey this is October and everywhere you look is pink. Our Packers are wearing pink on Sunday, I bought a pink 'add a quarter inch' ruler, Fiskars rotary cutter and a package of pink Clover wonder clips. Seriously, I bought the pink wonder clips immediately when I saw them in September, I knew that I couldn't live another day without them, same goes for the rotary cutter. Although I had considered doing an entire scrappy quilt in all teal I decided to add in bright pink.

See the little nose in the background?! I cut my strips 2.5 x 4.5 and randomly matched one pink and one teal. I had nine fabrics of each colorway. Next time I do the cutting I would cut 2.5 x 9 and then cut the pieced strips in half. I didn't really have a good plan since I wasn't working from a pattern but it came together anyways! I was able to cut, sew and layout the entire quilt after work last night. One thing that I didn't do right away was 'square up.' I figured it was such a simple pattern that I probably wouldn't need to... nope, I'm not perfect as it turns out, sigh. Next I'll be squaring up the blocks! This is going to make a really cute baby quilt which I hope will be done by Friday.

Stout Homecoming Weekend

Last Friday I finished up my country girl improv quilt, commissioned a super cute chevron quilt (fabric ordered, check!) and headed north! It was 10 years ago that my hubby, our best man and I graduated from the MS Training and Organizational Development program at UW-Stout. It was a beautiful fall weekend in Menomonie, we tailgated, walked around campus, bought t-shirts at the bookstore, enjoyed the local craft brew and watched our Blue Devils get the snot beat out of them... Mostly good stuff! The game would not have been complete without a student wearing only a horse head, suspenders and underpants! I'll save the photo for another venue.  Instead here's a pic of my hubby and I with the Stout mascot... tidbit: we didn't have a mascot when we went to college there! He's new newish   

Link Parti's 

Take a look at the linki parti's I get down with here or by clicking on the Linki Parti's link above. Linking up to Freshly Pieced Pretty Bobbins Show and Tell Tuesday and Sew Fresh Quilts 

Sew much to do!

I think it's fair to say that this weekend was our first fall weekend here in southern Wisconsin. We turned on the fireplace, I dug out my wool socks and flannel shirts, switched from white to red wine and made chili for the Packer game today - sounds like fall to me! I love fall so all is good! I had planned to work on my Ghastlies pillow cases this weekend but we had a busy Saturday. This was the weekend of the cocker spaniel fundraiser we have been looking forward to. We woke up around 5am on Saturday to make the two hour trek to the event. My hubby and I both volunteer for the rescue with a bunch of other great folks - we all worked hard yesterday and accomplished a lot. My hubby's favorite job for the event - Mascot.  He loves it!

The weather was cool but not rainy, there seemed to be a lot of people in attendance and an excellent time was had by all. My hubby and I came home with lots of goodies from the silent auction. The dog quilt I made sold in the silent auction too - It felt really good to have made something for the auction.  We have enough dog treats, toys and collars until the next event in 2015. I cannot tell you how cute our Laci and Peanut were when we unloaded the stuff and started unpacking. It was like Christmas for these guys. There are toys laying everywhere right now!  My favorite part about the event was taking our 12 year old Peanut to the lure course. If you aren't familiar with a lure course - it's an instinct testing event where a flag or squirrels tail (fake, fake, fake) is pulled around a large course on a string by a pulley system. Some dogs are in love with the 'chase' - Peanut loved the chase and the catch. For an older guy he bounded after that tail barking all the way until he caught it and then shook it up and then did it again, round and round he went. Laci understood the concept - she chased it but quickly decided it wasn't very lady-like to chase squirrel tails and sniffed the grass instead. They were both cute cute cute in their different ways!

Ghastlies Improv

Last year about this time I made two mini quilts using Ghastlies fabric by Alexander Henry. They ended up being my first improv blocks ever!

 

I especially like the guy on the right carrying the pink martini! I've had these two guys listed in my shop for just about a year and finally sold them on Friday. The buyer asked that I made three additional mini's to complete the set. Even though it wasn't the Ghastlies project I was planning on, it seemed like pretty good timing. My stuff can always come later (tell that to the material I bought for my purple spring throw pillows)! I got to work today on creating three different mini quilts, starting with the following prints from the Ghastlies fabric

Once I had my girls picked out and cropped from the fabric, I grabbed my scrap bins of orange and grey/black and got to work.

Each one will have a totally different personality. I've put together and ripped apart twice the 'pointing girl' on the left. For some reason her shape is tricky to me... or I just keep making really bad choices with her... maybe she isn't really pointing, but giving me the finger instead (the nerve!). I might take her apart again or scrap her altogether if she keeps it up. Ah hem, the other two are coming along quite nicely.

I also had some time to work on the teal, orange and grey bundle I showed you a couple weeks ago! Here's a little work from today on those pretty fabrics. I've ordered some charcoal grey minky to complete this quilt.

The Ghastlies mini's and teal, orange and grey quilt will be my wip this week. I plan to complete the mini's by Friday and hope to get a solid start on completing the teal, orange and grey quilt with a planned finish of sometime next week for that one.

Getting Linki With

Quilt Story: Fabric Tuesday
Sew Can She: Show off Saturday
Stitch by Stitch: Anything Goes Monday
Tweety Loves Quilting: MOP
Val's Quilting Studio

crazy mom quilts