Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

I think this maybe ranking up there with my favorite favorite quilts I have made yet! (My husband says "but you say that about all of them") and yes, this is true, but I really mean it this time! I just love all the bright vibrant colors and the jungle print is too precious.



This quilt top pattern just kind of came to me. I knew I wanted to do something that was interspersed with big blocks of my main print fabric because the print is on a larger scale, and I'm really happy with the way this turned out. My blocks measure 9 3/4 inches X 9 3/4 inches (they were supposed to be 10 x 10, but I ended up trimming them back slightly, so the finished quilt will measure appx 50 x 50 inches.



I've started on the back, I think I'm going to piece together some solids (I'm thinking a bright blue and yellow) with a stripe of 8 inch strips of the prints featured on the front. Stay tuned, shouldn't be much longer!

While I was uploading pics of this quilt top I found these that I must have forgotten about:



I think this was the second quilt I made a few months back for a friends baby, and I was holding on to it until they had the baby and told everyone her name. Welcome baby Annabelle!



I embroidered Annabelle's name on the quilt and was able to give it to mom, dad and baby Annabelle this weekend. I love that my machine does embroidery, all I really use it for is putting names and initials on things, but it makes gifts super personal, and everybody loves something with their name on it!

Well, happy belated 4th of July, hubby and I (along with the dogs) are off to spend the day at my parents soaking up some sun and swimming in the pool, what a perfect day!

Mod Sampler Quilt

I just put the finishing touches on my Mod Sampler Quilt quilt-along pattern by Oh Fransson! I really like the way its turned out.


The blocks on the front and back are pieced using 12 different fat quarters from Amy Butler's Love fabric line. The sashing is a Kona solid, I believe in Snow? (basically one shade off of white)


The back is peiced with a blue swirly pattern (I forget who it was made by) and the bottom is Kona Grass. I really like the way the back came out! I had a few little puckers, but I think it was from moving the quilt around so much trying to rip out the first attempt at quilting that I didn't like. Again, after obsessing about and contemplating ripping out portions of the quilting AGAIN, I relented and decided I am "OK" with it.


The finished size is 52 inches x 62 inches, a perfect "cuddle up the on couch" size!


This quilt will be going to my mom as a Christmas gift...I think I need to roll it up and hide it from myself so I'm not tempted to either use it myself or give it to her early!

I'll be posting this week to Lit and Laundry's Finished for Friday and to AmyLouWho's Sew and Tell.

As for whats next...I think I'm going to start on one of the two baby quilts that needs to be made for friends of ours who are having babies. Neither couple is finding out what they are having, so gender neutral it is! Here's a sneak peak:

Baby Allison and other friends

Welcome baby Allison! I received this picture in the mail along with Alli's birth announcement the other day, and it brought a huge smile to my face to see my quilt in one of Alli's first professional baby pictures! I'm so happy that mom, dad and baby Alli seem to be enjoying the quilt, because it is one of my favorites that I've made.

As far as my mod sampler quilt, it's moving along, while giving me a run for my money all at the same time. I seem to have made two new friends througout the quilting process this time around.



Hello seam ripper, hello lint roller, it seems we've been seeing alot of each other these days. It all started when I became overzealous and decided to try a free motion flower pattern described by Oh Fransson! in a recent tutorial of hers. I read through the tutorial, and thought "piece of cake, I can do this" and dug right in. Well 4 flowers later, I decided that my flowers were nowhere near as nice and I hated it. So after an hour of contemplating scrapping the whole quilt and just starting over, I decided to try and rip out the quilting and start anew with my good ole standby, stippling, that I love so much.

So thats what I did. I tried to make sure I heavily stippled where the punctures from the old quilting was, its still noticeable (to me at least), but I'm hoping once it's washed that will help make it even less noticeable when its all crinkled up.



I have the binding sewn together, pressed and ready to go. It's an Alexander Henry print called Mod Dots. I'm in love. I think it maybe my favorite print in my stash right now. (and how fitting "Mod dots" binding on my "Mod Sampler" quilt)



Hopefully tommorow I'll get the binding on the quilt and will have more pics to share!

Mod Sampler quilt top

In between our busy busy weekend filled with birthday parties and lounging poolside I was able to get my mod sampler quilt top finished! We had wonderful weather this weekend (in Pittsburgh, weather like this is sometimes few and far between) and my parents have a pool, so we were able to spend today relaxing by the pool. It was perfect.

This was the first time I had done a quilt with sashing, and I'm really liking the way its turned out.



I'm always disappointed with the pictures I take of my quilts, they never do the "real thing" justice. The colors on the quilt are so much more vibrant than they are in the photograhs. Alas, I guess I need to play with the settings a little more on the camera, and not just use the "easy" setting for optimal performance.



Anyways, in the process of working on this quilt top, I have discovered 3 new quilting tools that I don't think I can live without from here on.



1. Spray starch. I couldn't believe how easy it made ironing! And it made the fabric have a slight crispness which really helped with getting accurate 1/4 inch seams

2. Freezer paper. I know that freezer paper has a multitude of uses in quilting, but as I still consider myself a "newbie" this was the first time I have experimented with it. I used it as described here by Oh Fransson! for correcting blocks that are slightly off in length (i.e. I had a few blocks that ended up being 8 1/8 inches wide/long as opposed to 8 1/2 like they should be).
...Yes I know that I purchased the worlds largest box of freezer paper, but thats all they had at the store!



3. Pressing seams open! Again, I know this is nothing new, but when I was learning to quilt, my instructor always had us press to one side, so thats the way I did it also. I tried pressing the seams open on this quilt, and I can't believe how flat it helps the blocks lay (lie?? I never was good with that distinction!). I think I may be converted to a open seam presser.

Anyways, I'm hoping to get the back put together and then get this bad boy finished this week, so I can post to finished for friday/sew and tell. I'm thinking this quilt will be another Christmas gift either for my mom or mother in law, hope they like!

sampler blocks

So I was able to finish my blocks for the Mod Sampler quilt, and I think I like it! I played around with the layout for a while, and this is what I've come up with:


I used 12 of the fat quarters that were in the Amy Butler Love fat quarter bundle, and I like the combination of fabrics. I took a trip to Joann's today to decide on a sashing fabric (I may have looked slightly crazy, as I brought a million little scraps with me to decide, and had them layed out everywhere!) I decided on Kona Bone, its not white, but not quite ivory either, I'm a fan. Then I wanted to pick my fabrics for the pieced backing and binding.



I'm in love with this binding fabric, and definitly bought extra to add to my "stash"


I'm hoping to get the sashing and quilt top completed over the next few days. As much as I loooove summer, its not so conducive to getting quilting projects done, as it seems were constantly running!

Jessica

Back in action

Over the weekend the hubby and I were out of town, so alas, no quilting or sewing projects have been worked on. Friday was my birthday, and it just so happened to coincide with a trip a few of my friends and our respective hubbies had planned a month or so ago. We drove up to New York (lower state NY, basically in Jersey) to visit our friend's new house, and the boys golfed and worked on a few projects around said friend's new house, and us girls went shopping! Now while I love crafting/quilting/sewing, and of course reading (on my new Nook!) I also seem to have a small shopping habit, and a weakness for fun snazzy shoes! I picked up these beauties at Nine West in the most amazing outlet shopping complex I've ever been to (woohoo for sales and discounts!)



While I dont have much quilting progress to show, I feel its only fair to share the fruits of my shopping labor with everyone. I think these may be my new favorite shoes. Yes, they slightly remind me of a bumble bee, but I just love the black and while with a splash of bright yellow. I imagine these sprucing up a boring work outfit in no time!



Anyways, enough about my shopping habit. I have made some progress with the Mod Sampler quilt. I wasn't quite sure how I was going to feel about this quilt, or for that matter the fabric selections I made, but as I'm putting the blocks together, I'm really liking the way the blocks are turning out!


These were the first weeks blocks, super easy to put together.


And the second weeks


Here's the third weeks



And the fourth weeks. These were by far the most time consuming to make...I pieced them together as was described in the instructions, but the more I thought about it, it probably would have been easier to piece together some strip sets and then cut rows of the strip sets to make the blocks, but this wasn't too bad.

They are by far my favorites, and I am amazed at how accurate I was when cutting and sewing the tiny squares together! I attribute this to my newly replaced rotary cutter blade. I only suffered one small battle wound on my thumb, but definitly worth it for how easy it made my cutting!

Hopefully tommorow I will finish up the last 2 sets of blocks (2 square in square blocks, another fav of mine). I also need to pick a sashing fabric...I'm thinking of just a cream Kona solid, but I'm not 100% sure yet...any suggestions??

Lesson Learned

Bless me Father for I have sinned, it has been ENTIRELY too long since I changed my rotary cutter blade! Seriously I know I haven't been quilting for all that long, but I think knowing to change that blade frequently is pretty basic.

I had started to cut my fat quarters for the Mod Sampler quilt (Quilt along by Oh Frannson) and was having a heck of a time, and it was like a lightbulb went off! After changing the blade cutting was smoothe like buttah! haha Seriously, I was beginning to think I was developing Carpel tunnel from pressing so hard while cutting. Like I said, lesson learned, I vow to change my cutter blade more frequently.

Anyways, I wasn't so sure about the fabric combinations I had selected so far for this sampler quilt, but as I'm cutting, I'm loving what I'm seeing. I haven't gotten very far, but heres a peek:





Like I said, not much to report on today, and we're headed out of town for the weekend tommorow to visit friends, so there will be no quilting this weekend, but I'm taking Monday off as a "sanity day" so it may be a quilting bonanza! Anyways, the friend I'm visiting is pregnant and due in a few months, so I'm hoping to get a sneak peek of the nursery so I can begin to plan her baby quilt!