What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

To ease back into a sewing groove for the new year, I made a pillowcase for our son, Ross.

A couple years ago, he brought out the guitar pillowcase I made for him when he was a high school junior to show that it was cratering fast, hinting that a replacement would be nice.

This was the novelty fabric used for the pillowcase, and there was only a half yard of it.

I decided on a six-inch width for the cuff and no trim piece because I didn’t have any coordinating fabric for one. I cut a window in ...

Part of this week was devoted to repairing two quilts, labeling one, and creating a hanging sleeve for another.

I made this I-spy-ish quilt in 2001 for our younger son,

who, deviously took a pair of scissors to the binding, resulting in this:

My exasperation upon discovering it soared to 11 and resulted in a flood of tears. After 20-plus years, I finally pulled the quilt out of storage to make the repair.

I applied some Fray Check to both sides of the cut on the border and then the back.

Next, I pulled thread to match the border and ...

There were two cuts of the A-B-C blocks fabric left in my nursery collection stash, and I was determined to use them to make one more crib sheet.

Unfortunately, the larger of the two was only 1½ yards (54 inches), so panels would have to be added to each end to get to a working size of 68 inches. Fortunately, the other cut was 36 inches, which meant that there was plenty of extra fabric.

The challenge was to make sure that the corner square cutouts used to create the pockets would not interfere with or be located too close ...

There comes a time in the life span of bed sheets when the hems split

and the elastic on the fitted one craters.

In our case, the timing of their demise was perfect. Voilà! Crib sheets!

I hate to throw away stuff that still has a lot of life left in it, and our recently expired sheets were no exception. I don’t recall when the idea popped into my head to repurpose them into crib sheets, but having followed through on it, I think it was worth the effort – and a ...

Thirty years ago when I was pregnant with our first baby, I asked my mom if she would make bumper pads and a skirt for the crib and she said yes. I was so happy that she agreed, as I had already been to the fabric store and found an ultra-cute nursery collection, but more importantly, because I knew if Mom made them, they would be perfect – and they were.

I liked all the coordinating prints, but the main / focus print with the toys was what sold me on the collection because it wasn’t too infantile – no cows jumping ...

My son made me a keyboard. It’s fabulous. You could almost say it’s beautiful.

He texted me out of the blue one Saturday afternoon last July requesting a Facetime session, opening the conversation by announcing that he had a Word document (yep, that’s my boy!) with questions I needed to answer about my new keyboard – oookay . . . .

For years now, I’ve debated about upgrading my keyboard to one with a number pad but lacked the patience to evaluate all the options at the computer store.

I hope you had a nice Thanksgiving. Our younger son flew in last Saturday to spend the holiday with us, and his visit was just the boost I needed to bring me out of my funk. Here he is with John yesterday, checking the roasting chickens on the rotisserie.

We always cook two so we have leftovers and so I can freeze some of the meat for a casserole or chicken pot pie at a later date. Plus, it doesn’t take any longer to decontaminate the kitchen after prepping two chickens as opposed to just one, so may as ...

 Hello everyone, and happy spring! We are in full bloom here, and the weather has been really nice. It feels so great! Of course, it also feels kind of sneezy and scratchy, but who even cares? It's like waking up from a very, very long sleep. I have been sewing quite a bit lately, so you know I'm feeling quite a bit better. I think getting the vaccine helped me a lot, and so does the sunshine. Not to mention that this nightmare semester is almost over! Pandemic teaching has been the worst, but at last we are ...

Last week was the first week since April that didn’t still feel like April because it wasn’t just the two of us in the house like it has been for months on end. Our son Ross came for a visit, his first vacation since he started his job last September after graduating from college. It was sweet of him to drive 1,200 miles to see us old folk even though there wasn’t much to do once he got here. He brought along his not-quite two-year-old Australian Shepherd which made things interesting because we’ve never had ...

I am so excited to announce a project I’ve been working on for weeks and weeks… Summer Sew Camp! This is a week-long set of projects designed specifically for teaching kids how to sew. First of all – YES! Adults can play along as well (of course!) But I have designed this with kids in […]

Blogger has made some changes to the blog drafting tool and I'm trying to give it a go before it becomes the standard. It appears the intent was to make the tool easier to use for those writing their posts on mobile devices. I draft my posts using my desktop computer. I can type faster, pull content faster, and generally get from idea to blog post faster on my desktop than I can with my mobile device. I've been blogging either with a desktop of laptop for almost seven years. Change is hard. I just wish the new ...

Hello all, and welcome to my stop on the blog hop honoring Paula Budinger. Paula was a good and gentle spirit who blogged about the quilts she made at Paula B Quilts. She made a lot of scrappy quilts for kids, and donated almost all of them. I got to know her through Angela's Rainbow Scrap Challenge, where Paula often linked up her creations. She and I sometimes chatted back and forth, like ya do, about her quilts, especially the antique quilts she collected. And she was a Wisconsinite as well, so we had a small connection there, too ...

We’re all in this together. After seeing a lot of rainbows and interesting window art on my neighborhood walks, I wanted to join in. I created an image in Illustrator and put it to fabric.

Here are the two images I digitally designed to choose from:

I chose to make the former, hoping once this quarantine ends I can hang my mini without negative associations.

Since this process was a first for me, I wanted to share how it was achieved. If you choose to make one, it’s more of a guideline than a traditional pattern.

My mini ...

We’re all in this together. After seeing a lot of rainbows and interesting window art on my neighborhood walks, I wanted to join in. I created an image in Illustrator and put it to fabric.

Here are the two images I digitally designed to choose from:

I chose to make the former, hoping once this quarantine ends I can hang my mini without negative associations.

Since this process was a first for me, I wanted to share how it was achieved. If you choose to make one, it’s more of a guideline than a traditional pattern.

My mini ...

We closed 2019 with two wonderful outings. In November, we enjoyed the Houston Symphony’s performance of the second Star Wars movie, The Empire Strikes Back.

In mid-December we returned to Colorado for the Denver Art Museum’s exhibit Claude Monet: The Truth of Nature, which was FABULOUS. The collection took 3½ years to curate and includes more than 100 paintings. We invited the boys to go with us, and their first response was to decline – more than likely with wrinkled noses, rolling eyes and shaking heads.

My three favorite men in the world.

A couple weeks later while chatting ...

This post contains affiliate links. Thanks for your support! Remember this room? This is the lovely room over the garage in our house. It’s about 13′ x 33′, with a walk-in closet as well as a bathroom not included in those measurements. My oldest daughter has lived up there (in the largest space in the … Continue reading New Studio Space for Quilting

At long last, a new quilt design to share. I've been working on this fun wall hanghing for babies and kids since July of this year, but it was sidelined as the seasons changed and I took on new editing work in addition to my part-time office job at a pre-school. I had such fun designing this new quilt for kids, featuring vehicles that kids love. Wouldn't it be the perfect wall hanging for a child's room? Toddlers will love this bright and colorful quilted wall hanging...and it's a great teaching tool for words and ...