Free Motion Quilting Follow Along

Autumn is here. The temperatures are dropping, the leaves are dressing up in their brilliant colors and more importantly, I unpacked my sweaters ( which makes it officially Autumn for me!). I love this time of year. The crispness of the air gives me a renewed sense of purpose and ignites my creativity. I mean really, who wants to sit inside and sew when it's warm outside??? Obviously not me if you look at all of the UFO's that are still unfinished from last Autumn! I was goofing off on facebook tonight and came across a post from Leah Day (from the Free motion quilting project) about the Fluffy Sheep free motion quilt-along.FLUFFY SHEEP??? How couldn I NOT check it out.....

Bloomz Quilt

I love having a lazy Saturday! I think we underestimate the value of "stopping and smelling the roses" in the crazy-busy lives that we lead nowadays. I don't think that I've ever regretted chosing to snuggle with my hubby instead of sweeping the floor. Amazingly enough...the floor waited :)So what have I been up to quilting-wise? Well, I finished quilting and delivering my Bloomz quilt to one of our nurses. I designed this quilt as a mystery quilt (I'll add the link to that at the end of the post), but the colors I used in my sample were soooo Pam.

Schlep Bag Wednesday

I love a good puzzle.From figuring out how to hook up the new dvd player to putting together jigsaw puzzles.The mental exercise can be frustrating at times, but is always very fulfilling when I can finally figure it out. Today I found something that combined quilting and a puzzle of sorts....The Schlep Bag from Sentmental Stitches. When I first read the instructions, it reminded me of those tests we took in school where they showed you a picture of a flattened box, and asked you to figure out where the black square ended up when you folded the box up in your mind. Let me tell ya...the Schlep bag is WAY easier than those tests  :0)
Here is my creative Schlep Bag Journey in pictures:


yummy Moda Layer cake

Sunny April Saturday

Happy Saturday! It's a beautiful, sunny day here in northwestern Montana and we're going to spend the day outside, but I thought I'd come and post some new pictures for you to look at before we headed out to play.

I've been working on some more mug rugs and finished an Easter tablerunner for a swap at My Quilting Buddies.First off though, I have to show you a picture that I found on my hubby's camera that he took out of our livingroom window about mid-January:....isn't she cute?

Star Quilt

Happy Sunday! Today was kind of a lazy sewing day for me. I got an Easter tablerunner cut out, played with some fabrics for more mug rugs and worked on a couple of new quilt designs in EQ7, but that's about it so far. I did want to share a picture of a quilt top that I made a few weeks ago. It's called "Charming Stars" and its from Moda's Bakeshop. This pattern is extremely easy to do and is perfect for the charm packs that are ever so convenient. We're doing this pattern in My Quilting Buddies and will also be starting this block at the Thursday quilting group at church in two weeks.Here's the Moda Bakeshop version:

And Here is My version:

Trying Something New

Today I made my first Mug Rug! I've heard them called Snack Mat's too...but that always comes out as a tongue twister when I try to say it LOL.

Anyways...I can see why everyone says they are so addictive to make! They're about as close to instant gratification in quilting as you can get.I think I spent more time playing with my fabrics,trying to decide which ones to use than I did actually making the Mug Rugs. They are small, but still big enough to practice some free motion quilting. Leah Day comes to mind and I'm definitely going to use some of her patterns to practice on these cute and useful little projects. If you've never seen Leah's free motion quilting project....you gotta go check it out. The link is on the right hand side of my blog under "My Favorite Links"

Here are my mug rug shots...in progress and the finished products:

Sunday Sewing

Today we had a lovely breakfast at the church, put on by the youth group to raise money for their mission trip this summer. The kids did a great job and the blueberry pancakes, yogurt and berries were yummy!
The weather here in northwestern Montana was dismal today so I figured it was a perfect day to spend the afternoon quilting.I completed 6 blue and white Jacob's Ladder blocks and I'll post pictures tommorrow when I get them off of my camera...sure wish I could find the transfer cable for it. 
I'm searching for a design for the Easter tablerunner that is up next on my to-do list, so surfing the web seemed like the place to start. I find some of the coolest places when I'm "surfing" and came across a very nice blog.
Cindy Carter,of Quilt Patterns from Seattle has a blog where she designs quilt patterns and shares them freely on the web. What a generous heart she has! There are some great scrappy and beginners patterns. I really like this one, called "Flowers in My Window". Click on the picture to check out her blog.

Well, I'm off to continue my table runner pattern search.

Hugs,

Tina

National Quilting Day

Today is National Quilting Day.....what are you working on? I've been cutting out blocks for my swaps My Quilting Buddies. I love the blue and white color scheme of these blocks! I'm thinking of making some extras so I can make a small mat for my eating bar counter top  in my kitchen. Maybe, if I just look at the spring-like quilt blocks, I can ignore the ugly snow that insists on coming down today. Is anyone else as tired of the snow this year as I am??
I was checking out the National Quilting Association website this morning and they have a cool free quilt pattern offered for National Quilting Day. It's called "Build Your Own Log Cabin" and you'll find the link to it on the right hand side of the page. If it's gone when you go to check it out, let me know and I'll send you a copy of it. I love the colors that they used in the picture on the instructions and the quilting is very pretty too.
Here's the quilt:

I hope you enjoy your day of quilting!
Hugs,
Tina

TGIF!!!!!

Hugs,

Tina



Happy St Patricks Day and UFO's

Happy St Patrick's Day! I cheated and had corned beef and cabbage at lunch AND let that nice lady at the restaurant cook heehee ;) 

One of the nurses volunteered to put the binding on the Hugs quilt. Yay!!!! I enjoy doing the hand stitching on the binding, but not crazy about the machine sewing part of it. I've always sewn my bindings on the backside of

Happy Wednesday!

Don't you just love Wednesday's? The " I don't wanna get up and go to work" Monday is over, but the "I can't believe the week is over and I haven't gotten anything done" Friday is still another day away :) I've spent this week so far working on my Friendship Hugs quilt. My tension wasn't as nice as I'd have liked but I wasn't going to rip out all of the decorative quilting that I attempted on the border. I've decided that I don't care for the cotton quilting thread that I'm using.It's a pretty varigated green, but I think it's too thick of a thread.I still have to add a line of quilting on the little inner butterfly border, then the binding and it'll be done! Yay! I've got a little ruffling of the edges going on, but I think I can take care of that when I add the binding.

All in all, I like the quilt and I think the recipient will appreciate all of the love that is going into it. Here is my work in progress:

                

Virtual Cork Board

Awhile back I was surfing the net and came across a site called Pinterest. It's like a virtual cork board where you can "pin" pictures that you find on the net. You can make your own boards to sort your stuff and can even "re-pin" things from other peoples boards to your own. I love this site! I've been pinning alot of the cool things I've been finding on quilting blogs so I don't forget them. It's a great way to keep the things that inspire you when you're in cyberspace.
Here's the link to one of my boards if you'd like to see what it's like:
One of Tina's Pinterest Boards

I pinned a couple Mug Rug idea's on there tonight. We're doing a Mug Rug swap at My Quilting Buddies so had to find some inspiration and found this easy peasy one:

Piecing this directly on your batting/backing sandwich would make this one go together pretty slick! I think that Mug Rugs would be a great way to practice some free motion quilting or thread painting too.

Ok...I'm off to see what other cool inspiration I can find in cyberspace!

hugs,

Tina



The Journey Begins......

I've always admired the clever crafty bloggers out there in cyberspace. I've wondered how they can come up with things to talk about every day. I've read their posts with interest and found inspiration within the pages of their blogs. I've also, on occasion, come away with a different view on some things than I had before I had a glimpse into someone else's way of thinking. What a wonderful thing :)  And so, I decided that I would share my creative journey with you.I've been a crafter and quilter for years. I've also been a seamstress and that particular creative journey taught me that I have much more fun if I make things "just because" instead of doing it as a way to make a living.Oh well....it sure seemed like a good idea at the time :)

What have I been working on lately? One of my co-workers just underwent breast cancer surgery so we decided that we wanted to make her a quilt.I thought of a friendship quilt, but I almost got the feeling that we were making something as a goodbye gift. THAT was definitely NOT the message we wanted to send to her. So, after thinking on it for a bit, I decided that we would invent the  Friendship Hug Quilt for her. I decided to use simple snowball and nine patch blocks with a creamy center and a scrappy green background. Everyone signed the center of the snowball block with a simple "hugs with  their name" and some even added small drawings of hearts and flowers beside their names. The card that will go with the quilt will say " When you need a hug, wrap yourself in this quilt and get one from us"
 I LOVE THIS IDEA!! Who knows...maybe the idea will catch on :)
I don't have a picture of the actual quilt yet, but here is an EQ7 version of it:



I'll be working on the quilt this weekend, so I'll post a picture when it's finished.

Well, that's it for now.

Hugs,

Tina