Flea Market Fancy Granny Squares Cinco De Mayo Wedding Quilt

How's that for a title?

I finished the top for my friends wedding quilt. I used Katy's strip pieced tutorial but with fat quarters so I could make a variety of sets with fewer blocks because this is a smallish quilt. I was excited to lay these blocks out but when I started I just couldn't get a layout I liked. I finally decided on this diagonal layout of green, yellow, blue, green, yellow, blue etc... kind of... the blue block in the bottom corner should probably be yellow but I like the blue.. and looking at it now I think I could have definitely used more red but I'm happy with it. I have some Granny Squares left over that I will use on the back. Then I have to decide on quilting and binding. Any suggestions???

Hand Pieced Quilt-A-Long ~ Sashing and Border

Today I'll go over putting together the hand pieced quilt top. I am using 2 inch white strips for a finished 1.5 inch sashing and border. You can decide what size and color you would like. Also if you want cornerstones you would have to adjust this to your blocks measurements.I made this really simple and cut 2 inches by the width of fabric (WOF). You can also piece your rows together first then measure the length of your rows and cut the 2 inch strip by that number. One 2 in. X WOF strip "should" be enough for 2 rows but fabric widths vary so please measure first.

You will need:
8 ~ 2 in. x 6.5 in. sashing strips
5 ~ 2in.  x  length of pieced rows (3 for sashing, 2 for top and bottom border)
2 ~ 2 in. x WOF border strips (side borders)
Mark a 1/4 inch sewing line on all sides of all of the strips.

Piece together your rows putting a 6.5 inch sashing strip between your blocks.

Sew the 5 ~ 2 in. x length of rows strips to the top, in between and bottom of your rows. Trim off excess fabric from strips.

Take the 2 remaining 2 inch x WOF strips and sew them to each side of your quilt top. Trim off excess fabric from strips. Press your top gently.

That's it for this week. I think we will take next Friday off because hand piecing the sashing and border will take some time.  So the Friday after next we will layer, baste and talk quilting!!!

Here are the links for all of the hand pieced blocks:

Block #1 ~ Churn Dash
Block #2 ~ Jacob's Ladder
Block #3 ~ Ohio Star
Block #4 ~ Bear Paw
Block #5 ~ Granny Square
Block #6 ~ Shoo-Fly
Block #7 ~ Card Trick
Block #8 ~ Friendship Star 
Block #9 ~ Square in a Square
Block #10 ~ Log Cabin
Block #11 ~ Flying Geese Pinwheel
Block #12 ~ Honey Bee

The flickr group is here. Come on over and see all the other pretty hand pieced blocks.

Have a great weekend!!!

☆☆☆ Fabricworm Flea Market Fancy FQ Bundle WInner ☆☆☆

The winner of the Flea Market Fancy FQ Bundle from fabricworm is comment #418 ~ Paskiaq!

Thank you all who entered! Have a great weekend!!!!

I've been strip piecing Granny Squares for one of my best friend's wedding gift. I used Katy's tutorial here. Except I used fat quarters to get half the amount of blocks for one set. I'm making a smaller size quilt and I wanted to have a few more different fabric combinations. They whip up so fast. I have one more set to make and then I hope to put it together and quilt it. That's the invitation. It's a Cinco de Mayo wedding / birthday party. It is going to be so fun and I am really looking forward to it! I was going for blocks that have the colors in the invitation. Did I do okay?

I started this really early yesterday morning. Inspired by this picture on pinterest and watching Little House on the Prairie. I've had some of these prints for a while and I wanted to use them for something. It's a bit darker and grungy than I usually go for. I really like it :)

I'm also working on a lampshade for this Vintage Irmi Humpty Dumpty lamp. I found it last year at my local thrift shop for $5 bucks! I had been looking for one for so long but was not willing to pay the price for some of them I had seen on-line. It works and it is so cute. It just needs a cute lampshade to go with it.

My only finish for the week were these little quilts that I blogged about here. The purple one is for my friend's daughter. The quilting on the purple one looks so much better than the quilting on the scrappy one in my opinion. ♥ I am in love with hand quilting ♥

That's what I've been up to!

Linking up with Freshly Pieced WIP Wednesday  and JAQS Studio Made by Me.

Fat Quarter Shop Giveaway Winners ~ California Girl Jelly Roll

The winners of the Fat quarter Shop California Girl Jelly Rolls are :

Molly and...

Brenda!

Thanks to all of you who entered!

2 Little Quilts (from Amy's Sleepy Time Animal Pals pattern)

It's been a rainy, chilly weekend here. A nice weekend for snuggling and sewing.

One of my best friends is getting married on May 5. That is also her daughter's birthday. So I am making both of them quilts. I finished the one for my friend's daughter, a little doll quilt to go with the doll I am going to make her. I used Amy's (nanaCompany) Sleepy Time Animal Pals pattern. It is completely adorable. I found a couple leftover nine patch squares and the remaining strip sets from the baby quilt I made for my friends baby shower last year. It's funny that this time last year I was playing with the same fabric for the same people. I hand quilted this one. I love the way hand quilting looks.
 

I made a little name tag for the back.

And of course I had to make one for my littlest. I went with scrappy. I already had all of the squares cut so all I had to do was sew. I machine quilted this one. I should have waited to hand quilt it but my fingers were sore and I really wanted to see it finished. Not to mention that someone was waiting ever so patiently for it.

I think the bear looks a little upset about nap time in this one. What do you think?

I loved this little embroidery and I'm thinking of using one of the cute animals from it on a fabric basket made from Ayumi's pattern. I love to put doll quilts in them when I give them as gifts.

I also wanted to say thank you all for your well wishes for my ruptured ear drum. It's such a strange feeling, kind of like your under water or there are a bunch of cotton balls stuck in your ear. The pain is mostly gone but I can not hear from it yet and the ringing is annoying to say the least. I truly thank you all very much for your concern and reassurance.

I hope you have a restful Sunday.

Flea Market Fancy Fat Quarter Bundle Giveaway

The hand pieced quilt along is coming to an end soon. I have enjoyed the process immensely. I loved hearing your comments and emails about hand piecing too. I know I will continue to hand piece quilts in the future. One of the comments I received often was about the fabric I used in my blocks. I used Flea Market Fancy for all of my blocks. Most of mine were made from pieces that my very lovely and generous quilty friends swapped me. They were from the first Flea Market Fancy print. I started making my hand pieced blocks before the reprinted collection was available but I was so happy that some of the collection was being reprinted because I was running out of some of the prints I wanted to use for my hand pieced quilt. Well the reprint sold out of many shops right away too. Many of us are waiting for second shipments of the reprint to make their way into quilt shops.

Well I am, over the moon, excited to say that fabricworm has the entire collection in stock! fabricworm is offering 20% off Flea Market Fancy now until Friday 4/20 @ 11:59 pm PST. I have my order in my cart and ready to go. I am making one of my dearest friends a wedding quilt with Flea Market Fancy. I think the colors will fit in nicely with a Cinco de Mayo wedding!This is such an awesome deal. I've been waiting for my local quilt shop to get their order but this is actually more cost effective for me because even with shipping charges it is still less expensive for me to order online with fabricworm using the discount than it is to use the gas to drive to my local quilt shop and pay full price.

I am also so very excited to say that they are offering a Fat Quarter Bundle of all 21 prints to one of my lucky readers!!! Gasp!!!The super sweet owner of fabricworm, Cynthia, has this beautiful bundle cut, set, aside, and ready to ship to a new home :) Can you believe that?! Thank you so much Cynthia!

to enter leave a comment...
if you read my blog you can leave another comment...
if you participated in the hand pieced quilt along or joined the hand pieced flickr group leave another comment...
and lastly if you facebook, tweet or pin (pinterest) and feel like spreading the word then come back and leave another comment.
that's 4 chances to win some of the most fantastic fabric ever printed :)!!!

I'll announce a winner Friday April 27th. Thanks for entering and good luck!!!

☆☆☆ Please forgive me for not posting a hand pieced tutorial this week. I am nursing a ruptured ear drum right now so there has been no sewing or picture taking happening here. I plan to have the next step in our quilt along posted Friday the April 27th. Thanks so much for understanding.☆☆☆

Fat Quarter Shop Giveaway!!!!

The very wonderful Fat Quarter Shop has offered not 1 but 2 California Girl Jelly Rolls to giveaway!!! Isn't that awesome of them?!

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you know that I love Joanna Figueroa and Fig Tree Quilts. There is not one of her fabric lines that I didn't love. California Girl is no exception!

The colors are so fresh. I love the soft feminine feel of this line. Don't you?! Can't you see a Granny Squares quilt made with this and some creamy white fabric?! That's what I would make :)

I'm really excited to be able to pick 2 winners (using random number generator)! Leave a comment telling me what you would make with a Jelly Roll of California Girl (a quilt for me, just kidding). I'll announce the winner next Monday 4/23.

Honey Bees, Granny Squares and Simple Patchwork

Hope you all are having a restful Sunday. I wanted to pop in and show you the finished 6 inch Honey Bee block for the hand pieced quilt along. Isn't it adorable?! I am sure it is my absolute favorite of the whole bunch!!

I only have 5 more Granny Squares to make for this quilt and then I'll add the sashing. I was going to make matching Granny Square quilts for my girls using what I had left of my Sweet fabric (Urbans Chicks) and some other cute soft pinks and aquas but my oldest said she would rather have this one. So I'm debating on making the other one now or using that fabric for a simple patchwork quilt.

Well with the Granny Squares quilt top nearly finished I let myself make a couple of patchwork squares using what I have of Bliss, Ruby and Vintage Modern (Bonnie and Camille). You can see some of my seams don't line up so nice (especially one spot on the aqua block) because I had to fudge it a little. My bliss patches were 2 1/4 in. and the rest were 2.5in. So I moved my needle over to give me a bigger seam allowance and catch just a hair more than 1/8 of an inch on those Bliss patches, if that makes sense. I was going to mix all of the colors (pink, aqua, red, grey and green) in each block but I know me and I would spend way too much time fretting over placement and then it's more stress than fun so I went with one color per block and love it!
Did you get any sewing time in this weekend? What are you planning on sewing this week? I'd like to work on some Farmer's Wife blocks. I find I work on 3 or 4 of them then take a long break.  Then I really start itching to make some, make 3 or 4 and take another long break. It's a pattern I am happy with :)

linking up with
and  JAQS Studio for Made by Me Wednesdays.

Hand Pieced Quilt-A-Long Block #12 ~ Honey Bee

Well this is the last block for the hand pieced quilt along. I decided on one of my very, very favorite blocks (don't I say that every week?), Honey Bee! It combines piecing and applique. A great skill builder.

For this block (6 inch) you will need:

4 ~ 2 in. squares (corners, print)

4 ~ 2 x 3.5 in. rectangles (sides, background)

4 ~ 1.5 in. squares (print, inner nine patch squares, mine are yellow)

5 ~ 1.5 in. squares (print, outer nine patch squares, mine are blue)

12 ~ honey bee / tear drop shaped pieces (print, mine are yellow)

freezer paper or regular paper

Honey Bee applique template here

(I printed this out and it is a bit smaller than what I drew so you may have to play with the size a bit or feel free to draw your own.)

or you can save the image here and adjust it to fit the quilt pieces.

I'll start with the applique pieces. First trace the template onto your freezer paper. Cut out the pieces. Iron them onto the back of the fabric. 

Trim 1/4 in. away from the template. 

Fold the center of the pointed end in first. (please excuse my sick little cutting board. It is far beyond self healing and I am in need of a new one)

Then fold each side in to make a nice point. Thread a needle and insert it into the point 

and fold your fabric over the template the whole way around using a basting stitch. Make 12 of these.

**Note that I assemble my whole block before I sew my applique pieces down. That way you can see that everything is placed exactly how you want it and not going to get sewn into the seam allowance. I am just showing you rather quickly for the sake of time. You can use matching thread and make your stitches look much nicer than I did here.

With my applique piece in place, on top of the piece of fabric it is being appliqued to, I bring my needle up from underneath of my fabric just catching the applique piece and go back into the fabric right at the edge of the applique piece.

Continue sewing down your applique piece this way leaving about 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch open. Take out your basting thread.

Remove the paper.

Use your needle to turn the seam allowance under and continue sewing in the same manner you did before until your applique piece is completely sewn down.

To assemble block see picture. It is the cutest block and I can't wait to see the 6 inch version when I finish it. 

Here are the links to Blocks 1~11:

Block #1 ~ Churn Dash

Block #2 ~ Jacob's Ladder

Block #3 ~ Ohio Star

Block #4 ~ Bear Paw

Block #5 ~ Granny Square

Block #6 ~ Shoo-Fly

Block #7 ~ Card Trick

Block #8 ~ Friendship Star 

Block #9 ~ Square in a Square

Block #10 ~ Log Cabin

Block #11 ~ Flying Geese Pinwheel

Come join us over at the hand pieced flickr group!

Next week we will go over assembling the quilt top!!! Have a great weekend!

WIP Wednesday ~ 4/11/12

It's been a slow week around here. Everyone has come down with a cold. I've spent days sitting on the couch cuddling with sick little kiddos. So I have to be pretty quick on here today before I am called to sit on the couch and watch Mustard Pancakes for the umpteenth time.
I sewed a few more hexagons into flowers. Right now I think I am going with the aqua Kona to put in between my flowers unless I find a more traditional green that I like. 

I crocheted more Granny Squares. I wanted a more cream colored white but my sister in law assured me that this bright white looked better. I think I need 100 of these. I have 12 :)

I played around with little squares.

and I sewed my hand pieced block for the week and worked out the measurements and template for Friday's block.
That's it. I finished nothing. Started new things and worked on one old thing.
Now back to my seat on the couch that now has my rear end permanently imprinted on it.

Linking up with Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday.

See ya Friday :)

Good Friday

 Here is the story if you were ever curious.

Happy Easter!

Hand Pieced Quilt-A-Long Block #11 ~ Flying Geese Pinwheel

I asked Jacque if she had any suggestions for this week's block and she suggested a pinwheel. I thought that was a brilliant suggestion and I really love pinwheels. I chose a Flying Geese Pinwheel because I get many compliments and questions about my Flying Geese Pinwheel quilts. There are a few speed piecing methods for Flying Geese units but I think they are more geared towards machine piecing. So for this block we will use the traditional method of piecing flying geese.

For the block you will need:
1 ~ 4 1/4 inch square for the geese (print)
4 ~ 2 3/8 inch square for the sky (background)
4 ~ 2 x 3 1/2 inch rectangles (background)

Mark a line on each diagonal of the 4 1/4 in. print square. Mark your sewing / seam allowance lines also.

Mark a diagonal line on the 2 3/8 in. background squares, 4 total. Mark your seam allownace, mark the seam allowance for the 2 x 3 1/2 in. rectangles too.

Sew your Flying Geese units together, 4 total.

Sew a 2 x 3 1/5 in. rectangle to the pointy end of your Flying Geese unit.

Layout your units in a pinwheel pattern. Sew your 4 units together. I like to sew left to right, top to bottom.

Here are all of my blocks so far...

Here are the links to Blocks 1~10:
Block #1 ~ Churn Dash
Block #2 ~ Jacob's Ladder
Block #3 ~ Ohio Star
Block #4 ~ Bear Paw
Block #5 ~ Granny Square
Block #6 ~ Shoo-Fly
Block #7 ~ Card Trick
Block #8 ~ Friendship Star 
Block #9 ~ Square in a Square
Block #10 ~ Log Cabin

Come join us over at the hand pieced flickr group!

I hope you all have a happy weekend :)