Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving to all of my friends who are celebrating tomorrow!  I'm looking forward to getting started with all the cooking now that my house is clean enough for company again.  I hope you all have a wonderful holiday filled with family, fun...and maybe some shopping!

I'm guessing that many of you are planning on some holiday shopping over this long weekend, and in honor of the biggest shopping holiday of the year, my Pattern Shop is having its very first sale.  Both of my patterns, Fabricland and Xs and Os are marked down 25% through the end of the day Sunday, November 27th.  What a great way to treat yourself this weekend!

  

Have a wonderful weekend!  Happy Thanksgiving :)

WiP Wednesday: The one where I really should be cooking...

Thanks for all the well wishes for my little guy - he's doing a lot better this week, though one of the medications he's taking is making him a bit more hyper and crazy than usual, so that's made the week pretty interesting.  I cannot believe that tomorrow is going to be Thanksgiving already.  I'm sure it won't surprise you to know I've got a list of things to get started on today for Thanksgiving, so I'm going to try to make this one short and sweet.

Finished:
Little Apples improv quilt


Finished Little Apples quilt



Soft books for my niece and nephew




For Katie's book (the pink pages), I used this awesome tutorial

SS Swap 

Still going:
Summer Sampler Plus - Finished up my three extra blocks for this quilt and mixed them in nicely, so next, I'm going to work on finishing up the quilt top!

Extra blocks for my Summer Sampler Plus complete!


Zero progress:
PJ Pants for the munchkin
New Bake Shop project
Charmed Prints QAL
Farmer's Wife QAL

And since tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and I'm hosting again this year, I don't see a whole lot of sewing getting done soon!  Hopefully I can have a Sewing Friday instead of Black Friday or something, clock some quality holiday sewing time.  Happy Thanksgiving to you all!
Monday, November 21, 2011

Little Apples Improv Quilt - Done!

First off, I've got a winner to announce!  The winner of the Kona color card and two patterns is:


Commenter #19, Jessica from Sew Crafty Jess!!  Congratulations, Jessica, I'll send you an email shortly!

Did you have a good weekend?  I really did.  I finished up a quilt and I am really, really happy with how this quilt turned out.  After picking out these fabrics, and buying many of them in Salt Lake City during the Sewing Summit back in early October, I kind of hit a bit of a wall, trying to figure out what I wanted to do with them.  Aneela Hoey's illustrations used in the larger scale prints in the collection are just so darling that you can't just chop them up at will.

DSCN8185


When I matched up my Little Apples prints with my Kona card, I snagged a few half-yards of the coordinating colors to add to the mix, and that was when I decided to go forward with a log cabin inspired improv piece.  I went about chopping my solids into strips of varying widths (1", 1.5", 2" and 2.5"), and fussy-cut 16 charms from my Little Apples fat quarters and half-yards.

The blocks came together really quickly, and as they multiplied on my design wall, I wasn't sure if I ought to add some sashing between the blocks to give the eye a less chaotic place to rest, but ultimately, thanks to some helpful Twitter and Flickr friends, I wound up skipping the sashing and piecing the blocks all together.  I think all the chaotic bits of color are part of what makes the quilt top visually interesting.

DSCN8183

I did stick to my comfort zone when it came to quilting - I went with a simple, all-over stipple.  I really need to get out of my stippling rut one of these days, but I do enjoy actually doing it.  It feels natural to me, after all these quilts I've done this way.   That being said, though, I think that's going to be one of my quilty New Year's resolutions, to try more quilting techniques.

DSCN8182


I bound this quilt using the same Kona Olive color I used in the quilt, but I did make a bit of a boo-boo - notice how skinny the binding is?  Totally an accident.  Instead of cutting 2.5" strips like I usually do for my binding, I cut 2" strips, but I made it work.

DSCN8184


The baby who will be receiving this quilt hasn't been born yet, but he is on the way and I'm excited for him to arrive so I can share this lovely quilt with him!!   Happy Monday everyone!  I'm linking up with {Sew} Modern Monday at Canoe Ridge Creations, drop on by to check out some recent modern sewing finishes

Quilt Stats:
Name: Little Apples quilt
Size: 40" square
Fabrics: Aneela Hoey's Little Apples collection for Moda Fabrics, Kona Olive, Kona Bahama Blue, and Kona Coral
Quilting: All-over stipple in Gutermann white thread
Binding: Kona Olive
Pattern: Improv-y log cabin, totally made up on the fly

Welcome! I'm Elizabeth, mom to a mood teen boy and a chatty six-year-old girl and I sew for my sanity. Let's get to quilting, shall we?
The Epic Sampler BOM Club kicks off Oct 1st
Copyright 2010 by Elizabeth Dackson. Powered by Blogger.

Search This Blog

Tutorials

 photo Icicle-Star_zps7f032133.gif  photo Boxed-In2_zps800ae9da.gif EasyPeasyFauxZigZag StringHeartBlock StarCrossed CrossMAze CathedralStar RainbowRing DoubleFlip PatchworkWheel FriendshipOctogon FlyingGeese HST Weathervane MarinersStar StackedScrappyBlock ScrappyAngles HolidayPresentBlock DivideandConquer CharlestonFarmhouse ModernHalves ModCircuitry ModNine Kaleido SlicedCoins Kaleido BellaCrossing SweetGirlie MiniBookshelf ClamshellLoop DoubleHourglass BaptistFan TetrisMug StringDiamond ScraptasticTote OffsetDiamonds MunchkinSoftBook PatchworkBathMat