Month: March 2016

Happy Easter

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This morning, we had another blast from old man winter. My

favorite saying is” if the weather is rotten outside, it is a perfect

day for quilting inside.”  Don’t you agree?

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Baby girl quilt

My son is heading to Thailand, this summer, with our local

Church. Fundraising is always a big part of raising money for the

kids to go, so how can I not make a quilt?

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I saw this panel at Lens Mills or Fabricland and I couldn’t resist

buying it. It is so cute. I think it is based on a book called”How

Much Do I Love You?”

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I added borders because the panel wasn’t big enough by itself. I knew

that feathers would help dress it up a little and make it a bit more

classy. I hope the receipent thinks so too.

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The backing

I has some light pink fabric that I thought would match the front

of the quilt.  Again, I think it fits and works well with the front.

I used a white polyester thread on the front and the backing of

the quilt.

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Kathy’s Quilt

Kathy made this quilt for her grand daughter who is leaving

for University in the fall. Can you guess what university she

will be attending in the fall?  What a great idea!!

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A close up of the blocks used for the quilt top itself.

I really am beginning to like words on a quilt. Maybe I am

transitioning into the Modern Quilt Movement without

realizing it.

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The back of Kathy’s quilt

Kathy pieced her backing. This is one of my favorite

techniques as well. It helps use up the left over fabric and

adds lots of interest on the back of the quilt.

I used an Omni polyester cream thread for the top and the

back of the quilt. And “Raindrops” was the name of the

overall design quilted onto the top.

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This is the picture of what I discovered in my washing

machine this week. I am attempting to teach my teenage

boys how to do their own laundry. Great idea  but sometimes

it fails miserably.

While the washing machine was spinning, the laundry soap

container fell off the machine and landed on the floor, laundry

soap flying everywhere.  The cap just happened to be left OFF

of the container. A huge puddle  was lying on the floor so

my daughter cleaned up the mess.

As a result, the towels were smothered in laundry soap and

when I washed them, this is the result of it. I had to laugh

or I would have yelled. No one was home anyways to hear

my rant.

It was funny because I cleaned the washing machine out with

a scoop. So much for teaching the kids self sufficiency.

What are your funny kid stories? I am sure that you

must have at least one to tell.

Have a great Easter.

Cake and a Chameleon

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At the beginning of the year, I made a resolution to try and create

some of my own quilty artwork. So far, this hasn’t gone too bad.

Here is something I have been working on this week.

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Each year, Quilt Canada  has a Trend Tex Challenge at its

National Quilt Show. As a member or non-member,

you can purchase a kit and create a small wallhanging.

The kit contains 5 large fat quarters and a theme.

This year it is “Living A Life in Green.”

Sounds quite challenging, doesn’t it?

When the kit arrived, the 5 colors reminded me of

a chameleon I had seen on Pinterest or Google images.

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So, I had to try it out. The technique I am using was created

by Susan Carlson. She recently created a 26 ft crocodile using

this cut and paste method.

She lightly glues down small colored pieces of fabric until

it creates an image or picture.

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It is alot of fun but intimidating when you first begin.

I had done another piece (8″ x8″), several years ago.

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This lizard caught my eye because of all the texture  he has.

I wanted to try to recreate him in fabric.

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I traced the outline of him onto white fabric and then I stitched

all of the texture on my domestic machine. I used some

interfacing underneath so that the fabric wouldn’t distort with

all the stitching on it. Then I colored in the greens, browns and

blacks with coloring pencils. Finally, I  applied a clear coat over

the whole top so the colored pencils wouldn’t wash off or be

rubbed off. It was so much fun that I am doing it again.

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Here is his leg. I apologize for the blurry photo but you

get the idea. This is what I call the “ugly stage” because

it looks like garbage until more pieces are added.

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Here is the finished Chameleon. I have to finish the background

and add his spikes to the top of his back. The deadline is quickly

approaching so I have to push myself to complete it on time.

I don’t think that I want to give him up though. He is the

perfect pet, I don’t have to clean any cages or even feed him.

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Susan brought me this quilt, this past week. I immediately

fell in love with it. It is called “Cake Walk” by Lori Holt.

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I haven’t quilted it yet but I am so excited to do so. Susan is

so talented. She looks at a quilt and then modifies it, and

improves upon it, in my opinion.  I can’t wait to get at this

baby, it is going to be so much fun. Susan pieced the cakes

together and then bought all types of trim, in order to

create the “icing” for the cakes. What a great idea!

I am so inspired once again by Susan’s creations, that I

have got to make a fabric cake postcard. Wish me luck.

March Break is interfering with my quilting once again.

What about your March Break?

Don’t forget to check out

The Canadian Needle and Thread Network.

Strip by strip…

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Here is what I have been working on lately. Linda created

this quilt for her grand daughter. I think that she’ll love it!

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This is such a quick quilt to piece together. It is created by

sewing strips to strips and then a border is added, if you

so desire it.  And it looks  like a million bucks.

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What a great selection of prints in this quilt. Her grand daughter

will certainly love and have fun looking at all the prints in

this quilt.

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“Flirtatious” is the name of the panto chosen. And a light

yellow polyester thread was used for the top and the backing.

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The back of the quilt.

Orange is the color of the backing and what a great color it is.

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You can really see the stitching on the backing.

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Guild Charity Quilt

This is a Charity Quilt that one of the members, in my local

Quilt Guild made. Brenda is a very generous person with her

time and always pieces together quilts for the Guild, which

are then given to the local Hospital.

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This is an adorable panel. I wanted to stitch something

out rather quickly so I chose “Swirls” by Norma Sharp.

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The backing

I used a light purple thread on the top-So Fine. And a dark

purple polyester thread on the backing.

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Hope you are enjoying the warmer weather. Don’t forget

the time change this weekend. Spring ahead and not back.

My coral reef…

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I have been fortunate enough to be able to complete the 9

blocks for my Oceans BOM. And I am really surprised

that I managed to complete these blocks so soon.

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The nine paper pieced blocks came from Janeen,

over at Quilt Art Designs and  the patterns were

free. Instead of adding sashing between the blocks,

I wanted to make some gradations and this is how

it turned out.

What do you think?

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I really like the tuna fish. The Manta Ray needs some

gills embroidered onto his underside.

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My Red Octopus isn’t quite red enough but I will

chalk that up to artistic license.

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I think the Dolphins are so cute and adorable. I chose

a different color for the background in each of the blocks.

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I have been debating what else I can do with this completed

top. My brain is on overload today with all the ideas

swimming around dealing with coral reefs. I really

want to add some more tuna fish, jellyfish, coral and

other things. I was online checking out some ideas when

I ran across this website.

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Sayuris World is a website you need to check out.

Aren’t the jellyfish so cool?

This lady is really creative!! She uses felted items to create

this whole scene. Wow!!

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I really like the Message in the Bottle block. The message

actually looks like writing on it.

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Baby Quilt

Besides finishing up some of my own things, I also

quilted this baby quilt for a customer.

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“Splat” is the name of the overall design. I used a soft

grey Glide thread on the top and a light white polyester

thread on the backing.

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This backing is minky. I must warn you to be careful not to

stretch the minky too much. I quilted a baby panel and

used minky on the backing and I threw it out after I

was done. The quit wouldn’t lay flat because the minky

had stretched too much.

Remember, just be careful when you are using it.

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This is Kay’s quilt for her husband. He is a brick layer

so she wanted to make a quilt depicting this idea.

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I think she hit the nail on the head and did a superb job.

She wanted the bricks to be outlined; I used a monofilament

thread for the SID work. In the 2 outer borders, I used 2

different purples and stitched in straight lines that offset

one another. Again,  the straight lines reminds me of bricks.

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The backing of the quilt. I used a cream polyester thread

for the backing.

Hope you have a great week. Just remember, spring

is almost here.