I'm a winner and a finisher!

One of our beautiful granddaughters is on her high school dance team and they performed extremely well at a competition yesterday.  As a fundraiser there were many wonderful raffle baskets that one could win.  I put in several tickets on a loaded Trader Joe's basket and lo and behold, I was the winner!!  I am thrilled with my winnings!

 After coming home from the dance competition, I finished hand sewing the black binding on this quilt that I have depicted before when it was in the WIP stage.  I'm liking this one a lot!

This and that

I was reminded I hadn't blogged for a while, but to tell you the truth, sometimes I wonder whether to keep it up.  We'll see.

This past weekend was the annual quilt retreat that I go to.  What a great time I had with friends, and lots and lots of sewing accomplished.  The following photo is the layout of a quilt one of my friends is making for her daughter.  I think it is just spectacular.  Gotta love that blue and pink!

I worked on a couple different projects, and got a lot of blocks completed, which I will plan to post about another time.

The following photo is a quilt I am nearly done quilting on.  I think I have posted about this at least once before.  At any rate, I was within six blocks of being done quilting the body of the quilt, and darn it all, anyway, if I didn't run out of thread.  I did manage to find a pretty good match, so completed that and am half done quilting the border.  I'll post again when it's bound and totally completed.

 I signed up to take a Beginning Wool Applique class with a friend.  That class was Monday, and truthfully, I enjoyed it much more than I thought I would.  It is a fun process.  We all were to purchase a small kit and mine is a Buttermilk Basin kit. 

Progress being made

I now have 56 of these blocks completed and am in the process of trimming them a bit and testing layouts.  Laying them out is enough to make my head spin!  I will eventually have something I am satisfied with.  Sorry the quality of the photo is not so great.

Fat Quarter Shop BOM

Yesterday a friend called my attention to the Fat Quarter Shop BOM shown below and told me she had signed up.  I generally don't do BOMs where the fabric is provided, but this one I'm a real sucker for, so it didn't take but a few moments to decide to go for it.  A different designer will design each block.  It looks like tons of fun, and I love what I'm seeing.  Don't you think it is cute?  The website is

http://www.fatquartershop.com/2015-designer-mystery-block-of-the-month 

Quilting Reatreat in February

Prep work is completed for my Dove Tales quilt.  All the block elements are cut and I'm ready to take it to retreat in February.  All the pieces for each block are separated on a paper plate, and it makes it so easy to just pick up the correct piece and start sewing.

Then I just had to do a sample block for my Primitive Patchworks basket pattern.  That pattern I am working on the rest of the cutting for.  I hope to take it to retreat also.  I will have my choice of whichever one I want to work on, and maybe it will be a bit of both.

Sewing day

Today was a special day.  My friend Kelly came over and we went to lunch (first things first, you know), and then spent the afternoon sewing.  Kelly has come over a couple Mondays a month for several years and we have a great time eating and visiting and sewing.  Yes, we actually do get quite a bit accomplished. 

These are some of the blocks I worked on today.  I have 56 blocks now that I need to stitch around the circles with black blanket stitch and then put the top together using black and white sashing.  I saw a quilt much like what I'm doing hanging in a quilt shop and thought "I could do that," so purchased some more black and white and bright fat quarters and here we are.  I'm getting excited now to get it all put together.

Beach time!

Two wonderful days spent on the coast at Gleneden, OR.  This is one of my favorite areas to stay, as it is off the highway and very small, making it a great place to walk and walk, with the beach being right there and very few cars on the roads.  

 

The sunset photo was taken from our balcony, so our view was spectacular. 

I worked a bit on my turtle wallhanging that I purchased the supplies for when we were in Hawaii in April.  It will eventually be finished - I hope.  The pattern is "Herd of Turtles" by Pacific Rim Quilt  Company.  It is a two-fabric applique pattern.  

http://www.pacificrimquiltco.com/images/quilts/herd-of-turtles-300.jpg

Top is done!

I have long wanted to make a Hunter's Star quilt, and I finally did it.  I would have liked it to be a bit bigger, but I was running out of some of the fabrics.  It turned out to be fairly easy construction using the Rapid Fire Hunter's Star ruler.  So that's one thing that I can scratch off my quite extensive list of quilts I want to make.  Now I need to sandwich it and figure out how I want to quilt it.  In the meantime, on to other projects...

Disappearing Pinwheel

I mentioned a few days ago that I was tempted to make a disappearing hourglass quilt, and then I discovered the disappearing pinwheel pattern (tutorial and pattern here:  

http://tinyurl.com/obya7a7 ) .   I was intrigued, to say the least, and made a DPW block.  It was super easy and I love the way it comes out.    I like how it's depicted on several images I saw with the DPW blocks surrounded by a plain border and then a border of pinwheels.  I think that will be a project in my future (not too distant though, probably).

Dove Tales and Mt. Hood

A while back a friend and I were at a quilt show and one of the vendors was a quilt designer who was one of our very early quilt teachers.  Her name is Pam McMahon and she was a wonderful teacher and is a very talented designer.  We each bought a pattern.  I had a terrible time deciding, but eventually chose Dove Tales.  Her website is piecebypiecequiltdesigns.com .  I didn't see the Dove Tales pattern on her website (of course I could have missed it), but there is contact info if anyone wanted that pattern.

I decided to make a test block and love how it came out.  I am not using layer cakes, as she did, but I was able to cut what I needed from scrap yardage with no issues at all.  Anyway, I am pleased with the result and looking forward to making 19 or maybe 20 (depending on whether I use the test block) more blocks.

This photo of Mt. Hood was shared yesterday.  The credit goes to Oregon Mt. Hood Territory.  "Our" mountain is just stunning in its beauty!

Tough decision!

A while back I saw a couple photos of completed disappearing hourglass quilts, and I was smitten!  There is a tutorial here by the Missouri Star Quilting Company.
http://tinyurl.com/l8jpvm8   

 Then, today a friend showed me the Disappearing Pinwheel and I really fell for that one.  http://tinyurl.com/kqrjpvz

I think they are both beautiful, and since I can't decide yet which one I want to do, I guess I will start making primitive patchworks' "Prairie Baskets."  I bought this pattern last week after I saw a sample made up in our LQS.  I have PLENTY of fabric to make it without purchasing more, and after I use some of my stash the dent in my fabric supply will not even be noticeable!!   primitive patchworks is a local pattern company and I don't find them on the web at all.

More quilts from 2014

I was looking at photos and decided to share a few more quilts that I completed in 2014.

I can't take credit for this photo, but Mt. Hood has received a lot of snow, and is always beautiful, but especially lovely cloaked in a stunning white blanket of snow.  Mt. Hood is about 45 miles from our home, and there are a number of places in town where we have a wonderful view.

 First, I hope all will have a very Happy, Healthy New Year!

A viewer asked me about a quilt pattern from my blog, so I decided on this last day of 2014 to post again (that is, if I can figure out how to do it after all this time.)  The four photos are some of the quilts from 2014.  The following quilt was in a magazine, and it hangs in the summer in our dining area.

 This quilt I had wanted to make for a long time.  It is "Shakespeare in the Park" by Judy Martin.

 

This quilt was made for our grandson who is an avid New Orleans Saints fan.  Unfortunately, the Saints sort of crashed and burned this year, but he loved the quilt.

I made two of these snowmen table toppers for our two daughters-in-law.

More photos

While we were gone, we made an impulsive decision (sometimes the best kind) to make a little detour and go to Arches National Park in Utah.  It was a beautiful day without a cloud in the sky, and the rock formations were beyond amazing!