Puzzle and a Bag

When I saw this puzzle at Value World I could not resist. It's one of the hardest puzzles I have ever done, but I finished it and will be passing it on to my dad to try.

Close-up of the middle. This quilt can be found at the Shelburne Museum in Vermont (which my family visited last year, although I don't remember seeing this particular quilt).

Weather is blah today so I spent the morning making myself a bag. Planning on using this to keep projects in while traveling this summer. Good for the trailer, the cottage and anywhere else I might go. It was really nice to make something for myself.

Close-up of some of the quilting.

Pretty handles.

Looks like it will hold enough.

Pattern can be found here.

Why Mary is my best friend

My friend Mary recently went to Vermont for her summer vacation. Her and her family stay at her Grandmother's former house (which all members of the family use as a vacation spot now). Her grandmother use to be a quilter but is no longer able to quilt. So, when she came back from her trip this time what did she bring with her? A bag of fabric they found in the house. Not all of it is cotton and most of the pieces are 1/4 yards but they are FREE vintage fabrics so I am not complaining. Already trying to decide what I am going to do with them. Enjoy the pictures.

Florals.

Brown florals.

Paisleys.

Non-cotton fabrics. Upholstery?

Some masculine fabric.

Strips.

Solids - not sure these are 100% cotton either.

These I have already set aside for a project.

What a nice friend, eh? Anything you would like Sarah?

Fab Friday

Saturday was the annual guild yard sale - only open to guild members. Wasn't as good as last year or I was just better at restraining myself. Here is what I picked up.

A bag of green fabric scraps. I have a project for them or else I wouldn't have got them.

Bigger pieces. There is 2 yards of the blue flower fabric. The daisy fabric was too cute to pass up and the paisley fabric is for my sister.

These are all about the size of a fat quarter or a little bigger. The blue fabric (second from the right) was my favourite fabric of the day but doesn't show up very well in the picture.

Finished Projects

This little wall-hanging is for my Etsy shop.

This is the back of the Christmas project I had cut out last week. Now it is all pieced and quilted and waiting to be revealed; in a few months.

Fall quilt all finished and ready to go north.

Stipple quilting on the yellow fabric to help it fade and let the blue fabric pop.

I wasn't sure what I was going to do with the big blocks. Ended up doing echo quilting in each triangle. It turned out pretty good. I used clear thread.

I used black thread in the bobbin so it is difficult to see all the quilting on the back of this quilt.

Projects in Progress

It seems I rarely take pictures of projects in progress. I have a tendency to take things apart and change my mind a lot while I go (I once took apart a quilt I was halfway done quilting, right down to individual blocks and redid it). The following projects aren't going to change so they get to be posted.

Wednesday I was in an ironing, cutting and piecing mood so that is what I did.

Here are the pieces for my mom's Fall quilt.

My quilt space is in the same room as our "office", living room and entryway. Cramped indeed! So when I have fabric ironed but I'm not ready to cut it, it goes over the back of the chair. Also backings and finished quilt fronts waiting to be quilted are also stored there.

A little holiday project for someone special. Those are 1 1/2 inch and 1 7/8 inch squares.

Fall quilt all pieced. Can anyone see the mistake?

There it is in the bottom left corner. It has now been fixed. Oops. Better now than after I quilted it.

Okay, that was Wednesday. Thursday was spent at the Ann Arbor Art Fair. Friday was more ironing and cutting.

Calliope fabrics for a project not for Calliope. Decided that I will try to give everyone in our family something with Calliope fabric in it. Who gets the project with these fabrics? You'll just have to wait until Christmas to find out.

Here is a project for me. It is my 30th birthday present to myself and hopefully I will get it done by mid September to enjoy it this fall and winter. I used some of my favourite fabrics and need one more to complete the blocks. There are 21 of these blocks, measuring 7 x 18 inches. There are more blue blocks to go with the fabric I still need to buy. There will be applique on top. Any guesses of what will be appliqued and what colour fabric I need to buy?

Close-up of the block. The green fabric I have had the longest and love it. My niece Ellia is very lucky to be the only person to have this fabric in a quilt I made. I've been saving it for myself for years. The blue fabric (I have a lot of because I love it so much). This is the first time I will be using it in a quilt. The red fabric I have bought in the last year or so and is a nice change compared to the other fabrics and the brown just lets the other fabrics stand out.

Etsy Projects

Here's what I have completed over the past week or so for my Etsy shop.

Wall hanging made from a moda charm pack (40 squares from the same fabric line all 5 inches for those non quilters). I think it could also be used as a baby quilt.

Some ducks flying over a pond. This mini quilt is attached to an 11 x 14 art canvas.

Last but not least, some pretty butterflies around an 8 x 10 canvas.

I have a few other projects ready to be quilted and hopefully posted to the shop later this week. Oh, and I'd like to get some holiday gifts completed before we go on vacation next month. Guess the kids will have to entertain themselves or watch a lot of videos.
I picked up the next 3 books in the Elm Creek series while at the library this morning. I am already 80 pages into "Round Robin".

I got sucked in

No pictures, just a small book review. I have seen the Elm Creek Quilt novels but never thought I would read any of them. However, last week at the library I decided I would take a look at what they had. They had the first book in the series so I checked it out. I started reading it Friday night and just over 24 hours later, I finished it. It wasn't a great novel like "Oryx and Crake" by Margaret Atwood but it was a nice summer read that I really enjoyed. Taking it back tomorrow and am picking up the second one.
Oh, it was called, "The Quilter's Apprentice". I won't go into details but I enjoyed the storytelling of the older quilter's life than I did the quilty parts of the novel where she was teaching her apprentice how to quilt. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys quilting, or anyone who wants an easy read.

Tablerunners and Hummingbirds

Have completed a few little projects so far this month, all for me (a couple for Etsy too that I will post later).

This is a tablerunner I started one day when I was just fooling around with some fabric. The fans are cheater fabric and were already cut up into individual fan squares when I purchased them at a yard sale. I had enough squares to make the 3 circles; I played with them a lot before I decided on this option. The border fabric is from the Calliope fabric line.

Close up of the circles. I outlined quilted each piece of the fans, stippled in the middle and in the border between the circles.

Another close-up.

Picture of the back.

This little runner has a very long story to it that I will save for another day. Right now it is adorable little runner that is heavily quilted.


Close up of the leaves with red veins.

Picture of the back.

Close-up of the back. As you can see my machine does not like rayon thread, it just rips it and eats it up. Unfortunately, I only had 1 red thread at the time and was forced to continue quilting with it.

Here is a cute little hummingbird quilt. It is a dish towel but I cut the hummingbirds out and the rest of it up for rags.

Close-up of the hummingbirds. They are outlined and then stipple quilting between the birds. A vine of flowers is quilted in the first border.

And the whole reason I bought the towel - a Calliope hummingbird!

Picture of the back and more hummingbirds.

Arabella's Quilt

On Sunday, my youngest niece turns 1. I have made all my nieces and nephews a birth "sampler", all cross-stitched. They are very time consuming, so I decided to do Arabella's as a quilt and free-motion the words on. It is my own pattern and I just cut the flowers and leaves out of the fabric before machine appliqueing them down.
Finished quilt hanging in the window.

Close-up (no longer hanging).

Close-up of one of the flowers.

Her name. I didn't write it on the fabric before I did it. I "wrote" it once on scrap fabric and then just did it.

The date.

The back. I really enjoy looking at the back of quilts because you can see all the stitches and how much work went into it; although the white thread doesn't show very well in this picture.

Michelle, I know Athena still needs her sampler. It's up to you if you want it cross-stitched or I can do a quilted one for her too.
In good news, I sold something on Etsy last week. One of my vintage baby quilts has moved to Florida.