Bluebirds

The baby bluebirds have grown up and flown away.  Here is a photo that my husband took a couple of days before they left the nest.

They will spend the next couple of weeks hiding out in the woods close by while they learn how to fly better.  The parent bluebirds will still help feed them while they learn how to feed themselves.  There was one egg left in the nest that didn't hatch.  We are hoping the parents will come back and raise a third batch of beautiful bluebirds this year.  Bluebirds are territorial and this particular couple have claimed the bluebird house in our backyard.  It helps that my husband keeps a feeder stocked with mealworms!

 

My Good Luck is Finished?

Okay, it's getting to be the end of the month and I have a finish of sorts that I would like to share.  Here is a picture of my Good Luck quilt before I added the borders. 

Today was a busy and productive day.  My husband and I cleaned out our FROG (finished room over the garage).  It had become our dumping ground for luggage, boxes, worn out computers, outdated electronics...oh, it was a mess!  So we spent most of the day getting rid of stuff.  (This means more room for stash!)  My sewing time was limited.  But I did get the rest of the sashing sewn on and the rows all pieced. 

Here is a picture of it with the borders on.  It is on a full size bed (in the clean, dejunked FROG).

 

 

 

I hope to get the backing pieced and sewn together tomorrow.  Then the top and back of the quilt will be put away for machine quilting later.  (There is a really great reason the FROG got cleaned out!  I am so excited!)  And I am really hoping that my Good Luck that is finished is just the quilt top.

Good Luck Quilt in Progress

Will this quilt bring me good luck?  Should I buy lottery tickets?

I have been working on this one in the mornings before I go to work.  So far, I have the first two rows pieced together with sashing.  When I bought the Kona Coal I was a little concerned if it was too dark.  I like it!  Here is how it looks:

 

 

 

 

All four rows in the bottom photo.  It has a border and will end up at 79" x 79".  The pattern is from Debby Kratovil's book Supersize 'Em.  She taught this class at the Raleigh, NC Sewing Expo.  (See my earlier post.)

 

I hope to get the top finished before we have guests come to stay with us next week!  



 

Update on baby Bluebirds!

While at the Expo, my husband sent me this picture of the baby Bluebirds ~

 

They are getting much more cute, aren't they?

 

I hope their house kept them high and dry because here is a pic of our backyard this morning in the deluge of rain!

 

 

 

Here's a picture of a box turtle that was hiding during the rain and thunderstorm under a tree in our backyard ~

 





A wonderful BDay gift from a very special, awesome friend

My dear, awesome friend Jessica gave me my early BDay present while we were at the Expo.  LOVE!  This quilt will be hung in a special place on my sewing room wall.  It is gorgeous!  (After making this block for the mini quilt challenge, I know first hand how time consuming it is.  She made FOUR!)

 

I have the FQ stash of the Modern Bliss fabric line, which she knew.  I am dying to get it out and start making a quilt!  (I haven't quite made up my mind which block/quilt pattern yet.)

Thank you, thank you Jessica!!

Gorgeous, isn't it?!?!  (It is a cloudy, dark, rainy Monday.  My pic isn't the best.) 

And the pillow cover she made to go with it ~

 

What a great, awesome friend! 



After the Sewing and Quilting Expo!

I don't even know where to start!  I had an absolutely fabulous time at the Expo with my friend Jessica!  (A huge thanks to my dear husband who kept everything together at home, cooked and cleaned while I was gone.)

It took two bellhop carts to get me and my friend Jessica's stuff to the room!  Poor bellhop, but we tipped him well.

This was our view before going down into the Expo shopping area.  Jessica called it going down to heaven!  A contained place just full of fabric, thread, patterns, gadgets, notions, sewing machines, sergers, longarm machines, cabinets, etc.  Oh My!

A quilted car cover!

One of my favorite quilts - there were others but I didn't take enough pictures.  : (

 

Here are pics of some of the projects from the classes that I took:

 

 

Two columns/rows finished of Tumbling Blocks taught by Nelly Vileikis.

 

And 4 blocks from the Good Luck Quilt block class taught by Debby Kratovil ~

 

 



This class was one of my favorites, Debby is a fantastic teacher!  That evening, Jessica and I went back up to our room and cut, pieced, pressed and sewed away!  I have a pile of pinned pieces that need be sewn together. 

The gray will be the sashing and the aqua fabric in the center of the blocks (photo above) will be the cornerstones.  I am excited to get this one finished!

I also took the classes Bag in a Flash:  Serger basics taught by Barb Callahan, All About Zippers taught by Darlene Guillory, and Longarming 101 taught by Valerie Schlake.  (YES.  I did take a class in longarming - but that's for a different post later!)

Here is a pic of my Glimma tote, name tag holder, Note Taker (pattern by Pink Chalk Studio), and Class Mate (pattern by Atkinson Design) that I took with me ~

Last but not least, I got some great stash!  Heather Bailey fabrics!  WhooHoo!

Sewing Expo!

I am sew excited!  It is almost finally here!  'IT' is the Sewing Expo in Raleigh!  I cannot wait to go!  Yay!  Going with my good friend Jessica.  I like hanging out with people who cut up perfectly good fabric just to sew it back together again.

Here is a picture (taken this morning) of some prep work I finished last night for one of my classes that I am taking.  I love this line of fabrics (Urban Mod); the colors, the feel of the fabric, and I have leftovers, too! 

 

 

Happy Father's Day!  

Glimma Quilt in progress

 

Here are the blocks that I have done for the Glimma quilt!  The blocks are 12.5" unfinished.  I plan on the quilt being 5 across and 6 down.  Depending on how it looks, I might add borders.  I love how it is turning out!  Making these blocks is quite time consuming even with chain piecing.  There is a quite a bit of ironing involved.  It's worth it, I think!

Mini Quilt Challenge!

Jennifer Mathis from Ellison Lane has a mini quilt challenge that is open until 5:00 pm June 16.  There are prizes!!

This is a block I fell in love with - the Windmill block designed by Lynne Goldsworthy at Lily's Quilts from the book Modern Blocks compiled by Susanne Woods.   It is paper piecing, which isn't my favorite, probably because I am not very good at thinking upside down and backwards.  ; p  When I saw the mini quilt challenge on Jennifer's blog, I knew exactly what mini quilt I wanted to make!  With color; bright, happy color!  The center fabrics are from Connecting Threads, all others are R. Kaufman fabrics including the Kona bleached white (from my stash).  It finished at 15" x 15".  I enlarged the paper piecing pattern by 20%.

 

(After being washed and dried.)

 

 

 

The front and back before being washed and dried.  No, this wasn't an easy block.  I might make it again because I love windmills.  This one reminds me of a Ferris wheel.  I put a button in the middle (which was hard work because of all the center stitching and the seams!).  I am not sure I like the look.  Different color button?  Hmmmm.  This will go on my sewing room wall.

 

 

Pictures of finished Scrappy Garden Trellis Quilt

Voila!  The binding and label are sewn on, and the quilt has been washed and dried to crinkly perfection.   The bottom picture shows the FMQ a little better.   It is about 44" x 46".  I used up just about all of my Amy Butler Lark jelly roll scraps to make this. 

(Front)

(Back - imagine tree is not there...)

 

(The FMQ - I am trying out different patterns.)

Baby Bluebirds!

Three of the four Bluebird eggs have hatched!  Awww, aren't they cute?  Well, not really at this stage.  One of them is obviously hungry! 

Lucky Pinwheels Quilt

All weekend, thanks to tropical storm Andrea, I have been working on a quilt that I have named Lucky Pinwheels.  It is a pattern by Jaybird Quilts (Julie Herman) called "Carnival".  I used the Lazy Angle ruler designed by Lazy Girl Designs (Joan Hawley).  Both the pattern and ruler are very cool!  I will be using the ruler again to make an autumn quilt - hopefully THIS year!

Here is a picture of a stack on some that have been ironed along with a stack of ones I'd just finished chain piecing.  It is a happy, bright, colorful stack!

And here is a picture of my 1st quality inspector in the sun. (When we did get some sun this weekend.)  He's making sure that I square up the pieces just so...

 A picture of the pieced back...

(Bright and cheery!)

 

 And a picture of my second quality control inspector making sure I got all the wrinkles out of the quilt sandwich...

(He's personally pressing it for me.)

 

This quilt is going to be given away, so I am not going to post anymore pictures until I have given it to the special person!  I have been wanting to make her a quilt for a long time with this line of fabrics and I finally did it.  She loved another quilt that I made a couple of years ago in a similar pattern with the same fabrics.  So I hope she likes this one!  (I don't think she follows my blog, but I'm not sure.)

 

I am excited to start quilting it as I already have what I want to do in mind, which doesn't always happen for me.  Sometimes I have to stare and think, look at books, put it off for awhile and end up usually just jumping in feet first.  Sometimes it works, sometimes not.

 

I will post more pictures later.

Bluebird Eggs!

We have a bluebird house and a bluebird couple that live in it every Spring/Summer!  They have already had one family, and now they are on their second one.  Bluebirds can have as many as three clutches of eggs every Spring and Summer.

My dear husband got a great picture last night and here it is:

 

 

So far, 4 eggs!  Last family was 5!  In about 3 weeks they will start to hatch!  I will post more pictures.

Craftsy Block of the Month June 2013

This year, I have signed up for 3 block of the month clubs (so far).  While this interrupts my quilting and sewing schedule (like I have one - Ha!), I have learned great skills from making each and every block! 

Here is a work around I did for the Craftsy BOM for June:

 



This is known as Lemon Star, Lemoyne Star (name on Craftsy although I didn't find that name in my Encyclopedia of Quilt Blocks), Idaho Star and a few others.  I wanted to see if I could take the pattern and make it with 1/2 square triangles, a few rectangles and a some squares.  I wondered if this would simplify the Y-seams.  Well, I am not sure if it was "simpler" or not...I haven't made the one actually taught on Craftsy.  ; )  I plan to!  I did simplify the cutting of this as I used my Accuquilt Go and the dies.  The size is also bigger than the one on Craftsy by 3/4".  Looking at the layout of the quilt, I can do a work around for the size difference.

I was born and grew up in Idaho and have been looking at making a quilt with the Idaho Star, Farmer's Daughter, Fourth of July and some other quilt blocks about my life.  That is one of the reasons I really wanted to see if the Idaho Star could be made several different ways.  It can, but I am not sure that the look is quite the same.

 

 

Here is where I pin my oversized blocks with the Lemon Star on top!  My finished Swoon blocks are there, my finished Sew Lux Hop Skip and Jump blocks are there along with some name tags and a favorite saying.  It is my happy wall!  Oh, and my sewing room gets the sun from the east.  It is a bright place to work in the mornings and that is usually where I can be found...



Finished Projects!

There is one thing I do not like about sewing - and that is hand sewing!  I put doing it off until I have several items to do.  Then I like to hand sew on the bindings, etc. while I watch TV.  But I don't watch much TV at all.  I'd rather be sewing!

Here is a Classmate that I got the binding sewn down on, along with my finished name tag holder.

 

 

It is a bit blurry, sorry about that!  The pattern I used is in the picture, Classmate by Atkinson Designs.  This was a challenge for me!  My topstitching isn't very good as with all the layers (soft and stable is one of them).  My machines did their best, but it was hard to get an even stitch.  (Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it!)

 

There are a lot of pockets in the Classmate!  I love lots of pockets to stash stuff.  Perhaps it is that whole stash thingy...

 

Here is the inside of the Classmate and the back of the name tag holder.

 

 

 

Yeah, finished is a great feeling!  Ready to go now!

 

Happy Monday!