Hearts

I have said before that I am not a big holiday decorator. Christmas - there is a tree and now that I know how to sew, I've made a couple of table runners and a wallhanging or two.  Other holidays?  Not so much.  While I love seeing how others decorate for the seasons and holidays, I just don't do it.  I don't have the room for all the stuff.  And my house is cluttered with little girl toys.  Decorating around her stuff just doesn't look right.  LOL.

However, when I see cute, I need to make.  

Candy hearts.  Adorable.  I want to make 20 blocks for a lap quilt.  For now, 3 blocks will do for a wall hanging.  If I get my act together, I will make this a leader/ender project.  But I need to get some squares organized and by my machine.  I also want to beef up my low volume stash a bit.  Some of the low volume squares I used aren't very "low volume".

Close up of the hearts.  The green one stands out great.  The other two get a little lost but they are there.

On Instagram, lots of people were making some simple hearts and turns out it was a free tutorial out on Cluck Cluck Sew's blog.  I have been hoarding many charm packs and wouldn't you know?  I had a few Valentine ones.  I busted them out (stash busting 2015) and made my own.  I made 25 blocks instead of 20 as in the tutorial.

I forgot the name of the charm pack I used.  It had green in it which I didn't use.  

I have lots of hearts to decorate with for next year!

Enjoy your day!

Jen :)

Patchwork Pumpkins

I am pleased as punch that my idea actually worked out.  Over the summer, I made a cupcake wallhanging that I just adore but it doesn't scream "Fall".  I mentioned in my cupcake post that I wanted to make a few more of this style of wallhanging and mentioned pumpkins; my follow through is pretty lacking though.

Not this time!  I am crazy about my Patchwork Pumpkin wallhanging!  I admit that it still needs to be quilted and I plan to do the same to the pumpkins as I did with the cupcakes.  I'm going to stitch and flip with tabs to hang it with.  I plan on getting this chore done this weekend and get it hung on the wall by Sunday night.  I'm going to back it in orange polka dots.

I wanted this wallhanging to be more "Fall" than "Halloween" so I searched for the right pumpkin border.  That was tough.  Everything was either too realistic for my wallhanging or Jack o Lanterns.  I wanted a whimsical pumpkin.  I couldn't find what I had in my mind so I settled on mini pumpkins.

It will do.  

I was going to applique a pumpkin, similiar to the cupcake but I ended up taking the patchwork pumpkin that Lori used in her quilty barns and made it a bit larger to fit my idea.  I'm thrilled it all worked out like it was in my head.

Enjoy your day!!

Jen :)

Scrappy Crossroads

Lori Holt did a quick tutorial on Instagram on a scrappy crossroads block.  Since I had nothing else to do (haha), I joined in the fun and TRIED to do a bit of scrap stash busting.  I didn't even make a dent BUT I have a very cute wall hanging for my efforts.

I only made four blocks since a big quilt is just not in the cards for me right now.  I have enough larger quilts in various stages of finishing.  The four blocks only took me a week to do; I worked on them a little bit each night.  Things went much faster once I found my box of 2.5" squares that I had already cut a while back.

I also added a 2.5" outer border to finish it all off.

I can't wait to get this one quilted!

Hmmmm.  Now I wonder what I should work on next?

Enjoy your day!
Jen  :)

Cupcakes done

Cupcakes done and hung on the wall.  I'm really happy with it.  Seeing this on the wall is making me want to make a few more for the more major holidays.  I think I'm going to make pumpkins next.  :)

Instead of adding a binding, I layered and stitched and turned it out.  I made hanging tabs too for a change of pace.  You know?  I have a Halloween panel (plus backing and binding for it) that I have been hanging on to for oh - 6 years.  I think I'm going to do the same for it and hang it here.  I did some top stitching and that is the extent of the quilting on this piece.  If I were to do anything else to it, it would still be in the pile waiting its turn.

I've started sashing my nested churn dash blocks too.  Punk and I have been working on her quilt blocks too.  I've been doing most of the work though.  Her enthusiasm for this quilt isn't there.  I've been piecing most of the blocks and leaving a few for her to work on.  Maybe with the layout, she'll help some.

35 more days until Disney.  :)

Enjoy your day!

Jen 

Hey Cupcake!

I've been waiting 2 years to find time to make this wallhanging.  It was on the cover of the Spring, 2012 McCall's Quilting magazine.  I found the time.  Got it done in a day.  Just need to quilt it.

Isn't it sweet?  Here are some close ups of the cupcakes.

My goal is to now get it quilted and hung on the wall for Punk's birthday in August.  :)

Enjoy your day!
Jen :)

Home to Roost

I spotted this fabric group early last year and while it isn't my "style", the folksy look of the houses and chickens really spoke to me.  I took the time in September to gather up some fat quarters during the CT shop hop so that I could work on the pattern I purchased over this winter.  I stored it all away and promptly forgot about it.

I dug it out on Monday and got to work.  This is what I finished so far.  Not much but it's something.

Here's my dilemma with the pattern:

See that sunburst block there on the left?  I hate it.  I need a substitute.  I'm willing to use gold or a soft yellow for the block to represent the sun but I do not, I repeat, DO NOT want to deal with curved piecing.  I'm not good at it and I don't want to use this project to hone my curved piecing skills.  The quilt has small pinwheels so I was thinking a larger pinwheel but I'm not in love with that idea.

Do you have any block ideas to replace that sunburst one?

Enjoy your day!
Jen  :)

Quilted Finishes

I received some happy mail in the last week or so.

Snow Sparkle.  I've never showed you this quilt before.  2 years ago, I took a class to make this quilt with a friend of mine.  The quilt shop kitted up the fabric for the class and I went with it.  I don't like batiks at all.  They don't float my boat.  I made the center of the quilt and held off putting the borders on because again, the quilt just didn't do it for me.

When I brought my finish home, both my mother in law and father in law raved about it.  They both loved it.  For my FIL to praise it, he must have really liked it.  I packed it away and forgot about it.  It's been in the back of my mind to get it finished and gift it to them for Christmas.  So I did just that.  I put on the final borders and sent it off to be quilted.

Now I want to keep it for myself!  Jill quilted it in the Glace panto with snowflakes and it is gorgeous!  I'm not going to keep it.  I am going to gift it this Christmas.  Eventually, someday, it will come home to me.

I'm working on hand sewing the binding on but it's slow going.  Being on the computer all day and then trying to work a needle and thread, my hands hurt.  I made pretty good progress with it though.  It will be done for Christmas.

Full House is next.  Mary announced a quilting special on her blog a few weeks ago and I think it was a big hit.  I sent off my Reunion "Full House" Schnibbles and Mary's turn around was super quick!

Here it is hanging in its future home in my dining room when I get the binding on.  This one I'm going to try to machine on 100%.  Just to give my hands a break.  This weekend hopefully.  Mary quilted sweet daisies on it.  I love it.

Thank you ladies!  You did a wonderful job!  More quilting coming your way after the holidays.  I need to build up my quilting fund again.  :)

Enjoy your day!
Jen  :)

My new favorite thing to do!

Hand sew bindings!  Wow.  I never thought I would say those words!  Seriously.  I hate hand sewing on bindings.  Sinta and I were talking over email about how close Christmas is and I had commented that there are 2 quilts that I want to finish and get quilted for gifts.  And since it's September and I hate to sew on bindings, I better get cracking!

Well, she was kind enough to forward me a link to a little tutorial that she uses (some of you may already do this) and told me to give it a shot.  I read through it, gathered up the necessary tools and set out to work.  And you know what?!  On Sunday afternoon, I got a binding sewn down and completed in 3 hours and not 3 days!  It's just a simple wall hanging that I had Sharon quilt for me about a year ago and it just sat around over here because like I said... I hate(d) hand sewing on bindings!

Others may look at this and say Jen??  That would only take me 3 hours to do to begin with!  Well, I'm slow.  I'm excited to have learned this new way (new to me anyway) of "loading the needle" and getting it done.  I'm now moving on to another wall hanging that needs its binding sewn down.  Super excited!

Oh.  Do you want to see it?

close up of center

Enjoy your day!
Jen