What's In a Name

I had a tiny handful of WIPs unfinished in 2014 and my name tag for my guild meetings was one of them. I did manage to finish it up just in time for our January meeting!

I didn't have much of a plan in creating this. I started with a small white rectangle of Kona white, apx 3.5x5, and just added my favorite scraps until I was happy with how they looked. I moved the whole mess onto a piece of scrap batting and backing. I free motion quilted the little scraps in place starting with those closest to the back. There was a little deconstructing and reconstructing involved with that. I free motion embroidered my name to the dark teal solid with a piece of stabilizer behind it and then attached it to the top of all the other scraps using the special stitch, which reminds me of bird footsteps, along the bottom and straight stitch around the top and sides. That was my second attempt at my name... the first attempt had a better R at the end but messier is other places. Hope its legible! Or close enough! I mean really, its the fun colors and prints that matters the most isn't it!?

And look, there's that design wall I was yacking about awhile back. Seems like a good place to hang it up so I don't forget to take it along... we'll see if that works anyways! Sort of brightens up the space too!

I don't think the Kona white was entirely necessary but it forced me to stay within my limitations otherwise I would have just making it bigger and bigger - I had lots of other 'favorite' scraps waiting in the wings. As it is I'm already going to need a bigger chest to display this beauty! I didn't think to measure that...

I backed it with more little birds and attached a scrap piece of teal binding... always love a teal binding!

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 crazy mom quilts, Richard and Tanya Quilts Quilt Matters My Quilt Infatuation and Whoop Whoop Friday 

Flippin Quilt In Progress

I've made some good progress on the disaster nine patch, err, disappearing nine patch blocks I've deconstructed and put back together. In fact, I've got the top all put together! I realized during this process that I must have a design wall - all the cool kids do. The room I've been sewing in has long been a spare bedroom; however, we've lived here for four years and we've never had all spare bedrooms full. My hubby took down the bed and we temporarily hung a flannel lined tablecloth on the wall to use as my design wall. Yay! Now the room is just a sewing room. If we ever need to we can put the bed back up. It was a little sad actually as the bed was my sons childhood bed and before that it belonged to one of my brothers growing up... now its packed away waiting for another use.  Anyhoo... my design wall. I'm thankful I don't have to lay my quilts out on the floor anymore - this should significantly reduce the amount of dog hair I'm lint-rolling at the end of each quilt. One can hope anyways! Here's my first quilt top made using a design wall

This feels much better than my initial attempt at the nine patch. I'm going to try that pattern again using more than nine fabrics - seems like a great scrap quilt to use up loose charms.  This quilt measures about 27x34 a good size for a baby quilt or even a wall hanging. I spent some time last night pulling together binding and backing fabrics and came up with the following

Since the front is so busy I'm considering something simple for the back. I'm leaning towards the charcoal minky dot with one of the grey and white fabrics for the binding. The white minky leans towards vanilla which doesn't feel right on this quilt. Color inspiration

(source)

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 My Quilt Infatuation and Sew Fresh Quilts