Holiday Mini Improv Quilts and Dog Progress

Lots of catching up this week after the holiday last week! I've made quite a bit of progress on one of my dog quilts. The grass and sky have been pieced. I've cut all of the applique pieces using Wonder Under 805 which I have used since Steam a Seam II disappeared earlier this year although it looks to be back now; if anyone has given the new stuff a try I'd love to hear about it. I have just a few applique pieces left to attach including the eyes which are the most difficult to place. Temporarily I'm using scotch tape to attach them... and hoping I don't run over the tape with the iron!

This gal had some pretty floppy ears with the left one laying flat and the right one flipping out a little. I decided to give the right one a little dimension and added some fluff between the layers. I had worried about the batik dog fabric as I don't use a lot of batik but I think it really works here.

I do my applique with my Pfaff (love her!). It can be a slow process especially on rounded corners where the fabric needs turned every couple of stitches. Maybe I won't do such round-y letters next time!?! I'm using both Mettler and Aurifil threads to do the applique.

This will be my third time making this quilt. So far I'm really liking the 'Hildy' version!

Holiday Mini Improv Quilts

Just before Halloween I did a custom set of mini Ghastlies quilts for a client. Now there is a matching set of Christmas Ghastlies mini quilts! 

I love doing improv with the Ghastlies; you don't really know where you're going until you've arrived. They are all different but coordinate well together. They have been shipped off just in time for the holidays! I can't get over the gold polka dot fabric by Dear Stella; I lucked out and had a few large scraps of the gold and red snowflake fabric that went really well the the gold polka dots too.

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 Quokka Quilts Whoop Whoop Friday Freshly Pieced and Richard and Tanya Quilts 

A Gaggle of Ghastlies!

Ok, 'gaggle' technically refers to at least five geese according to wikipedia.  I don't have five geese here but I do have five finished Ghastlies mini quilts!  Gaggle sounds appropriate anyways so totally using it... and with gusto! Here's the finished gaggle of Ghastlies mini quilts. This gaggle was featured at Richard and Tanya Quilts: Finish Up Friday!!!

The two minis on the top were made for Halloween last year. The three on the bottom were new additions this year. The little girl on the right gave me the most trouble, I think because of her sharp angle at the bottom but in the end she turned out just fine. My favorite is probably the fellow with the pink martini, followed by the gal with the umbrella. The backings were all done in coordinating prints - I love all of the backings!

These were a lot of fun to do and I'd love to do a full size quilt with this print in the future. I don't think I could bear to part with it though. I quilted these guys all in simple straight lines, some in the ditch, some in a top stitching fashion and some just-winging-it style.

I'm still hoping to finish my Ghastlies pillow cases before Halloween too. I hope I'm not saying that a month from now! Here's a peek at the pink scallop edging I created with my mom a couple weeks ago for the pillow cases

Before they are attached to the pillow cases they will be folded in half to create a double scallop or cut in half and then attached for a single scallop look. Not too sure how its going to work out just yet... In the meantime I've been working on my orange, teal and grey quilt project. The charcoal minky backing arrived yesterday from fabric.com. I have all the white squares marked down the center with a pencil line, just need some serious sewing machine time to sew together all the squares.

I'm looking forward to sewing the squares and my goal would be to have them all sewn together by the end of the weekend so that I can start sewing together blocks sometime next week. Looking forward to some fall activities this weekend, football, more football, and maybe even spending a little time at the apple orchard picking out mums, apples and winter squash! It feels like an apple crisp kind of weekend!

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 Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Richard and Tanya Quilts, Sew Fresh Quilts, TweLoQu's MOP, Val's Quilting Studio

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

Happy Birthday to Me and a Friday Finish

Hey it's my birthday!  September 11 that's my day! 

It’s my birthday and for me birthdays always mean cake and wine…. Also acceptable is wine and cake – either way. And just to clarify, not whining, but w-i-n-e! Cake demand request to my hubby went in earlier this week so we’ll see what he comes up with! I think there will even be dinner out included at an awesome Cajun restaurant nearby. Liliana’s can make any day feel special. Birthdays. Are. Good.

Also, in the theme of presents, gifts and good things, I was a WINNER this week (do you see the word w-i-n-e in there??). Pink Chalk Studios hosted a studio showcase this summer and I was one of 50 winners. Thanks to them for their generous giveaway! I love their What Goes With What series which shows off coordinating solids for different designer fabric lines.

Ok, last thing about presents… or gifts…. Last week I told you I was planning to attend the Madison Quilt Expo. It’s pretty much as close as you can get to quilt-y overload! I didn't get nearly as much stuff as I did last year. Here’s my haul from this year

Those zippers were just 50c each – they are all long enough to use for quilted pillows. This year at the Expo I hardly bought any fabric, just 4 charm packs and 1 fat quarter… that’s hardly any right? My mom came down to attend and stay for a visit. She brought my dad and their cocker spaniel, Chloe, to visit too. Just to clarify neither of them (dog or dad) went to the quilt expo. It’s no wonder I didn't get much sewing done last week…. Lots of shopping, eating and touring the countryside while they were here. My mom and I did start a Halloween sewing project before they went home. I know, I already said that I was done with Halloween projects this year but what the heck I'm going for it. My mom came home from the Expo with a Quick Points scallop ruler. I pulled these cute Ghastlies fabrics so that we could try it out. Another WIP to add to 'the list.' We used the ruler to make some cute scallops from the pink fabric; it worked really well although I think I need some practice sewing curves. I'm not usually a 'frilly' person and don't do much - read never - with edging, piping, rickrack or whatnot. I'm not sure what the scallops and rest of the fabrics will be yet, I was thinking Halloween pillow cases for our bed maybe. I've never made pillow cases before, seems doable though. If you know of a tutorial for king size pillow cases, point me in the right direction!

Back to the Expo. I went to two modern quilt lectures, one of them hosted by Lee of Freshly Pieced! I got to see a bunch of her quilts from the new book she co-authored, Vintage Quilt Revival: 22 Modern Designs From Classic Blocks, in person. Oh yeah, I bought that too…. But that was it, I swear! I love that you can mingle traditional with modern and still consider yourself a modern quilter.

Now the Finish

My Finish Up Friday is a little early this week (did I mention the wine… I’m planning ahead here). I managed to finish quilting the Argyle Pinwheel Pillow, install an invisible zipper for the second time ever, (side note - I hope by this time next year I will be able to do this without reviewing each step because there are a lot of steps!), and put it all together for photographs. Yay! When quilting the bottom half of the pillow I mimicked the quilting on the top only the lines were going in the opposite direction. It looked better on top, there was a great big open space in the lower left that I didn't like. I added the three straight lines going in the opposite direction to fill the area. Much better! It actually ended up a better size for an 18 inch pillow insert instead of the 20 inch I thought would work. No matter. I’m happy with this little creation, I really like how the band wraps right around the pillow and disappears.

And

This pillow is available in my etsy shop.

Linking up this week with 

Crazy Mom Quilts - Finish Up Friday
Confessions of a Fabric Addict
Pretty Bobbins
Richard and Tanya Quilts
Sew Many Ways
TGIFF at Quilt Matters