Balloon Festival

I finished up my Layers of Charm quilt for my niece yesterday, and since the photos of the top were taken at night, I am so happy that I got the opportunity to show off the gorgeous colors in the Meadowbloom line with the pictures of the finish.  Sunshiney pictures would have been fantastic for these fabrics, but that was not to be.  You can see that my deck is still a little damp from the recent rain we've had, but since tomorrow is bringing even more precipitation, I had to seize my cloudy photo window and make it work.

You know, sometimes names for my quilts immediately jump out at me, and sometimes I struggle. My mom loves word play and imagery as much as I do, so I almost always discuss my quilt names with her whether I need help with it or not.  Sometimes we really have to play around with several options to come up with a name that I like for a specific quilt, but even though I was having a tough time with this one, Mom came to the rescue (as she often does).  Immediately, she said that the shape of these big blocks looked like the tops of many hot air balloons in flight, and I knew she was right!  So, this one is aptly named Balloon Festival.

I'm not one for New Years' resolutions, but if I had to make one, it would be to try to sew my stash as much as possible.  Make no mistake, this is definitely not a fabric fast.  I will certainly continue to buy fabric for custom orders, when I see it on sale, and when I know I just can't live without it.  In general though, I want to try to make my stash work for the quilt I'm making more often, rather than jumping at the chance to buy more- even if it means using a certain fabric that works well, but may not be exactly what I had in mind.

The backing for this quilt is a perfect example.  Since this quilt was made with a layer cake, there weren't any scraps for the backing.  Instead, I pieced the back using the same colors as the top, but I was able to pull every single fabric from my cabinet.

I even had enough Kona Berry in my cabinet for the binding, and I love how the deep shade frames the quilt.  This photo also shows the pretty details of the prints in this line.  Since many of them are smaller, they aren't very visible in the full-quilt shot.

I think my niece is going to love this quilt.  I won't give it to her until next Christmas, so I'm way ahead on my 2016 gift list, but the fabrics and colors are perfect for a "tween" girl.

I also have the pleasure of kicking off the new year by welcoming a new sponsor- Five Monkey Fabrics!

Five Monkey Fabrics has a beautiful selection of modern fabrics, including yardage and bundles, as well as individual fat quarters half yard cuts.  The shop has fabrics from a wide variety of designers, and their prices are fantastic.  I love this Michael Miller Fiesta bundle-

and it seems I can't get enough of Christmas, because I'm also scheming about the things I could create with these holiday prints!

I would be remiss if I didn't also let you know that Five Monkey Fabrics has an AMAZING clearance section with lots and lots of gorgeous fabric yardage, half yards and even fat quarters to snatch up.  The clearance fat quarters are only $1.50!  Right now there are clearance fabrics from several beautiful collections, like Little Azalea, Lottie Da, Freshcut, Madrona Road, and many more.

Five Monkey Fabrics is also really helpful when it comes to orders of custom bundles or specific yardage.  Beautiful fabrics, great customer service, and free shipping on US order over $50 is tough to beat!  Even if your order is less than $50, Five Monkey Fabric's shipping rates are great, and orders are shipped out in 1-2 days!

I am so thrilled to welcome this new shop to My Quilt Infatuation.  Definitely check them out!

Layers of Charm

Yesterday at NTT (which is still going on right HERE), I mentioned that Fat Quarter Shop is featuring their top ten videos of 2015 throughout the month of January.  I jumped at the chance to make the Layers of Charm pattern, my personal favorite, to help celebrate!  Here's a glimpse of all ten patterns being featured this month.

There are several of the top ten patterns that I really like, but when it came down to choosing one to make, I knew it had to be Layers of Charm.  It is SO fast and easy, but best of all, it is a fantastic way to show off some of your favorite large prints.   The pattern uses layer cake squares and charm squares, so there is no cutting required.  Just jump right in and start sewing!  I don't always use a ton of precuts, but I have to admit, it was nice to get to the sewing machine quickly for this one.

I made my Layers of Charm pattern with a layer cake of Moda's Meadowbloom line , but I did end up using some Kona from my stash instead of charms.  The color palette in this collection is bright, but not overly so, and the graphic florals and tile prints are really fun.  Even though some of the prints in the line are smaller than I realized, they still work well in the quilt.

(*Please pardon the nighttime photos.  Sometimes it just can't be helped.  I promise to get pictures that really do justice to these gorgeous colors when the quilt is finished.  :) )

Here is a close up of some of the sweet prints in this line, especially the text print.  It has some wonderfully inspirational sayings, and the script mixed with the flowers is so beautiful.

This pattern was lightning fast!   I went from a stack of fabric to a whole quilt top in a little over an hour- no lie.  This is definitely going to become one of my go-to patterns when I need a speedy quilt that still has some wow factor.   You can get the Layers of Charm pattern (written in several sizes, by the way), along with Fat Quarter Shop's other free patterns HERE, and you'll see the link to the youtube video tutorial there as well.

I know we just finished with Christmas, but as funny as it sounds, this is going to be a Christmas gift for my niece next year.  She is twelve, and when I really stopped to read that beautiful text print, I immediately thought the words, along with the colors in this quilt, would resonate with a "tween" girl.  I have a long time to wait before giving it to her, but I think she'll love it!  Now of course, I just have to decide on the backing and get down to business on finishing it.

Check out these other bloggers who are showing off their own Layers of Charm pattern today!

Tina of Emily Ann’s Kloset

Tricia of Notes of Sincerity

Jane of Quilt Jane

Anorina of Samelia’s Mum

Erica of Kitchen Table Quilting

Shruti of 13 Woodhouse Road

Connie of Free Motion by the River

Gerri of Planted Seed Designs

I am also excited to let you know that Fat Quarter Shop is giving away a $100 gift certificate as part of their Top 10 of 2015 celebration.  To enter, you can make a Layers of Charm quilt, or one of the other Top 10 patterns, and post them on Instagram with the tag #layersofcharmquilt and #FQSTop10.  Fat Quarter Shop will announce the winner on February 1st.  Good luck and happy sewing!

Happy Needle and Thread Thursday!

Woohoo!  It's Thursday again, and I can't wait to party!  The past few days have been dominated by restoring order to my house and cleaning up the glittery chaos that is Christmas.  We all know that I'll still be finding bits of glitter in April, but whatever.  I love it anyway.  So, that has meant that I still haven't quite finished my scrappy X Plus quilt (just binding left!).  I can't wait to show it to you though.  I am in love with it!

I've also been working on another quilt (that's two at once, friends...I must have taken leave of my senses, ha!)  This one is to help celebrate Fat Quarter Shop's most popular video tutorials of 2015. I picked my personal favorite of the ten most popular, and I'm revealing this one tomorrow, so be sure to check back!

Since last week's NTT was dedicated solely to reflecting on my quilting journey in 2015, as promised, I'm going to highlight some of my favorite links from not only last week's party, but the final party from 2015 (before Christmas).  Double the features this week means double the inspiration!  From the party before Christmas-

Awesome Modern Crosses from Laney at Sugarplum Patchwork-

Super cute alligator quilt (with some insight into her process of creating such a unique quilt) from Susan at Quilt Fabrication-

Pretty Christmas ornament table runner by Lori at Crossquilt (she used my tutorial, but rounded the bottoms of the ornaments- still adorable!

And from last week's party-
This stunner from Never Just Jennifer-

A sweet Farm Girl Vintage quilt top (complete with lovely, snowy backdrop) by Tanya Quilts in Colorado-

And last, but not least, classic patchwork in gorgeous fabrics by Val's Quilting Studio (and more beautiful snow)-

Okay then, friends!  Let's party it up!

1.  You can link finished projects or WIP's , but just keep it about quilting and sewing!

2. Link to your specific post (not to your home page!) to make it easier for others.

3. Please remember to spread the word and post my button or a text link.  

4. Spread the comment love far and wide!

5. Following me is not a requirement to link, but is so very appreciated!

*Welcome to all of you new quilty friends!  Here's a helpful tip for linking up- select "Auto Crop"  when selecting your thumbnail photo.  For some reason, trying to crop your own image results in the dreaded "white question mark box," and we definitely want to see your awesome work!  :)

Scraps, Scraps, and More Scraps

Happy 2016, y'all!  I don't know if it's because I have been a little bit lazier with using up my scraps in my quilt backs, an increase in productivity, or a combination of the two, but my scrap jars were overflowing once again.  If you remember, I completely emptied them this summer with Shattered Rainbow Encore and The Kitchen Sink. At any rate, since returning from our Christmas travels, I got to work to combat the ever-increasing mountain of scrap fabric that I seem to accumulate.

Improv piecing has always been my go-to method for busting through the scraps in my jars quickly, and over the past three years, I have had enough scraps to make a large queen-sized quilt each summer (plus one extra throw-sized quilt this past summer).  I love improv piecing, and it really appeals to the lazy side of me that would rather not have to cut scraps into uniform sizes, but I wanted to branch out and use my scraps differently this time.

In looking around the seemingly unlimited inspiration that is the online quilting community, I saw THIS quilt, along with several others, and decided to jump right into turning my bits and pieces into an X Plus quilt.  I particularly loved how this quilt utilized light and dark values in all areas of the blocks.  My first X Plus quilt, made with Pat Bravo's Carnaby Street collection, has a more uniform look.  This is the quilt I like to take on trips, and even though I still love the planned design of my first, the X Plus pattern in scrappy brights really is mesmerizing.

I made my blocks 10 inches (finished), so the quilt will be twin size, 70" x 90."  I'm sad (and a bit surprised) to say that although my scraps are greatly diminished, I still have lots left.  I would have kept on making X Plus blocks, but the remaining leftovers are just too small.  I seem to have lots of strings that are less than 2.5," so once I get this quilt finished up, I'll need to figure out another plan for those (and I need to get back to using more of my scraps in my quilt backs)!

NTT, Reflection, and Best of 2015

Happy New Year's Eve y'all, and welcome back to Needle and Thread Thursday.  I missed hosting last week, but I hope your Christmas holiday was wonderful.  If you're like me, you gave plenty of quilty gifts, and a huge part of the fun of the holiday is revealing the results of those hours of secret sewing to your family and friends.

Before we jump into a brand new year, it seems fitting that I take a moment to reflect on 2015.  I am combining my reflection with my "Best of 2015" to not only include my favorite finishes, but other significant events as well.  So, here's a little recap of this very important year in my quilting journey.  I chose to highlight the quilts, patterns, and happenings that were my own favorites, rather than following the stats.

1.  When I think about the "Best of 2015" as it applies to quilting, this is unequivocally number one- I made quilting my full-time job in May of this year.  This was a huge leap of faith, and it requires some discipline to keep "creative quilting" and "work quilting" balanced (though sometimes they overlap), but I have loved every minute of it.  Besides giving me more time with my family, all of this extra time to quilt has allowed me to...

2.  ...finish 71 quilts this year.  I know that quilting is NOT all about the numbers, but at the end of each year, I can't help but count them up.  Some of these quilts are very small, and not all of these are included on my finished quilts page, so keeping that in mind, here's how they break down-

   *30 quilts pictured on my finished quilts page-  I am including my favorite three finishes, and you can see the original blog posts by clicking on the picture of each quilt.

Take Two-

Shattered Rainbow Encore-
A repeat of the original made in 2014, but I made this one for keeps, so definitely has to be included as a fave.  I would be remiss if I didn't include that I recently learned that this quilt is also a #quiltconreject for next year's show.  I decided to enter this one and only quilt on a whim just before submissions closed, but even though I didn't really ponder over the decision long, I won't pretend that I wasn't disappointed by this news.  After seeing some of the other quilts that were not accepted, I see that Shattered Rainbow is definitely in good company though.

Pop Star-

   *5 preemie quilts- I donated six total to our local children's hospital, but one was actually finished in 2014.

   *3 other team quilts- Since LSU is near and dear to my heart, I included that one on my finished quilts page, but I made three others.  These three rival team quilts were included in blog posts, but not on my finished page.

   *33 memory quilts (from dress shirts and flannel shirts, not T-shirts)- a couple of these sets were included in my posts, but when this side of my business picked up, I made the decision to work on these "behind the scenes" to keep my blog about modern quilting as I originally intended.

3.  9 new quilt patterns released (and one more in the works).  The design process of quilting really fuels my creativity and keeps my love of quilting strong.  Bubble Bath and Baubles are my two favorite patterns released this year (The photos link to the blog posts for these quilts.  If you want to visit my Etsy or Craftsy shops instead, you can find those buttons on my right sidebar).

Bubble Bath-

Baubles-

Although this one is not one of my most popular patterns, it is still one of my favorites.  I am still a curve chicken, so I love quilts and patterns that have the illusion of curves, but without actually sewing curves.  Maybe I should make curve sewing a goal for 2016?  In the meantime, I think I need to make another Baubles quilt soon, and I think I have the perfect fabric in mind.

What an amazing year;  I feel so grateful to have been able to share it with you!  I am looking forward to seeing what 2016 has in store, and to continuing to be inspired by this amazing modern quilting community!

Now, let's get to this week's party.  Since I included my Best of 2015 post in this week's party, I am going to skip the highlights this week.  Instead, I'll feature projects from our last party, as well as this week's NTT in our next link-up.  Happy New Year to you!

1.  You can link finished projects or WIP's , but just keep it about quilting and sewing!

2. Link to your specific post (not to your home page!) to make it easier for others.

3. Please remember to spread the word and post my button or a text link.  

4. Spread the comment love far and wide!

5. Following me is not a requirement to link, but is so very appreciated!

And...That's All, Folks!

Yay!  The final quilt on my Christmas to-do list is finished, and just in the nick of time, too!  The pattern choice for this baby quilt was actually born from a need to use up some fabric that was cut by mistake.

In my haste to get started on my Filigree quilt, I accidentally cut all of my white background squares to the finished size, instead of a half inch bigger for seam allowance; and if that wasn't enough, I also cut my sashing an inch too short as well.  To top it all off, I didn't realize any of this until I had every single piece cut.  Every. single. piece.  I am usually meticulous in making sure my measurements are correct before making a single cut, so I really don't know possessed me to just haul off and start cutting.  That was a pretty large cut of Kona, so it was a low moment for sure.  Suffice it to say- lesson (re)learned.

As much as I really didn't want to keep staring at my big pile of mistakes, I just couldn't bear to throw all of that Kona away;  so when deciding on the pattern for this quilt, I specifically searched for one that would use up some of those squares and strips.  As it turns out, my Truffles pattern made perfect use of them, and that made this little baby quilt so easy to crank out.

I love the color palette in this quilt.  I have had this Joel Dewberry Bungalow fabric in my stash for awhile now, and as much as I love it, I haven't been able to work it into a project.  I've always tried to fit this fabric into an existing vision and it just never worked out.  For this quilt, I decided to let this fabric dictate all of my other fabric choices instead.

I pieced the backing with scraps, and made a scrappy binding as well.  Scrappy bindings are my favorite when the quilt has enough white in the background that it doesn't look too busy.  The various shades of pink and purple, mixed with fresh green are so fun and girly, that I've decided to name this one Blackberry Bramble.  A little out of season perhaps, since we are mere days away from Christmas, but the colors seemed too perfect to name this one anything else.

(photo courtesy of My Sunshine Vintage)

This little quilt measures 48 inches square, and will be a perfect gift to welcome a baby girl!

Ohhh... and before I forget!  I have one final piece of business to take care of before signing off for Christmas.  I owe you a winner for the Santa's Here fat quarter bundle giveaway.

Sew In Love with Fabric, the blog for Benartex, actually chooses the winners for the giveaways they sponsor, and they have let me know that the winner is comment number 107.  Congratulations Michelle!

MichelleDecember 11, 2015 at 3:07 AM

I follow you and sew in love through email!

ReplyDelete

I'll contact you soon to get your mailing address so you can get your fabric!  

Okie dokie, friends!  I truly hope that you all have a blessed holiday, and I'll see you after Christmas for NTT on 12/31 (remember we are taking a break this week).

Filigree Finished and NTT

I refuse to accept the fact that Christmas is a short nine days away.  The last few weeks have flown by at lightning speed and I'm still working on one final Christmas order.  I am super excited that I get to share another finish with you today, though.

This quilt is for my grandmother and measures 74" x 74."  She wanted a quilt that was between a thrown and twin size, and although I planned to make a quilt that was around 65-70" square, the pattern dictated the larger size.  Speaking of the pattern, that is on my list to finish up within the next couple of weeks.  Here's a sneak peek at the cover though-

I really loved designing this pattern, but in retrospect, I wish there was a little bit more contrast between the two shades of blue, so the twisted ring pattern would show up better.  Oh well, hindsight is 20/20, I guess.  My grandmother loves it, and that's the most important thing for sure.

I used all of my scraps on the backing, and because I used several more prints than necessary, the leftovers turned out to be substantial!

I had enough leftover fabric to make a scrappy binding, but I thought since both the front and back were a little busy, this quilt needed a solid binding. Kona Navy fit the bill perfectly!  My grandmother also asked for a matching throw pillow, and I had just enough strips to make this fun spiral improv pillow.

I don't know why, but I find this method to be much more tedious than my usual improv method, which works in a rectangular shape.  With this spiral/circular improv, I feel like I end up having to cut too much fabric away.  Maybe I'm just going about it the wrong way?  I do love how the pillow turned out though, even though it was a pain to put together.  It is a 16 inch pillow, and I still need to get the pillow form for it.  Then, I'll be ready to give both to my grandmother when I see her for Christmas.  I can't wait for her to see them in person!

By the looks of last week's party, y'all are sewing up a storm too!  Linda at Koka Quilts showed off this amazing quilt, full of so many gorgeous fabrics.

Jessie at Measuring Success linked up this Radiant Blues quilt.  Just beautiful colors.

and Helen from Till We Quilt Again shared her stunning Eclipse quilt.  This illusion is jaw-dropping!

Wow...just WOW!  Believe me when I say that I really wanted to choose several more from last week's awesome party, but as I type this post, it is almost time for my wild thing to get home from school.  I know you're all busy finishing up those gifts for special people, and checking off the to-do list as Christmas creeps ever closer.  I can't wait to see what you're sewing this week!

**By the way- since next Thursday is Christmas Eve, NTT will be taking a break.  We will resume the following week (I know that's New Year's Eve, but we're going to party anyway that week).  I hope you all have a fantastic holiday!

1.  You can link finished projects or WIP's , but just keep it about quilting and sewing!

2. Link to your specific post (not to your home page!) to make it easier for others.

3. Please remember to spread the word and post my button or a text link.  

4. Spread the comment love far and wide!

5. Following me is not a requirement to link, but is so very appreciated!