Sunday Stash #10

I got just a couple of new things this week.  I am planning a wedding quilt for my middle daughter and she loves fall colors. I wanted to make something modern using fall colors and I am going to use mostly Kona solids, so I had to start getting some of them. Sorry the pics are not brighter, but cloudy and rainy is the order of the day here.

This is the pattern and the first of the fabrics. The pattern is Concerto by Aria Lane, a pattern company that was started by Alyssa Lichner of Pile O' Fabric. I fell in love with this quilt when I first saw it and am so happy to have a reason to make it now. I still need to work out what other fabrics I want to incorporate. The pattern and fabrics came from Christa Quilts. Colors are lipstick red 1194, orange 1265 and Canary yellow 26.
Next, I was blog reading and saw an adorable quilt by Allison of Cluck Cluck Sew using this sweet goldfish fabric by Timeless Treasures. I fell in love with it. It is actually a brighter white background.

I scoured the internet and found it at Fabric.com. They are out of it now, so I am thinking I am not the only one.  I bought a yard to use in a baby quilt. Allison has a great pattern that she used this in, but I haven't quite decided if I am going to use that pattern or another.
Here is the fabric I pulled from my stash to go with this one:

         This is the complete pull, for now. I may add or subtract. Still thinking on it.

 Some Sweetwater, Squared elements, Emily Herrick, Malka Dubrawsky and some older blues.

        Some Pearl bracelets, Denyse Schmidt, Alison Glass, and Laurie Wisbrun.

                                 These are the darker blues I chose.

And this is an older batik that I have used pieces of in many things. It is a bit hard to tell, but the dots in it range from a yellowish orange to a darker red orange. I have always loved it and it will be perfect in this.  Linking up to Sunday Stash.

Happy Quilting Day

I have to go to work soon, but I did take a bit of time this morning to work on some bee blocks. Not quite done and the triangles are giving me fits, but I will keep going until they work out well.

Hope you have a great Saturday and get to sew lots.  Talk to you soon.

Scraps and Charms

My Friday finish today is made from scraps and two charm packs. I had this stuff sitting there staring at me for so long and I couldn't figure out what to do with it. It was like it was at the edge of my thoughts, but wouldn't come into focus. Needless to say, I did get it into focus and now the top is finished.

 I saved the white curved pieces off my Retro Flowers quilt because they were so interesting and I though they should become something. I toyed with lots of ideas, but nothing in my mind would translate to the fabric.

 I finally decided to sew them together into pairs along the curved side. I clipped the seam and turned it right side out and ironed the heck out of it.

 I took two charm packs out of my stash of charms, one was Oh, Deer and the other was a Moda charm pack that went well, color-wise. The name escapes me at the moment. I arranged them on my design wall to a pleasing effect.

 Then I inserted the curved pieces in a pattern and stitched them in when I sewed the seams together. Yes, they are a bit bulky where they overlap, but I love the way they look.  They are like little pockets.

I am going to quilt this in the ditch I think, so it will be well anchored, but I don't want to stitch over those pockets.  Happy Friday to you. Linking up to TGIFF at Quilt Matters, and the new Sewjo Saturday at My Go Go Life.

My Aurifil Experience

So if you are on Facebook and you like Aurifil, you see lots of pretty things made with Aurifil thread and read lots of comments on how great it is for quilting.  This is my Aurifil experience.  I have told you before that I have been sewing for more than 40 years now, and quilting for more than 20 of those years.  I started out sewing with whatever thread was available and when I bought thread, it was a cotton polyester blend.  I never gave thread another thought.  Until I began quilting.  Use cotton thread was what I was told.  NO POLYESTER EVER!!

At that time, the best thread at my LQS was Mettler and I used it exclusively for years.  And then, I bought a new machine. I bought a Bernina. It was the most expensive machine purchase I had ever made. I told myself and my husband that this was the last machine I would ever own (hopefully) and I intended to take great care of it.

Then, in 2010 I discovered blog land and began following many blogs and eventually began my own blog here.  I entered a giveaway on Lily's Quilts blog in October of 2011 and won a 48 spool suitcase of Aurifil threads. You can read about that here.

 Here is what that suitcase of thread looks like today, 2 1/2 years later.  This is the front side.

 This is the back side. I still keep all my spools in there and whenever I have to buy a spool of white, which is most used of all, I put it in there too.  I think I need to buy a cone of the white, actually.  But back to my story.

 So, I got this thread that everyone said was so superior to others and I began to use it. It sewed like a dream. I noticed less lint. My bobbins seemed to last longer.  I was amazed and so thankful for all this great thread.

 I sent a spool off to a woman as a pay it forward gift.  She had never tried it before and I felt like I should share the wealth, so to speak.  It was a long time an a lot of blog reading before I knew there were other weights of this thread.

 This is the 50 weight and it is the only weight that my LQS carries. I can't tell you when they began to carry Aurifil, but they have it now, and have for several years at least. You know it's kind of like when you buy a new car and you suddenly notice how many of that type of car are on the roads? It took a while to notice it at the shop.

 Now the new buzz in quilty blogland is the different weights of Aurifil and what they can do.  I try not to be too much of a follow the crowd quilter, but sometimes, you just can't help it.  So I am thinking of getting some of the heavier weight threads to try out for myself.

 I love the look of Aurifil on my quilts and if a heavier weight stands out more, I would love that too.

 I might even try a bit of hand stitching with some Aurifil. I would love to see what that feels like even though I don't do that much hand quilting anymore except as embellishment.
A couple of months ago I tried to use another brand of thread in my Bernina. It did not go well. I think she is just as hooked on this thread as I am.

I know this sounds like a bit of a commercial, but when you find something wonderful, you want to share it with everyone you know. These opinions are strictly my own. Talk to you soon.

I Am Thinking "Ruffles"

Today is my day to not only Think Ruffles, but to show off some ruffles.  I became very excited when Madame Samm first proposed this blog hop. I love any blog hop that is a bit out of the usual. Ruffles...so pretty and feminine.  And our head cheerleader, Amy, at Sew Incredibly Crazy...yeah, crazy like a fox! She is doing an amazing job keeping this hop on track. Thanks to both of them. Now, on to my contribution.

 The first thing I thought of was a ruffled pillow. I had a lot of 2.5 inch strips left from a Deb Strain Jelly roll from a few years back. Perfect.

 And even though it's kind of Valentine's looking, surprise, my hubby liked it. I think he could see the potential in all these ruffles.

 Rows and rows, until I ran out. So I called it done. I think you could do this with about any color. The texture is amazing, so if you have a jelly roll lying around, ruffle it.

 Then, I wanted to make another one, but different. I have been on a quest to use my stash this year and I had some Summersville 2.5 inch strips left from another jelly roll. All blues and greens, so I made my ruffles.

 Then, I attached them in a concentric circle. When I ran out, I found a small bit of the orange from the same line and I thought it was the perfect center.

 I love the texture of this one. The orange wasn't quite big enough, so I seamed it, matching the pattern as best I could.

I really love this one. Again, it is the textures that grab me.  And for the back, which barely closes, I used up the last bit of the ruffles.

My last project has been simmering in my head since the beginning. I wanted to do an apron with ruffles.  But then, at work one day I saw this young woman in a skirt with some really cool box pleats. The skirt was a light brown, but there was and orange color in the pleats that showed when she walked. So how to marry that idea with ruffles?

My pictures of this project are a bit piecemeal. I had no model available, so I made do and the pictures are more of the details. I used a grey dot, Confetti Dots by Dear Stella for the main body of the apron.

 I had some lime green Sketch leftover from some past project and another dot fabric by Dear Stella that looked like plant beds. Those became my pockets and waistband/apron ties with ruffles added to both.

 In my box pleats is the cutest little sheep print fabric ever. This has been sitting in my stash for about a year, waiting for the perfect project.

 Here is another shot of the waist from the front, with the ruffle and the box pleats.

 And even though it is not a smooth transition, I felt it needed ruffles at the bottom hem line. I only put them on the grey dot, since I didn't want the ruffles to hold the pleats completely open.

The pleats allow the sheep to peek out occasionally.

 Here is the bow in the back of the apron. I draped a fleece blanket around a body pillow and tied the apron around it for these picture.

One last shot of the sweet pockets. This is the perfect spring apron. I love making aprons, as it is a departure from quilts that is nice to have once in a while. They are pretty quick and lend themselves to lots of different design elements. Hope you enjoyed my show and tell today. Please hop on and see the other wonderfully talented ladies with whom I share my day.

March 10th

 

The Tilted Quilt

A Geeky Crafty Life

Constantly Quilting

Life in the Scrapatch

Pig Tales and Quilts

How arT you?

                                                                    GrammieQs

Sunday Stash #9

So...I guess my fabric fast is over. I made it 2 months. Well, I don't intend to go crazy now, and I am trying to still use my stash. But after the color intensive class, I am going to try to be more deliberate in my fabric purchases. I can see now how just loving a fabric doesn't make it the right purchase for using it. With that said, here are my newest purchases:

 This is a fat quarter bundle of Wishes by Sweetwater. They are one of my favorites in fabric design and I always buy some of their lines. I got this collection from their Etsy shop.

 Here are some more confetti dots by Dear Stella. This is such a great collection and I love ALL the colors. The grey and the lime green are to replace some I used up in a couple of projects. This is one of my new go to blender collections.

 These are the Joel Dewberry Herringbone prints from the True Colors collection. Again, a great blender in several colors. Smaller scale prints are great for that.

 I took this picture to show the older Herringbone prints from Joel Dewberry. The colors have changed a bit and they were tone on tone originally. I didn't realize that when I ordered these, but I still like them and will be able to use them.

This is my one wild and crazy purchase. I bought a full yard of this delicious water color print by Dear Stella. I am going to make it a focus of a quilt and pull fabrics to show it off. I am thinking tone on tone and maybe some Kona solids.  I haven't got a definite idea yet, but I do have an inkling of what it will be.
So, there you have it, my fall from the wagon. Linking up to Sunday Stash.

Saturday Something

So Amanda Jean is taking March off to recharge. That is no reason for me not to have a Friday finish, but I had less sewing time this week, due to a change in my work schedule. I am diligently working on 3 different projects with a fourth in mind.  Here is what I did yesterday:

I am using this fabric, Sasparilla, to make a quilt for little B. It was my WIP for Wednesday this week.

Well that quilt has produced a generous pile of these, which I am stitching together into HSTs.

To make these cute little 4 inch blocks to somehow add to the quilt that I am piecing. Perhaps a border? Not sure yet.

Have a great Saturday. I am off to run a 5K.