Another do.Good Stitches finish

I was the mama for our Bliss circle in October. I was inspired by this Red Pepper Quilt:

But I didn't want to do sashing again. So I asked the girls to make me one block like above and then one 9 patch with the colors inverted. Each block finished out at 12 inches. I love the simplicity of this one.

Here's a close up of some of the scrappy cuteness:

I machine stitched my binding on.

And the back is all black and white to contrast the front.

I just have to share this because it made me laugh. I put on the label before quilting and it fell in a perfect spot!

Thank you ladies of Bliss circle, you did a great job!

Color Wheel Quilt finish

I hope all of you here in the States with me had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Ours was full of fun and food. So grateful for my little family.

This quilt has been on my "to-make" list for a long time. Since I've been on a fabric diet I figured this was the perfect time to raid my stash and finally get it done! Not sure if that's really logical, but it was in my mind!

This pattern comes from the book Last Minute Patchwork and Practical Gifts by Joelle Hoverson. And it is so much easier than it looks!

The part that takes the longest is picking out your fabrics. To me, that's the most fun!

One thing I did struggle with was the quilting. I thought about doing circular quilting but knew there were a few "bubbles" in the color part that weren't going to be the most flat. So I stuck with the straight line that I've seen most people do.

The center was the challenge. When I started, I was going all in one direction, one line after the next. All the fabric was being pushed into the center and I wound up with a huge ball in the center. What wound up working for me was to start in the center a few times and do a bunch of lines in a few different directions to smooth down all the fabric. It came out pretty good!

Now I just need to put a sleeve on the back so I can hang this in our great room. I think it will go perfect over the kids toy shelf.

Quilt stats:

Size: 56"x 56"

Pattern: Joelle Hoverson, Last Minute Practical Patchwork and Gifts

Fabrics:  stash

Quilted by: Myself

Finished: 11/12/12

Bee blocks

I don't think I've blogged about these yet. I was an overachiever with my 4x6 blocks and got them out pretty early. What can I say? It was my first time and I was really excited about my block choice.  Here is my mockup with my colors.

 

The block is called the birthday star and can be found here. These are the blocks I made for my hive members.

I'm excited to see what everyone has made for me.

Then I also got done my November do.Good Stitches blocks. This month we made scrappy butterfly blocks with this tutorial. These were so easy, they came together nice and quickly!

And speaking of Flicker groups, I'm really excited to have joined the Scrappy Bits swap again. And for the first time I've joined the Doll Quilt Swap for lucky round 13! So I should have some fun stuff to blog about! Have you joined any fun flickr groups lately?

Neptune Baby Quilt

Sorry it's been so long since my last post. Things have been a little busy with Hurricane Sandy, personal issues and family issues. But, rest assured we are all good. We were really spared by Sandy and I'm so grateful.

On to the fun stuff, this quilt has been in the works for a little while and I'm excited to have it finished. If you've been around here a while you've seen me auditioning different solids for this one here. After that I auditioned Kona Everglade and Kona Flesh. Neither gave me the look I wanted.

So finally at a PMQG sewing night, my friend Anna helped me find this fun Basic Gray Grunge (asparagus?). I'm really into textured solids right now and I think this makes a fun sashing fabric.

I had a Neptune Honeybun and was waiting for the right inspiration. I saw a quilt with this pattern in a local quilt shop and knew it was perfect. After posting about it, I found out that Camille Roskelley has a pattern for this in her Simplify book.

I decided to do some random loopy quilting on it and I think it turned out fun. Here are a couple close ups so you can see the quilting and the sashing fabric.

I used the anchor stripes on the binding because I love a stripey bias binding.

 I think being on a fabric diet has helped me get over hoarding favorite fabrics. I used all Neptune for the backing and it felt good!

My label is sewn in.

I was thinking of selling this but not sure if I'm ready to part with it. Let me know if there is any interest and maybe I'll finally open an Etsy shop!

I am entering this into the Sew Sweetness Tula Pink Sew-Along.

Quilt stats:

Size: 56"x62"

Pattern: LQS/ Camille Roskelley?

Fabrics: Tula Pink Neptune, Basic Grey Grunge

Quilted by: Myself

Finished: 11/1/12