Hexies for Liam

Last year in the chaos of moving to Seattle, I somehow forgot to make a baby quilt for one of my cousins! Her second child, and the first boy, was born last July and it wasn't until I received an invitation to his first birthday party that I realized I had never made him a baby quilt. I had these prints in my stash, so I thought I'd play around with some hexagons. I drafted a hexagon template based on the best size to use with fat quarters (my hexie template has 3" sides, if you'd like to replicate it). The fat quarter set that I had wasn't quite enough, so I pulled some other prints from my stash as well.

(Whoops, Matt is holding the quilt upside down here! That's what I get for quickly snapping some pictures just before packing up for our trip!)

I quilted it in an all over meandering with a green veriagated thread like I used here.

The binding is a print from Modern Meadow by Joel Dewberry.

And on the back I used two flannels from my stash. The yellow is part of Anna Maria Horner's  collection (the softest flannel EVER!). And the green is a print from JoAnn's. It was too cute to pass up!

How cute are those animals?!?

At approximately 35" x 42", this quilt is still a great size for a toddler to snuggle under. And I just received a thank you from my cousin saying that Liam has been doing just that!

Birthday gifts for the C family!

I'm finally back from Illinois, and I have so much to share! I'm hoping to post about my sister's wedding shower in a few days, I'm so happy with everything came together for it. But for today I'd like to share a few birthday gifts that I made for a friend's children.

One of my childhood friends has 3 kids (ages 5, 3, and 1), all with summer birthdays. She had an amazing birthday party for the kids while I was visiting, so I made a few gifts to bring along. She requested no gifts, but I couldn't help myself!

For the 5 year old and 3 year old I made a fort kit to share (this idea was on her pinterest board, so I took that as permission to break the "no gifts" rule!):

And for each of them I made a small zip pouch filled with glow sticks and a flashlight, perfect for using in their fort!

For the baby I made a Halloween outfit (child #3 deserves a cute holiday outfit that's not a hand-me-down, right?!):

For the Halloween outfit I added a few raw edge squares to the front of a store-bought t-shirt:

And I made a simple elastic waist skirt with a ruffle trim:

I love this fabric combination so much that I created an identical skirt for Addy, and I may order more fabric so that I can make myself a pair of pj pants!

Fabrics for the fort kit:
1,001 Peeps by Lizzy House
Fabrics for the Halloween skirts:
Guising by Lizzy House

The long overdue quilt post!

Tomorrow Addy and I will be on our way to Illinois for 16 days. Now that the list-making and packing are done (I fit 2 pairs of running shoes, 2 pairs of sandals, heels, 2 dresses plus all other essentials for the trip in a small roller bag!!), I thought I'd blog a bit! This quilt has been finished for a few weeks, but we just found the time to take pictures of it this afternoon.

I started this quilt as part of the Sparkle Quilt-Along over at Canoe Ridge Creations and In Color Order.  The large blocks of print in the center of each sparkle immediately attracted me to this quilt, and reminded me that I had a small stash of Innocent Crush just begging to be cut up! I decided to use a landscape layout for these blocks, because I intend to hang this quilt behind our couch (one day, when our couch is actually up against a wall!).

 

For the quilt top I paired a medium grey solid (similar to Kona medium grey, but I think it's a Cotton Couture solid) with 12 prints from Innocent Crush. I quilted horizontal straight lines with a chartreuse thread, and about 8" from the end I ran out! I finished the quilting with a bright blue thread, and then I went back through the quilt and randomly picked out a few lines of chartreuse quilting only to replace them with quilting lines in the bright blue. I love the effect of having the blue quilting lines sprinkled throughout the quilt. You can see a bit of the quilting in this picture, this is the end where I ran out of chartreuse thread:

For the back, I pieced all of my scraps together and filled in the gaps with some solids that I had on hand. The pink is Kona in pomegranate, the purple is Kona in eggplant and the brown is Kona in taupe. I love that the quilting runs vertically when the quilt is hung this way. I think it flows so well!

Another shot of the back:

 

I left a label off of this quilt so that I could hang it with either side facing out.

Quilt stats:

Innocent Sparkles

42" x 56"

Fabrics: Innocent Crush, Kona solids, Cotton Couture solid (I think!)

Binding: Quilter's Linen in magenta, I think!

I'm so happy to have this quilt finished! I don't like to have a ton of WIPs, plus I wasn't in love with this quilt before the quilting. I think that's probably why I chose to quilt it with bright colored thread-I wanted to jazz up the flat feeling that I was left with when staring at all of the grey! Now that it's quilted, though, I'm totally in love with it. Unfortunately our living room doesn't allow for our couch to sit against a wall...so I'll just have to wait to hang this one.

I have a few more projects to share (some of which are gifts for friends in IL) so hopefully when I'm back at the end of July I will be able to blog a bit more regularly!

Scrap Pillows

I know I've mentioned this before, but I generally dislike fabric scraps. I typically give them away because I can't handle the clutter. But recently I was going through my scrap box and realized that I had a bit of an attachment to some of them, so I whipped up a few pillows! I really love how these turned out, and I think I've found a new use for my favorite scraps.

This first pillow started with the grey flea market fancy print:

I love practicing my free motion quilting on pillows. This paisley pattern is one of my favorites for small projects.

More quilting:

The back is a herringbone print with a contrast trim (idea shamelessly borrowed from here):

Finished size is about 11" square.

And the second pillow started with the robot fabric:

I like the way this quilting has a "circuit" feel to it. Typically when I quilt in a square meander, I don't cross my lines. I saw this quilting style over here and decided to give it a shot! It was fun to do, and I think it would be great on a guy quilt.

For the back I used a monkey print by Melly and Me and a pink print. Another contrast trim, too!

Finished size is about 12" square.
I'm sure there will be more pillows to come! I even started making some fun monochrome blocks from my scraps. Addy loves choosing the scraps piece by and piece and it keeps the blocks more random than if I were to choose the prints! She wants to make a quilt for us to use, so it may be awhile before those blocks pop up on here, though.
I have lots more to blog about, but things may be quiet around here for a few weeks. Addy and I will be heading back to Illinois for a few weeks, and I have a lot of prep work before the trip. I hope to be back at it soon after our trip, though! I'm working on writing the pattern for my tote bag, and I'm still planning a giveaway to help me name the tote. Stay tuned!
And lastly, I've decided to list a few things on etsy again! Items will slowly start trickling into the shop, wish me luck!

Donkeys in Wellies

I have been holding onto a fat quarter of some Laurie Wisburn donkey fabric for a few years now. This was a fabric that she printed through Spoonflower, long before Jack and Jenny came out. I always intended to make a cheerful table runner from this print, much like the Christmas versions that I made a few years back. Then a few weeks ago I decided to make a simple plus sign quilt, featuring the donkeys! The colors in the donkey print offered such a great variety that it was the perfect starting point for this quilt.

 

All of the fabric came from my stash (yay!), and I had just enough of a few of these prints. I love when that happens! I also learned that this quilt design is great for mixing prints that wouldn't normally go well together. As a whole, the prints make such a great effect!

 

The quilting is an all over meander, and the binding (machine stitched) is from Backyard Baby. This is one of the BEST shades of orange. The backing is a rainbow stripe.

 

Finished size is 42" x 60".

It was hard to let go of this quilt, but right now it is in the local shop, Happenstance.

Pillows inspired by "Quilting Modern"

I'm not sure if I've mentioned the new book, Quilting Modern, before. I know Katie from the Seattle Modern Quilt Guild, although I didn't actually meet her until the book was well underway. She is tons of fun, and so inspiring! As I read through my copy of the book, I really felt like a little bit of Katie went into each project and technique.
Jacquie is equally as inspiring! Her blog was one of the very first quilt blogs that I ever followed, and even as my tastes change and my blogger roll reflexes that, I don't think I will EVER tire of Jacquie's work. I haven't met her in person, but she's very sweet over email!
I buy very few books, especially sight unseen. But I knew that this book would be a hit, so I preordered it - and I was not disappointed! What I love so much about this book is that it is a collection of modern quilting techniques before it is a pattern book. There are directions for creating the quilts in the book, but there are also fabulous descriptions of techniques and other layouts using the techniques.Oh, and I can't forget the section that covers quilting designs - who doesn't need more quilting inspiration?!
The first project that I made was with stitch and flip triangles. I wanted to make a pillow for a friend as a birthday gift, so I thought this would be a fun time to try out the technique.

I used linen for the center of the pillow and hand embroidered a G for my friend's last name:

Straight line quilting:

I used a brown for the binding and one of my most favorite prints for the back:

Fabrics on the front are from Outfoxed by Lizzy House (orange) and It's a Hoot by Momo (teal).
Back fabric is from Weekends by Erin McMorris.
I also tried the slice and dice technique in the book, and made this pillow for Felicity (she blogged about it here!):

On the back I used a cheerful raindrop fabric. She does live in Vancouver, after all. :)

Fabrics on the front are linen (from JoAnn's) and Quilter's Linen in lime and azure, I think. I really love the quilter's linen because it has the stability of a quilting cotton with the visual texture of linen. It washes up really well, and I don't mind at all that it's not real linen!
On the back I used a print from Summersault by Eric McMorris.
I can't wait to use some of these techniques in larger projects. The stitch and flip triangles are especially appealing to me, because they create so many different layouts!

Exciting News!

If you are in or around the Saratoga Springs, NY area, come out to Beekman Street tonight for the second First Friday Art Walk! There is a cute little shop on Beekman called Happenstance. where I've started to sell bags and quilts. I will also have a photo album of previous quilts that I've made, in the event that someone is interested in a custom quilt. I will be at the shop tonight from 6-8, so stop by and say hi!

Here are a few of the tote bags that I added to the shop:

 

Exterior is Lizzy House Pearl bracelet and AMH Loulouthi laminate. Lining is FMF. I'm playing around with different styles, this tote has fusible fleece and quilting on the main body:

This is one of my favorites. The Heirloom laminate pairs so well with the Ruby body and FMF lining!

The striped body of this tote is made from an IKEA ottoman cover that I picked up for something like $2.50! I used the wrong side of the fabric, because I like the more subtle stripe.

I couldn't resist this fabric when I found it - in the home dec section of JoAnn's!

So fun! And the home dec weight is prefect for this bag. I may need to search for a laminate to pair with this print!

Some FMF paired with more Heirloom laminate!

I almost kept this one for myself!

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All of these totes were created the same way I made my Echino tote. All of the totes have a magnetic closure, outer pocket that is divided into two sections, and an interior zip pocket. Now all this tote needs is a name! I'm thinking of doing a giveaway next week in return for naming suggestions. Stay tuned, and start thinking of tote names!

I also have a few small quilts in the shop right now along with some quilted pillows. But I'll save those for another post. Have a great weekend, everyone!

The My Memories giveaway is now closed and the winner has been notified. Thanks for playing along!