Designer a Day - Day 5

Today I have for you Sandy Klop of American Jane.

In my book she is the Queen of Little Pieces!  This is one of her newest patterns

Sailing the Seven Seas.

I saw this quilt in person and just about died!  It was absolutely fantastic! 

Here's a closer shot so you can see all the little pieces.

I can't wait to do this quilt!

So what are we up to now?  Seven designers, 16patterns, and 2 books.  Well continue to stay tuned because I have dozens more patterns to share...and a Blogoversary giveaway coming soon!

And the Hexi Quilt goes to...

RAGAMUFFIN YOGINI



Thank you to everyone who offered to give my hexi quilt a new home. 
I really appreciate it.  Stay tuned because you never know when another
quilt top sitting on my shelf may need another good home.

Designer a Day - Day 4

Good afternoon!  For today's Market goodies, I present...

Don't Look Now and Miss M

I was really ticSkled to see Kellie of Don't Look Now at Market again.  Her quilts are BANANAS!  And her Animal Alphabet is next on "must buy" list.  If you haven't checked out her blog before you really NEED to. 

Miss M...I dont' have a lot of information to share with you.  Her patterns were available as part of Pattern Press' booth (an Australian pattern wholesaler).  I came up empty in an attempt to find a blog or website to share with you.  But if you follow the link above it'll take you to Hugs 'n Kisses website where you can purchase patterns.

That's all I have for today.  Chat with y'all tomorrow!

P.S.  Is it wrong that I want to do Little Monsters just for me?

Cracked Pots Revisited

Remember wayyyyy back when I started my Cracked Pots quilt? 

Well I have him-hawed sharing a picture long enough. Its going to the quilter tomorrow and I wanted to share it before it left.  In the beginning I had grand plans to put up the drop stand and take a proper picture.  But this is the best you're gonna get today...me standing on a dining chair taking a picture from above.

I'm very pleased with it and can't wait to see it hanging in our booth at the Houston Quilt Festival!  If you go to festival this year make sure you stop and say hi when you see the quilt.

I just don't know...

...about this quilt and how its turning out?  I don't know if the cream is too light or the dark brown is too dark...or if it's the orange border.

I am going to keep plugging away on it and see what happens.  I have at my disposal the same border print but in teal, green, and brown.  I definately think the orange isn't right for this quilt.

Maybe it's just me but what do you think?

Designer a Day - Day 3 and another Giveaway

Well here we are again...Day 3 of my Designer a Day!

I hope y'all will forgive me for taking the weekend off from posting about my Market finds.  I had a good reason.  Our youngest son arrived home Saturday for two weeks R&R from Iraq and it has been six months or so since we saw him.  As we speak he is parked on the couch relaxing and watching a movie...*happy sigh*.


Okay let's move on.  Today I have for you Gail Pan Designs.  I've been following Gail's blog for quite some time so I was quite tickled when I came upon her booth at Market.  This was her first time attending and she didn't disappoint.  I could have bought one of everything in her booth...but instead I settled on these lovelies.

In order they are: 

A Christmas Welcome

Busy Little Christmas Elves

Snowy Garden Stitcheries

Blessings to All

and

Summer's Bouquet

And now for the giveaway.  I am going to give away my copy of Snowy Garden Stitcheries to one lucky winner. 

Sorry it's not all of them but I haven't made the other yet so you can't have them...LOL...yet.

For a chance to win simply leave me a comment. But please make sure I have a way to contact you. "No reply" commenters that do not leave their email address are not eligible for the giveaway.

I will pick a winner for this giveaway on Friday at the same time I pick a winner for this one.

Till tomorrow...

My Studio

Remember that this past November when I purchased a Studio from AccuQuilt?  Remember I had all sorts of grand ideas about showing you all the cool things you could do with it?  Well life's other commitments (and my ADD) got in the way...no big surprise there.

Now while I didn't ever show you anything, it doesn't mean I didn't play with the studio...because I HAVE!  I've cut oodles of 5" squares to do a Disappearing Nine-Patch comfort quilt for a friend before she died of cancer.  I've cut blocks for a friend that was doing a block swap.  And I've even done a little cutting for me.

Back in December I was dying to try out two specific dies...my Rob Peter to Pay Paul and my Double Wedding Ring.  From a Tula Pink layer cake and some background yardage I cut out my RPtPP blocks.  I'm a little less than halfway done with them.  I love the little notches that the Studio cuts on these blocks.  They make lining pieces up super easy!

From the scraps leftover I was able to cut enough pieces for a 2 x 2 Double Wedding Ring quilt.  And here is my progress so far on this one.

So today I'm going to put all my obligations aside and work on these two projects.  It's ok to do what you want once in a while isn't it?

Designer a Day - Day 2 and a GIVEAWAY

Welcome back!  Today I'm going to share with something special from one of my favorite designers Sue Daley of Patchwork With Busy Fingers. 

In posts past I have gushed about my love for Sue's Engligh paper piecing designs.  At this Market she introduced this set of patterns designed exclusively for her American customers.  They celebrate Valentine's Day, Easter, Spring, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.  Each little wallhanging measures 12" x 14".

Here is a closer look at each pattern.

Aren't they just adorable?



Now for the giveaway!  I am going to give one lucky person ALL six patterns.  Each pattern includes all the paper pieces necessary to make each little wallhanging. 

For a chance to win simply leave me a comment...no other hoops to jump through.  But please make sure I have a way to contact you.  "No reply" commenters that do not leave their email address are not eligible for the giveaway. 

I will select a winner via random number generator next Friday, July 1st.

Till tomorrow...

Hexi Quilt Free to Good Home

***COMMENTS ARE NOW CLOSED***

Somehow or another I acquired this  3" hexi quilt. 

And now it needs a good home.  Could it be your home?

If you're interested just leave me a comment.  "No reply" commenters that do not leave
their email address are not eligible for the giveaway.  If there are more than one of you that wants it, next Wednesday I'll draw a name via random number generator.

Designer a Day - Day 1

Ok first up I actually have two designers for you...Monique Dillard and Debbie Roberts.

Many of you will already know about Monique Dillard's Fat Quarter Winners and what a fabulous book it is.  This one is my favorite!

But what you may not know is her book is part of a new series of books to be published by C&T Publishing called The Quiltmaker's Club.  The goal of this new series is to give you MORE for LESS.  Each book is full of wonderful patterns at $20.00 or less per book.  Every so often more books will be published as a part of this series.  You can read more about the current books in this new series here and read Monique's blog here.


Next up is Debbie Roberts, owner of The Quilted Moose in Gretna, NE.  Debbie's book Four Seasons at Minglewood came about when she decided to design a BOM for her shop to use all her leftover Christmas fabric.  Let me tell you...this book is fantastic!  Not only does she give you instructions to make the quilt on the cover, she gives you these alternate layouts...

..and eight other quilt designs!


Well that's it for day 1.  See you tomorrow...hopefully!

And now you know why...

...I haven't blogged about my Market purchases yet.

*hangs head in shame*

Yeah right!  This is the pattern portion of my Market haul.  It wasn't until we were packing to come home that I realized how much I had actually purchased.  There are SEVERAL dozen patterns...and a couple books...in that one pile.

Starting tomorrow I'm going to do "A Designer A Day" for y'all so you can see all the "new to me" stuff I found at Market.

See you tomorrow!

Finally able to post a picture...

...but I had to go a roundabout way to get it done!

Here's Block 1 of 2 from Frontier & Furrows.  I have all 15 done!  I would have had them done if it hadn't been for jury duty Monday...grrrrrrrrr.  Next up is the second block design for this quilt and then it'll be DONE. 

I like getting things done!

P.S.  If you ever have trouble inserting pictures like I did today, click "Edit HTML" on your New Post page and you'll be able to add your picture there.

What the frick...

is going on with Blogger?  I can't upload photos.  This is a first for me.

*grumble grumble grumble*

Next up...

Frontier Furrows by Antler Quilt Design

I've had this pattern and fabric sitting here for a couple months now waiting to be done.  And now it's time has come.  I absolutely love this color combination.  The fabrics are a mix of Ohio Autumn/Arnold's Attic by Barbara Brackman with a little Kansas Troubles and Bon Voyage by Laundry Basket Quilts thrown in.

While at Spring Market I had the opportunity to meet Doug Leko, the designer of this pattern.  Did you know he's only 18 years old and going to be a senior in high school this fall?  He is such an amazing and talented young man.  I think we expect great things from this young man in the future.

You can check out his website here and his blog here.

Cue music...

...I'm so excited!

It's arrived...month #1 for Flower Garden by Kim McClean, offered by Quilters' Paradise!

I don't sign up for BOM's very often...I like to pick my own stuff.  But every once in a while, there comes along a BOM that is too good to pass up.  Kim and Kaffe...it doesn't get any better than that!

I love Kim's patterns and have been wanting to do one for a while but my Kaffe stash isn't quite up to parr yet.  So this BOM came along at the perfect time.

Now if someone can find me some time to do it I'd be ever so grateful.

Anyone up for a fabric swap?

I've been mulling over an idea in my head for a few days now and I'm wondering what you think.

First, a little background.  As some of you know I love scrap quilts.  If I'm not working on a sample quilt for the shop, I'm usually working on a scrap quilt similar to the one pictured above.  For scrap quilting I have a system wherein I buy fat quarters and split them in half into fat eighths.  One goes in my "scrap" bin and one is stored for later use. 

This system allows me more variety without having to deal with loads and loads of fat quarters.  My Civil War bin alone has several hundred different fabrics.  Now can you imagine how much room all those fat quarters would take?  And all the constant unfolding and refolding?

So what I'd like to do is have a Fat Eight Swap limited to 8 to 16 people.  So at most it would be a 2 yard purchase plus postage to participate. 

Option One would be a one time swap where we pick a style (Modern or Civil War because these are the ones I really like) and the color is up to each person.  Another way would be to just assign each person a color to shop for. Boom...done...you have a small stash in a variety of colors to play with.

Option Two would be a longer commitment.  For this one we would commit to a style and each month (for no more than 12 months) we focus on one color.  With this swap you would receive tons more variety. 

I am particularly fond of option two because I really want to start collecting more modern prints like the ones in my last post.  What you saw in my last post is the full extent of my modern print collection.  Option two would help build a good usable stash for anyone just starting to collect...over even someone wanting to add to their existing stash for that matter.

So...thoughts?  If you might be interested please leave a comment telling me:

• Which option is more appealing?
• A 8-person or 16-person group?
• And what style...Modern or Civil War?

And we'll just see if we can get something going!  If you know anyone else that might be interested just send them this way.

Chat with y'all soon!

*happy sigh*

This makes me happy...

A couple new finishes

No....I don't have any pictures of my Market haul yet.  I've been crazy busy with life in general.

But I do have a couple new finishes to share with you.

First up my version of Gail Pan Designs' Snowy Garden Stitcheries.  We found this at Market and upon returning home it was the first project I started on...something quick and easy.

Next up, and just finished yesterday, is a quilt commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Civil War. 

*sorry for the wonky photo*

At the shop there were a couple of bolts of Lincoln Bicentennial panels from Windham Fabrics.  Each scene depicted pictures from the Civil War.  We loved the panels but could never figure out what to do with them and they were selling.  So I began the mission of finding a use for these fantastic panels.  Jackpot!  While searching Windham's website I found a pattern called Army of the Potomac that used a completely different panel.  But after making a few measurements I knew the panel would fit and we were off to the races.

I'm really pleased with how it turned out.  And my husband really likes it too which is always a bonus.  The quilt measures 58" x 58" and is the perfect gift for any Civil War buff.


I have a couple other finishes but like a ding dong I didn't get photographs and now they are at the shop.  So obviously no photos to share...sorry.

One was the Smokey River quilt I talked about in a previous post.  It turned out fabulous I must say. 

And the other was a new pattern I purchased at Market called Perfect Ten by Swirly Girls Design.  I just LOVE their patterns.  And this particular one could not have been easier and quicker.  It took less than a day to cut and sew it together.  I made my version in Kaffe Fasset, Philip Jacobs, and Brandon Mabley prints and let me just say this...I think it turned out FABULOUS!  I will try to get a picture of it as soon as possible to share.

Well that's all for now.  I have to get ready to give a quick EQ7 tutorial to someone who's thinking about buying the software and then it's backing to quilting.

Have a fantastic day!