Morning Beginner Quilt Tops

We had a great time yesterday at the Beginner Machine Piecing class.  There were five students in the morning class and all but one finished their quilt top.  They are working on their borders now.

As you can see, the last one has the inner border on.  She actually stayed for a little while after class and put her outside border on.  Unfortunately, I didn’t get a photo of it finished.  Hopefully they will all bring them in to show me when they have them finished.

Next up will be the night class.

Melinda

More Progress on Gone With the Wind Quilt

I worked on the Gone With the Wind quilt yesterday.  First I finished all the pieced blocks – 10 of them.  I did manage to sew some backwards but got them all sewn correctly, after Danielle and her seam ripper helped me out.

Next were the appliquéd blocks.  I got them prepped and managed to appliqué all of them last night while watching/listening to American Idol.  Now the next step is to sew all the blocks together – maybe this afternoon between sessions of the last Beginner’s Machine Piecing class.

Melinda

Beyond Beginner Class

Tonight was the second session of the Beyond Beginner Session of classes.  Last night the lesson was about putting a quilt on point.

I love seeing all the different fabric selections.

Aren’t they doing a great job!

Melinda

Gone With the Wind Progress

I worked on the Gone With the Wind quilt today.  I got all the four patches made, started on the appliqué blocks and have everything ready to make the star points tomorrow.

Here are the four patches, there are 50 of them waiting for the star points to be made into blocks.

Here are the two appliqué blocks I got done.

I have 8 more to make for the quilt.  I decided to appliqué by hand – needle turn.  It seems to be the easiest way to do these but takes a little time.  I got two done while teaching a class this evening.

We are continuing our little mini retreat tomorrow so I hope to get more of the piecing done and the rest of the appliqué prepared.

Melinda

Design Wall Monday

Guess what is still on my design wall.  Here is the upper left corner of my block of the month quilt – all sewn together.  I need to cut a lot more 3 1/2 inch green squares to make the rest of the border blocks.  The finished quilt will be 90 inches square and is outgrowing my design wall.  Check out the rest of the design walls on Judy’s blog.

Today I am going to Danielle’s house and am going to work on my Gone With the Wind quilt all day.  It needs to be done early in March so I need to concentrate on it.

On the quilting side, I just finished taking all the quilting out of a customer quilt.  The tension went bad and I didn’t notice in time.  I had finished a beautiful amish feather curl border and now it is time to put it back on the frame and start over.  Fortunately this doesn’t happen very often because it takes about 4 times as long to take it out as it does to quilt it in the first place.

Also, I am teaching a Beyond Beginners class tonight where they will be making a lap quilt on point.  This is a fun series of classes.  Busy, busy day!

Melinda

I am a Winner!

I won a giveaway at Sharon’s blog – Indigo Threads and received this in the mail yesterday.  I am collecting for a dots quilt so these really excited me.  Thank you Sharon!

Aren’t they wonderful!  My guild is exchanging 10 inch squares of dots for three months starting in April.  We take in 12 squares that are traded out and returned to us during the meeting.  I think I will do 2 sets each month so I can collect even more dots.  Have I said that I love dots.  For my birthday this year, I have requested bright dots so by the end of the year should have a great collection.

Melinda

Dear Jane

I started working on a Dear Jane quilt several years ago.  What I had planned was a very scrappy quilt in 30’s fabrics.  I have 42 blocks and have decided that I really don’t want to make any more.  I laid them out on the floor and am trying to decide what to do with the blocks I have made so far.

They are a lot brighter in real life but they just don’t excite me enough to continue on.  I think I just need to sash them and make a small quilt out of them and move on to the bright Dear Jane that I really want to make.

I am not sure what I want for sashing but I do think it needs sashing to separate the blocks and let each one stand on it’s own.  Not sure what color sashing to use.  Any ideas?

Melinda

Busy Day at the Quilt Shop

Today was the third Saturday and that means another round of Saturday Sampler.  We had a lot of women and a few men at the shop.  During one of the busiest times, some of the local Gone With the Wind fans came in.  They wanted to buy more Gone With the Wind fabric to make curtains and a quilt from.  I think we have sold more Gone With the Wind fabric to non-sewers than we have to quilters.

One of my favorites is a guy with this wonderful hat.  I asked him if it would be OK to take a photo of it.

See all the pins on the hat?  It was amazingly heavy with all the pins.  Each pin is from a Gone With the Wind event that he has been to.  He was buying fabric to make curtains for his Gone With the Wind room.  He also bought 8 yards of another GWTW fabric.  I think he was having a quilt made and the 8 yards is for the backing.

Also, one of my students from an earlier beginners class brought her finished quilt by for show and tell.  Here it is.

Didn’t she do a great job!

Lastly, a Mother/Daughter came in and they were picking out fabrics for a neutral Blooming Nine Patch.  When Pat Wys came to guild last year, this is one of the favorite quilts she showed and several guild members have talked about making a version of it.  She also had a all neutral log cabin quilt that is wonderful.  Her pattern is called White Chocolate.

Here are the fabrics they picked out.

They bought an eighth of each fabric to play with and will be back tomorrow to buy enough to make a quilt.  Should be a great quilt when finished.

Melinda

Dog Quilt Progress

Maetha has asked that I finish the Dog Quilt so it can hang in the shop for The Greater Atlanta Quilt Shop Hop next month.  It was finished except for the last three borders so I worked on it last night and got it finished.  Here it is in the quilting studio waiting for its turn to be quilted.  It is number 6 on my UFO list but if I get it done, I will select another UFO to replace it – there are certainly enough of them to choose from.

Since our theme for Shop Hop is “As American as Movies and Popcorn”, it needs a movie name.  I googled dog movies and I think the best fit is “All Dogs Go to Heaven”.  These dogs look heavenly.

Now that I am looking at the photos, I realize that I forgot to follow part of the pattern.  There is supposed to be a small nine patch in the outside corners of the outside border.  It would be easy to make the change but I am not sure I need to.

This quilt was a block of the month last year but we are still able to get the patterns if anyone wants to make it this year.  As a block of the month, I packaged all the fabrics including the buttons for the eyes but this would be a great quilt to use scraps on. 

I am teaching the Wacky Devine Nine class this evening so won’t be able to start quilting.  I have a customer quilt that is ahead of it in line anyway.

Melinda

Sorting Selvages

I have an out of control selvage stash.  They are in bags and boxes and overflowing but in no order and a real mess.  I decided I need to get them sorted in some way and decided that color would be the best choice.  I have a bunch of large handled paper bags and decided to use these to sort into.

I have tied a colored selvage to each bag handle to represent the color that is in the bag.  Every time I go into the sewing room I grab a handful of selvages and sort them.  All the selvages going in the bags have writing or dots on them.  I have another bag where I am putting all the selvages that don’t have writing on them.  I will probably throw them away but right now I can’t seem to make myself do that.  I might be able to think of another use for them.

It is going to take a long time to get all the selvages sorted but I think it will be worthwhile in the long run.  I think I want to make a selvage color block quilt of some sort.

Melinda

Tuesday

Today was the monthly board meeting at guild.  Everything went fine and then we went out to lunch.  We went to our favorite Mexican restaurant and I had Rolled Tacos with beans.  Yum!

It snowed almost all day but there was no accumulation.  It was more like snow mist, not even showers but it stayed cold all day.  We are getting tired of this cold winter.  It has consistently below normal for weeks and today was more than 20 degrees below normal.  I don’t think it got above freezing when normal is in the high 50’s.  I guess we have El Nino to thank for the strange weather.

Here is a little peak at the secret project progress.

 

Also, I have noticed a lot of color wheels on the web recently and thought I would post a photo of one I made at a retreat a few years ago.

It hangs in my sewing room and I usually don’t even realize it was there.  While working on my green/black quilt, I noticed it and thought I would post it.  As I recall, we made it using Quiltsmart interfacing.  I should look it it more often.

Melinda

Design Wall Monday

Here is what is on my design wall today.

It is starting to look like a quilt.  The two blocks at the top are going to be the border.  I decided on a pieced border, with a black inner border and outside green.  I cut 3 1/2 inch squares of green and am using them as leaders/enders.  Once they are sewn into pairs, it will be a simple thing to put two together and then two more and make them into a block for the border. 

For more design walls, go to Judy’s Blog.

It is a very busy quilt!  I think I am really going to like it when it finally gets finished. 

This next photo is for a secret project I am working on.  I am meeting friends at the shop later today to work on this project. 

Melinda

Happy Valentine’s Day

First I thought I would share the snow status.  They are saying on the news that we could get another couple of inches in the morning.  I hope they are wrong.

Here is the yard this morning.

and here it is this afternoon.

Almost all gone.

My sister Robin posted a few pictures of her heart quilts and they reminded me that I have one.  I stole a photo of Robin’s off her blog so it is first.

Robin and I frequently make quilts that are “exactly alike only different”.  This quilt is a good example of that.  First she made hers and told me about it.  I decided to make one like it and here is mine.

As you can see, my fabrics are much darker than hers.  I really like this quilt.  It is from a pattern by Jackie Robinson and the heart is made from 3D prairie points.  Here is a close-up of the pieces.

I tried to teach this quilt a long time ago at Tiny Stitches but no one signed up.  I think it is because it looks like a difficult quilt to make but it is not – it is very easy but it is hard to convince anyone of that.

Happy Valentine’s day to everyone.

Melinda

Snow is melting – Mail is good

We decided not to open the quilt shop on time this morning because of the snow/ice.  By 11:30, it looked like it was safe to venture out so off I went – slowly up the hill and made it to the main street with no real problem.  Once I got on the main street, it was clear sailing all the rest of the way to the shop.

Once I got there, the phone started to ring off the hook.  Yesterday, Maetha talked to Bonnie Hunter and she agreed to come to Tiny Stitches for a brief lecture and trunk show on Sunday, February 28th.  Bonnie sent the information out to her Yahoo group and put it on her blog.  We put it out to our email list and put it on the Tiny Stitches website.

Apparently people do read the emails because we filled up the open spots for Bonnie’s visit by 2:30 today.  Maetha then talked to Bonnie and we scheduled two sessions instead of just one.  There is still room in the later session.

Thought I would also mention some mail I received yesterday.  First from Barb was this

Selvages!  Bright and colorful selvages.  Thank you again Barb!

Then from my sister Robin came this

A very cute Raggedy Ann and Andy stitchery pattern.  It even has buttons included.

Melinda

Here We Go Again – Snow in the South

I went to work at the quilt shop today early since it was so busy.  People always go shopping for milk and bread when snow is coming but apparently quilters run out for fabric and thread.  The store is open on Friday nights until 7 pm and I usually go in around 5 pm.

Today it started snowing around 1 pm and by 5, there was a lot of snow already on the ground.  We closed the shop at 5:30 and found that empty bolts work well to scrape off snow – who would have thought.

Here are a few photos – it is pretty.

Did you notice my bottle tree covered with snow?  All blue bottles!

Here are the little doggies in the snow.  They were not happy.

Driving wasn’t bad but should be bad tonight – glad I am home and staying here.  Hopefully we will be able to get out in the morning.

Melinda

Purse Class

I taught the monthly purse class tonight.  We had six people but I only got photos of two projects.  The rest of the group made great progress but not photo ready.

Here is Lisa’s purse.

This purse is really interesting.  She started it last month and managed to finish tonight.  After completing this purse, she started another project.

Robin came to her first purse class and is working on a tote bag.  She had a good collection of pink that she is making the tote for her aunt.

Melinda

Feathered Star Finished, Done, Complete!

OK – I made a new star for the center of the of the feathered star block and it is finished!  Done!  Complete! Not making any more changes!

I made a liberated (ala Gwen Marsten) star for the center and I am happy with it.  I got it sewn in, the borders on the block and it now measures 24 1/2 and is ready to be the center of my quilt.  All the other blocks are done and now the border is next.  I have been thinking of a pieced border but I probably should just have my head examined instead.  If I give in to my impulse and start the pieced binder, I need to cut squares from all the green to start.

I am so glad to have this finished.  I hope to start putting it together soon since it is still my January UFO.  I have better hope for my February one.

Melinda

Beginners Class – Evening Flying Geese

The evening class was great also.  There are more people at night and they all worked hard on their flying geese.  Here they are.

 

Don’t you like all the blocks?

Melinda