Mikaela's Quilt

Well, now that I'm actually getting underway on this quilt, I figure I need to post about it.

Here's the story: I was going to make Mabel's quilt for my sister, but then she couldn't decide the size or fabric, and then she decided that I should make one for her daughter, Mikaela, instead. :)  Originally she really liked my sketch for my Bottled Rainbows quilt, but I decided that there was no way that I could make a ~80" by 90" inch ticker tape quilt. :) (Did I mention this will be the largest quilt I've made!) Anyway, so while she was here this summer we changed the layout a few times and came up with the following layout.

• The quilt will finish 84"x91". 
• It will be 12 rows of 13 blocks.
• The blocks have a 5" square center (patterned fabric) with a 1" solid border.
• The borders of each block will be made from 7 different colors (red, pink, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple)
• and each color will have 22 blocks per color, broken down to 7(+1 extra) blocks made in 3 different shades. (does that make sense? so there will be 3 different reds, 3 different pinks, etc.)
• The center blocks will be the same color as (or match) the border color. (just look at the pictures) :)

(really bad cell phone picture! :) )

Mikaela went through my stash and pulled out everything that she liked. We matched them up with some solids that I have, and amazingly I think I'll be able to pull off this whole quilt just from my stash (though I may need some more solids)! Awesome!! :)

I've had this pile sitting in the corner for a while, and finally a week or so ago decided to start whittling away at it. And so here we are!

Anyway, so it's really pretty simple! And after ironing and cutting it all out (which actually is taking FOREVER. (like an hour per color = 7 hrs.) :}, I don't think it should take too long. (thank goodness for chain piecing! I love it!) :) So far it's been pretty enjoyable! I love all the colors! All the blocks will be pieced right next to each other in a random color order (or not. We'll see once I get it up on a design board and start playing around with it. :) )

you can keep up with my progress on my side bar, under "Projects I'm working on". :)

Our Story: Mabel and her ooey-gooey goodness!

a new Mabel post here!

W.i.P. Wednesday #14

I have been so excited to do this post! I feel like I am working on so many things at the same time that I can't keep track of what I am doing. :)

I have finished a few things! Like this awesome zipper pouch!

I made one for my FTLOS swap partner (which I also finished and finished up a lovely pillow cover). You can see more of that here.

And a new purse! I'll post more about this soon.

The wedding gift from this summer. It's a floor mat for the kitchen and a hot pad.

And now to the list making! Here's what's currently on my mind, and in my sewing machine:

W.i.P.'s

• I finally cut the binding for this quilt. It'll be nice to finally get this one out of the way (and into my shop) :)

• I also have a pile of mug rugs and coasters that just need to be quilted and bound, as well as a lot of ideas for more. :)

I love this old school fabric, and I'm adding some more modern stitching... though I think I'll do less lines than what is on the top coaster. They are so much fun to make!

• I've been working on my quilt for my niece! My huge pile of fabric that she picked out is actually starting to turn into something! 

(I have to post pictures so my sis knows that I really am making progress on it! lol! I have even done more since I took these pictures earlier today. :) ) 

• I have also been working on my Kaleidoscope quilt from the Kaleidoscope QAL that was hosted over at Don't Call Me Betsy this summer... I'm getting there. :)

I thought I had a more recent pic, but I'm even closer to this... I'm starting to get tired of having this on my wall above my bed. ;) lol. and I kind of wish I'd put it together how I originally had planned. Oh well. I hope I still like it when I finish it... maybe I'll have to put it in the closet for a while (and get it out of my mind for a while) and then pull it out and love it again. :)

• The above mentioned zip-itself pouch has a tutorial (with the adjustments for making it with a sewing machine rather than hand stitching) that I'm putting together. Maybe next week???

• I'm getting a lot of blocks coming in from my do.Good Stitches circle! I can't wait until they all arrive and I can put them all together! :) 

• a pile of bags that are waiting to be finished for my shop.

I really love these fabrics together! :) I am digging pink and orange lately. Can you tell? :)

I think that's it for now...

and of course more patterns and ideas for more projects that I want to do! :) It just never stops. :)

Wedding Present

My step-sister got married a while ago, and I didn't get the binding put on her gift until last week. I don't know why... but it seems like I work my tail off to finish something, and then once I miss the deadline it floats around in unfinished project land for eternity. Well, not that long because now it's finished and I sent it last week, and she should have received it by now and I sure hope she likes it. :) and and and. Sometimes I have the worst grammar I think. It adds personality right?! uh, not so much. I'm sorry. :D

I asked her mom what her colors were for her kitchen and she said they tend so stick to sage, blues and browns. This is what I had in my stash and I sure hope she likes it!!

I was really tempted to paint my toenails to get this picture, but I haven't painted my toe nails for YEARS, so I decided not to. But I really love it! I don't love it as much looking at it close, or any where other than on the floor, but when it's on the floor (where it is meant to be) I LOVE it and I want to keep it. :) I think I'll have to make myself one. :)  (Update: I didn't realize that I never said what this is - a kitchen floor mat, for infront of the sink - and my sister thought it was a placemat and was a bit confused when I started talking about standing on it on the floor... lol! too funny! So just in case you were also confused... it's a floor mat/rug/whatever. :) )

the back

Anyway, I made a little hot pad to go with it. :)

 

Congrats! And I hope you are happy together forever!

I'm so glad we're sisters!

Vinyl-licious

My cricut has been a busy bug. lol.

Ok, quick bug, as in I'm bugged. (ok, I really don't mean to use bug so much when referring to the cricut, but I just am!) I don't know if any of you out there have/use one, but it's useful. Well, I also LOVE Make the Cut! (MTC) It's the best software out there, but last summer cricut/Provo Craft suede MTC and told them, and any other 3rd party software, that they can no longer make their software compatible with the cricut. So that is really buggy for me because until I get a different cutter, I can not update my software (which has improved leaps and bounds since then) or my cricut (which I don't really care about, because I'm sure they haven't improved much of anything). :)  Anyway... I still like having it and using it, and luckily it stills works. So here I am showing you what I've done:

My sister is one of those Super Moms who does everything! Literally. She's the PTA sec, is the Team Mom for her sons football team, Primary President for her ward, I'm sure is involved with her daughters soccer team - but I can't think of anything specific. Anyway, and the list goes on. So, she enlisted me for the beginning gift of the football team, which turned out super cute!

She had me make all the boys names, along with their jersey numbers, and some symbols to represent their team, etc. to put on some water coolers. I love cutting out vinyl. Taking off all the extra stuff after it's been cut and it just looks so clean and sharp. I don't know, I like it.

Anyway, she sent me a picture of it all finished. Don't they look great?!

She also made some for all the of the cheerleaders (yes. It is an 8 year old football team that has cheerleaders. lol. Gotta love Texas sports!)

So that's that.

We also had our Young Women's Standards night the end of last month. It was kind of crazy, but for our gift for the girls, I made up a little vinyl saying for them that they could stick on their wall, or mirror, or whatever. It is quoted from the back of the For Strength of Youth pamphlet as a reminder of the choices you are making, "Am I living the way the Lord wants me to live?" I made one as an example and put it in a frame to hang on my wall. :)

Fun times! Fun vinyl!
Sometimes I wished I knew when/if we were ever going to move so I could put some stuff up on our walls if we really are going to be here forever. :) One day... I'm remaining hopeful. :)

do.Good Stitches - Harmony

Here are my blocks from August:

 

and then I hung them up in the window

 

I think they look kind of cool. :)

and I also think I've been going a little picture crazy lately. 

where's the balance???

And here are mine for this month:

oh here it is.

I didn't take any good pics of these.

yet.

I think I might redo the one on the left. It might be a little too intense with all the other blocks that people are doing. Though I guess I could just take off the outer border and put a white border on it. hum.

I really love the blocks that I'm getting from everyone! They look so great! :) I can't wait to put the whole quilt together. :) I am having a lot of fun in this group. It makes me happy. (cheesy! gag. j/k! but it does.) :)

FTLOS awesomeness!

This is what I first put as my title:

For the Love of Solids {a modern swap} Round 1 complete!

But that's really long, and kind of boring. :)

I was kind of hit and miss during this swap... there were a LOT of pictures, so I kind of just picked ones that really stood out to me in one way or another to comment on and every time I look at the group pics I find more that I really like and that I missed before... but overall it was a blast! I received my package on Thursday of last week and it was FANTASTIC!!

I actually received it from Leigh - leedle deedle quilts, who in my do. Good Stitches circle is the ring leader (I don't know what the official title is). :) Which is cool. :) I love what she made for me!

I had asked for a huge beach bag that all of our towels will fit in for when we go to the poole, or the beach, or whatever, and let me tell you, that this is AWESOME!

Check out the huge pockets on the front and back as well

I love the design and colors of it too. I think I need to find more reasons to use this, especially since summer is over. (Can't wait until next year!)

She also sent along some cute potholders, which I have been thinking that I need some new ones. :)

and some cute fabric!

Thank you Leigh!! :)

Now onto what I made...

Can I just tell you that I haven't enjoyed sewing anything for a while as much as I've enjoyed sewing my two projects?! I truly had a blast putting these together, and I didn't drudge one part of it, not even ironing! And that is saying a lot! :)

Going backwards, I made this pillow:

and this little zip-itself coin purse!

and starting over:

 After I sewed the first set of pieces together for the blocks, I hung up the strings in my window to keep them from getting tangled, and they looked so fun just blowing around in the light breeze that I kind of went picture crazy taking pics of them! :)

and then... I finally decided that I should make a pillow and not send my partner some random squares sewn together as a banner. That is NOT what she asked for. ;)

So here it is. The pictures didn't turn out quite like I hoped, but it was so much fun and I hope she likes it! I was really intimidated to sew something for her because she is AMAZING! But when she commented on my draft picture that she thought it would be beautiful, I was able to relax a little, and I love it! (I used this quilt tutorial I can't find it. But I know I have it on another post. I'll find it and update ths... and after the fact someone pointed out that this is a disappearing 9-patch. duh. That could have saved me a lot of time. Don't hold me to it, but I'm going to post up how I would do it differently if I were to do this again in a 2 tone project... like for my bed spread?)

For the zip-itself coin purse I used this tutorial. I realized after my first attempt that she was totally talking about hand stitching it and not machine sewing it. lol. Anyway, I also didn't really like the ribbon I was trying to use, so I started over and decided to use fabric strips, and still machine sew it, except this time I knew what I was doing. I think I just might post my alterations a little later - because I like to remember those kinds of things, and then if anyone would also like them, awesome. :)

So, here it is!

My zipper was longer, and I was planning on cutting it shorter, but to get the right shape I needed to keep it's original length, which meant my fabric was too short, but I actually am glad because I like the little color change right on the end. :)


So fun!

I also threw in a couple more zippers - I know she loves red and white, so there you go. As well as the bunting of two rows that I was planning on putting on the back of the pillow, but in the end I decided that I liked it better without them. So now she can hang them in her window, or use them in some other matchy-matchy- project. Or whatever. :)


I sure hope she likes them!

p.s. I think this must be Neil's favorite project too. Whenever I've brought up anything asking him what pattern I should do for this or that, he just tells me to do it just like this, and with the pink and orange... even our bed spread. :) (If I made this for our room, it would be blue and green though. ;) )