Potential New Block of the Month for 2017

I have a commissioned quilt that I'll be working on starting after I finish the current t-shirt quilt up and get it shipped off.

This new quilt will have 12 appliqued teddy bear blocks in it.   I am considering writing those 12 blocks up as a block of the month for my blog and then at the end of the year putting them into a full quilt pattern that would be for sale.

However, before I do all that work I thought I'd run a quick survey to see what kind of interest there would in it.   To complete the survey, click on here -->   Take Survey

Gratitudes:
1. For the ability to design and create quilts

2. For the desk that I will be getting from work and being able to use it for my quilting.

Weekend doings......and BOM news

Managed to get a wee bit of sewing in yesterday.   Made the next block for the Favorite Fabric swap that I'm in currently.   This block is for Lois G. and is already back in the mail and headed back to her.

I then finished designing two new blocks that will be used for the new BOM that I'm working on.  That makes a total of 4 blocks designed for it at this point.   I won't show pics of them because I want them to be a surprise for when I'm posting the block patterns.  I did use my fav fabric to make the block samples, but I haven't decided whether to keep using it or switch to something else.

Gratitudes:
1. Sinus infection has improved, altho not gone yet.
2. Weather is supposed to warm up some this week.

BOM Finished and swaps

I finished off the green and blue BOM that I've been working on this year, well finished off the top at any rate.    Most of the sashing was added over the span of a couple of mornings before work.  Finished that off last night.   That left me with just the borders to add today.  

I didn't want to piece them because of the print that I used would not look good if just butted together.   So I had originally thought that I would need to add a pieced element in order to make everything fit together.   After not being able to figure out what I wanted to add, I decided I would check the piece of the floral fabric to see what length it was.    And unlike what I normally do, I had plenty of fabric to do the side borders on the lengthwise grain of the fabric, with more than enough fabric leftover to do the top and bottom borders widthwise of the fabric.  Woohoo.   The corner blocks are from one of the leftover fabrics from the quilt.

In other quilty work, I've joined a couple of swaps.   The first is a 'Favorite Fabric Swap", where each participant sends a fat-eighth of their 'fav fabric' to each of the other participants.   Each person also chooses block pattern that they are willing to make for everyone else from the fabric that they receive.  What each person ends up with is a set of sampler blocks that are all ready to put together in a wonderful quilt.   I've participated in the swap several times before and am looking forward to seeing the blocks that I'll get back.   The fabric that I sent out is a red/blue/cream floral.  It is a small print but I think it will make a nice quilt for a wounded female soldier and will eventually go to American Heroes.  

I've also received the first fabric from one of my fellow swappers and have finished off my block for her.   Margaret sent the cutest kids fabric with all sorts of sea creatures on it and a lovely gold to go with it.   I added a turquoise moda marble to round out the fabrics needed for my block.   The pattern I used is called "Next Door Neighbor" and can be found on Quilters Cache.   I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of the fabrics that will be sent for this swap.

The last swap that I'm in at the moment is the Secret Santa Soiree that is being hosted by Suzanne.  I'm looking forward to the swap and have heard good things about what was received last year by those who swapped.

Gratitudes:
1. A working heater at home with fall temps starting to cool off.
2. Meds for the sinus infection seem to be finally starting to work.

Teddy Bears completed

Finished off the Pastel Teddy Bears quilt top today.    I ended up floating the 3" stars and churn dash blocks in muslin and then trimming them to 5" so that they would twist and turn down the sides of the quilt.   Then added a breaker border of dark brown, and a final border with the pink that was in the piano keys inner border and the four 3" bear paw blocks that I had.    All but two of mini blocks were used in the quilt and the others are going out.

Next up to work on is the blue and green BOM.   A better picture of the blocks  is shown below.  I'm using a blue Kona solid for the sashing and a yellow print for cornerstones.   There will be a pieced inner border - still debating though on what I want to do with it.  Need to figure out the dimensions for it so that i can do some graphing of the possibilities.   The final and outer border will be a solid made from the print fabric used in several of the blocks of the BOM.   You can see it best in the bottom right block.   In looking at the blocks, I'm really wishing that I had used the navy Kona as the background fabric throughout the quilt.    But I didn't and i'm not going to buy anymore fabric for the quilt.   Since I don't plan on keeping this one it really doesn't matter anyway, just me being picky and wishing I'd done something different.

Gratitudes:
1. Beautiful fall weather.
2. Having a second job that helps to make the ends meet when time to pay the bills.

Retreat memories and tally

I was blessed to be able to attend a quilt retreat this weekend with a group of friends from an online quilt group, many of whom I've known in person and virtually since 1996 or so.    And one of my best quilt buddies came through this group of wonderful gals and their DH's.  

To set the stage, I hadn't really been able to do much sewing of quilty stuff for pleasure in more than a year.  While most everyone else was out shopping on Saturday or at the Amish dinner on Friday nite, I made up for lost time this weekend!   Pics below are of the pumpkin BOM blocks that I got the stitching finished on (BOM was started in 2005), 2 pairs of pillowcases that will be Christmas presents this year, 2 quilt tops that were done start to finish (one has been sold, the other will be a donation to sunshine), and the start of another donation quilt made from a leftover piece of backing from a long ago quilt.    Both of the quilt tops were made from 'kits' of coordinating fabric that I'd pulled yrs ago and never had time to make up.   Both used up multiple pieces of fabric from my stash, yeah!  

The black and peacock feather print is the top in progress.   I'm planning on adding a black border, then a piano key border in turquoise, lime, orange, and pink, followed by a narrow border in black and ending in one of the 4 colors in the piano key border.   This will also be a donation for Sunshine quilts.


I've got another retreat coming up in 3 weeks so I'll be prepping more (maybe all remaining) pumpkin blocks, prepping blocks for the other two BOM's that I've got in progress from this year and pulling more fabric kits to take with me to get made up and out of my stash.  

Gratitudes -
1. Safe travels this weekend to/from the retreat, good times with friends and my roommate for the weekend.
2. For the blessing of knowing that I have a job to go to tomorrow morning.

Been a while since I posted and I've actually been able to do some quilty type work for the first time in what seems a long time.

One of the things I managed to get done was to pull backing fabrics to go with the quilts I finally found that are for Sunshine quilts.   I knew when I had moved over a yr ago now that I had a tote filled with quilt tops for American Heroes and for Sunshine Quilts.   Well, that tote managed to stay hidden until a couple of weeks ago when it decided to make an appearance again.  These five pics are the ones that I made for Sunshine a couple of yrs ago and then never managed to get them sent off to be quilted by someone.   Thanks to today being payday I can finally afford to mail them off next week.   Just need to confirm with the quilter that that is ok.  Some of the fabric in them (upper right quilt and lower left quilt) is from Bev, a very special quilting angel that Sunshine misses very much.   I've still got some of her fabrics somewhere so her love for the kids will carry on as I have time to make it up.   The middle quilt on the right was made from the leftover fabric that I had in making up backings for the other 4 quilts.

 I finished up a couple of commissioned projects for a friend back in Dallas.   These included felt Wordless books and bean bags.   The bean bags are made out of cotton fabrics, with one side being solid green and the other side being a rail fence type block with 4 stripes.   They are supposed to finish at 4", but I ended up cutting the strips wrong and the blocks finished at 6".   Net result was that I had to remake the strip sets for the bean bags.   But because I hate to see fabric go to waste - especially as much as this would have been, I too the blocks that were too big and put them into a quilt top.   This quilt will end up going to American Heroes at some point in the future for the child of a service man/woman.

This weekend I'll be headed to a quilt retreat after getting out of school on Friday.   I'm taking lots of goodies to work on, and hopefully I'll make a dent in what I'm taking with me.  Among other things that I'm taking with me are blocks from 3 BOM projects - one of which I started back in 2005, the other two are from this year.   Here's a pic of the three blocks that I'm taking to do the buttonhole stitching on for the 2005 BOM.  I've got a number of other projects with me as well to work on including pillowcases for Christmas gifts and fabric for a sample block for my next block submission.  And I should say, I'm not taking a one of the commissioned garments that I need to get made up.   This weekend will be spent sewing on fun stuff.    I'll post a pic next week of what I get done over the weekend.  =)

Gratitudes -
1. The hot temps are finally gone!
2. Quilt Retreat is this weekend and I can afford to go again.