January Mini Quilt

Here's my January Mini Quilt for Crystal. 

I could not think of an idea at all! So I came up with this just using some scraps. I think I need to start coming up with several ideas and write them down since I have 8 or so more of these to make! But boy are mini quilts ever fun! Making mini quilts has got to be one of my most favorite projects I've done! They are fast and practically instant gratification!

measures: 16"x19"

fabric: "California Dreamin" by Jenean Morrison

2011 in review

I guess I was busy this year!

I think part of how I accomplished so much was hubby was deployed 8 1/2  months of this year.

But also in this year, we moved from one coast to the other! (California to Rhode Island!)

Happy New Years my Bloggy Peeps!!

Teacher's Gift

My eldest daughter is in 2nd grade. I decided to make her teacher a Christmas gift this year after polling some of my teacher friends. They all said it would be nice to receive a home made gift, so I made a Christmas table runner for her. 

 This pattern was one that I won on Rachel of p.s. i quilt's blog a couple years ago. I finally got around to making one.

Baby Clothes Quilts D.O.N.E.!!

I am so glad I got these done! When I agreed I'd do these for a friend I really had no idea how much work is involved.

First there is the cutting up of the clothes. Then, if there are outfits made of jersey knit, they need to be interfaced for some stability. Then you end up with squares of all different sizes. So what do you do? It's hard to have a plan for a quilt when you have various sizes of fabric pieces. So I completely improved the whole thing. I realized working with the knits was such a pain that I selected to not use any more than I had to. That being said, there weren't very many cotton prints. So I added lots of my own fabric which was fine with my friend, thankfully! I showcased specific outfits that were set aside for each girl and then the rest of the clothes were worn by all three and incorporated in each. When you are dealing with several different outfits, nothing really all matches each other. So there are lots of colors going on, but I think as a whole it works. 

I can say I will never make any more of these again except for the two I plan on making my girls some point in their lives. They will probably be high school or college graduation, or wedding gifts, so I have some time! And I only saved cotton clothes for theirs. Knits are just really hard to quilt!
Each one measures approximately 54"x62"

ABBY'S

KELSEY'S

LILY'S

December's Mini

Here's my mini quilt for December. I wasn't going to do it "Christmasy", (is that a word!) but then this idea came into my head one day. I think it looked better on paper, but it turned out ok, I guess. I really liked the background fabric. When I saw it, I thought it totally looked like wallpaper which is what I was going for. Then for the quilting, I decided to quilt in all the white lines of the pattern. It's my favorite part of the quilt. Sorry for the crappy picture, it was raining so I had to take it indoors.

I HATE BASTING!! poem

Yes I'm yelling

Yes I'm screaming

What I'll do next, there's no telling

It hurts my back

It hurts my knees

I don't like it, It exhausts me

I absolutely HATE basting quilts

 

 Two down....three more to go. Yep, I'm going to do a little quilting this weekend!

For inquiring minds....I spray baste. I have to do it outdoors....and it's breezy today. 

yep....I HATE it!!

My "pain-in-the-neck" quilt project...

Baby Clothes Quilts

THREE of them

One of my friend's asked me if I'd be willing to make her three quilts made of her three daughter's baby clothes. I told her I'd look into it and get back to her. After lots of research online I found that to have these made in a lap-sized quilt they can run anywhere from $300-$500!

Her girls are 10, 13, and 15 and she'd been hanging onto these clothes for all these years to have them made into quilts. I thought, "How hard can these be. I'll do it!" So she brings me the clothes and a couple days later, I go through the huge Rubbermaid bin. Oh NO! 85% of it is all jersey knit stuff, 5% is sweaters, and the rest is cotton fabric. Then in the bin are 3 bags with specific outfits for each girl in each bag. Each bag contained their "coming home" outfits (all jersey knit stuff in newborn size) and then some t-shirts and sweaters. oh....what a challenging project I have ahead of me! These things have been hanging over my head for so long. I've had this bin of clothes for almost a year!

I'm determined to get them done this month. I've got the first one just about done. I took a sneak peek picture last night to send to my friend and she loves what she sees so far. 

Honestly, I'm not super crazy about them because the clothes I had to work with was so limited and not my choice of fabrics, patterns or colors. But I've added some of my own fabric and did the best I could working with some of those knits (and no sweaters! you just can't cut up a sweater and incorporate that into a quilt!)

Hopefully I'll have all three of these done soon to show you.

I've learned one thing...I'll never make another one of these again. 

(Except for the ones for my girls but I was smart and ONLY saved cotton clothes!)