FNSI Sunflower

 I belong to the Assiniboine Circle Quilt Club and our quilt show is on September 25th. The theme for our show is sunflowers and I had planned on entering 2 sunflower quilts. One is only a background so far, and the other was just a bunch of petals cut out. Time to panic. Thank goodness for the FNSI. I finished cutting out some leaves and have temporarily placed the sunflowers on one of the quilts. The sunflowers are not sewn together, just lightly tacked together with Elmer's glue. Once the placement of the flowers and leaves is final, they will be tacked into place with the glue, then raw edge appliqued in place.

I had started this quilt in a class. I believe this is based on a Phil Beaver's design. In the beginning I was cutting out the petal pieces exactly as the pattern but that was way too finicky for me, so I just freehand cut the rest. The pattern had a rooster in it - too barnyard for me. I love roosters but not for this quilt. As of yet I have no idea how to do the stems. The original plan was to use some kind of braided trim but I think it will end up being just fabric. The sunflower centers will probably have some beading (if I can get my act together!). I'm completely drawing a blank on how to free motion quilt the background. Any suggestions?

I always think I know what I will work on for the FNSI, but invariably change my mind by the time it rolls around. Maybe I have a fear of project commitment!

Happy Stitching
corina

Vintage Patterns, Wins & Where Did the Time Go?!

No, I haven't disappeared off the face of the earth. This past month was super busy and blogging took a backseat (more on that near the end of the post). There has been no sewing but I did come across some vintage patterns when I was tidying up my sewing storage. I bought these at a garage sale a few years ago. My idea is to put them in frames and hang them in my sewing room. I really love the Jacki O style pattern.

 

Guess they had pretty tiny waists back then!

 I was lucky to win 3 giveaways this past few weeks! The first was lovely fabric from Tilda's Twisted Life. to celebrate her 100th post (she has designed a lovely quilt called X Marks The Spot, you should pop by her blog and see it). Thank you so much Melinda!

Check out this lovely prize I won from Lynne at Lily's Quilts (great site - lots of tutorials too).

I thought I won a sample pack and a simple little color card for Aurifil thread. When I opened up the package I was blown away by the color card. The colors are actual threads wrapped on the cardboard and it is huge. It came with a pack of 5 spools of different weights of thread. One of them is a variegated black and white (they must have seen all the B&W quilts I've been making!)

The last giveaway was a bundle of fresh lavender from Sue Hauser of Alderwood Quilts.

They have a wonderful online quilt store (especially love the selection of patterns they carry) and they also own a lavender farm!! I couldn't actually receive the lavender myself as I live in Canada (you know - shipping plants across border issues), but I was able to give the bouquet to a blogging friend, Linda from Stray Stitches. I'm sure many of you are familiar with her wonderful blog. It is because of her that I've won so many giveaways! Instead of searching out giveaways, I just go to her blog and there is a list of them for me to check out! Hmm, maybe I shouldn't have said anything - might diminish my chances of more wins!

The reason I haven't been around lately is that my best friend who has bravely endured whatever cancer has thrown her way these last 12 months has had another major surgery. Actually she had 2 within days of each other, as there were complications and they had to go back in and fix it. I'm happy to report she is out of the hospital and doing better!

Between the hospital visits I was painting the trim on our house. Not the best thing to do if you are afraid of heights! It's also pretty hard to paint when you are glued to the stucco in fear! I wanted to surprise my husband though, so I bravely made it up three rungs of the ladder, knees a knocking all the way (you can stop laughing now).

Now that life is a little more settled I am gearing up for more sewing. The FNSI is this Friday and I am sooo looking forward to it. Don't forget to sign up!

Happy Stitching!
corina

My FNSI Results

Even though I was the first to sign up this time, I was probably the last to get started! I'm not quite sure where the day went, or for that matter, half the night. My Moody Blues quilt needed some work so I finished piecing the drunkard's path blocks. They were a bit tricky to sew because on some of them I had to match the strips on both convex and concave portions of the blocks. There will be a lot of matching seams once I sew the blocks together too (now I know why I loved doing the string quilt!)

There are more blocks than are shown in the photo but not too sure of their placement. I like the present arrangement and may leave it as is (I swear I rearrange them on a daily basis!). By the time I add borders it would be a decent size for our bedroom wall. There are a couple of blocks that are just strip pieced. Eventually they will have a full circle appliqued on them.

As you may have noticed I am on a black and white kick. So here we go again!

I finished the last round of another Jelly Roll 1600 last night. I've had a few ideas in my head and that pattern makes the perfect background for them. One of the ideas was to applique a bunch of funky flowers in wild colors off to one side of the top. I cut out one flower (missing a center) to see how I liked it. The other idea is to applique a bunch of philodendron leaves on the top, so I cut out one to see the effect.

I think I like both ideas, which means I need another jelly roll 1600 background! Tomorrow I'm invited to another mini retreat with Myra of Tactile Pleasures in Fabric. I will be bringing my 40 2 1/2" strips and hopefully come home with another background.

Once these last 2 quilts are pieced I've gotta do the sunflower thing. So yes, eventually there will be something else on my blog besides  B/W!

Happy Stitching
corina

Jelly Roll 1600 Expanded

 I came across the Jelly Roll 1600 and decided it would be perfect for the backing of my Disappearing Nine Patch. If you're not familiar with the Jelly Roll 1600, it is a quilt race that uses 1 jelly roll to make a top that is 48x64. You mix up the fabric strips in the jelly roll and sew them together in one long 1600" strip,. Then you cut off the first 18 inches and  take the beginning and end of the strip and sew them right sides together. At the end of the seam you have to snip the strip where you folded it onto itself. Then you repeat the process for a total of 5 rounds  (you start with 1600", then to 800", 400", 200", 100" and finally 50"). The website at Heirloom Creations explains it much better than I do and includes a video of  "the race".

I didn't have a jelly roll, so I just cut up my own 2 1/2" strips.  I needed more than 1600" since it had to be 75" square. I cut 60 width of fabric strips and sewed them into a long 2400" strip (2400", 1200", 600", 300", 150", 75"). That gave me a quilt that was 75" wide  but still only 64" long. To make it longer I just sewed a few extra rows to the top .  I am toying with the idea of appliqueing a few big simple flower shapes on it. Maybe tomorrow. I would definitely use this pattern again. It comes together very quickly. Not including the time I spent cutting strips, it was sewn, ironed and trimmed in just over 3 hours. That includes a million breaks, ironing seams as I went and keeping in mind that I'm not a speedy sewer.

Joining the strips

Longest strip of fabric I've ever worked with!

 Happy Stitching!

 corina

Disappearing Nine Patch

My Disappearing Nine Patch quilt top is done - maybe. I haven't decided if I'm going to add a border or not.

I think I like it just the way it is though (still okay size for a throw at 65", yet I prefer a throw to be at least 70"). I spent most of the day yesterday fooling around with the blocks. At first I just laid them out any which way and it looked way too busy. Then I tried making sure the fabrics all matched within the blocks, still wasn't right. Tried matching all the greens that lined up together and it still wasn't right.  I even tried the other layouts, still not good. Finally I just focused on the greens themselves, and arranged them from lightest and brightest in the center, radiating out towards the darkest. That was the ticket! If I would have known what direction I was going with it when I started, I would have made sure that the whites and blacks I used on the outside would have been the darkest, but I was determined not to have to make more blocks (stubborn German/Polish background).

Puppies have been neglected today. They hate Mom sewing. At one point Jaxi got under the sewing table and stepped on the pedal again. That necessitated a wee bit o' ripping - I'm not a turbo sewer! Time for a nice long walk to stop the grumbling around me. The sun is just starting to go down and there's a nice breeze going so those pesky skeeters shouldn't be a problem.

Happy Stitching
corina

More Black & White

I am on a black and white kick! I still have yards of black & white fabrics in my stash. The last quilt hardly seemed to make a dent in it (perhaps that's due to one or two a few several pieces jumping into my arms at the quilt store recently). I had so much fun making my first string quilt I thought I would make my first Disappearing Nine Patch! I'm totally into instant gratification right now so it's the perfect quilt to make.

I LOVE this!

all the squares cut

9 squares sewn together, then cut in half horizontally and vertically

turn the pieces one way and you get this

or you could make this

There are lots of ways to move the pieces around. I will probably switch out pieces from 4 different blocks so that there are 4 different greens in each. I will be using the layout of the first picture in this post.

The house is in order. All my errands are done. I have paired up some squares and am ready to start chain piecing tomorrow! I'm keeping my fingers crossed that nothing interrupts my perfectly planned day.

Happy Stitching!
Corina