Hearts Hearts Hearts

I was busy with other things in early February, and if I'm being honest, was quite unmotivated to sew very much. I was looking for my sewing mojo. So, I did not make anything heart shaped for Valentine's Day, even though a part of me wanted to. So I did what any quilter would do when I found my mojo, I started on a heart quilt.

I think it was this little guy that got my mojo back for me. I won this amazing hand made Tomte Stitching Station from Moss and Lotus for the December Tomte Sew Along. When I saw it, I immediately felt better and more like sewing. How's that for magic?

 I had a wonderful bundle of fat quarters that I bought from Fort Worth Fabrics that I just knew would be perfect for hearts. I used Allison's at Cluck Cluck Sew pattern for the hearts. You can find it at her blog.

 See how pretty they are? This bundle of fabrics really makes my heart sing...lol.

I think this one is my favorite print in the bunch. The color is just so vibrant. And I love the touch of gold.

I currently have it up on the design wall . The rows are all together, and I am trying to make decisions about the vertical sashing strips. This cutie will be done soon, though and then to quilt!

 One bonus of this quilt is the leftover triangles from the bottom of the hearts. I decided that the fabric is way too pretty to waste any of it, so I sewed them right up as leaders and enders with the hearts.

  And now I am going to have this little wall hanging for my efforts. Isn't she pretty? I will be back soon, with completed projects to show to you. Have a great rest of your week.

Happy Birdie Quilt

And now the happy birdie quilt for Miss N is finished! I love how this turned out.

 Twenty five blocks in the No Point stars free pattern from Allison at Cluck Cluck Sew.

 Quilted on the machine with a variegated pink thread in an uneven straight line grid. Love the way it looks on this section of the backing.

The entire back, all from my stash and the binding is leftover bright pink from a recent quilt make as well. Can't wait to give this to her in a couple of months when I go for my visit. Lots of snuggles ahead. Talk to you soon.

Wednesday WIP-Done!

I have finally finished the quilt top with the No Point Stars pattern by Allison of Cluck Cluck Sew. What a great pattern and my quilt top would have be done so much faster, except I decided to sew together all the HSTs an use them for sashing. Well, turns out that didn't work out. There weren't enough of them. And I didn't have enough extra fabric to just make more. So I went to plan B. But I had to come up with Plan B first.

 The first Plan B that I really liked was to change and use this bright green for the sashing. But, my sister didn't think it worked and when I showed my daughter, she said "what else do you have?"

 So I pulled out these two purples. One is marbled and red violet and the other a dark purple that leans more towards blue. She didn't like either of those. "Got any grey?" Yes, it turned out that I did have about half a yard of grey. It was just barely enough, and I got to use my bright green as the corners.

 And here it is. I am having trouble getting true colors indoors. It has been rainy and windy here, so maybe tomorrow. But it is done.

 I used the HST strips for the outer border. I love the way it turned out and yes, I know the contrast is not the best on some of the pieces, but it's for a two-year-old so I think it's fine. And I like it too.

 Now I just have to piece together a back for it so I can pin baste it. I already know how I want to quilt it. But for now, this project goes back burner for a few days. My sewing space doubles as a guest bedroom and we have a guest coming, so I will need to pack everything up until next week.

 But that's okay, because I am hand quilting my Penny Sampler Quilt with Pearl Cotton and I still have quite a ways to go on that. I will show you some pictures of the progress next time. Until then, Happy Wednesday.

And Now it's Monday

Life has been crazy here lately. Packing and showing and selling the house. We are now in the final stretch and soon I will have to pack up my sewing room. I am trying to leave a couple of projects out until the last minute so I can sew. I need a few minutes of that now and then or I will go crazy. I'm sure you know how I feel, right?

Last week I made this teeny tiny two inch block. Quilt Shop Gal has a thing going on and you can go there and follow the link to get the patterns. They are free and oh so fun. It is to help you work on precision piecing. This makes me want to make more.

 I also was able to finish another project. The sweet little words so sparsely sprinkled on the fabric melted my heart. I have been wanting to make something out of it for awhile now.

 It finished at about 36 x 40 inches. For the binding I used a blue Kona solid I happened to have on hand. I wanted a frame for all that softness and I think it makes the small blue flowers pop out a bit more.

 Sorry we're sideways here. I forgot to reorient the picture first before I posted it. I quilted it in a heart loop de loop on the horizontal.

 Here we go right side up. The hearts were made for Cluck Cluck Sew heart pattern. It's super easy and fun to make bunches of hearts. I am not done with that one yet. Still making more hearts for another project.

                           More words...

When my husband saw these words he came up with the name for this quilt..."The Accidental Princess Bride". And so it is.

 I used a yard of Amy Butler Gypsy Caravan for the back. I love the print by I have never been able to work it into another project.

               It's pretty here.

And then I made another one of those tiny two inch blocks. So precious. Have a great Monday and I hope to talk to you again soon before the big move.

Love is Love is Love

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone. I have been working so hard getting the house ready to sell, that I decided to give myself today off. I have done the dishes and made the bed, but the rest of my day has been spent sewing. I am working on a couple of projects using Allison at Cluck Cluck Sew's heart pattern. One is a small quilt and the other is more of a long term project.

 I started out using two fabrics from the Paperie line by Amy Sinibaldi. I love all the sweet prints in this line, but these hearts are my favorite and I have been trying to use them for almost a year now.

 I made four of them to see how I liked them. I wanted to see how they looked together on the wall.

 And I must say, my favorite part is where these little words show up. I did not fussy cut. This is totally random.

Then I tried something different. I left the top and bottom border strips off a couple to see how it would look off set every other row. I loved it! Sew that is how I am going with it now. I hope to have it finished soon to show you.

 These are the hearts that started the whole thing. I pulled a few 5 inch squares out of my red scrap bin and began to make these.

I don't really know where I am going with this right now, but I see it as a long term project. I want to use lots of other colors as well as the red, and I am thinking about trying out some other solids for the borders as well. I would like to end up with a big quilt eventually.

And lastly, these lovelies have sprung up in my yard. 80 degrees last Sunday coaxed them out. I do love an early spring. Have a great day and I'll see you soon.

A Wonderful Day

Such great progress made yesterday, for a Monday no less. I had to work, but when I got home, I decided I needed to make some sewing progress too. I have lots of tops that need to be pin basted and quilted, so I started on that. Pin basting is so much harder for me now because my knees can't quite take the crawling around on the floor like they used to.

 Remember this? It is the final quilt top made in my Sunday Morning Quilts Bee. It has been pressed and on a hanger on my door for a loooong time.

 And I recently assembled this sweet top made from Allison at Cluck Cluck Sew's pattern Suburbs. This was the second one I made from that pattern.

This Christmas version is the first. So now, all three of these have backs and are pin basted. Hopefully over the next couple of weeks, they will get quilted and bound and off to their new homes. The X Plus quilt stays here with me, to remind me of all the wonderful women who were in my bee for three years.

 In between quilting, I am assembling a couple of quilts. I am doing the HKQAL with Amy at Sukie Don't You Know. The quilt top is a little further along than this, but this is the only photo I have so far. I am caught up as of today. Only 12 more blocks to go!

And I am also working on another quilt for baby N, using these great organic fabrics by Rae Hoekstra mixed with some sea prints from Monaluna. I am loving this one for sure.
Talk to you soon.

Monkey Business

Happy New Year to you all. This is the year I get back on that horse and ride it for all it's worth. I feel good, my cancer is gone and especially important to me, I am loving sewing again! I don't know if I will blog as much as I did before, but I am certainly sewing a lot! Here's what's going on at my house:

I made this quilt top from the pattern Suburbs by Allison of Cluck Cluck Sew. I did the top before Christmas, in Christmas fabrics. Now I am going to get it quilted for my middle daughter so she will have a Christmas quilt at her house for next year.

I enjoyed putting this together so much, I am making another one from non-Christmas fabrics. Here it is in process:

I am using some of my treasured Heather Ross fabrics in this one. I love how different the two look with such different fabrics.

 I am in the process of quilting this quilt for a very special person. I had to take my machine for service, as I was having a difficult time with the quilting, but it is fixed and smoother sailing now.

The pattern came from this book by Vanessa from V and Company. A great little series of six books that each focus on one color. I love many of the projects in these books. I cut out all the pieces for this quilt and started piecing it last spring, before the Chemo got to me. Then it sat for months. I knew my sewing mojo was returning when this quilt started to beckon to me to get back to work on it and now it is almost finished!

So I guess you are wondering about the title of this blog post. Well, ever since I finished my treatments, I have been thinking that I would love to find a way to give back to the hospital community that took such good care of me. Then a way was presented to me. There is a group of lovely women who make sock monkey dolls for the children's hospital here that is a part of the over all hospital complex. My daughter met them, and got me in contact with the leader of the group. So now I am learning how to make them, all by hand. I feel like this is only the beginning of my journey to giving back. There will be more, but for now, this is what I do.

The one on the left is the example monkey that I was loaned to copy after my first lesson. The middle one is my first one I made, but it has no ears yet. I still have to have my lesson on how to make the ears. The one on the right is my second sock monkey. I think I'm going to like this!

WIP Wednesday with a Giveaway

I saw this adorable goldfish fabric on Cluck Cluck Sew a few weeks back and I knew that it was the perfect focus fabric for a baby quilt. I had been wanting something just like this. So I went on line and found it.  I did my fabric pull, but then waited for inspiration. I love Allison's Juice Boxes Quilt, but I didn't want to just copy it. (She has a pattern available for it.) Then, it finally came to me...Economy Quilt Blocks.

 I decided to put the goldfish in the center of all the blocks to make it cohesive. I added a couple of greys to tone it down a bit. I will need 25 of these to make my quilt. They finish at about 8 inches.

 I got the specific measurements from Amanda Jean at Crazy Mom Quilts. I wanted the blocks to be big enough to really see the goldfish.

 I am happy to finally use a bit of this print from the Going Coastal line that I have had like forever. I had forgotten how much I loved it.

 This is going to be a great baby quilt. And I love making these block so much, I might just have to make another one in some other fabrics when this is done.

                                          I love this one...

And this one...the Squared Elements are navy, although they look almost black here. When I get the top together I can take it outside and get a better picture in natural light.

Now, about that giveaway...I have a book that I loved reading that I would really like to share with someone.  A few weeks ago I won a copy of this...

I have enjoyed it immensely, but I am not one to keep a book that I wouldn't read again. And I do love to share a good read.  So if you would like to win this very gently used copy of Nancy Zieman's book, just leave me a comment and tell me to put your name in the draw. That's it. I will pick a winner next Sunday, March 30. Due to postage rates this is only open to US readers this time.  Hope you all have a great week. Linking up with Lee at Freshly Pieced. Also linking to Fort Worth Fabric Frenzy Friday.