Have you joined in the Sliced Coins Quilt Along?  We're going to start cutting next week, and everyone in the Flickr group has started to show off their fabric auditions.  Here's some highlights...

1. Sliced Coins Option 1?, 2. Possible Don't Call Me Betsy Quilt Along Choices, 3. Sliced Coins Option 2, 4. Sliced Coins Quilt-Along fabric, 5. Fabrics for quilt-along, 6. Janette's fabric choice, 7. Choice 2, 8. Sliced Coin: Option 1, 9. Sliced Coins Fabric, 10. Sliced Coins Quilt Along Fabrics, 11. Twin baby quilt #1 fabric audition, 12. Twin baby quilt #2 fabric audition

I can't wait to get started next week!  There's still to join in - grab a button and join the Flickr group.  Stay tuned next Friday for cutting instructions, and if you missed the details on the needed materials, check here.

I'm proud of myself, I tried two need things in my quilting world this week...spray basting and free motion quilting in a loopy fashion.  Neither quite went as planned, and I'm glad to be done with both of them.  Let's start with the spray basting...

I bought a can of June Tailor's basting spray as a Christmas present to myself.  I've been wanting to try spray basting for a while, because I positively despise pin basting.  I decided it would be good to start with something small, so I chose to spray baste the patchwork quilt that I'm sending along with the doll I'm making for my niece's birthday.  I sprayed the heck out of my batting, just like the instructions said, without thinking first.  My piece of batting was larger than both my back and front pieces.


This was not my smartest moment here.  I realized this after I smoothed the batting out on my back piece and found myself sticking to the batting that was sticking out.  Did I stop there?  Nope.  Did I trim the excess batting?  Nope.  I flipped it over, sprayed the other side of my batting and smoothed on my front.


Did I then do some trimming?  Nope.  I started quilting.


The darn batting stuck to my machine several times and it dawned on me why I was having troubles, and so I hope my lesson is officially learned.  I think I'll try spray basting again - maybe on a baby quilt?  Another small-ish project, for sure, until I feel more confident in it.  Other than my own silly error, it was definitely an enjoyable experience.  Being able to quilt without stopping every five seconds to take out a pin was pretty darn awesome.

I felt truly inspired yesterday when I hopped onto Flickr and saw what Lynne's been up to.  She's just starting to FMQ and is already trying stitches I haven't attempted, so I thought it was as good a time as any to try a new FMQ style.  I opted for some loopy meandering stitches.  I did some drawing first, to get a feel for it, and then did a small 5" practice square.  It's quite possible that my practice was a full-on waste of time since the stitches totally disappeared into the over-busy fabric.


I had a rough time at first trying to get the hang of the loops - should they all go the same direction?   Should they all be the same size?  I knew I was overthinking it, so I just turned up the music on my iPod and let go.  I really liked the look of the loops though, at the end of the project.  I will definitely try this kind of FMQ again.  It was actually a lot of fun.  If only binding were as much fun...

I got tagged yesterday by my dear bloggy friend, Lee.  If you haven't met Lee and her blog, Freshly Pieced, you are seriously missing out.  Lee has an amazing eye for design and she's produced some seriously inspirational quilts.  My personal favorite is her Hope Valley quilt, which she's thinking about making into a quilt-along (note to Lee - yes please!).  Thank you for thinking of me, Lee!  You've probably seen these going around a little bit in the quilty blog world this week.  The Liebster blog award is for those of us with under 300 followers, and I get to pass the award on to a few other deserving bloggers, so here goes...

1) Megan @ Canoe Ridge Creations - I adore Megan's blog.  She's got a great fabric stash, thanks to a previous job at her LQS, and she's made some beautiful quilts in this last year that I've been following her, including a wonky 9-patch quilt that continues to creep into the back of my mind when I think about new quilts and a gorgeous spiderweb quilt in progress using MoMo's Wonderland.
2) Katie @ Katie's Korner - Have you seen that gorgeous AMH zig zag quilt on her blog header?  Beautiful! She did some gorgeous small wall art quilts last year, including a robot and a rocket, not to mention some truly stunning quilts.  She's also inspired me to try to make a tree skirt for my Christmas tree later this year.
3) Brooke @ April Two Eighty - I worked with Brooke last year on a quilt, and before that I stared in awe at the amazing photography on her blog.  Brooke shares everything on her blog, her sewing, her life, her love for music and interior design.  And her blog is positively drool-worthy - just check out the AMH hexie quilt she's getting started on!

Thank you, Lee, for thinking that my blog is creative and funny!  I truly love blogging and the fact that other people seem to enjoy my blog totally makes my day.  :)

And now to the works in progress regular scheduled programming...

We're just over a week into the new year, and the munchkin is already asking when it will be Christmas again.  On the bright side, he's got a birthday coming up - him and two of his cousins, actually.  All three of the grandkids on my side of the family have birthdays within a three week period starting at the end of January, so it's getting to be birthday bonanza time.  He  has already asked Mommy to make him a polka dot blanket for his birthday, so add it to the list!