Soooo Many Projects

It was a busy weekend, my attention span is a nanosecond!  I finished up my quilt for DQS 11,

A little spiderweb quilt.  Fun to make and I am pleased with the look.  Those bulky seems were special!  I would change a few things to improve upon that problem.....next time.  I added a few spiders just for a little color and fun.  I need to add a label and then ready for mailing around mid month.

I have a couple of Seeing Squares small quilts in progress.  One will go to a little boy in Germany for Christmas, one is just for fun.

I have another small quilt I need to get busy on which is a gift.  I am part of the For the Love of Solids swap.  I have the fabrics selected and the pattern too so need to get busy.


I tried this block as an experiment.  There is a bit of waste with this one, but how good is this going to be made out of Neptune?  I think I will love it so much.

Last but not least I am quilting along with McIntyre Girl in a Garden Fence QAL on Flickr.  This one will be a Christmas gift for a little red headed boy who I love so much.

It is good to have my sewing energy back.  I don't know where it went for awhile!

It's Monday Again!

Where did my weekend go???  Seems like Friday finally comes and then I blink and it is Monday again.  It was a great weekend.  Went shopping with my niece for Back-To-School for my girl "Greats".  One 5 and it will be her first year in "Big Girl" school, and then one who is 4 and it is her first year in Pre-School.  So much fun.  What beautiful little girls they are.  While shopping we ran in to the boy "Greats".  All such great kids, I am truly blessed by them.

I got a little sewing done.  These blocks are work intensive
but I love how it turned out.

I learned a few things, as I always do.  The number of layers of fabric in the center of these blocks is

 far, far too many.  Think I will leave the last strip off the last 1/4 inch of the foundation and save that layer.  I love the way it turned out.  Really cute I think.  It is ready to quilt so I had best get to it.  It is for my partner in the DQS 11 swap.  Has to go into the mail mid August.  I have plenty of time.

I will then get busy on my "For the Love of Solids" swap.  Then I am swap done for this year,  I have several plans for gifts so I need to focus!

Speaking of swaps, if you ever join one please be involved.  It is so much more fun if you are.  I have had notoriously quiet partners in most of my swaps so far.  Everyone is busy, I understand, but really, don't join unless you plan to participate.  It is so much more rewarding for both of you if you do!

Happy Monday everyone!  Hope your week goes well.

Bee Blocks

Today was bee block day for me.  I belong to the KC Scrappy Bee, our 2nd year and the BEE Neptune Bee on Flickr.

For the KC Scrappy Bee it was Caitlin's month and she wanted a spider web block.  She had a color range we needed to stay in but with my vast!! stash it was no problem.

For the BEE Neptune it is Yolanda's month.
She chose hexagons.  Since the hexagon skill eludes me, I made these pieced hexagon blocks!  Could have been better!! Could have been worse.  All in all I am pleased.


I keep saying that I need to stop this swap, Bee stuff!!  Will I never listen!

Garden Fence QAL

Caitlin is hosting a Quilt A Long on her blog here   http://mcintyregirl.blogspot.com/2011/07/lets-get-it-started-uh-huh.html

Have you seen the great Garden Fence quilts on Flickr??  What a great fun quilt block.

This is a mini quilt I made with mini charm square centers.  This is a 5 inch block.

This is a full size Garden Fence quilt that I put on the floor to tweek the layout.  These blocks are 11 inches square, made with charm square centers from the Moda Happy line.  It was so much fun pulling coordinating fabric from my stash for the block borders!  This quilt was made completely from stash.

I still need to add the white sashing and put it all together.

Join Caitlin for her Garden Fence QAL.  It will be lots of fun and you will end up with a great quilt at the end.

Small - Mini - Doll Quilts

I somehow was chosen to participate in the Flicker Doll Quilt Swap 11.  My first DQS was # 10 and lots of fun.  This round we are making a true doll quilt.  Minimum 6 blocks and no more than 18 inches square.

 Cool Blue Diamond

                                                  Red Hot Diamonds

Mini Garden Fence




Not sure what I will do yet, Mini spider web is a possibility!  Who knows.  I've got to get going, mail date is not too far off.

Blogger Slacker..............Life Slacker

I am a blogger slacker!  At the same time I seem to have been a life slacker also.  I am not certain of the cause but I am investigating.  Maybe a summer funk has come to live in my brain, I am not sure.  I have been sewing a bit but not the usual over the edge amount.  I have decided to wake up, shake it off and get busy.

I have done a couple of little things like this,

 a doll size take on Kaffe Fassett's Hot Diamonds,  It was quick colorful and bright,  A fast instant gratification.

This one got a little wonky in quilting but good enough for the girls to use for their dolls.








I have to get busy now.  Everything I have slacked on needs to be completed.

Tools of the trade...part 1

I have not contributed here in a while.  I have been working but don't feel like I am making progress.....just keep plugging away.  I still have several projects that need to be finished.

I wanted to talk about using the tools we have to make our quilting life a little easier.  There are so many of them.  When I started pulling together my quilting tools for this post I could not believe all the tools I have!

Cutting tools are such a necessity.  Every size of rotary cutter, blades, my precious circle cutter, a true necessity for me, and various scissors for various projects.  I use them all, not on every project but it's nice to know they are at hand when I need them.

Can you say rulers!

OK, I have a lot of rulers.  I have many specialty rulers.  I never met a ruler I didn't like.  I like to have the proper tool for my projects......Yep, I have too many rulers!  I have about 4 rulers I use everyday.

  One of the best tools ever is this rotating cutting mat that I can trim and square up blocks without moving the fabric.  This is a nice tool.

Those JoAnn's coupons feed this tool obsession of mine!!  Some specialty tools are not available there but you can almost always find the basics.

Thats it about tools so far.  I'll  talk about my favorite specialty tools next time.

Dig out those tools from their hiding places and find the treasures you have not been using that will make your quilting life so much easier.