Black, White and Blue All Over

It doesn't happen nearly often enough.

I have finished a quilt!!

 This one started as the block swap we did last year in PQA.

I chose the block pattern and the color scheme.

Then, each month someone else in the group would make me a block to add to the collection.

That gave me 12 and then I made 12 more so I could have a bigger quilt.

 It ended up measuring about 68 x 92.

Big enough for one of the kid's beds.

I'm a kinda sucker for secondary patterns and this one has some great patterns.

I quilted it myself with the new walking foot my husband gave me for my birthday.

(He's so great about knowing exactly what a girl needs - could have something to do with the running wish list I have....)  ;)

Happy Stitching!

Karyli

Zig and Zag for Baby Girl

We welcomed a new niece to our family.... well, a few months ago.

I hear she is so cute.  I can't wait to meet her someday but she lives across the country.

I made this little quilt and sent it to her.

 All those half-square triangles were actually fun to play with.

 The back turned out cute too.

Welcome Little One!

A Great Summer Finish

I've got a great summer finish!!

I'm so excited to finally have this one done.

I started working on those stars about 10 years ago.  That was back when I first started quilting.

I guess this was one of my first big, solo projects.

 I just worked on it a little at a time... and 10 years later...

Taa Daa!  Here she is!!

I really like the black for the sashing and borders.  It gives it a bright, starry night look.

Maybe a little hint of Amish too... 

 The back is pretty basic.  I  just put three big black stars there.  They look pretty sweet though.

 It was quilted by a local long-arm quilter.  She did a great job.  I held the border up to the sun so you can see the star pattern around the edges.

 Look!  It glows!

 The first quilting technique I ever learned was paper piecing and it came pretty easily to me.  At that time, I didn't know how to make a square with any sort of design on it except by paper piecing so that's how I made each of these stars.

I designed the pattern and traced each one and then sewed them all.  They are 8 in. squares and there are 72 of those little gems.

Here are some of my favorites:

 It looks great on my bed, doesn't it!

(I built my bed too.)

Someday, I'll get some pillow covers made to go with it.  Any suggestions on pillow cover designs??

Anyway, I'm loving my new quilt. 

I give so many quilts away, it's nice to have something for me.

It's already been loved...

I thought I should share this one with blog world.

 This is a string quilt I made for my second son when he was a baby.  He is 6 years old now and it still lives on  his bed.

I made this with whatever boyish scraps I could find in my limited collection at the time.  I love the bright yellow sashes.  He actually says yellow is his favorite color. 

 It's one of the first I machine quilted.

I had a bunch of colorful thread that my mother-in-law found at a yard sale and I used every decorative stitch my machine had... and had a good time with it.

 I love how it turned out!!

I keep telling myself that I need to do another one of these quilts... someday.

Ticker Tape Parade and Hot Air Balloons

At our PQA meeting this month we revealed and exchanged our Mercy Border Blocks again.  It is always so much fun.  It's like Christmas.  We get to see the new borders that everyone has added to the blocks and we get so excited. There's always lots of ooh-ing and aahh-ing and some squealing too.  It's really pretty silly.

Anyway, this time I got Shannon's block to add to.  This is how I received it:

She started with a Ticker Tape center.  Rainbow colors on a white background.  She did a great job on it and then the borders that were already added were great too.

I added a Ticker Tape border!  Yeah, crazy!  I know!  A lot of work... but I really liked how it turned out and I think Shannon did too.

If you want to see the rest of our gorgeous growing quilts, you can go to the Parma Quilters Anonymous blog.  They are all amazing.

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One of my favorite blogs to visit is Quilted Delights.  Leah is quite a fabric artist and does wonderful work.  She makes some amazing fabric postcards and I have perused through her creations more than once.  I wanted to give it a try.

This is what I came up with for a first time:

I stitched along each cloud with silver thread but the picture doesn't show it.  I really like how it turned out.  I may have to try some more.  In fact,  I thought I'd do a smaller version so it would easier to share with friends.

This is what I came up with:

Book Marks

Cute, huh!

Don't you wish you were my swap partner this month.

Well, until next time...

Always look for silver linings.

A Quilt for Christmas

This is what I spent every spare minute through the month of December doing -- which isn't many with all of the holiday trimming and celebrating that goes on in our house.  But, I did get it done in time.  My inspiration came from here.  I fell in love with this pattern and had to try it.  It was a lot of fun.
This is a gift for my favorite sister.  She's not a quilty person but I hope she'll like it and feel a part of me in it.

 I loved each square as I made it but as I put it together, I wasn't so sure. There seemed to be too many bright colors going on but when it was completely finished... I loved it again.  These are some of my favorites:

The one above and below are the same background fabric and I love how it worked so well with orange and teal.  They look totally different.

I quilted it myself on my regular old machine.  It isn't perfect but it looks good.
I really love the back too. I just used scraps from the front and splashed it across the back.

 No outside pictures with weather like that.

Merry Christmas, Sis!

Mother Hen

There are eight children in my family.  One year for Mother's Day, I made this little quilted wall hanging for my Mom.  Isn't it so cute!  The pattern came from this book.

It Is Finished - Looking for Summer

I've called it "Looking for Summer" because I've been working on it throughout winter and this long spring as we impatiently wait for summer to arrive.  It seems that spring has over stayed it's welcome this year and I am ready for the bright sun shiny days of summer.  So here is my bright sun shiny quilt as we are "Looking for Summer."

There is a story behind this lovely gem:

Auntie was a member of a cotton club about 25 years ago where members received a sampling of four inch cotton squares on a regular basis.  She collected these squares for years.  Some time ago when she learned that I enjoyed sewing too, she gave me her box full of about a thousand four inch squares.  They were all so beautiful and unique.  I would get them out just to play - sort - admire - drool over them.  I finally decided to design a quilt so I could use some of them.  I still have hundreds left for another project someday.  I sorted out the brightest ones I could find in the collection and came up with my new beauty. 

I'm in love with it!

I tried a new basting method for me.  I usually do the, lay it out on the floor and pin the heck out of it, method but not this time.  I wanted to try fusible batting on this one and see if I might get less puckers.  I think I'm in love!  It was so easy to put together.  I ironed in together and just pinned around the edges for security.  It held together throughout the entire quilting process and I had ZERO puckers!  Yes, I will use that again.

I bound it with strips of bright scraps to add to the colorfulness.  It measures 66 x 78" and my daughter has already spoken for it so it's first home will be on her bed.