Dinosaurs!

We're settling in here in our new home and the boys all decided they needed new pillows for their beds and to bring down stairs when they're watching a movie.  Mommy to the rescue. 

We searched through images for inspiration and, of course, they all landed on the same thing... 

Dan from pieceandpress made an awesome dinosaur quilt you can see here.  http://pieceandpress.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/heros-nemesis-or-orange-lizard.html?m=1  I took that as inspiration and made just the head for the pillows for the boys. They've enjoyed the process and so have I. 

I'm alive and I live in London

Really, that sums it up right about now.

We're here in London.  Have been for almost two months now, and we still are not in our own place. 
We were supposed to move into a house 2 weeks ago, but once all of the things were out of it, it was very evident that there was a lot of water damage and mold and was unfit to live in.  We got out of that agreement and got our money back.  Now we're just waiting for our references to go through on another house and hopefully we'll be able to move in this week...but that's what I said last week. 

I have I think 3 or 4 quilts to show you that I photographed and uploaded before we left, but then my laptop died.  It's alive again, but there's nothing left on it.  So I'm hoping that I have the pics on the backup drive and if I find them, I'll show you.  My plan was to blog about them during the obvious down time that I would have from the sewing machine, but nothing I've planned has been happening as I saw they should...so....

Anyway, we've been able to see God's faithfulness to us, though.  The first house we viewed we loved and were going to make an offer, but the estate agent said that we probably wouldn't want to live in that area and warned us not to. Who does that when they're trying to make a sale? Come to find out from a friend, who's husband is a cop, that the worst criminal in the burrow lives just down the street.  Okay, Lord! Thank you for protection!

And since we've had to do so much waiting, we've got great deals on furniture and beds, etc.  It's been a blessing to see these things come together.  In another month I'll hopefully be unpacked and look back on these two months and laugh...even if I don't feel like laughing right now! Perspective changes everything.

Thanks for those of you who have checked in on me.  Hopefully I'll be sewing sometime soon...and sleeping in my own bed and cooking in my own pots and pans....

WIP

I have 4 new finished quilts to show you...I know I keep telling you.  They're piling up.  But I have one more that I'm trying to finish up before we leave in 53 days!


It's my Bejeweled quilt from the pattern that I wrote, which is for sale here.

I'm trying something new, which I've never been great at: straight line quilting.  I'm using blue painter's tape as a guide, because I started to mark the quilt and decided I'd rather have lines that aren't perfect than waste my time.

It's coming along, but my biggest WIP is packing. 


 

There's my stash.  In box number 9.  It's packed and ready to fly, or float, however we decide to ship.  I still have batting and my machine and odds and ends and scraps to pack, so if you want to add any scraps to that, I'll give you my address! I've learned that one of my favorite types of projects is scraps.

Hope you are having a lovely Wednesday and here's to finishing up one more quilt before I'm out of here!

A Pillow for my Sis

I have soooo much done.  Made 2 more quilts for my other 2 nieces, finished my huge Swoon quilt, made a memory quilt out of baby clothes, and I'm working on quilting my Bejeweled quilt.
But only a few have been photographed and I've had no time to blog lately.

My house is getting full of boxes, which means a lot of sorting and trashing and garage sales and my heart is full and excited and overwhelmed and I can't believe we're leaving in 63 days and I'm rambling....

Ok, so today I'll show you the pillow I made for my sister, who needs some color on her new gray couch that I love.




Olive it. And if she doesn't want it I'll take it. But I think she'll want it. It's all her colors, which are my colors. So I may make a sister pillow to stay at my house in LONDON! Because I'm moving there in 63 days, did I tell ya?

Back to the pillow. I added a few hand stitches in the gray crosses. And the back has a little design element to it. It's an envelope closure for easy washing and I hope she loves it!

Thank you to Quilt Story for featuring Brooke's quilt today! Talk soon...

Squiggly Circle/Zig Zag Swirl

A few gals asked me about the free motion quilting I did on the Stained quilt I just shared with you.
I'm calling it the "Zig Zag Swirl."  Better than circly thingy.
Anyway, there a bad video that I shot that will give you an idea of what the movement looks like.  (Don't mind that I had to keep picking up the foot to go over the fabric.  My son glued some fabric in place for a pillow for my mother, so I was keeping it down with the quilting.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SYDkWeTa0Q 

Also, here are a few tips for you if you'd like to try it on your own:

You'll want to start from the center and work your way out.  Determine how big you want your circles and how small/tight or large/loose you want your zig zag to be.  Mine was less of a zig zag, more like a squiggle.  Okay, maybe I should call it the "Squiggly Circle."



If you get pinned into a corner like the one pictured below, you'll want to make sure that you make the circle the same size as the rest, so move your starting point closer to the edge, even though it will be cut off.  Go around until you can't go full circle any more.  Then you'll bring it to the side (where the pencil is pointing) and bring it down a bit, the same amount that it would be if you had gone around the whole way.  You want to keep the illusion that it's the same size circle.  Do that on the sides until you've filled in your space.



 Sometimes you'll only have to do that once, like in this pic.

Hope you like it and let me see, please, if you use this. I'd love to know! xo

Claiming

Just claiming my blog on bloglovin' like all other bloggers out there. 

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Well, since I'm here, I'll show you my finished Stained Quilt-a-long quilt that I finished in June.  I finally figured out where I hid it while I was on my 4 month road trip...at my mother in law's!



The quilting was a squiggly circly thingy. I don't know what to call it, but I wanted to try something new.  Here it is on the back, which is pieced from a few different red/blue/white fabrics that I've had in my stash forever just waiting to be used.

A scrappy finish

As I think about my WIP that I have going, I am happy to say that I have finished a quilt that will be given to a friend in the near future...whenever she has her baby shower.  It's a girl! And I had all these great scraps left over from my niece's string quilt (here) that I wanted to use up.  It's a perfect fit.



I just cut 3" squares of white and then sewed the little triangles I had left over to opposite corners of the square.  I used the same fabric for each square, but definitely could have just gone totally scrappy and used different fabrics everywhere.  Originally I wanted to do different colors radiating out of the center, but I didn't have enough of the same colors to do that, so I went this route, and I like it.



I know that my friend will love it for her new baby that is due in June...just before I leave.

Which reminds me, I have to make one more quilt for my second niece, Taylor, before I leave.  I have the materials cut out (some of them) and will start piecing soon. I am using the Kaleidoscope QAL pattern from don'tcallmebetsy.  Pics to come when I'm through.



 I'm linking up today to see what others are up to.
 crazymomquilts.blogspot.com

 

A Quilt for Silas

I'm making progress on making sure that all my nieces and nephews have a quilt from their Aunt Sarah before I move to London in June.



This quilt if for the newest little guy. He was born 12/12/12! What an awesome birthday! His name is Silas and he is soooo cute. I get to meet him for the first time in 10 days. I can't wait!


My sister picked out the fabrics and asked for a big quilt that he can grow into. (I really know that she wants it big so they can cuddle up on the couch together!)




I'm so happy I found the same line of fabric in a soft flannel for the back. I'm sure that they're going to love to cuddle up with this...although I want to be the first one to cuddle with him next week!

It's a Dog's Quilt

A friend bought new red leather chairs and wants to keep them looking new.  But her dog loves to sleep on one of the chairs at night.  So she asked me to make a quilt that will be for the dog to sleep on and protect her chairs.


I know how much she looooves her dog, so I knew I wanted to find just the right fabric.  And I did! There's a little dog on it that looks just like Truffles.

I drew a larger version of the dog onto a white piece of fabric that was backed with interfacing for stability, and then "drew" the dog face on it with black thread.  I can't believe how easy it was!



And I love the way they turned out.



And so did my friend.  And hopefully Truffles will love to sleep on it.

I made the back simple, because I figured that she would put the back face up for the dog to sleep on.



I also added some bones and paw prints into the free motion quilting.  And her name is in the center square.



 It was fun trying something new.  I think I'll add this type of sewing into more projects!

Linking up today at CrazyMomQuilts.  Enjoy your weekend!

A New Pillow

This 20x20 half square triangle square has been sitting in my closet for over a year now.  I made it from scraps left over from my Swoon quilt....that still has not been quilted...but that is another story.

Today, I broke out the scraps of muslin and wadding and put it all together! Yay for a quick finish.



I also worked on little envelopes for my kids to keep their allowance money.  They each have three envelopes, one for saving, spending, and tithing.



Here's a pic of my little ninja doing one of his  chores.



Hope you have a great weekend!

I'm linking up at CrazyMomQuilts.

Which Layout?

I'm working on my next quilt. It's for my niece.

This is the design she likes and the colors she wanted. I have more than half of the blocks left to make but I keep playing with the ones that I have ready. Now I have to decide how I want to place the colors. Take a look and let me know what you think.

In this layout, the same fabrics are placed across from each other.



In this layout, the colors are placed randomly.

I don't know which one to go with. I like them both. Want to weigh in? I'd love it if you did...as long as you aren't offended if I don't choose your way!


 

Owen's Quilt

When my three year old asked me to make him a quilt after watching me make his cousin a quilt, I could not resist.  I was just getting into quilting about a year after he was born.  So he did not get a baby quilt.  Actually, none of my kids did.  And he fell in love with the soft minky blankets that you can buy at the store for a few bucks, so we just went with that.  I figured once he asked me for one, that would be special and I knew I would love making it.


 (The colors are a little off, but they are the DS quilts fabrics from Joann, so I'm sure you know what they look like in person.  Blues, not black, greens, not yellow. I need a camera...)

And I did.  Every time he saw me sewing he said, "Momma? Is that my kilt?" with such excitement in his voice that I couldn't take it! I worked quickly on it and finished it up with a soft minky backing so that he would enjoy the same feeling as his other blanket that he loves so much.




So here it is.  I used the pattern Pow-Wow which you can find here.  It was easy to understand and went together easily.  Not to mention I have a lot of little HST's in greens and blues to make a new little project.



He loves his "kilt" but still doesn't use it.  But it hangs off his bed and he knows it's his and that his Momma made it just for him...and that's enough.

A New Goal and a New Quilt

Well, I'm moving to London, England in 6 short months.  And I've made a quilt for all my young nieces and nephews...the ones that have been born in the last few years.  But my goal for this year was to give my older nieces and nephews a quilt before I leave.

I took care of Grant, whose birthday was in December, with this camoflage quilt.

Next up is my oldest niece, Brooke.  Her birthday is 4 days after mine in February, and I'm happy to say I'm already done with her quilt!  (Only two more to go after her!)


Here it is.  She's going to be 15 this year.  I can't believe it.  I think this will suit her.  She told me she likes all these colors, but no yellow, which is funny because her room is yellow.





This is an up-close of the quilting. I did big flowers throughout the quilt. I like it. (Don't mind the string hanging off there...don't know how I missed that!)



The back is one fabric I chose that I thought she would like. The colors in the pic are a little off, but it's really nice in person. I hope she likes it!

I had a lot of little triangles left over when I trimmed the blocks.  I made a baby quilt with them, you can check it out here.

I'll soon be sharing with you my newest nephew's quilt (See HERE) that will be on it's way to him soon. (He was born 12-12-12! How cool is that birthday?!) 

Thanks for stopping by!