NICKI'S PRIZES

I spent the entire weekend sewing!  I was in class Saturday from 10:30 a.m., till 4:30 p.m.  Needless to say, I was pooped.  But I learned some cool tricks with Regina Bernina, so I'm really excited!

Sunday, I made Nicki's prizes from the blog giveaway.  Since she was the only person who signed up, I made coasters and my first mug rug.  Still not digging the name "mug rug."  Just sounds weird.  How about "snack coaster?"  Or "mug mat?"  Anyway, the giant coaster/mini placemat turned out REALLY cute.  Totally going to have to make more of those!

Here are the coasters, front and back.  I switched it up a little and used different fabrics for the backs.  Usually, you use one of the fabrics you make the coaster fronts out of, but I ended up with five coordinating fabrics, and I totally had to use them all!

I used gray thread to do the quilting, and this time I used a longer stitch.  It turned out really well!

The backs are so cute!  I love these stripes!  So fun!

And now to the mug mat.  Sorry, just can't do that rhyming thing.  At least not in this case.  Anyhow, I used the two stripes as backing and binding.  Nicki's initials are NH.

Now no one else can walk off with it and claim it's hers!  Nicki really likes the backing.  Love it!

I really enjoyed making this mini quilt.  So easy and so cute!  It was great.  I'm totally going to make more of these.  I think my momma would like one.  And Nicki absolutely loved it all.  She said the fabrics will coordinate PERFECTLY with her living room decor.  She goes, "I can't wait to take them home!"  Yay!

HAVING NICE TOOLS MAKES A DIFFERENCE

Now that I have Regina Bernina, my new 350 PE, I have been sewing like a demon!  It used to be such a fight to sew, but now it's fun to sew again!  I haven't had this much fun since I learned to sew when I was 11!  I've sewed nearly every night since I got the sewing machine.  I've made three sets of coasters, a candle mat, started a table runner, and started three shopping bags.  I'm really excited to sew each time I sit down at the machine.  What a great feeling!

MORE DETAILS ON THE LAP QUILT

I'm still using my cellphone to take pictures, but I set up the fabrics in a nice bright spot and I've edited them to look a little more lovely and bright than they usually come out.

Here are the charms that will become the coins.  A ConnectingThreads.com charm pack only has 20-ish charms, so I bought four.  They're only about two dollars a piece, so it's not bad.

My sister LOVES pink, and this collection, called Antoinette, is very pink.  It's darling, in fact.  I picked pink fabrics for the sashing and binding because Mary will love that.  Here's a shot of the sashing fabric.  It's a pale pink on white design.

So lovely!  I do my bindings on the bias, and I love using stripes for the binding fabric.  It just comes out fun and funky.  So here's the binding fabric.  It's a medium pink background with darker pink printing.  Very cute.

That will make some fun binding strips, won't it?!  And for the back, I decided to use the focal fabric from the collection.  It's background is white, which is kind of a bummer.  It'll probably get dirty fast if Mary uses it for a lap quilt on the plane.  But the pattern is so pretty, I couldn't not use it!

I'd say these came out pretty good for cellphone pictures!  As for the pattern, it's a Stacked Coins Baby Quilt from Moda Bake Shop.  Mary's only about five-foot-four, so I'm not worried.  And then she can either hang it up or use for when she has kids!

SOMETHING CUTE TO WHILE AWAY THE WAIT

So, I'm waiting for fabric from ConnectingThreads.com to make a lap quilt for my sister who's moving to Australia.  While I'm doing that, I decided I would take the Tweet Tweet Charm Pack my mom bought me, and make half-square triangles out of the fabric.

My god-kids were here today, so they helped me sort my darks and lights, and we got to work.  Emily, my god-daughter, wants to learn to sew.  That was kind of the plan today.  However, even though she's six and has the IQ of Albert Einstein, she decided to run an index finger across the blade of my rotary cutter.  That's what I get for assuming she knew better!  So, no sewing for Emily.  Just some tears and tissue paper.  But she watched, and we did a fun little technique I saw on Moda Bake Shop -- making four half-square triangles with one pieces of Charm Pack.  Put the together RST, sew 1/4" all around the four sides, slice once on one diagonal, slice again on the opposing diagonal, and -- VOILA -- four half-square triangles.  I haven't pressed, but I'm going to do so to the dark side, as it were, and go from there.  Here are some pics.  Excuse the quality -- these are with my cell phone.

So, a little jumble of unpressed half-square triangles.  Fun times!

I tried to show off the different ones I've cut so far.  I have about 12 more pairs to sew and cut.  I'm thinking pinwheels, but I'm going to let Emily choose, since it'll be for her.

Here's a preview of a pinwheel, if we go with that.  I'm trimming the squares down to three inches.  Closest measurement I can get!  Fun times.

Enjoy the pictures.  Love this fabric collection.  It is darling.  So very fun.

CHARMING STACKS OF FABRIC

I didn't get as much sewing done this weekend as I'd hoped.  I ended up helping my mother clean out the house I grew up in.  I cleaned my own house.  I babysat my sisters Doberman.  I was a little busy.  But last night, I finally sat down and sorted out the two charm packs of Moda's Blessings that I bought.  Mom bought me a honey bun of the same fabric, so I was able to use both charm packs for the placemats.

I'm going to do reversible disappearing nine patch chargers, rather than your typical placemat.  Mom's table is oval, so large placemats really wouldn't work very well.  And she likes funky things, so there you go!

FAT QUARTER SHOP ROCKS

So, you know I follow the Moda Bake Shop. I also poke around at the Fat Quarter Shop quite a bit, and I've been eying one of their Block of the Month Clubs for a while. I decided yesterday that I would join it, since it's actually pretty affordable. Only $10 a month for a block pattern and all the fabric to make it. It'll take a year to complete, but it's using one of my favorite new Moda lines: 12 Days of Christmas by Kate Spain. I love her designs! Here's a sneak peek, and if you click on the picture, it will take you to the info page:


You can order a finishing kit and a backing kit (kinda wish they came together). That's the expensive part. But it creates a rather large quilt! Yay! I'll keep you updated!

PROJECT RUNWAY

Okay, some of you know that I watch very little reality TV that isn't related to cops, except for COPS. That one gets old fast.

Anyway, the one non-crime-related reality TV show that I will watch religiously is Project Runway. I missed a few episodes here and there, but was always able to catch up thanks to cable's sometime annoying habit of replaying episodes over and over. Yesterday, I got to watch the final runway show and was totally impressed.

First of all, it was the first time the final three were all women. There was a woman from Africa and two very young girls from the States. Korto, from Africa, was one of my favorites this season. Sometimes, her work was a little over done. Other times, it was absolutely beautiful.

My least favorite was Kenley, and although I thought it was cool that three women made the final, I sort of wished she hadn't been there. Her attitude and even her voice pissed me off and made me hate her clothes, even if they were actually quite whimsical and lovely.

My favorite was Leanne. Her work was gorgeous. Simple and modern and fresh. And totally classic at the same time. I always judge the final runways by the adage, "Would I wear any one of these pieces in public?" When I can answer yes for each piece, that means the designer did a fantastic job, in my opinion. Granted, I'm not model-thin by any means, but I would wear each one of Leanne's pieces, even the ones that were entirely neutral (not my favorite color palette). And she won.


Congrats, Leanne, this season's winner of Project Runway. I love your collection!

TABLE RUNNER PREPARATIONS

So I have all the strips cut for Mom's table runner. It might not be totally finished by the time Harvest rolls around this weekend, but at least Mom'll have something to decorate her table. And I'll get some coasters done -- quicker than potholders. Sets of four or six, depending on how much I have left over. I'm just going to do pinwheels since they're so easy. And kinda crazy quilting since I have such an old machine! Wish me luck!

AN UPDATE ON THE CHASE RACE

So I've come up with a better design, one that I like better and is a bit more quilt-square-y, if that makes sense! It's not as full of large pieces of fabric but of quilt blocks. Whew! I like the idea. It'll be fun to work with.

This is what the design will look like. I turned the panel on its end so that it is more in line with the size of the quilt. This will be a twin-size so it can grow with him. And the panel will afford him the opportunity to have a racetrack on which to drive his matchbox cars.

And this is what the blocks will look like. Sorta. They are half-square triangles, not strips with set-in squares or whatever. I don't do that set-in stuff. Too complicated. I like my quilt blocks simple. Not too simple, but simple. And the extra space between the blocks on the sides and the panel will be taken up by strips of checkered flag fabric. Not the real thing -- I wish. That would be totally awesome! But fabric from this Vroom! collection.

THE CHASE RACE

So my friend Tisha from work is having her first baby at the end of October. She's been HUGE since July, poor thing, so he's probably going to be a honker! His name is Chase Allen Gallop. So cute. And his nursery theme is cars and trucks. I pledged a baby quilt for Chase at her baby shower Saturday. And I found the cutest race car fabric collection. It's brand new, thank God, so I'll be able to find some while I have money! I have mapped out a preliminary design. Tell me what you think!

MY BARGELLO PLANS

So here's my plan for the bargello table topper for Mom's and my booth at the Harvest Festival. It'll of course be a little different than this, since I didn't take the size thing into account -- I was just trying to figure out if it would look okay when there were only six colors. Whew. Thank God it looks like it will. I'll let you know how it goes -- no worries there!

I DIDN'T JUST TRY

I really did sew today. I waited until it was later, about seven this evening, since it's been so hot. And then I finished quilting another placemat. I didn't finish them all, but I have all four of Ginna's done, and two of Mary's. I'll finish another one tomorrow, perhaps -- although the season finale of the Closer is on -- and then all I have to finish once they're quilted is the binding. I have a crappy picture of one of Ginna's. Excuse the fuzziness!

I SHALL TRY, REALLY I SHALL

To sew this weekend. Okay, wait. I think I'll live this weekend by one of Master Yoda's more famous sayings: "Do or do not. There is no try." So I will sew this weekend. By God, I will! Hee, hee.

My priority: those pesky placemats for my sisters. I can finish the quilting this weekend and start on the bindings, no problem. However, I've never done bindings before, so it might get a little ugly. Thank God for online tutorials! I figured out how I'm going to bind by reading up on Marcia Hohn's website, The Quilter's Cache. I go there all the time! She has tons of great patterns of traditional ancestry or her own, as it were. Great site. Check it out if you haven't already.

If you click the title of this blog entry above, it will take you directly to Marcia's tutorial on quilting binding.

DAMN THE CLOSER! AND DAMN EUREKA!

So there was a new episode on last night. In fact, for me, there were two. I missed last week's because I had returned from my parents' house that afternoon and was exhausted! I went to sleep last Monday and hardly woke up to go, "Oh, there's a new Closer on right now."

Needless to say, I got no sewing done last night. But this morning, I did put together a diagram for a wall-hanging that I've been wanting to do forever! It's for my living room. Aquas, taupes, and brick reds. I love the combo of aqua and red. Saw it in a Martha Stewart Weddings and have been in love with it ever since -- I totally plan to use it if I ever get married. The fabrics are from a Moda line called Wuthering Heights. My mom bought me a bunch of fat quarters at a local shop, then I got them home and started to wash them and press them. That's when I discovered the name of the collection. It was meant to be -- I'm a former English teacher! The design is simple because I want to show the fabrics off. They are gorgeous!

This is sort of what I plan for it to look like, including the quilting lines. When your machine is 28 years old, you can't do a lot of fancy stuff. It's a Husqvarna Viking, but it's got a really short arm on it, and no variable speed. Oy. Time for a new machine. That's what the Etsy shop is going to be for -- making new machine money!

And I doubt I'll get any sewing done tonight, either, since there is a new Eureka on. Hm. Maybe I should move my sewing table into my living room so that I can sew and watch at the same time. I could sew during the commericals! EUREKA!

GOOD INTENTIONS

I love it that I always have good intentions of sewing over the weekend, but they never seem to come to fruition. I spend the first part of the day being busy with friends and their children, and then I lack the energy to create anything once a I get home. Or to finish anything.

I am a terrible sister who needs to get her butt in gear. Last Christmas, I decided to make placemats for my two little sisters and their husbands. But we opened presents early so I didn't get to finish them in time -- and I never have. It's almost a year later. I can't believe I never finished. Shame on me. I think I'll work on it tonight if there's no new Closer episode.


But see, they're going to be cute when I finish them! They are the first things I've actually quilted, not just pieced. The first one to be quilted didn't turn out so well, but the rest look really good!

POOR, UNFORTUNATE SOULS

I know, an ominous title, but they certainly are poor, unfortunate souls. They are my only two finished tops, but they have never been finished. Shame on me. Of course, one of them belongs to a friend of mine now -- she sews, too. So here they are: the first is the top I created for my sister's wedding three years ago; the second is a bargello, my very first, and I was really proud of it, except for the fabric choice.


The above is the wedding table topper that sat under my sister's huge coconut hatbox cake.


And above is my first bargello. I'm totally making more of this -- I loved it. And I pieced the strips without using pins -- I apparently line up my corners better without the pins. Weird!