WIP Wednesday

Finished: My Madrona Road challenge piece is finished and posted to the contest page.

 In Progress: Whirlygig Baby Quilt. My niece is expecting her second baby girl on February 13. (Her first daughter, Abby, received this quilt in 2011.) This time, I've been inspired by a jelly roll that has been in my stash for almost 2 years and this pattern.
 

The strips are done and waiting to be sewn into blocks. I mixed up the colors and patterns and pinned the block parts together. As soon as I finish cleaning the house, I can sit down to sew again! I think this will go together really quickly.

Temporarily On Hold: Everything else!  It is officially Girl Scout cookie season, so my free time has been severely diminished. This is my last year volunteering for Girl Scouts, and I'm starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel! Click on the Cookie poster in my sidebar to find cookies near you.

Be sure to visit Freshly Pieced for more WIP Wednesday inspiration!

Madrona Road Monday

 I'm so excited that my Madrona Road challenge piece is finished before the deadline! It was actually finished on Thursday, but I have been busy dealing with 2600 cases of Girl Scout cookies since then.

It doesn't have a title yet. Madrona Road Chevrons Herringbone?

It is almost 47" square. The pieced chevrons are 8.5" wide. 

I only used the fabrics provided (Thank you, Michael Miller!) plus 2 yds of Vanilla  Cotton Couture and 1 yard of Blue Sprout that I purchased. I used virtually every bit!

It is quilted with Aurifil 50wt, #2326 (sand/tan). This thread is a dream to work with!

 I had quilting design issues. My original vision was for feathers along the chevrons, but they were too wide for me to handle on my Bernina. I played around with some drawings and thought I could pull off the swirly fern effect (left). Nope. Hated it. So I tried a swag thing and liked it much better (right).

 Here you can see both options on the back. It took me an hour to pull out the quilting I didn't like. So worth it!

This is the only shot I have of the back. You can see how I pieced everything I had left. It wasn't quite wide enough and I had to add some Kona gray to the side. I want to write my own little story on the white part as a label. Still thinking about that!

And because it is snowing again, I made Pete hold it up for me outside. Look at those skinny legs! He didn't get them from me.

Hop over to the flickr group to see all the amazing entries!

Q1 Finish Along Finish #1.

Ready to quilt

My Madrona Road chevrons are pinned and ready to quilt. I decided to bust out the prized Aurifil thread! I wish I had a color in between these, but I think I'll use the darker shade.
I had been thinking about quilting feathers, but I think the chevron is too wide for me to create a smooth feather on my Bernina. Plan B is a vein with curled leaves. Wish me luck!

Stitching on the go

We are at a swim meet today and I'm happy that I have a little hand stitching to do. I saw this block on Pinterest yesterday and couldn't wait to cut one out.

Finishing Up Friday

Not finished yet, but I am making progress. This is the top half of the guild raffle quilt. I just stitched together the top two quarters. I'm really hoping to finish the top this weekend before I take Julia back to school. {sniff}

 

While I was piecing the first quarter of this top, I was not using leaders & enders. I felt like I was wasting too much thread, so I cut out a baby quilt! I'm not using the pattern I had intended to make with this jelly roll. I must have seen it on Pinterest and I am so easily distracted! I'm now making Whirlygig by Amelie Scott. It's going to be adorable! In just one day of piecing, you can see how much I pieced from the first pile (on the bottom). This is a great technique for piecing two quilts at once!

If I can stay off Pinterest for a while, I might just get this done soon!

I'm linking up to Amandajean's Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.

Scrappy Trip Block 1

I finally caved. I made a scrappy trip along block. I've been following the phenomenon on Instagram (#scrappytripalong), Flickr and various blogs since just before the New Year. I needed a break from the raffle quilt, so I thought I'd just pull some strips that were already cut and whip up a block.

Maybe I should have kept Bonnie's pattern open. I missed a step and cut the strips before sewing them into a tube. Oops. A few more seams and it all worked out.

I need to tweak my seam allowance. My block finished 1/4 inch too small. See the 12.5" square ruler sticking out under the block?

This block is a little busy. That is just the nature of my scrap bin. I'll need to add some quieter prints and solids.  Some variety in value will help, too.

WIP Wednesday - Raffle Options

Hello to all of you visiting from Quilt Story! Thank you so much to Heather and Megan for featuring my Zig Zag Friends quilt today! What a treat for me.

The original post didn't show the full quilt. I went back to look for one, and it seems I never took one! I guess no one was home to hold it up that day.

Moving on to our regularly scheduled WIP Wednesday post...

 It was not a terribly productive week, quilt-wise. Girl Scout cookie season is in full swing, so there's not much time to do anything else.

Finished:  I love these bee blocks that I sent to Kelleigh for the Modern Stash Bee.

In Progress:  When I counted up all the Ninigret Quilter's raffle quilt units, I realized I was short. I made more crazy stars and star points and started laying it out last night. I don't have a design wall- I use a flannel backed plastic table cloth on the living room floor. If I need to move it, it can be rolled up and the pieces stay in place.

This will be a big quilt, so I can only lay out a quarter at a time. Here's the top left quadrant.

Plan A

After I had it set out as I had planned, I thought it might be interesting to switch around the small stars. Interesting, yes, but do we like it better? 

Plan B

My Facebook friends like Plan A better. What say you, blogland?

On Hold: The rest of my WIP list is waiting for me to finish the raffle quilt. You can see it on my WIP page and in my Threadbias studio. I want to love Treadbias, but I haven't completely figured it out yet.

Thanks for stopping by! Now hop on over to Freshly Pieced for more WIP Wednesday inspiration.

Two Blocks and a Pillow

 Just a quick Sew Modern Monday post. It's Girl Scout cookie season, so I'll be trying to squeeze in a little sewing whenever I can.

I finished my first bee blocks for the Modern Stash Bee. Mo Stash, for short. Tom Selleck is the poster boy, and the hives are named after his TV shows and movies. So silly!  I'm in the Three Men and a Baby hive, and Kelleigh asked for bright solids on white to use in a charity quilt. The tutorial for the block on the left was part of Jackie's Bloggers BOM last year, but I had to scale it up to make it 12.5". And I used flying geese units instead of HSTs to eliminate some seams. The block on the right is the Spring Blossom block from Volume 1 of Quiltmaker's 100 Blocks.

Julia finished up a pillow she had been working on for a friend's birthday.  She had seen the quote on Pinterest and drew it on a piece of linen blend. She had to watch some Youtube videos to remember how to do a stem stitch. (She's always been a redwork fan!)

Instead of piecing a border around the embroidery, I had her cut two 15" squares of the Amy Butler print, one for the front and one for the back. She pressed under a seam allowance on the embroidered piece and basted it to the center of a print square. Then, she trimmed it out with the ric rac and stitched it down. Quick and easy!

Have a great, quilty week!

WIP Wednesday

With no finishes to report this week, I'll just show you my top priority WIP: Ninigret Quilters Raffle Quilt. It really should be done by now. Done. Quilted. Bound. Labeled. Tickets printed. As usual, I'm behind schedule and playing catch-up. 

I was hoping to have something to show at the guild meeting tonight, but I only have piles of parts. Maybe I'll pin them to a flannel and bring them anyway. I feel like such a slacker!

The pattern is called Going in Circles from the book Certifiably Crazy by The Buggy Barn. 

I need to run! I have a full day of volunteering ahead of me. Religious education office at church this morning, Girl Scout cookie meeting this afternoon, and a guild meeting tonight. I'm tired already!

During my breaks, I'll be surfing here...

2013 Finish-Along Q1 List

Yay! I'm so excited to be participating in the 2013 Finish Along! It fits in nicely with the Threadbias UFO Group. Thank you, blogland, for keeping me motivated to keep sewing!

Here's my current WIP list, in order of importance.

1.  Ninigret Quilters Raffle Quilt. As the quilt show chair, it is my job to make sure the raffle quilt gets done in a timely fashion. The show is in October, and the raffle quilt is still just a pile of block parts.  Not good! I don't even have a picture to show you. Will update later.
Here's a little peek:

2.  Madrona Road MQG Challenge. The top is done, the back is piece, the binding is ready. I need to buy some batting and get this quilted by the end of January. I'm thinking about quilting feathers up the chevrons. My feathers need some work, so this would be good practice.

 3. Baby Quilt for Grand-niece due in February. Not started yet, but I have a pretty jelly roll waiting for a special little girl. I think I bought it 2 years ago at MQX.

4.  Sugar Wave. This isn't important, but it will be easy to finish. I layered it and did the in-the-ditch quilting in November. Now I can have some fun in the wavy parts!

5.  Friendship Star Mini. This would be another quick finish. I plan to donate it to our Guild's Silent Auction at the show in October, so it probably won't get done this quarter.

6. Swap Soup. My excitement has dimmed for this piece. I might be doing a trunk show soon, so it would be fun to include this one, for the swapping stories alone.

7. Three by Three. I'd love to finish this for my bed, but I'm not crazy about the piano key borders. This side is OK, but the side you can't see in this pic is not so great. If I can redo the offensive corner, I'll send it out for long arm quilting.

8. Mod Bento. I love this little swap top. Why has it sat undone for so long? I'll need to find a nice print on sale for the borders. (Love the hands and feet!)

Eight projects is not too bad, but you know something else will come along! I've resisted the Scrappy Trips craze for a whole week. How much longer can I hold off?

Fresh Fabric

I've purchased and received so much fabric in the last month, I thought I'd create a mosaic. It looks cool, no? $12.49 a yard is not cool! That was the price for Madrona Road at Ryco yesterday. Thankfully, I had a coupon. Who can afford to make a whole quilt at that price? Stash is free, right?

1. $12.49 a yard, 2. random purchase, 3. Threadbias UFO group fat quarter rewards received, 4. more rewards received, 5. V & Co Simply Color, 6. rewards sent, 7. rewards received, 8. Madrona Road for MQG challenge, 9. Pink Chalk sale

It looks like I'm entering a blue phase. There is still some orange in there, but the calmer, cooler blues are appealing to me now. Maybe I should start picking up some Emerald. What's with that Pantone Emerald? Does it look like the gem to you? I am glad it's not the late 80's version of emerald, though. My bridesmaids wore tea-length velvet and taffeta emerald dresses! Can you picture it?

I'll be heading to the courthouse for jury duty tomorrow. I hope they send me right home, but I wasn't that lucky last time. (Murder trial in 2001.) Have a great week!

Progress

The Madrona Road challenge piece is coming along. I'm still hoping to get the top finished for the meeting this afternoon but I have a Girl Scout event this morning. Back to work!!

Testing, testing

I'm sitting in a waiting room as Julia has her wisdom teeth removed. With an hour to kill and no hand stitching to do, I thought I would test out posting from my phone.

How about a photo? My brother posted a sunset photo to Facebook this week from his vacation spot in Florida. So I snapped the sunset from the grocery store parking lot last night. It's the best spot in town to see the sunset without driving down to the beach.

ETA: Now that I'm home, I see how bad this photo is! And it posted at "original size" which was humongous. I'll need to figure out how to post smaller photos.

WIP Wednesday 2013

Happy Lucky 2013! 2012 was a big year for my daughter (high school graduation, Gold Award, starting college), and 2013 will be all about my son (high school graduation, Eagle Scout, joining the Marine Corps). We're looking forward to a great year!

 

I'm so happy to get back on track with WIP Wednesday! My goal this year is to show you some quilty progress each week.

Finish: The biggest and most important finish of the past few weeks was my nephew's wedding quilt. I'm so happy to have this quilt off my WIP list and onto their bed!

New: Madrona Road Challenge. Many of you are participating in the Modern Guild challenge with Michael Miller's Madrona Road collection. I started playing with the fabrics last night and I'm hoping to finish by Saturday's Rhode Island Modern Guild meeting.

I found inspiration in this print and several herringbone quilts popping up in Pinterest.

This is as far as I got last night during the Rose Bowl Game. The braid is pieced on a 60" long piece of 9" wide brown paper. There's no way I'll have enough fabric to piece several strips this long, so I will need to figure something out later.

In Progress: (In order of importance)

Ninigret Quilt Guild Raffle Quilt

Sugar Wave

Swap Soup

4x5 Bee Quilt

Friendship Star Mini

Mod Bento Swap

3x3 Swap Quilt

Bears in the Farmhouse

Planned for 2013: (not started yet)

Mo-Stash Bee (Jan - June)

Baby Quilt for new grand-niece (February)

Emerald Challenge (due March 8)

New York Beauty (always on the list!)

Check out the cute new button for WIP Wednesday...