Up-cycled quilt

My husband put a bunch of dress shirts (really nice, really expensive dress shirts) in the pile for goodwill about 6 months ago and I just knew I had to keep them.  I didn't know for what, but the fabric was just so soft and such a nice color.

Enter baby Oscar, who was born a month ago.  I was thinking of what I should do for his quilt, when his mom posted a picture of his nursery on her blog and I thought to myself "Self!  You need to use those shirts!"

So I cut them up, along with some old khakis, seersucker pants, and an old dress of Gracie's.  I wasn't really sure how it was going to look, but once I had it put together I was in love!  I know, it's a little weird to be gifting a quilt made of our old clothes... but it is my husband's super close friend, and they are pretty openminded, so I think it's ok :)

Thanks to mom, again, for advice on the borders.  I really stink at borders!

And I used quilting flannel for the first time for the backing.  I really love how it felt - I'll be doing that from now on for the baby quilts I do.

Luckily, I have a little break from baby quilts.  The next baby is in March, and they aren't finding out the sex, so I have time!

I have been working on Gracie's quilt.  Yah, I finally decided it was time to get this out of the WIP pile.  I am done with the basting and finished up the quilting today!  Just have to put the binding on that baby and I'll be done!  Gracie is so excited!



And I have my next quilt already cut out!  It's one for our house, so I'm super excited!!

HSTs for Christmas!

I made my husband's parents a quilt for Christmas!  I didn't know if I would have time to get it done, but I set a schedule and stuck to it!

I decided to do HSTs (Half Square Triangles) which I think take a lot of time and patience, but it's worth it with all of the different designs you can do with it!  I used a solid khaki color and blues and teals.  I really love the way it turned out!  Inspired by Rita at Red Pepper Quilts (who I think is SO amazing!)

I am not really into borders, so my mom helped me choose the borders (and the back - she's awesome!)

I tried "stitching in the ditch" on this quilt, because I wanted it to be really soft without too much quilting.  Stitching in the ditch is a huge pain and I don't think I'm cut out for it!  It is so precise!  If you look closely at my quilting I am not even in the ditch half of the time!  Oh well!  At least once it was washed and dried it got so crinkly that you can't even tell!

This is the largest quilt I have done since using my new sewing machine.  I had to do the block layout at my husbands office because it was too big for any of my floor space (it measures about twin size).  I had a tricky time with the basting - I did that in our computer room, but it was a really tight squeeze! If I had had more time I would have brought it back to the office!

I have one more baby quilt to do (baby overdue at this point!) and I really need to finish Gracie's quilt.  Poor Gracie.  That has been a WIP forever!  My parents got me a gift certificate to my local sewing shop, so I'm hoping to be able to take a class, or to get some beautiful new fabric to make something that I can keep for our house!!

Disappearing 9 patch

Another quilt done!  This one is for Gracie's preschool teacher.  I'm pretty sure she doesn't read my blog so I am posting it before we give it to her next week.  She is such an awesome teacher so I wanted to do something special for her.  Her favorite color is teal, and I decided to do a disappearing 9 patch (the correct way, not the ridiculous way I did Gracie's quilt!)

I had some teal and yellows left over from my previous quilts, so I just had to buy some blues (Hello, Black Friday!) and the border and back.  For the binding I usually just use what I have and do a scrappy binding. I love the way that looks.

I thought I had bought enough of the backing but I must have done my math wrong!  So, in the spirit of Tim Gunn, I had to "make it work".  I actually like the way it turned out, but it was a lot more work than I was planning on!!

I finally bit the bullet and did a stippling for the quilting of this one.  I took the class so long ago and I have been too afraid to try it on an actual quilt!  I couldn't decide on any other straight line quilting (besides stitching in the ditch - and that sounds so boring to me!) so I just did it.  It's not perfect.  But it's ok and I'm glad I did it.  You can definitely see the difference from where I started to where I ended.  Practice really does make perfect!


And OF COURSE, Gracie was painting at the other side of the table when I was quilting, and OF COURSE it got on the back of the quilt, and OF COURSE it was cheap $1 Joann checkout line paint that isn't washable.  Sigh.  But, you can't really tell, and at least it's for Gracie's preschool teacher who is used to having paint on everything :p  I tried to keep my cool, and Gracie kept yelling "MAMA!  You ruined my project!!"  Oh Gracie.

Another quilt that I love!  Next up is another gift quilt, probably more of a twin size, and then we have another baby on the way to some of our friends, so I'll be keeping busy!

In my spare time (ha!) I have made an earbud holder for my earbuds and some infinity scarves (thanks Pinterest!)  I have a few more scarves to do and I want to make a case for my iPhone!  I love that I know how to sew and can do all of these small projects!!

A quilt for baby Sofia

Another good friend of mine just added to her family through the miracle of adoption!  A baby girl!  I love doing quilts for baby girls!  She told me that they were going to decorate her room in pinks, purples, bronzes and ivory.

I went to Joann Fabric on Black Friday.  I know.  It was CRAZY!  I waited in line for an hour and a half just to get my fabric cut (I was buying for 2 quilts) and another 45 minutes to check out.  But it was an extra 25% off your entire order, so I think it was worth my time :)

I used a pattern I purchased from Oh, Fransson! (I love her blog).  It is called New Wave Quilt.  I bought it when she was having a 50% off sale (because I am so frugal :p)  This was an awesome pattern - so easy to follow and this quilt came together really fast (2 days.  I was a machine.)

 I wasn't really sure how I felt about it until after I had done the final wash.  Now I really am in love with it.  And I'm happy to report Heidi and baby Sofia are in love with it too!

I already started a lap quilt for Gracie's preschool teacher for Christmas - I'm just doing a disappearing 9 block, but I am having a hard time getting myself motivated!  I am also working on some other small Christmas gifts!  Hopefully more updates to come soon!

I'm back! And a baby quilt for Theo

Yes, it has been a long time since I have posted!  I have good excuses!  We were in Disney - and while we were there got to extend our trip by 5 more days!  Then when we got home we adopted a puppy!  Beautiful Jasmine (yup, we're a Disney family all the way).  She is a black standard poodle (no shedding - yay!)  The first few weeks were very time consuming - I had to watch Jasmine every second - so there was very little sewing going on!

But, some exciting things happened at the end of October.  Two of my friends were blessed to be chosen as adoptive Mamas (within 2 days of each other - I was so stressed!)  Baby Theo was born and placed with a very good friend of mine from college and 2 days later Baby Sofia was born and placed with my friend in Florida!  So I had to get moving on some quilts!

I chose a "wonky log cabin" block for baby Theo's quilt.  His mom loves bright colors, so I chose orange and teal.  I bought the fabric a while ago, I just couldn't decide on the design.  This quilt was a major labor of love.  I don't know if I'll be doing this design again any time soon!  Ironing after every seam was very tedious.  But, I finally finished it and I really love how it turned out!  Another one that my husband says he wishes could be kept at our house :)

I already decided on a design for Sofia's quilt, and I know the colors I want - I am going out on Black Friday to get some deals on fabric!  Also on the docket is a lap quilt for Gracie's preschool teacher for Christmas and another quilt I need to finish for Christmas time too!  I also have a few homemade gifts I want to make too... I better get moving :)

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Touch Pad cover

My husband recently bought an HP Touch Pad.  He has been asking me to make him a cover, and I had done the research and picked the fabric... I just hadn't done it yet!

So we were just hanging around yesterday, having a lazy Sunday and it was the perfect time to do this project!

I used a mix of tutorials: This one from Moda Bake shop and this one from The Cottage Shop

I used scraps for the outside, a piece of warm and white for the batting, and a piece of an old dress shirt of Gregg's for the lining (I know, I know, I'm so resourceful).  It was also my first time doing free motion quilting on any project.  I had to start over and rip out some of it, but it ended up coming out pretty good!  I do need to play a little bit with the tension on my machine and the speed while free motion quilting.  I guess that is just going to take some practice!

So now the new touchpad is ready for our Disney Vacation!

A quilt for baby girl!

A friend of ours just had a baby girl!  I was making her a "gender neutral" quilt because she wasn't finding out the sex of the baby in advance.  But as soon as I found out it was a girl I decided to make a "girly" quilt, because everyone I know is having a boy or not finding out the sex!

I did another zig-zag quilt, because I am temporarily obsessed with them.  Pink and grey.  Another quilt I love so much and had such a hard time parting with!

And I was SO excited to find this black fabric for the backing at Joann's.  It is just perfect!

I did straight line machine quilting on both sides of the zig zag seams in pink cotton thread.  I really love the effect... I am so glad that I started machine quilting.  I still have yet to do free motion quilting, but that is coming.  Just trying to get up my nerve!  And all of these pictures are post-machine washing, so it is all nice and crinkly!

A few more pictures:

We leave for Disney in 9 days!  Just finished a Bambi dress for Gracie and still need to do the Princess Tiana dress!  Almost done with our Pirate Costumes, too, I need to find a child size pirate hat to complete Gracie's costume!  I'll do a separate post on the Disney dresses and Pirate costumes when I am done with all of them!