Sunday Stash

I don't think I ever do these...but I added some cute fabric to my stash this week so I thought, why not?!

Friday night was the first sewing night of the Philly Modern Quilt Guild.  I drove over an hour through rain, wind and traffic to get there, but it was worth it!  I got the binding sewn onto my animal alphabet pinwheel quilt (which I LOVE) and picked up some new fabric while in the shop.  How could I resist?

3 yards of Blush by Basic Grey for Moda.  Yummy!  Believe it or not, I don't really have any WIPs.  So I might just have to cut this up soon!  

Such a busy weekend!  Saturday I drove through more wind, rain, and flooded roads to a baby shower to give mommy-to-be the animal alphabet quilt.  I literally pulled it out of the dryer, wrapped it, and walked out the door!  Talk about last minute finishes....but here it is all quilted.

Here is a close up of the backing...so cute!

Hope you had a great weekend!

“A” is for …

Animal Alphabet…

Yet another baby quilt and hopefully my last for quite a  little bit.

This is my first attempt at pinwheels and so far I’m loving it.  Charm packs make it quick and easy peasy to put together!

The fabrics are so colorful and fun…perfect for a little one!

Here is the top all put together with a cute baby blue border.  Fabric is Animal Alphabet by Moda with some white solids mixed in.  Another attempt at stippling…we’ll see!  I see basting/quilting in the near future since this one will be gifted on Saturday!

FO – Happy Campers

Here it is in all it’s quilty goodness!

 

 

I held this one captive for show and tell at the first meeting of the Philly Modern Quilting Guild (which was awesome btw!). 

My coworker stopped in with her new son last week and I was able to give it to her then, instead of mailing it out!  Whew!  Another one gone, and one more baby quilt left to complete for a shower on Saturday.  What ever will I do when I’m done making baby quilts?

Giveaways!

There are a few giveaways out there in bloggy world right now.  Here are a few I found through the ORB flickr group.

 

Michelle’s Musings is giving away a $50 shopping spree to CSN Stores in honor of her 28th birthday.   I went practical and picked a backpack for school!  Giveaway open until Feb 23rd!

 

Greta at Because I Sew So is giving away a FQ of Flea Market Fancy!!!  No seriously she is!  Giveaway open until Saturday morning Feb 21st.  Hurry over and leave a comment.

 

Dena is giving away 1/2 yard prints of Heather Ross, Tea Garden, Moda Mother Goose, and Make It You by RJR Fabrics for her 300 blog post milestone.  Go over and congratulate her!  Tell her I sent you!  Giveaway open until Feb 23rd.

 

Grendelskin is giving away a fabric strip set based on your choice of two color-ways to make your own quilt top using the Film in the Fridge tutorial for string quilts.  Giveaway open until Feb 28th.

Stippling Woes

I gave it my best effort…2 hours worth of sewing, ripping out large amounts of stippling, playing with tensions, rinse and repeat.  I told myself to not be a perfectionist about stippling and I was pretty happy with my work until I peaked at the reverse side.  My tension was way out of whack! 

First, it was too tight on the back.  I used 2 different colors of thread which I shortly decided was a bad idea.  After adjusting the tension to what I thought worked well, at least on my scrap piece, I ended up with the thread being really loose on the back.  Grrr!  Needless to say after I tore it all out a total of three times, I ended up straight line quilting the table runner.

Any advice regarding tensions would be really helpful!  I think I’ll whip up some pot holders for practice.

In other non-quilty news, there is a lot of snow on the ground from the snow storms last week and the week before.  The supermarket was out of eggs this weekend due to the storms and there were signs posted in the produce section indicating prices would be increasing and that supplies would be low.  I’m a little nervous about it to say the least. 

A picture of our snow covered street the day after the last storm:

A perfect weekend

because:

~no snow!  I’m still looking at piles of the white stuff but at least it didn’t inconvenience my weekend.

~me and Hubby went to a Flyers game Friday night complete with Chickie and Pete’s crab fries and my new favorite beer Blue Moon!

~I spent an entire Saturday sewing.  I finished one project and am almost finished my happy campers quilt.  Pictures to come soon!

~I bought my first OttLite lamp at JoAnn’s Saturday (40% off!) while picking up some Navy Kona solid.  The light is awesome!

~my wonderful husband is making a surf and turf dinner for Valentine’s day.  He cooks amazing meals!

Modern Quilting

Recently Julie started the Philly Chapter of the Modern Quilt Guild.  I was sooo excited when I saw Julie post about it because I’ve been looking for a quilting guild to get involved with locally.  I’m semi-new to quilting…I love the bright and bold fabrics that aren’t sold at JoAnn’s (read: designer).  Like all quilters and seamstresses, I have a mild complete obsession with fabric.   I make what I like and generally work with colors I love.   Am I a modern quilter?  I don’t know.  I’m not exactly sure what modern quilting is or if it can be completely defined.  Over at the Modern Quilt Guild blog, the question, “What does modern quilting mean to me?” was asked and I’ve been trying to answer it.  Here’s what I came up with:

Modern quilting is about fresh and fun fabrics.  The first time I tried quilting I picked the most traditional block pattern and boring fabrics.  Talk about uninspiring!  That project is packed up far, far away!  Modern quilting is taking old versions of traditional blocks and making them your own..either with fabric choices and/or machine quilting.  Modern quilting is also making your own pattern or having no pattern at all.  Although, I have to admit I am not a fan of wonkiness and wonky log cabins.  I think that’s just my Type A  personality.  To read more about modern quilting, check out the Modern Quilt Guild blog.

The Essence of Life

For Christmas, my extended family participated in a white elephant gift exchange.  My intention was to make my gift…it was a good intention.  I pieced a disappearing 9 patch table runner out of Essence by Deb Strain for Moda.  I was going to make coasters or buy a candle to go with it.  I only got as far as the piecing until work magically sent me off to central Pennsylvania for a few days. 

What really happened was I became  afraid…of stippling.  Silly, right?  I loved the pieced top and thought it would look amazing stippled…but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.  So there it sits, unfinished and calling out.  But now I have a problem…I have a baby quilt I want  to stipple so it looks like I’ll be tackling that table runner after all!  It’ll be great practice for a bigger project.

We have another major snowstorm on the way tonight.  Our third of over 20 inches in one year.  Craziness!  Maybe I’ll attempt some stippling between shoveling duty!