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Last week I had the good fortune to spend four days in South Carolina with a group of talented and fun quilters! Everyone brought their own projects and worked away all day and into the night. Mostly we had hot sunny days and were able to enjoy the outdoor pool.

These hat pin cushions were made and gifted to each of us by Judy. I absolutely love mine and am so thankful for her thoughtfulness and efforts.

Here’s Laurie with her very impressive bin full of 1 1/2″ solid scraps.  She’s turning them into the now popular ...

Last night for a period of time our internet service was out. Our service provider was not the only one effected by whatever happened. Oddly enough my mobile carrier was effected however I had service, which allowed me to get online and do some checking around. We do have the digital antenna so watching the… Continue reading Weekend Miscellany

There was a fair amount of flannel fabric left after piecing hubby’s cat quilt. The large pieces were used for the backing and there was still a fair amount of pieces left. Right then and there I cut them all up into 2 1/2″ strips and began to sew!

A patterned fleece is the backing, with no batting. Isn’t that backing jazzy?! Using the walking foot, I quilted using crossing wavy lines. Originally I was going to gift this quilt to someone, but it wasn’t quite large enough for the person in mind, so off to ...

Those of you who have surfed into my blog over the past two weeks or so will have noticed a completely new look to my site. Thanks to Derry Thompson of GloDerWorks and inspiration from several top art quilters with great sites, I think Derry and I have come up with a gorgeous new site–my first complete makeover since creating the site in 2004. I am responsible for (guilty!) the visuals, and Derry has done all the brilliant work behind the scenes to bring my vision for my site to life.

I still have a LOT of work on ...

A blogger I follow, Quilt Diva Julie recently posted about a string quilt she was doing called Optic Strings, using prints and solids. I loved it and immediately knew what fabrics I would use from my stash! The prints I pulled are all the Tula Pink prints I had and matched them with coordinating solid shot cottons. It was a blast to pull and match!

The cutting marathon began. The strips are 1 1/2″ wide by 10 1/2″+ long. There are 37 pairs of fabric and I cut two sets of each fabric with 4 print strips  and ...

The sconces in our house have made me crazy for years. The shades were made to fit on the old rounded incandescent bulbs…the ones you can’t find any more. The wires didn’t fit well on any of the smaller bulbs that suited the size of the shades and the fixtures–they were always tilting and crooked. And the “old West” look was SO not me! It was Candy Glendenning of Candied ...

At our modern guild meeting, we discussed art deco, what it means and looks like, and how it influences the modern quilt movement. 

Art Deco uses bold design, clean lines, colors and patterns to create geometric shapes. It was most popular from the early 1910s through both world wars and fading from fashion in the beginnings of the 1950s. Intense color, line and shape are characteristic of art deco.

A small retreat awaits me come Labor Day so I wanted to do some prep.  Most of my Works in Progress are not travel worthy – they are at the point that there’s too much thinking or I’m just not motivated to work on them. Interesting how when I begin my projects I’m SO excited and then, WHAM! Somewhere along the line I lose that enthusiasm. Fortunately, I tend to regain it later, sometimes even years later and manage to complete the project!

I recently purchased a kit on clearance and knew it was perfect for retreat. It ...

Finally!! This Round Robin project has been around forever! There was only one border remaining for me to do but I just couldn’t decide. At first I was so sure it was to be yellow.  I even sewed one strip on only to see it wasn’t the right one. Not much unsewing, so that was okay. Lots of auditioning and finally decided on a black and white print. I was also determined to use something from my stash!

I didn’t like all one plain border – just didn’t seem to go with all the other rounds that ...

Have you ever just wanted to sew, sew, sew?! No complex cutting, no pinning, and especially no thinking! That’s exactly how I felt a few days ago.  I dug through my charity quilt bin and pulled out pretty strips that a reader donated last year. They were not full strips, some really short, some half strips and the full length ones I cut so I would have all varying sizes.  I wanted some sort of accent in there so I cut 2 x 2 1/2″ black and white blocks to put between each strip.

And next?  I sewed ...

Sometime ago I emptied my fabric scrap bin and had cut everything into various sizes (posted here).  I took all the 2 1/2″ squares and started putting them together as a leader/ender project. After putting together 24 sixteen patches, I bordered each with 1 1/2 inch strips. It was all finished off with two rows of the 2 1/2 inch squares for a border. I loved all the crazy mixed up color and patterns! The scrap squares were now just about gone!

I laughingly said that there were just enough left to make a potholder

Voila ...

Industrious wouldn’t exactly describe my quilting progress this past month. There have been some big house chores, like power washing, and truthfully, I have been in a relaxed mode with my sewing this past month.  There’s surprisingly has been quite a bit of progress, though.  I got a quilt back from the long armer and did get it bound.  I’ve been working on a quilt for our bed – bigger than I usually do and although I love it and it’s exactly what I’ve wanted, it’s a bit boring (all 3 1/2″ squares). I ...

Hi everyone!  First, I have very good news-- we have found a house, and they have accepted our offer.  Yahoo! We will have a place to live in Baltimore.  Our house hasn't sold yet, so right now I'm going back and forth between being really happy about the new house and being really panicky about owning two houses.  Finding a house is a huge relief for us, though, even though we may have to eat pretzels for supper for a few months. 

How should I celebrate finding a house? Well, by sewing something, of course, and to heck ...

Recently I wanted to send thank you notes and somehow a store purchased card fell short of how I wanted to express my gratefulness. I was also feeling a bit restless about my sewing – time to break out the scraps and do some improve! I chose various brights and just had to add some black and white and just began to piece.

The heart shape on this one below was a happy  accident! There was a fair amount of sewing with those narrow strips, but it was fun.

Basically a wonky log cabin, the one below is my favorite.

Each ...

1. Artistry (creating and designing, use of color, fit and form)
2. Chemistry (fiber content, treatment and care of fabrics, glues)
3. Color theory (using ...

Several years ago, more like many years ago, I started collecting metallic fabrics. Many had an Asian theme and I loved them.  It took me a couple of years to decide, but finally I decided to do a hexagon star pattern.  I cut the hexagons on my Sizzix – I cut, and cut, and cut.  Rather than cut the individual triangles, I sewed the hexies to strips of fabric and then trimmed.

I found this black with gold dots fabric and a friend suggested that I scatter a few black stars about. Had to admit – a good idea.  It also meant ...

Hello, friends!  Long time no see! What can I say?  Life happens.  It has been a jam-packed couple of weeks. I went to my usual conference and participated in a panel presentation, which was fun and interesting, but exhausting.  The conference was in Pittsburgh this year, and let me tell you-- Pittsburgh is a beautiful city! We didn't get a lot of time to explore, but I would definitely go back. After the conference we went to visit the grandchildren, and that was pure bliss.  My oldest grandson kept calling me "honey," and they were all just a joy ...

These two quilts were donated quilt tops for Hospice that I quilted and bound.

These two were tops I put together from blocks sewn at the Quilt & Sew-In retreat. I also quilted and bound these.

Both were backed with yummy, soft fleece. I especially like the butterflies.

I couldn’t resist lining all the Hospice quilts to date on the clothesline.  All that color! All that generous effort by so many! Looks like a carnival!

And here they are, all stacked up and ready to go. At the end of summer I will hit it again and add a few ...

Picking out fabrics for a quilt is my absolute favorite part of quilting. I would love to work at a quilt shop!! Helping other people pick out fabric on a daily basis would be so much fun. I love all the different values of color. My favorite days are rainy days; and you might be asking, why are we talking about weather? The reason why I love rainy days is because the colors outside are more saturated. Everything is vibrant and beautiful! Unlike sunny days where colors are washed out or even blown out. Let’s take a moment to ...

A couple of years ago Kaufman Fabrics generously donated “scrap” fabric to the Fairview Quilters, the group I work with to make Hospice quilts. I quickly grabbed the bright batik scraps and fun lizard fabric. Last year a quilt was made with some of the lizard fabric and I saved a few of the leftover blocks. At one of the Quilt & Sew-In retreats, attendees pieced strips of the bright batiks together. I brought it all home and played on the design wall.  I love the results!

There wasn’t enough left over to make another quilt wholly from the batiks ...