A finish and a bit of decorating

Well the week is off to a good start if you ignore the weather - too bad ignoring the weather doesn't make it stop raining - ugh! Anyway I finished a little quilt and I love how it turned out. Just like the picture I had in my head. Love when that happens.

This is a Schnibble called Hat Trick - you can see it here. I used the Basic Grey collection PB & J paired with some Basic Grey Grunge in a yellow and red. LOVE that Grunge fabric! Now my friend Kathy quilted this in exchange for me knitting her one of those Urban Lace Infinity cowls I'm so fond of. I really love swapping like this and hope to do it again. She did a lovely job on this using a pretty golden yellow thread and some cute octopus-like flowers. It is hard to see it pictures but she also included my name in the border. My name, Carol, is quilted twice on each side in that alphabet print - how cool is that?? VERY!!!

So after getting the binding on last night in time to take it to Show N Tell at the guild meeting I knew just where I wanted to display this.

I got this idea from a blog post by Lori Holt of Bee in my Bonnet. I thought it was a great way to display multiple quilts in a small space. This is the entry to my storage room off my sewing studio. You see it as you come down the stairs into the basement. Very welcoming I think!

To hang the quilts I sewed a little triangular pocket into the corner of the quilt.

And I lucked out when I saw this over the door hanger at the dollar spot at Target. Actually I think I may have paid $2 or $3 for it but it was worth it. Love the curvy shape and it was yellow. How could I not buy it? LOL

So I hope to start working on a new project today...yes there are a few, couple, several, okay a whole lot of already started projects but I just feel like starting something new, and that's what I'm going do!

Happy stitching-
carol fun

Oh Snap! My Schnibble is done!

I rarely do two posts in the same day but I needed to show this before the parade of Schnibbles. I haven't done a Schnibble in a while and I was excited to hear that this month was sew one of your choice, as long as it wasn't one you had shown before. I started with the new line from Gina Martin called Sewing Box. I love this collection - all my favorite colors and stuff!!

And then I decided that the right pattern would be Gentle Arts...spool blocks!

Combine the two and ooohhhhh this makes me happy!

Now I was leery that I would end up chopping off the points on some of the blocks when I sewed them together, but I totally surprised myself. I sewed all 25 blocks together and got the intersections to look great on my first try. I didn't have to re-sew or fudge a single one. The sewing gods were definitely shining down on me. Now I did pin very carefully and I'm sure that helped but I don't remember the last time I sewed this many points together with no adjustments.

I want to get a yard of the fabric with the sewing implements on the white background for the back and then I'll quilt it. It is going to look so cute in my sewing studio.

Happy stitching-
carol fun

Just in under the wire.....

I've said it before and I'll say it again because it is soooo true... if it wasn't for the last minute I'd never get anything done. Here's my entry for the July Schnibbles parade. This is Four Corners done in Verna, an older collection from Kate Spain.

I had pieces of this in a plastic bin, patiently waiting for me to release it and finish it. I have no clue why I put it away when it was so close to being a top.

I love this line. I've made a table runner from it and I have a bunch of blocks I started with this fabric, which are also in the same box. Their time hasn't come yet. My favorite print is those tulips on yellow - LOVE IT!!

If you look at the original pattern it is a very scrappy quilt much like this version I made with Fall fabrics from Sandy Gervais.



Isn't is interesting that by just making a little change in the fabric placement you can get a very different look from the same pattern - I love that about quilting!

Okay I need to get this sent over to Sherri or Sinta - can't wait to see the parade this month!

Happy stitching-
carol fun

Thoughts for Thursdays - T is for....

I really had fun with this month's Schnibble but I have to agree with Thelma of Cupcakes 'n Daisies that the name Bibelot doesn't adequately describe this pattern. I would defintely change it to "T is for...." and you would fill in the blank. For my Schnibble it will be "T is for tape measure, thread, tie, tiaras and tropical fish" and that would only be the first row. I'm not sure the pattern is big enough for all of this LOL!

I went through my stash of novelty fabrics and identified all the pieces that had items that could start with the letter T. Now I will say that some of my T words do require you to ponder just "what in the heck was she thinking?"

Here's a list of what was going on inside that black hole of a space between my ears. You can click on the pictures to see things more closely -

Row 1: tape measure, thread, tie, tiara (not crowns), tropical fish
Row 2: Tyrannosaurus Rex, tools, Thomas the Tank Engine (a favorite of my boys when they were little), truck, teddy bear
Row 3: tropical tiki drink, turtles, teepees (and if you look closely you will see The polka dot chicken), tree toads, triceratops
Row 4: tulips, tool box, tiger, turkeys, another triceratops
Row 5: tam-o-shanter (its a kind of hat), top, telephone (the yellow one is the exact color of the one in my mom's 1960's kitchen and if you lusted after the pink Princess phone you are as old as me), train, time (not clocks - time! LOL)

The inside border fabric is another T item, it is turquoise tire tracks! The outside border has nothing to do with T I just liked that it had all the colors of the blocks in it. So now all I need to do it get is quilted. I'm planning on doing this one is a wavy line grid.

And before I leave you today I want to give you some of my thoughts on the NEW IMPROVED BLOGGER. Okay, I clicked on the prompt that said Blogger was going to a new interface in April, I assumed it would let me look around but NOOOOOOOOO.... it has totally changed my Dashboard and I can't figure out how to get the old format back. Now, when I loaded pictures it does load them in the order you uploaded them, instead of the reverse order it use to do. However, I didn't know this until I had uploaded them and then they were in the wrong order. I'm also having trouble seeing some of the header stuff. I need to have one of my boys look at it and see if they can remedy that. I'm also getting a message that my browser is no longer supported by Blogger and its says "Some parts of Blogger will not work and you may experience problems." Well that part is true. It suggests you try Google Chrome, which I downloaded but I still have problems. And I can no longer see anything from my Dashboard if I try to open it in AOL. Overall, I'm not happy right now. I really wish Blogger would have a platform for those of us non-techy people and just leave things alone. There is a little box at the bottom that says "Send feedback". I'll definitely be doing that.

Happy stitching-
carol fun

My I.S.T.H. Schnibble!

Ta dah! I got borders on my I.S.T.H. Schnibble yesterday (and did 4 loads of laundry -yeah for clean underwear!)



As you can see the chickens totally commandeered this quilt. Honestly, I just could not stop them! From the polka dot hens in the center blocks, to the chicken tracks background, to the border and the cornerstones. All chickens, all the time! While I was sewing on the border I realized what I.S.T.H. stands for in this quilt. I. S.pot T.he H.en -- get it I Spot The Hen! Oh I crack myself up (oh that was a bad pun too!)

Can you see the hen that well, I spotted? Upper right hand corner- here's a close up.




I am so happy with this little quilt. I'm going to let my long-arm gal quilt this one, because I know she'll come up with something wonderful to show off these dotty hens. This was so much fun. I can't wait to see what the pattern is for next month. Thanks Sinta and Sherry for managing this each month. I know the parade of quilts this month is going to be wonderful.

Happy stitching-
carol fun

Double X-Rated

Okay, did that title get your attention? Well there is nothing actually risque here, just the name of a large Schinbble quilt I finished not too long ago. I was able to drag it outside yesterday and take a few pictures.



The title comes from Carrie Nelson's pattern called X-Rated in her Schnibbles Times Two book. Because I can never let well enough alone, I decided to do the quilt starting with a small Schnibble in the center of a larger Schnibble.



Now this would have been easy if these quilts were constructed with blocks, instead they are assembled on the diagonal in strips. This made insetting the little one into the big one quite a bit more difficult. In the end I appliqued the little onto the center of the big one and then cut out the fabric behind the small one. It turned out great but I won't do this again.



Again this turned out to be a big quilt - around 92" square. It is an older line of Moda fabric called Hunky Dory by Chez Moi. I've purchased fabric from all the collections by Chez Moi. I looked on Moda's website but don't see anything listed for them that is current or upcoming - I hope that changes.

TGIF- I'm looking forward to the weekend to stitch and goof off. Hope your weekend is great!

carol fun

Last minute Schnibble Times Two

If it wasn't for the last minute I swear I'd never get anything done. Well last night I was lying in bed and had a thought (dangerous situation).... "oh I should get a top ready to give to the long arm quilter at the guild meeting tonight. Hmmmm... what should I take? There is that X-Rated Schnibbles Times Two top made with the Hunky Dory collection back in June. I had the top made but I wasn't sure how I was going to handle the middle section. I had done little X-Rated blocks and I wanted them framed by their larger buddies. Now if this quilt had been assembled in a block fashion it would have been easy to insert them, but this quilt is done in diagonal rows. When I worked on it in June I thought I'd do the little blocks as a seperate quilt and then somehow attach it after it had been quilted. But I wasn't really happy with that idea and then today I had a new idea, "What if I just appliqued this group of little blocks to the center?" Ah, a solution! (It was at this point I should have known that it wasn't that easy but I was still in my "gotta have something done for tonight mode.")

So at 1:30 I started this process. First try, I pinned the little blocks to the center, looked great, started to sew. Oh carp, the blocks are upside down. Unsew and repin the blocks. Second try, ok they're facing the right direction, get them pinned down, oh carp, now they're crooked. Unpin and try again -correct direction and even. Now I realize that the needle I'm using is way too big. It feels like I'm sewing with a javelin. Somewhere I have some applique needles. Where are they? Oh yeah, in that basket under the table with the Dear Jane blocks I started eons ago. New needle -much better. So I begin sewing away. Wow, this is taking a long time. I wonder how long it takes to sew down one side - yikes 30 minutes for one side! I'll need 2 hours to get this done. (Clock says it is 2:30 and I need to be ready to go to dinner at 4:45 - this is going to be close.) Sew faster!

Now I do enjoy doing some quiet handwork and this project gave me a lot of time to think and boy did my mind wander. I thought about how I learned to do the ladder stitch I use for appliqueing and sewing down bindings - Home Ec class back in the Age of Aquarius - early 70's. I had a wonderful teacher, Sara Lee, not that Sara Lee but that was her name, Sara Lee Fleischman. She was a good cook too. I'm so glad I had this experience. Do they even teach sewing in high school these days?

Then I thought some more about how I was going to finish this quilt. Although my stitches were pretty tiny I didn't like that the seam I was making wasn't real straight. Maybe I could cover the seam with rickrack? Oh I like that idea. After I get it back from the quilter I could cover the seam with rickrack and stitch it down with french knots or feather stitch and maybe some beads. Yeah, jazz it up a bit. Then another thought crept in..... why are you handstitching this? If you are going to cover it up you could sew it down by machine, sheesh (insert smack upside head). Should I switch gears? Naaahh... I was already on the fourth side, but I wish I had this brilliant idea about 90 minutes earlier. Oh well I got it sewn down and then I cut the extra fabric out underneath and took some pictures.



It doesn't lay real flat but with all the diagonal seams there is a lot of bias sewn to straight of grain. I've convinced myself that once it gets quilted and I wash it, it will have that nice crinkly look and you won't notice the lumpiness. (Yes I do expect miracles from the long arm quilter.) Check the clock....4:35, where did the day go? I had just enough time to stuff my top into a bag, grab my show and tell quilt and change my shirt.

Last minute but I got it done... so glad for the last minute!
Happy stitching,
carol fun