on the hunt for backing fabric

I finished the top for the crib quilt I was working on:

The pattern comes from the Simply Fat Quarters book.  The great thing about this book is that it gives you four different sizes for each quilt so the crib-size version I made above already had the math done for me!  I'm been scouring my stash for just the right backing fabric but I haven't found it  yet.  The hunt continues this afternoon.

Have a great weekend!!

First

First quilt top finish of the year, which is also my first BOM finish, and my first sampler quilt finish.

As always, taking pictures of the finished quilt top required my assistants.  First, Tucker stretched out on it and determined it would serve as a yoga mat:

Then Sophie tested it to make sure that she could properly clean her face on it:

Only then was I allowed to release a picture for public consumption:

This is the 2012 Designer Mystery Block of the Month that was offered by the Fat Quarter Shop.  The fabric is Vintage Modern by Bonnie & Camille, and it has a great summertime vibe to it.

Here are some of my favourite blocks:

Next up, I will be making a baby quilt for someone I work with.  She's having a boy -- I love it when we know the gender of a baby ahead of time! -- so I have some nice blues picked out from the Salt Air collection from Cosmo Cricket.  Now I just have to decide on a pattern.

Have a great weekend!!

Sunday update

I need to finish up the binding on this little number.  Sorry, can't show you the front -- top secret Xmas gift -- very hush hush ;-)

Auditioning borders for my Starburst quilt:

I'm in the home stretch for the quilts I want to give as gifts  -- sheesh, I better be, it's Dec 15th already! -- and it's starting to feel more like fabric work than fabric play so I took a tiny break and played for awhile with some Anna Maria Horner fabric, just for fun:

If a quilt made with these fabrics doesn't warm up a cold winter bedroom, I don't know what would.  How do you describe her colours?  Saturated?  According to the definition I could find here the saturation of a colour is the purity of a colour, and that pure colours are intense.  Yep, that pretty much nails it!

I also have some good news and bad news….

Bad news is that two of my favourite online fabric sources have gone out of business.  Beaver Creek Quilting made the decision awhile ago but Old Country Store dropped a shocker on everyone -- including their staff -- and suddenly shut their doors last week.  My heart goes out to the staff at OCS.  Losing your job is bad enough when you see it coming.  To have it dropped on you a few weeks before Christmas?  I can't imagine what they must be feeling.

Good news is that Manitoba is getting a modern quilt guild.  It seems to be just a Facebook presence right now but maybe we can help them build up some steam.  If you're in my area and you're interested, please go check them out.

Happy Sunday!  I will be staying inside today, quite possibly in my pi's all day.  Not a hard choice to make when the temperature is -34C.  

Cool!

So I set to work on my Starburst quilt blocks and it turns out that this pattern has a really neat piecing process.  The overall block looks like this (sorry about the bad lighting):

When I first saw those spiky outside pieces, I thought I would have to cut rectangles and then sew things together on an angle.  Wrong!

You actually make half square triangles of a background fabric and a print fabric, then slice your finished square into three strips, rearranging their order:

Mentally swap that strip that has the small printed section with the strip that has the large printed section and you'll get a picture in your head of an HST.  I wish I could show you the pattern instructions but that would be violating the designer's copyright.  Trust me.  It's darn cool.

I especially like it because I am not the best presser in the world.  If I had pieced those strips the way I originally imagined, my pressing would have been really wonky.  By starting with a nice crisp HST, my individual strips held their shape much better.

All the blocks are now done.  I just need to add in the sashing, cornerstones and borders.  Another really fast, really fun pattern from Margot at The Pattern Basket!

This n' That

After a MASSIVE fabric reorganisation, I feel much better about my sewing space.  I basically unloaded every scrap of fabric I had onto the kitchen island and starting sorting, folding and fondling until I arrived at this:

The fabrics that are stored upright have been folded around plain old manila file folders I bought at Staples.  Once you fold the folders in half, they stiffen up enough to support wrapping fabric around them.  I bought some of those comic book boards that others in blogland use to wrap their fabric but that was going to turn into an expensive venture.  I got a similar result for a fraction of the cost.  The upright fabrics are usually 1/2 yard/metre cuts but there are a few 1 yard/metre pieces in there, too.

The lower half of the shelves where fabric is stored horizontally are cuts of more than one yard/metre.  The shelves are inexpensive plastic shelves I picked up at Jysk that literally went together in a snap.

As you can see from the left hand side of the picture, I still have some piles that need folding but with the bulk of it organised, I feel like I have my own fabric store to shop in!

Sewing wise, I've started on a two-colour quilt for my bed but there's a long road ahead of me before it will be done.  I need something like 80 blocks and I think this represents about 24:

I'm also hoping to squeeze in one more Xmas quilt using a Pattern Basket pattern and a layer cake:

With a little help from the Sophmeister, I think I can get 'er done:

It's the most wonderful time of the year

Nope, not Christmas yet.

Nope, not back to school either.

It's time for the Canadian Blogathon!!!!!

Sew Sisters is hosting another blogathon starting November 18th and if you missed out on last year's fun, well, don't make the same mistake twice ;-)

You get to take a cross country tour of the True North Strong & Free and you get to see pretty quilty stuff.

I'm in.

You??

Catching up

Been awhile, eh?

I've been piecing a new quilt top:

Quilting up and binding a Christmas gift:

Practicing my hand quilting on a table topper:

And yesterday, I decided to go through my scrap bin and sort everything by colour.  I had two piles going.  One with traditional fabrics/colours, another with modern fabrics/colours:

Fig Tree scraps turned into a bit of a head scratcher because they worked in both piles.  The traditional pile usually won out :-)

Some things I learned as I was sorting:

• I have had a lot of pretty fabric in my life so far
• My tastes seem to be split 50/50 between traditional and modern styles.  The two sets of piles were stacked to pretty similar heights.  Interesting to note that the modern pile had a lot more grey than the traditional pile.  Grey really does seem to be the "neutral" in the modern quilting world.
• Red seemed to win out as the biggest traditional pile (thanks to French General)
• Aqua seemed to win out as the biggest modern pile (with no one designer winning the battle)
• I don't seem to be a fan of yellow for some reason.  
• I am appalled by the lack of purple.  I love purple and I've used it so little.  Must remedy that a.s.a.p.

Jack gave me the cold shoulder all day because I wouldn't let him sleep in the emptied scrap basket: