Triangle Quilt Finish

We spend Labor Day with the same close friends every year, some of whom we only get to see once per year for this one [awesome] weekend before we all head back to our respective corners of the country.  One of our friends has been going through some tough life things since last year, and I wanted her to know how much we've been thinking about her and how much we love her... so I made her this quilt.

(it's fun to have two willing quilt holders :) )

Our yearly weekend is spent at the lake, complete with crazy fun tubing, skiing, and kneeboarding, bright blue skies with epic sunsets, and tons of laughs. I think the colors in this quilt pretty well capture the vibe. I used 11 different Kona solids to achieve the look. This was my first pass at pulling fabrics...I later added the yellow and pale pink.

You may have seen me tease this quilt on Instagram a couple of weeks ago.  I was inspired by this triangle quilt from Happy Together, but I used a few more colors and made mine a little bigger.

I used a gray & white swirly fabric for the binding, something I have had in my stash waiting for the perfect project for years. The backing is a cotton/poly blend teal color.  Quilting is just wavy lines horizontally across the quilt.

Triangle Quilt
Size: 56" x 60"
Pattern: Inspired by Happy Together
Fabric: Assorted Kona Solids

Hide-oscope Baby Quilt Finish

I started this quilt over two years ago with Elizabeth's Kaleidoscope Quilt Along at Don't Call Me Betsy.  I finished making the blocks with the quilt-along, but I fell off the wagon after that because, in true budget fashion, I didn't want to buy the batting. The finished blocks made three moves with me, and when we found out we were expecting, I knew I had to wrap it up.

I chose to use my bundle of Hideaway by Lauren & Jessi Jung - a line I had loved from the moment I laid eyes on it.  Since we are not finding out Baby's gender, these prints set the tone for our neutral nursery style. Maybe they lean a little boyish, but I like how the aqua-teal blue balances that out.  I also like how they pack a little bit of whimsy without being in-your-face baby.  I backed the quilt with a large piece of the green House print, along with the yellow and green Deer prints.

I quilted this little number with an all-over squiggle. I really liked doing the squiggles since this baby-sized quilt was so much easier to manage than other quilts I have made. The quilt will probably hang out on our antique-dresser-turned-changing-table-with-towel-rack while we await Little One's arrival.

Hideoscope Baby Quilt
Finished size: 36" x 48"
Pattern: Kaleidoscope from Elizabeth / Don't Call Me Betsy
Fabric: Hideaway by Lauren & Jessi Jung
Quilting: All-over squiggle (no loops)
Binding: Clocks in blue from the Hideaway line

The curtains were hung...

...by the window with care :)

Drafty chilly nights require decent curtains, even if you do not have a proper rod from which to hang them. A few picture hangers, safety pins, and tie backs later, and we had a nice little barrier from the cold.

Initially I thought I would get a curtain rod as soon as we could, but now I'm kind of digging the stationary tie-back style.

Here they are when closed up for the night.

I use the magnetic ties to hold the curtains together when closed.

See that big green beautiful chair? That (and its partner) is what I am saving pennies to redo. So much character, eh? Can't you just see it in navy upholstery and antique white finishes? Yep, me too.

I was working on a basic hem on the other curtains for the dining room. I had given up hope to repeat this amazingly painstaking gathering technique. But then, wouldn't you know, I sewed my finger. On a HEM of all things. Ten, literally TEN inches from the end of the last hem on the last panel. Totally took away my sewing mojo. I have a bit of fear again. I'm sure I'm not the only one out there who has done this, but man, what a way to ruin progress!

So I baked a bit instead.

Banana cheesecake with chocolate ganache, anyone? A bit of an adult version of a kid food, if you ask me, and delicious of course. I guess a decent runner-up to sewing :)

Herringbone: finish

Linking up to Quiltstory's Fabric Tuesday today.

I think the finish bug bit me...!

(pardon the rainy-day-indoor-only-pre-move photos!) I steamrolled through the beginning stages of this quilt, but I only completed a few straight lines of quilting before adding the binding. You see, the back of this big guy is a very soft and cozy yet eager-to-shed micro-poly blanket. My living room floor was begging me to finish off the edges of the quilt, and once that was done, it went straight to the bed on the first cold night we had.

Thankfully it warmed up this week, so I set to finish the basic straight-line quilting along the herringbone frames. I especially like the way that the quilting looks on the back of the quilt (and I think the quilting is just enough to serve its purpose but still let the micro-poly backing be soft and cozy).

If you look closely, albeit very closely, this photo also shows the little light gray and polka-dot fabric details added in the binding.

stats
size: queen-ish
pattern: variable framed herringbone
fabric: Habitat by Jay McCarroll full collection, Kona Ash, Kona White-ish, random dark gray pillow cases
quilting: criss-cross straight lines at the foot of the quilt, straight lines following the frames on the herringbone portion

One more detail for fun :)

Now all we need are some more chilly nights, and maybe a cup of hot cocoa :)

Happy Tuesday!

Quilt finish (one year in the making)

That's right, this quilt has been woefully hanging on the back of our couch, stuck with safety pins and one rogue needle, while I toiled (or rather, didn't toil) over the hand quilting I had planned for almost a year. I posted about this quilt in my very first project post on this blog. As a recap, I had planned to give this quilt to my husband as a wedding gift. That didn't really work out. When I finally finished piecing it eight months later, I invented this grandiose plan to hand-quilt the piecing pattern. I got through a whole one block. In an effort to make this quilt more usable by finishing it, I made the executive decision last week to machine quilt instead. And now, my friends, it is finished.

Besides this quilt, let me recap what has been going on around here. My husband successfully defended and submitted his dissertation, my parents nearly sold out of what I had sewn for them (resulting in feverish restocking), we hosted Thanksgiving for the first time, hubby has 2 weeks left in school forEVER, and we recently found out that we will be moving back to Maryland in about a month (if you are keeping tally, this will be our third move this year).  Things have been...exciting.

Needless to say, there will probably be a shortage of handmade gifts coming from our home this year. Heck, there might not even be a whole lot of decorating here. But I hope you are enjoying the preparations for upcoming holidays :)

WIP Wednesday 7.13

It's that time of the week again, and I am decidedly doing my part to help Lee make it to 100 link-ups this week (after dropping the ball the last two weeks!)

Completed
Memorial quilts!

Long-overdue Gathered Clutches
My mother-in-law asked me to make some small clutches for her a while back. Funny thing is, I think she knows me, because she asked for them in March and needed them done by Christmas. Now that's a can-do deadline. I used the infamous gathered clutch pattern by Noodlehead for these.

In process
Hideoscope (pronounced Hide-oscope, not hideo-scope) (thanks to Katie for the name)
Well what do you know, I caught up with the Kaleidoscope QA! I think...should check the last post and make sure I didn't miss a step! Here are all my blocks.

I think my favorite part of the Hideaway line is the little guy in the alpine village who is fishing in the stream and has a quilt hanging to dry. If his house were for sale, I might just buy it.

My very first quilt
No pictures, but I dug it out of hiding. I'm hoping to finish piecing it by the end of the summer. Three years in the making...

Hope y'all are having a great week, and if you get a chance, write about what you are working on, and link up with Lee to help her reach 100!

my grandma, Ms. Marie

...and the beautiful quilts that grew out of her closet of clothing.

Okay, I promise, this is the very last you will hear about any sort of memorial quilt around here. I am officially retiring from cutting up clothes. But before I do, I would like to present the six Marie quilts, in memory of my grandmother Marie who passed away in October at age 98. She taught me how to crochet and embroider, skills a real Czech lady has [polka dancing, another skill a Czech lady should have, I do not].


Quilt #1: The Blue Room
My grandparents had three bedrooms, and the blue room, complete with blue walls and multi-tone blue shag carpet, was where guests always stayed. I don't remember a visit without asking "who gets to stay in the blue room??" It was my favorite room as a child because it had two touch lamps in it. So fascinating for a young engineer's mind.

original inspiration: the value quilt by Jess at sewcraftyjess


Quilt #2: Farm-girl Fancy
Marie was the daughter of the town banker. She was a classy lady. But she left the city to teach in a small schoolhouse and live on a farm with her husband Joe, where my mom and her siblings grew up plucking eggs from the chicken coup every day.

inspiration: broken dishes block


Quilt #3: Nebraska Wedding
This quilt is for my sister, who was wed to her born-and-bred Texan hubby in Nebraska so that our grandma could attend. The pinkish-purple diamonds come from the outfit that Marie wore to the big event.

inspiration: HST quilt at quiltstory

Quilt #4: Pretty in Pink
Marie's favorite, and I'm talking FAVorite color, was pink. She had this one housecoat, the pink-with-multiple-colors one in this quilt, that she wore at least once every time we visited. Sometimes it hung on the stairs to the basement so that she could throw it on and take a stroll through the deep freeze to find our dessert for dinner. This quilt is for my mama, complete with the lace from the outfit Marie wore to my mom's wedding.

Quilt #5: Go Huskers
This is the only quilt that has a touch of Grandpa Joe in it. The plain black blocks are from the suit he wore to marry Marie, way back in the 1930s. The corners have little touches of his tie collection. It was only fitting to sew them into a Huskers-colored quilt since he was an avid fan. You know, one of those that wore a fancy scarlet-and-cream outfit to the games.

Quilt #6: Corn Harvest Rows
A Nebraska farm is not complete without a few rows of grain. I tried to emulate them a bit with these HSTs.

And now they are all packed up and on their way to the family reunion to find their forever homes.

I'd like to send a special thanks to a lovely couple who lent me their yard to take these photos :) I bribed them with cookies and cupcakes. I think we're even.

a tribute to Alecia

It is both difficult and rewarding to finally say that this quilt is finished. Fair warning, there is a lot of emotional text ahead, both sad and awesomely funny :)

Alecia was the oldest sibling of the four of us. She passed away almost a year and a half ago, on December 23rd, 2009. It was a huge shock, unexpected, without warning.  I was back in Minneapolis from Atlanta for Christmas. Al and I had drifted apart to say the least, and when she called my parents' house on the 20th, I was the only one home, and I didn't think I had the energy to pick up the phone and talk to her. So I didn't. And that was it.

The process of collecting clothes was too quick. Every item was a memory, but there was no time to sit and remember. My other sister and I had jobs and school to get back to a thousand miles away. I packed up what I could and brought as much back to Atlanta as would fit [including a couple of space bags, which, by the way, are NOT reusable].

Then it all sat while I tried to heal. I would pick it up every now and then, but every piece smelled like her, and every shirt was a reminder that she wasn't coming back to wear it. My therapist [yes, therapist. if you can go through a sudden death without assistance from a non-family member, I commend you] recommended that I document the quilting process on a blog as a sort of homage to Alecia's memory. I kind of am doing that now.

My sister had her issues, but don't we all? She did care a lot about other people. She was always trying to make you smile, and she would give you all she had if it meant your happiness. Her acts of kindness were what kept her going so long. And her lasting gift to me is helping me realize that I need to make the most of every second that I have.


name from a sports shirt, orange shirt stolen from my closet years ago, yellow hip strap to some fancy undies, doll blanket from her childhood


blueberry muffin? (from Strawberry Shortcake) charm still in her jewelry box after all these years, blue linen (also found in a multitude of other colors), flannel pj pants, green shirt also taken from my closet (probably looked better on her anyway)


all the rest of the pieces. I am well aware that it kind of has a high-school-craft-project-modge-podge flare to it, but I think that's what I love, and I hope my sister Nicole loves too :) the more memories, the merrier!

Enough sobs. Here are some fun facts :).

Alecia was the person that taught me to use tampons. And by "taught," I mean I was visiting her at college, got my little package from mother nature, and Alecia would not buy me anything but tampons. I liken it to throwing a puppy into a pool and expecting it to swim.

She also had a slight obsession with finding deals at Old Navy. We would have more gifts from Alecia than from Santa some years. But, to Santa's credit, she would put just one piece in every box. And then she would leave the price tag on it so that she could show us just how great of a deal it was.

She was also obsessed with g-strings. Yep. Take a close look at the quilt and you will see some (the hip straps of course!) sewn into nondescript shapes like flowers and bows. And there were sometimes some of these under the Christmas tree from her too.

Alecia taught me the gloriousness that is a taco salad using a Doritos shell. Mmm...dinner tonight? Don't mind if I do.

She was a killer swimmer, particularly at the 200 fly [I think it was the 200 anyway]. If you know swimming, you know how B.A. the 200 fly is. One night she decided to go "north of the river," which was out of bounds for us, and she got rear-ended. She was still awesome after that, but it really threw her body for a loop.

Speaking of car wrecks, she also once ran into the pole that guards the drive-thru window at Burger King (where she worked). When she got home, I was outside playing, and she tried to shush me as I was yelling "What happened?!" Like you can hide a huge indentation and missing light on the driver side from mom and dad. Coincidentally, I worked at the same BK Lounge years later, and I am pretty sure the navy blue scuff marks were still there.

My mom threw a spade at her one time. Hahahaha. This makes me laugh out loud. We were reconstructing our back yard and basement, and during a huge storm, we had a lot of water pouring in. So my mom and Alecia went out to dig trenches away from the house (while my dad was out of town, because he was always out of town during these gems), and upon a very close lightning strike, the spade miraculously flew out of my mom's hands (aka was thrown) and landed inches from Alecia as mom ran around to the front of the house repeatedly screaming one particular cuss word that rhymes with 'fit.' All while I watched from my window.

She once let me take her car on a road trip if I repaid her by cleaning it. Another time, she convinced me to clean it by letting me keep any change I found. WIN. Seriously, if you had seen her car, you would know just what a jackpot that was for me.

I got her drop-handle bike as a hand-me-down. At least I think it was hers. That's what lead me to love bicycling. Okay, it's more of a love-hate, but I plain old love drop-handle bikes.

So, if you made it this far, thanks for trucking through my homage. I miss her, but I know that she is much happier now, and that can't do anything but make me smile :)

best to you all.
Mary

work in progress wednesday (and another finish!)

It has been one productive week around here.



This past weekend, I finished the sliced coins quilt along (only a few weeks late! eek) just in time for a picnic on Monday night.

I got lucky enough to squeak out another finish this weekend, my monochromatic quilt. I submitted it on Sunday night, so here it is for the blog! (Thanks to Sean for being a trooper and holding it up for several minutes)



In a nutshell, I was influenced by the "hyperbolic plane," which my husband works closely with in his PhD research in math. Yep, math, hyper-awesome-nerd style. If you feel the urge to search for hyperbolic planes, pay attention to how the lines spread out and converge, and then try to wrap your brain around those lines actually being completely straight on a 2-d surface. That's a hyperbolic plane. Did I lose you yet? It's cool, I lost myself a few sentences back.

Anyway, I tried to express this concept in the shading and quilting. I emulated the 'shading' in the binding and backing as well. If you look closely, you can see how one corner is light and the opposite is dark.



This one was fun. Slow, but fun. It was nice to design my own quilt for once. Here's another touch of midtown again...



So, all in all, I'd say two finished quilts is pretty good progress, eh?

In other news, I reeeeeally want to join the supernova quilt along. Pretty sure I commented on Lee's blog when she asked about a potential quilt along that I would LOVE it if she did one. Alas, the funds just aren't there....I'm bummed. But I am looking forward to seeing what other gals will be doing!

recap
Finishes:
-sliced coins quilt
-monochromatic challenge quilt

New:
-birthday gift quilt (plum/olive/gold)
Processing:
-memorial quilts
-March bee blocks
-DC quilt
-Hideaway quilt
Next up on my plate will be some memorial quilts. I would really like to get all the tops finished so that I can pitch all the little scraps and free up some room in our apartment :)

Go check out what everyone else has been up to over at Freshly Pieced!

Mary

Picnic blanket / Sliced Coins finish!

The sliced coins quilt is finished, just in time for a birthday picnic for my husband :)



I am so happy to have this finished up for the rest of spring! As you can see, the grass here in Atlanta isn't really green, or soft, so a blanket is a must.

I really enjoyed making this quilt...the piecing was so straightforward after Elizabeth explained it during her quilt along. Once again, I was 'surprised' by how big it ended up being, so the quilting was a little daunting (not to mention the troubles I had). All in all, though, I am so happy with it!



The sun kind of highlights how little the white fabric and white thread match, but who cares. I'm guessing that will be the least of this quilt's worries during its life (considering we nearly had a run-in with the results of people not picking up after their dogs).

More burnt grass...and a little bit of Atlanta midtown :)



Here it is all folded up on the way home!


Design - Sliced Coins from Don't Call Me Betsy's QA
Fabric - Soul Blossoms in blue colorway, Kona Snow
Size - 60" x 72"
Quilting - all-over meander / loops

Thanks for checking out my finish!
Mary

work[s] in progress (central park finished!)

better late than never right? hop on over to Freshly Pieced and check out what everyone else is working on.

late was worth it, I was able to get some photos of my latest finish, the Central Park quilt (aka my first commissioned quilt).



I love this quilt.



Have I said how much I love this? I'm not sure why. Probably because I am excited to play with all the leftover pieces now. (there are a LOT!)

Laura and her sisters asked me to embroider this quote on the back...inspiration for their aunt in the hospital.



So, as far as other projects...umm...I did finish the sashing on my sliced coins quilt.

Then, everybody and their brother discovered that I can sew (apparently it is a lost art?) and my list of commissions has grown. I have no charging scheme in place, so I'm still holding the "Will Work For Scraps" sign.  I am, however, closing the waiting list so that I can decide if I want to pay the government to be able to charge other people :)

Finishes:
-central park quilt

New:
-quilting/binding for a friend
-another raincoat for a gift (but still waiting for a commitment)


Processing:
-sliced coins quilt
-crochet scarf for just me
-monochrome quilt
-first quilt
-memorial quilts (right now, 4 in process)
-Hideaway quilt (formulating a design and bought yardage this week!)

Let me leave you with my view for the day. Laura is a coworker of mine (we share an office space), so we decided to hang the quilt over our wall hangings. Made the day so much better :) and led to a lot of drifting off into Central-Park-goodness.


thanks for swinging by!
Mary

postage stamp quilt

It's finished! My very first quilt just for me, completed with the postage stamp quilt along. By the way, linking up to Quiltstory's Fabric Tuesday again :)



Lots of you asked about the purple color - I think I answered each of you, but just in case, it is Kona cotton in berry (you can purchase it here). I cheated the quilt along by using a fat quarter set of Anna Maria Horner's Innocent Crush line that I received for Christmas for the pattern patches, as opposed to purchasing a jelly roll of fabric. I think this resulted in a lot more duplication of prints, but it also saved me a chunk of cash. You win some...you lose some... Since I had a lack of variety, I decided to do a random construction. I like it. A lot. Even if some of the prints are corner-to-corner.



This is my proof that I did indeed finish this mammoth. Not sure why, but 60"x80" just did not click in my head.  Regardless, it sure felt like an eternity to assemble this thing. After assembling half, I had to think long and hard about whether I just wanted to make two separate quilts, especially with my husband exclaiming "That's HUGE!" in the background. Go big or go home, right? Oh well, perfect end-of-the-bed-in-the-warm-springtime quilt.



For the backing, I chose Parisville by Tula Pink's Damask Dot in pomegranate with white fleece 'batting,' and I just did straight-line quilting in a 1-2-4-2-1 pattern (every 10 rows). Just in case you missed the last three photos, here is another one :)



(I ventured into our courtyard for this one, city dwelling => no backyard, and my window sill was getting old. Needless to say, I snapped photos pretty quickly in hopes that I would not look like the crazy lady taking pictures of a blanket :) )

I had to fight the urge to pull out some chess pieces and set them up on this quilt :) Thanks for reading!

Mary

charlie brown quilt

So named by my husband (he was reading my mind) because of the stripes and color balance.



You may remember the sneak peak from last week. Recap: for a friend of the family, first baby is a girl, due in early summer, recently had surgery and is now resting up on her couch (so I am told :) ). With my awesome new walking foot and some cream thread purchased amid the ice storm, I was able to finish the quilting and binding of this baby [quilt].



Cannot wait to package this up and send it off :)



what kinds of quilt patterns have you used for baby quilts?

mary