Black and White Plus One - Lonesome Beauty

Today was the reveal of the Swamp Fox Quilter's 2015 Guild Challenge and now I can show of my entry!  The theme this year was "Black and White Plus One." There is no gray in the quilt at all.  The illusion of gray is formed by picking out fabrics with tighter prints and varying amounts of black or white in each print.   

 The designed for this quilt came about by fusing three different quilts I saw on the internet:  The center Lonestar the outer ring of Lonestar blocks, and the stripped diagonal border.

I took several progress photos along the way with my cell phone.

 Since I worked on this quilt at various times each day, they all have different lighting.

Working full time and trying to get this quilt finished in time for the show meant random sewing times and several quick 15 minutes sessions during lunch breaks.

As I was putting the top together, I noticed the outer edge of the Lonestar got a little lost next to the black and white border fabric, so I decided to give the whole Lonestar section a skinny black outline.

Basting with the help of Sheen.
It never fails, when there is a quilt on the floor to be basted, Sheen is always here to make sure the pins are all in the right spot.

 I did continuous curves in all the diamond pieces, and some freehand in the New York Beauties.

 The borders got some fancy feathers, but they get lost somewhat in the busyness of the darker fabrics.

All those hours of shopping for the right fabrics, cutting, sewing, and quilting paid off and I am excited to say the quilt won Best of Show in our little quilt show!  It also won Best Piecing, Best Use of Theme, and second place for Machine Quilting!  I am super excited!

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Guild Challenge Quilt Progress

I snapped this photo on my phone when I was working on the borders for my guild challenge quilt.   I made another strip set just like it going in the opposite direction. Then I chopped them both up into smaller strips for the border.

I can't wait to show off the whole quilt!

Notice how I get assistance from my furry helper.

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End of April

Well, I didn't finish my goal for ALYOF.  All my spare sewing time in April was spent trying to finish my challenge quilt for my guild show.  The show is in June, but the quilts are due the first Thursday in May.  The challenge theme this year is "Black and White Plus One".  

Here is a sneak peak at one part of the quilt. I still have to finish the quilting. I may have to pull some late nights, but this will be done in time for the show!
I chose red as my "Plus One".  I contemplated picking another color because I feel there will be a lot of quilts with red, but seeing how red is my favorite color I ultimately couldn't stray from it.

I'll show the whole quilt at the beginning of June once all the quilts have been revealed at the show.

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ALYOF April Goal

I will be spending the first half of the month finishing up my guild challenge quilt, which has to stay secret till June so I am picking a smaller goal this month to make sure I have a good chance of finishing it. My Guild challenge quilt will be a finish in itself, but I want one I can show off at the end of the month.

I have been working on the hand embroidery on my "We Support You" quilt.  I got the rest of the hangers completed a couple weeks ago.  Now it is ready for a blanket stitch around the bras.  After that it will be ready for quilting.  For April's goal I am aiming for finishing only the blanket stitching.

If I finish my guild challenge early I may get to the quilting, but for now I am committing to completing the blanket stitching.  

Head over to the link party here to see all the other April Goals

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Polk A Dot Dresden In Progress

Some late night sewing tonight. Trying to get my dresden plates done in time to link up for the March ALYOF.

Bird Tree Blog Hop

I am excited to be a part of this blog hop. The birds in this fabric line are so pretty and I was lucky to be able to find the bird house panel and some coordinating fabric to go with it.

I cut each birdhouse and put them into a square in a square block on point...sort of.  The birdhouses aren't quite square, but I made them work all the same.  I used some of the all over bird fabric as the alternating blocks.  I figured the best way to show off this fabric was to cut it in a nice ten inch square.

The blue and the yellow sashing also come from this fabric line.  

They are soft colors and compliment the panel perfectly.

As I was contemplating what fabric I wanted for the back I thought about keeping it a nice pastel color to match the front, but I didn't have enough of anything in my stash that matched.  My stash is mostly jeweltones and bright rainbow colors, and a lot of halloween (which definitely wouldn't work). After letting the quilt sit for a while, I decided to go with this hydrangea print and matched some colors to go with it.  After all, birds live in bushes and trees.

Since I was only able to find the bird houses panel online, I am keeping my fingers crossed that I win one of the bird only panels from some of the other hoppers this week.  I have some left over scraps from this fabric line that would go fabulous with more birds.  ;)

If you haven't already, make sure you hop on over to these sites to see all the other bird related creations.

Friday, March 20 

Freemotion By The River

Sew Incredibly Crazy

Tea Time Creations

Baa's Amazing Adventures!

Selina Quilts

Ramblings of a Quilter

Busy Bee Quilts

Quilted Delights - (Me)

Grandmama's Stories

Thanks to Mdm Samm and Lana for getting everything set up.

To see the whole list of hoppers, click HERE.

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PQ6 Week 5 - Your Favorite Fabric

This week's theme for Project Quilting was: Your Favorite Fabric.

We were suppose to take our favorite piece of fabric (or set of fabrics) that have been sitting on the shelf for too long. The challenge was to actually make something out of it instead of caressing and admiring it.

I have a shelf that I store all my favorite fabrics.

Only the best of the best get put on that shelf.  The rest get stored on my other shelf by colors.  On this particular shelf are are several charm packs, a couple layer cakes, several random fat quarters, and two full fat quarter bundles.

For this challenge I decided to go with these two charm packs from Moda.  

I am tackling two projects this week with one quilt.  I also needed to make a quilt for my new grand niece and I knew these charm packs were the perfect fabrics for a cute little girl quilt.

Next came the hard part of figuring out what pattern I wanted to use. I knew I would be short on sewing time this week since I had to go to Rock Hill, SC for All State Choir with my son, so I ended up picking out a pattern that I could sew together in just a couple days.  I used the Jelly Roll Turn Over pattern from the Moda Bake Shop.

Yes, I am one of those people who sew over pins.  Usually I don't have any trouble but this week I wasn't so lucky.  I hit the pin in just the right spot and yanked the whole needle out of the socket, bent the pin a perfect 90 degrees into the machine, and yanked the throat plate off.

Luckily the machine and the fabric were just fine, but I have decided it may be best not to sew over pins for awhile.

I had the whole top completed and basted by late Wednesday night. Sheen was more than willing to help out, but I had to shoo him away when he decided he wanted to chew on the basting pins.  Can't have him eating those.


Since I had to leave town right after work Thursday, I packed up the sewing machine and took it to the hotel and did the quilting during choir practice.

During my son's lunch break we went to Glencairn Gardens and had a quilty photo shoot.

With the help of Sharon, a fellow project quiltian, I have named this quilt "Blooming"

It measures approx. 50 x 70 inches.

I used cute little frogs on Lilly pads for the back.

They go perfect with the flowers and butterflies on the front.

 All over swirlyness for the quilting on this one.

Click here to see all the other entries.

Voting starts Sunday Afternoon and lasts till Friday!

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ALYOF - March Goal

I almost forgot to post my March Goal for ALYOF. Today is the last day for link ups.

I've decided to work on my pastel dresden quilt. I want to have the dresden blocks completed by the end of March. This weekend I have been collecting the last Patel Polk-a-dot fabrics I need. I found the the last purple, blue, and green but I still need one more pastel pink. I have one more shop I'll try next Wednesday.

Check out all the other goals for March Here.

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