Calling for Mini Quilt Swap Particpants!

Have you heard of the Little Quilt Swap - Sew, Vote, Swap! group on Flickr?? I participated for a few rounds a few years ago when it just started and it was so much fun!!


Here's how it works:

• You make ANY mini you want!! You don't start with a partner, you don't have an inspiration mosaic to go off of, you simply make whatever you want. You can make 1 OR 2 minis.
• The mini needs to be between 12 inch square and 20 inches square. It does not have to be square, just not smaller than 12" and not larger than 20". It can be rectangle, diamond, circle, square, hexagon, etc. (must be finished, so quilted and bound).
• more details on the requirements can be found HERE.

Once your mini is made, you send a picture to the group mama. They upload all the quilt photos to the flickr pool anonymously! Sounds awesome, huh?! No one has any idea who made what. So that means no sneak peek photos!

Once the deadline for entries closes, everyone gets a form (or however they do it now) and you vote on every quilt, your favorite is number 1, next favorite is 2, etc. maybe that's not right, maybe your most favorite is the largest number? Anyway, they work it out. Whoever's quilt gets the most votes, or is the most favorited, gets their number 1 pick. The next person to get the most votes get their favorite quilt, unless it's already taken and they get their next top pick. So on and so forth. It is a really fun way of organizing it!

The better mini quilt you submit (hint, take really good photos too!) then the more likely you are at getting your top pick!! (If you submit 2 mini quilts then you will receive 2 mini quilts!)


And just had a walk down memory lane! lol. Here is my first entry quilt (embarrassed - it's so crooked. But my now good friend received it and said she loved it! So happy to swap with friends!) :)

Kate Spain's fandango line. 

I am actually destashing the rest of this jelly roll if anyone is interested! The only pieces missing are what you see here, about 10" off each print. ($40+shipping). Send me an email with your paypal if you are interested. oops, didn't make this into a selling post...)

Here was my entry for the Christmas swap, I really liked it! and miss it just a little bit now. ;)

Here's the Christmas mini I received. I still love taking this out every Christmas season and hanging it up! :) (I really don't like the way flickr photos are embedded anymore, and that you can browse right from the webpage, but it's kind of cool for now because you can get an idea of some of the minis that were exchanged a few years ago anyway. Visit the group page to see them all!) :)

For the Christmas swap my mini wasn't the highest voted mini, but I still got my number one pick because it wasn't the top pick of the people above me. So if your quilt isn't the most popular, that does not at all mean that you still won't walk away with your favorite mini!! That's the beauty of it since everyone has different tastes. It's great! The other mini I won is perfect in Mabel's room and we use it as a little kitchen rug and keep it with her kitchen set. And the little doggy sleeps on it. :) Perfect. :)



Anyway...

Their current round's deadline for entries just got pushed back to October 30th. They don't have enough participants this round and if they don't get at least 4 more, I think, then it will close and the round will be canceled. I really don't have the time right now to enter, but it's such a fun group so I'd hate for it to close. If you are at all interested, head on over!!! 

You could even do double time, make a celestial star mini, finish by the deadline of Oct 5th for my Celestial Star QAL and then swap it in this group!! :) (that might be crazy though... lol.)

I hope you are all having a great weekend!!

Quilting for a Cause

I mentioned that Marika is looking for some help to make a quilt for someone. I was chatting with her today about it and got the idea to start up a flickr group exactly for this purpose! It only took about 15 min to put together, plus sending out a lot of invites, but it's up!

You can find the group here: http://www.flickr.com/groups/quiltingforacause/

Basically, if you are making a quilt for someone and would like some help, join the group, start a discussion letting us know what you're wanting to make and what you need, and perhaps some info on who it's for. Then anyone willing to help can comment and help you.

If you like to sew blocks, then join the group and as people post quilts they want help with, you can sign up for as many or as few as you'd like! It's a nice alternative to a quilting bee since there isn only the commitment you sign up for. And I like that there is the potential of knowing exactly who all the quilts are for, since we'll be able to share stories, rather than just handing them over to Project Linus for instance (which is still so awesome, but you don't always know who it's going to).


Anyway, I would LOVE LOVE love it if you stopped over and joined the group! And if you would help spread the word! I know there are a lot of people out there that love to quilt and donate blocks, but I don't know everyone and would love your help. :)

Thanks a million!!

Happy Sunshine made from 70's Geese: Now You Can Make One Too! and FLICKR!

If you follow me on Craftsy, then you might already know, but I added another pattern to my shop! Wahoo! :)



pattern includes variation for the octagon-finished edges

It is for a 12" block version of the mini I made for DQS12, Happy Sunshine. I forgot that I named the mini and came up with something else for the block name, 70's Geese. It might have just been the colors I used together, but the mini had such an overwhelming 70's feel to it that I couldn't resist the name. Taking pictures of it with Instagram may have also contributed to that. I thought for minute that it might have 70 geese in it, but it doesn't. 32 Geese did not sound like a good name.... more like lame. ;)

Anyway, I just wanted to let you know. :)

oh, AND did you know... that I have a Flickr Group for my blog?????????????

maybe I'm super lame because I've actually had one for a loooong time now. I'm grateful for the 8 members that have joined me! Though I think only two other people have actually posted photos to it. One I invited. So come join me! :) I don't know. I figured I'd mention it again since a few people suggested I make one. :D Thanks! Don't worry if you don't post anything to it. I always forget to put things in it too. :)

Here is the link: http://www.flickr.com/groups/fromblankpages/

I hope you all have an awesome weekend!! :)

[3x6] Sampler Quilt Mini Bee

A couple weeks ago I signed up for the [3x6] Sampler Quilt Mini Bee on Flickr, and so far it's looking to be pretty fun! How it works is there are 7 of us and we each pick one block that we make for all the other members of our group - except that each person has their own color choices picked out and we make their block in their colors. So when I'm finished I'll have made 6 of the exact same block in 6 different color schemes. I think it will be a lot of fun!

For now the hard part is picking a block! 

Here's what I'm liking right now. The top two were my two original designs that I was going to try out (in my own colors) to see if I want to make 6 more of them. I think the top right I would maybe do a 4 square of that pattern for each 12" by 12" block, or it would be cool to do them really small and make it 3x3! That was what I was originally thinking.


But then I made this block

and absolutely LOVED working with HST's and so now I am leaning more toward the bottom two blocks.... and I think the bottom left might just be my favorite! It looks like it would be fun to make, as well as being visually interesting.

hum... what to do. After I finish up the quilt and my Christmas mini I think I'll get started with this and see what I can come up with. ;) I am loving my sewing machine! ;)

p.s. Thank you everyone for your wonderful ideas for the binding on Mikaela's quilt.  It's always nice to have another opinion. I think I would love to do black, but I just don't think she would love black. I would also love to do stripes, but I don't have any good ones for this. I think I've decided to go with  Kona Natural Bone and add a few sections of color. I was thinking white would be a bold border, but when I tried it it was too bright. Crossing my fingers that this will work, but I think it will. :)

Little Quilt - Sew, Vote, Swap Group

Last month I participated in this swap group and it was SO. MUCH. FUN! There are a few guidelines, but pretty much you make whatever you want! Then the group leader, JanBran, posts all the pictures so you have no idea who made what, you vote on your top favorites and whom evers quilt got the most votes gets their top pick, etc. it works out pretty well I think. I still haven't received mine so I have no idea what I'm getting! The anticipation is driving me crazy! Lol. But I'll post it when it arrives!

Here is the quilt I made which sew.whitney received, and said she likes it! :) she had left the nicest comment on the original post of the picture so I was so happy when I found out that it was going to her! :)




The other thing about this group is that there is one more round of it going on this month, and it's Christmas themed! Yay! I really want a cute Christmas quilt to hang up. And the size guidelines are smaller, so it wil be easier to make it up quick. Check it or if you want to join! It's really fun! (and kind of nerve wracking). ;)

I'm linking this up at Canoe Ridge Creations' Modern Monday... go check it out! :)