Happy New Year's Eve

I've spent a lot of time over the holidays working on making my new sewing space at the top of the stairs more functional. For your New Year's Eve entertainment, here are some pics of the work in progress! Oh, and New Year's resolution #1 is to finish this off ASAP! Happy New Year's Eve, everybody.

Those shelf things on the top of the regular shelves just needed a place to go. I think I'll stack fabric in the cubbies.

About halfway through cutting header cards off fabric samples. So many pretties!

The last of the fabric that needs to be sorted by color and/or style.

Kaffe Fassett fabric gets its own bin. No slumming with the mixed-manufacturer stuff!

Another bin, this one full of precut fabric packs. Yum, yum, yum...

I had a shocking amount of 30s-40s repros, so they got their own bin, too.

Green, blue, and purple sorting in progress. Lots more to do, too!

Christmas Wish

Merry Christmas, friends. I'm wishing each of you a sweet, blessed holiday full of all the things you love. That includes quilting, of course!

New Miniature Quilt Project

First draft of Homecoming mini sampler

I'm so excited about the new project I started this weekend. It's a miniature sampler that could be done as a block of the month, and the theme is Homecoming. 2014 is the year in which I hope to return to Pennsylvania, after 11 years in Colorado, so going home is very much on my mind. I might as well make a quilt of it, right?

I started with the Home Again Block:

Finished size 3" x 3"

This one is all template piecing, which I decided to do by hand in front of the TV:

Plastic templates ready to use

First I joined the A and B shapes to make the block center:

Here's the back. I trimmed seams to about 1/8", and swirled them at the center to reduce the bulk:

Now I'm working on setting in the background pieces. More soon!

This Little Quilt Went to Jordan...

Well, actually, it hasn't been shipped to Amman just yet, but it's going to be! The crib quilt for my niece's first baby is finished and ready to go. She and her husband are living in Jordan right now (that's next to Israel for the geographically-challenged), and the baby will be born there in February. I probably spent as much time machine quilting it as I did piecing, so I'm going to indulge in a couple of close-up pics, too!

I washed and machine dried it, and the quilting just popped!

Hoping you can see the sampler effect of the quilting patterns here

This quilt was great fun to make, and it's full of prayers and wishes for the happiest baby-hood ever. Look out, Amman, Jordan, here it comes!

Happy St. Nicholas Day!

From stnicholascenter.org

For those of you who aren't familiar with St. Nicholas' Day, December 6 is the feast day of the patron saint of children, who was the model for the modern-day Santa Claus. In lots of countries, children put out their stockings or shoes on the eve of December 6, and receive treats if they've been good, and possibly coal or sticks if they haven't! Since everyone who reads this blog has been very, very good, here's a treat to celebrate the day. McCallsQuilting.com has published the pattern to make my small Lone Star wall hanging, and you can get it free online! Click here, and get ready to turn 2 1/2" strips into something beautiful. Enjoy!

Adapted from a quilt designed by Lissa Alexander

Machine Quilting Adventure

The animal-themed crib quilt I started awhile ago for my niece's first baby is coming along well. Today I finished machine quilting all the solid-colored patches, and made good headway on the animal- and word-print ones as well. I had a lot of fun deciding on quilting motifs for each of the solid colors. Check these out:

Double hearts with a looping meander for the pale pink patches

Swirls for the orange patches...my favorite

Sunbursts for the yellow patches

Pea pods and snaky curves in the green patches

Waves for the blue patches

Stars with a large meander for the violet patches

I still have 3 rows of print patches to quilt, and then it's on to the binding. I can see the finish line from here!