Pillowcase Class

I had two students in the Pillowcase Class this morning.  The first thing I do in class is make a pillowcase as a demonstration.  Since Bill has a sock monkey collection, I decided to make him sock monkey pillowcases.

Each of the two students finished up two pillowcases.  Here are the first ones.

And the second ones.

After class I came home and worked on sourdough bread.  I bought sourdough starter from King Arthur Flour and this was the first time I actually was making something with it.  I was excited because the evening class had been cancelled since no one signed up.  I was ready for an evening in, having dinner with Bill and getting some quilting done. 

At 5:50, I got a call from the shop saying two students were there.  What!! They didn’t sign up for the class, they just showed up!  Of course, I had to go and teach again.  So much for the nice dinner.  I told Bill when to put the bread in the oven, grabbed a couple of chicken tenders that he was finished cooking and off I went.

If I had known I was going to teach again this evening, I wouldn’t have made both of the sock monkey pillowcases this morning.  Since I had to make another one tonight I made a Halloween one for Emilio.

One of the students liked the Halloween fabrics so she made two Halloween ones of her own.

The other student made a football one and then a floral one.

When I got home, we had sourdough bread and it was great!  I made two loaves so we will have more for sandwiches and toast.  Yummy!

Melinda

New Beginning Machine Piecing

I started a new series of beginning machine piecing classes today.  There were 4 students in the morning and 5 in the evening.  I thought I had taken photos of all the exciting new fabric selections but somehow I only have 7 photos.  Here they are:

 

Everyone did a great job for the first day.  We covered fabric and tool selection, perfecting a 1/4 inch seam, cutting fabric and ironing/pressing correctly and they all did a wonderful job.  The first block we make is a rail fence block.  Actually, there are 8 rail fence blocks in the quilt so they all have some homework to do this week.

Tomorrow I am teaching a pillowcase class.  That is always fun.

Melinda

Table Runner

I realized that I didn’t have a sample for the Beyond Beginner’s class I am teaching at the end of the month so I made a table runner yesterday out of the pattern.  The quilt in the book is twice this size but I really don’t need another wall/table quilt so made it into a table runner instead.

The topic of this month is paper piecing and here is one of the blocks that makes up this quilt.

Although I am not a big fan of 30’s fabrics, I do have a red and yellow kitchen (in my dreams at least) and have a old table with red chairs.  This will look very good on my kitchen table.  I couldn’t decide on any other color scheme and this is very much like the original quilt in the book so just went with it.  I stopped by the shop this afternoon and picked up backing fabric so I can get it quilted tomorrow.  I made the binding already so it shouldn’t take long to finish it up after quilting it.

Melinda

BOM Day

It was BOM day at the Allatoona Guild today.  As I am behind on making blocks, I just kept on going and finished two star blocks today.  I am finding that while making the quilt very scrappy results in a great look, it also takes a lot longer to cut out each piece individually instead of cutting all of them at the same time.

Here are the blocks I finished.

I started cutting for the next two star blocks but decided that I didn’t have enough darker green to give contrast.  I got the background and light/lime green cut and stopped by the shop and picked up 4 more 1/4 yard cuts of bright green.

I guess I will just keep plugging along and eventually get the quilt done.  I still have the feathered star block to make for the center but Lisa gave me a paper-pieced pattern and I think I will use that instead of following the regular piecing directions.

Melinda

Design Wall Monday

Here is what is on my design wall today – all the blocks from Ring in the New.

I posted the individual blocks in the last post.  These need to be cut down before I start putting the quilt together.  They finish at 4x6 inches so this will be a small wall quilt when finished.

Check out the other design walls on Judy’s Blog.

Melinda

Ring in the New

Ring in the New was a BOM from 2008 and I finally completed the last of the embroidery today.  Last November I went to Sweden to visit my son and his family and took 11 of the blocks to work on.  I finished all of them while visiting and then picked up the last block early in December.  It only took me most of a year to embroider Santa!

Here are the blocks – in order.

January

February

March

April

May 

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

We received a finishing kit as part of the BOM but I don’t want to use it.  Instead I bought these fabrics.

Now all I need to do is to figure out how to use them to finish the quilt top.  The border print of course will be the border and the other print is probably the cornerstones – fussy cut.  The stripe is the binding and the gray is the sashing.  I might still need one more fabric for the inner border.  I think there is another beige/black paisley print that goes with this collection.  I might try to find it before I actually start putting things together.

I really like the beige crackle background and the black floss for the blocks and want to enhance it with the borders and sashing.

Melinda

Halloween Quilt

I decided it was time to put up my Halloween quilt for the front door.  I always have a small quilt hanging on my front door.  We only get a little morning sun on that side of the house and we have a glass storm door so it is protected from the elements.  I have a small curtain rod attached to the door and use curtain clips to hang my quilts.  Table runners also work great for the door.

Anyway, here is my pumpkin quilt hanging.

 

My sister and I bought kits to make these little quilts a few years ago either in Wisconsin or Las Vegas – not sure which.  I don’t know if she ever made hers but I did mine 3 or 4 years ago and hang it every October. 

Melinda

Another Customer Quilt

I finished quilting another customer quilt on Friday and delivered it yesterday.  Carolyn was pleased with how it came out.  Her nephew actually make the quilt and he made it very large.  It didn’t really call for a custom quilting effort so I did a variation of dwirling with swirls.  I used a variegated thread that enhanced the quilt.

I didn’t get a photo of the back of the quilt but it was the solid dark with a few of the colored bricks used to help piece it.  I used a purple bobbin thread and it turned out looking almost like a wholecloth quilt.

Nice quilt, isn’t it!

Melinda

Purse Class

Thursday night was the monthly purse class.  There were five wonderful women attending.  A couple of them are regulars but I did have two new students that are not only new to the class but new to Tiny Stitches.

Here are some of the projects that were being worked on.

They aren’t all finished yet but I am confident that they know how to finish them at home.  We have been having a monthly purse class for a couple of years now and I really enjoy seeing all the projects.  What makes my class different from most is that the students can bring any purse project, along with the pattern and I help them make it.  So many of the patterns are difficult for people to read and understand and sometimes there is simply an easier way to accomplish the same thing.  I have made enough purses in my time that I have been able to figure out how to get it done!

Melinda

Blogger’s Quilt Festival

It is finally time for the Blogger’s Quilt Festival.  Last time I featured my Y2K Christmas hexagon quilt and I really do love that quilt but I have a new favorite.  You can see part of it at the top of my blog and I use it for a screensaver on my computer and on my IPhone.

Here is my Kiwi Zinger hanging at the East Cobb Quilters’ Guild show last month.

Here is a photo of it straight on after quilting but before binding.

I stippled the selvages and did feathers in the kiwi zingers.

I fell in love with selvage quilts after seeing Karen Griska’s Red Zinger in Quilter’s Home magazine.  She writes the Selvage Blog and has lots of interesting selvage project on her blog.  I looked at her tutorial on the blog and then just drew my own pattern.  Her quilt has a selvage border on it but when I finished the Kiwi Zinger, it told me that it didn’t want a border so I listened to it and bound it with the same Kiwi fabric.

Go to Amy’s blog and check out all the quilts in the Blogger’s Quilt Festival.  I can’t wait to check them all out.

By the way, I love selvages and continue to collect them.  I am trying to decide on my next selvage quilt but think I will make a selvage tote bag first – I made a small one for a swap earlier this week and it is so cute.  I am fortunate that I work in a quilt shop and customers bring selvages to me.  My fellow guild members have also been supplying me with selvages so I have plenty of material to continue my selvage journey.

Melinda