A March Finish!

First of all, the Scrap Quilt Secrets Giveaway is still open for comments! I have made an executive decision however, that I will not be responding to each comment individually as there are so, so many of them. Wowsers! Lots of great discussion as to what a scrap quilt is though! Very fun to read.

Flowers and Flying Geese

I finally finished up my Flowers and Flying Geese quilt, binding and all. I got that funky little crease in the middle from folding it up too quickly after it had been lying on the floor to finish drying. Just didn't seem like the best quilt to tell my kids, 'Hey! go ahead and walk across the quilt if you need to get across the room.' You know, like I do with some of my other quilts. When they are barefoot. And not carrying around iced tea, red Kool-aid, chocolate and/or a heaping plate of leftovers. There are limits. Not that my kids drink red Kool-Aid, but they could be. You just never know about these things.

It's {mostly} done!

I'm loving the stitching texture on this quilt, but am quite unhappy with the puffiness in the corners {due to uneven quilting, I'm sure}. I'm dragging my feet and whining about it in my head, but in actuality you and I both know they will have to be quilted a bit more in order for that puffiness to go away.*sigh  When a quilt is supposed to be done, it's supposed to be done.  But this quilt has been a journey right from the beginning, with me doing the creative thing using up leftover flying geese units and just basically having an applique play day. This quilt makes me want a larger design wall because all the initial work was done on the wall. What I could do with a larger design wall!!

A closer view of the stitching

So NOT complaining about that. Not in a real way. I feel blessed to have the space I have! And yes, three years later I get to see this hanging on my railing. Ta da! My quilting style is slowly solidifying and becoming a real thing. Who'd have ever thunk it? But I digress. What a pleasure to see a quilt top transformed with a little bit of diligent hand quilting! I never tire of that particular phase of quilting. And not to harp on an old, tired subject, but you have to know that this Perle Cotton type of quilting has completely changed my life.*wink  Because it's just plain fun!

And draped over the railing.
Don't you just love my bargain basement backing?

 I should probably mention that there are some mixed feelings about this quilt rattling around in my brain. It's such a 'me' quilt and yet, so, so white, pretty and kinda, maybe, too sweet. I'm leaning heavily toward gifting this quilt, but since I don't have anyone specific in mind yet, I'm just going to enjoy seeing it draped across a chair in my bedroom for now. Between my husbands family and mine, there are more relatives than I could ever hope to give a quilt to, so...., my thinking is, the right person will pop into my head eventually. I'm not even worried about it. I'll be thinking nice thoughts and wouldn't it be nice to give a quilt to this wonderful family person and wallah! What a wonderful  feeling to know there's going to be a quilt ready and waiting for once.....

**And something completely off the subject. Yesterday was Easter. Which happens to be our last name. Do you know how many times I've heard 'Happy Easter, Mrs. Easter' during this time of year? And 'All your dresses are Easter dresses' etc. People do love a good punny pun. And I've always known that my husband loves the Easter holiday, wants the big ham dinner, special family time etc. and gets kind of annoyed when things don't work out like he prefers. Well, this weekend made me finally realize that my kids also feel proprietary about the holiday--just like their dad. I'm raising a whole new generation of this Easter madness! Only, being teenagers, they think in terms of Easter candy and chocolate Easter bunnies. The special Easter traditions are definitely not a thing of the past. No! They just want more say of a say in all the goodies. I married into the name and so am left feeling somewhat bemused by their delight and possessiveness with everybody's holiday. Guess I'm partly to blame for always trying to make it a very fun, lighthearted holiday. Who wouldn't want to hold on to that?

One Out of the Hoop and Another About to go In

All the hand quilting is done on Muddy Creek now. I love the texture and feel of a freshly stitched quilt so very much. So worthwhile to get to this particular point in a quilt! This one has been giving me a few anxious moments, wondering if my light floral border fabric is maybe too 'light' for the murkier center colors. It always seems to be a roller coaster of emotions for me as I reach each different stage of the quilt making. Hopefully I'll find a good binding fabric to tie it all back together and then of course I'll be delighted once again. That's just the way I roll!

Muddy Creek

Next up in the hoop will be Flowers and Flying Geese. It was a small enough quilt top that the dining room table didn't have to be moved out of the way to sandwich and pin. Funny how that could be the deciding factor, but I was quite desperate to get a quilt ready to go. Don't need any down time with that hoop right at this particular moment in my life!

This is a make-do quilt top started a few years back. The flying geese units were leftovers from an old baby quilt that just sort of jump-started what you see on a quiet fourth of July weekend. I used a lot of odds and ends, leftover applique bits, and little pieces of fabrics etc. Always an interesting, but also fun, creative way for me to work. And sometimes I wonder if my best quilt tops start from this sort of challenge? It really is a huge thrill for me to figure out how to make the random odds and ends 'work'.

Flowers and Flying Geese

I can already see this quilt top is going to be a challenge for me to hand quilt. I'm really not that adventurous with pattern, but I'm thinking Perle Cotton and big stitch quilting for this go-round as far as the thread is concerned. It's a good change from the more muted colors I've been working with and this whimsical style seems to suit my current mood quite well.

A bit closer look

So ironic to see some of the same leftover pieces show up in this little mini quilt at the very same time I'm working with the other. I will never understand the way my brain works. Never, ever, ever.

Antique block mini quilt

It's been wonderful to have a slight breather from everything going on around here of late, getting more of a schedule together and less of an 'on demand' situation. Not sure what the next couple weeks will hold for me, but I'm making use of my time as I get it. I spent one evening just digging through my stash totes, emptying everything out and refolding everything well enough that the lids will actually stay on.

A stack of interesting fabric

Can you believe that some of the fabric jumped out to stay? I started with that grayed down green that I am so very tired of--challenged myself to try and find something to perk it up. Here it is in a nice little stack awaiting inspiration and motivation for some day in the future. I find that having it sit out in the open helps me to ponder ideas better and then eventually I'll make some sort of decision to go forward. Or maybe even dump it back in the stash totes. Either way, it's never a waste of time to try and generate ideas!

On to the Next Border(s)

You know me, always jumping around from project to project. It keeps me from being bored (as if that's ever a problem with quilting) and the color change-up from quilt to quilt is a wonderful thing. Some calming, others not so much!

Geese Tracks & Improv. quilt

Most of the baskets are appliqued now for my Geese Tracks & Improv. quilt. Just a few more and I can start sewing the borders together. They are SO blueish! I may have to add a little more color in to help that border out, but then there is that single red basket to think about. Mustn't take away from it's moment in the spotlight....

Flowers and Flying Geese Medallion

I finally sewed my Dresden wedges together for the Flowers and Flying Geese quilt too. Can you believe that I once didn't even like pink? (Having little girls probably took care of that problem!) I found a great fabric in my stash to fussy cut for the half circle centers and I am loving how it makes the Dresdens 'pop'. It's a bit brassy and bold for the rest of the quilt, but my heart is saying go for it. The border lengths are cut out, my Dresdens are ready to applique and I am getting excited about this border. Can you tell? I know if I would have plowed through the entire quilt last July when I first started this quilt, I would never even have come up with this border. It wouldn't have happened because Dresdens were just not on my horizon then!  Okay, lots to do today. Basketball games tonight and I'm still not through with everything that needs done for the day.  Never enough time to quilt like we want to.*wink

Prep, Prep, Prep

So much prep just to get started sometimes! I have been wanting to make another subdued looking applique centerpiece and the fabric I got from Ellen was the perfect spark to get going.

Muddy Creek prep

I love the purpley browns especially--so very wonderful to me. I drew up a basic plan to figure out how many leaves I need etc. and then cut rotary cut rectangles. I cut the leaves out (freehand) from those rectangles, skipping the tracing step completely! Love that, but now I need to go back and trim up my leaves because some of them aren't the exact shape I want--working on auto-pilot will do that to you!

Cutting the leaves

I still can't believe I cut the linen out of the backs of my Happy Flowers. Talk about working on auto-pilot. It took me a little while to get all the fray check on the edges of the linen, but I do think it's going to work out better in the long run. As you can see, I also zigzagged the edges of the block, so it's official now. I don't like the extra steps, the extra thinking things through, being careful etc. Mixing linen and quilting is not my thing, no matter how pretty and supple this fabric feels to me!

Adding fray check to the linen

I've also started cutting out Dresden wedges for my Flying Geese and Flowers quilt. The Dresden block is so timeless, it almost seems crazy to use it in this particular quilt! Oh well, I'm hoping to make them out of this stack of scrappy pinks and that way they will look kinda fun and give the quilt a little extra 'pop' of color too. My red, white and blue quilt has definitely morphed into something a little different!

Cutting out my Dresden wedges

I do love making things as scrappy as possible, adding in the maximum amount of different fabrics I think a quilt will allow. It really gives me a warm fuzzy feeling to dig to the bottom of my totes, find fabric that has never played well, and then give it a good place in one of my quilts. Scrappy quilting just seems to lend itself well to disguising older, less exciting fabrics if you're willing to make the effort. And I am, because it's just that charming mix of old and new that I love the most about quilts!

Flowers and Flying Geese Gets a Border

Too much time doing book work today. Sometimes it seems so unfair that I can't quilt all the time like I really want too. lol

Flowers and Flying Geese

I've been looking at my Flowers and Flying Geese quilt lately (the quilt I started 4th of July weekend), wondering what needs to happen next. I'm a firm believer in letting a quilt talk to me and express an opinion. Does that sound alarming or what? Anyway, there was plenty of red triangles leftover so I thought it would be great if I could include them in the quilt somewhere. Turns out they make a very nice framed border for the applique piece!

Looking a little closer

I dithered about and then finally settled on just sewing them onto the rest of the quilt and then chopping off the extra. Nothing about this quilt is perfect, so why try and pretend otherwise? I'm really happy with the way it's turned out, but now I'm leaning heavily towards adding a couple more borders. Yes I do love adding those borders onto my quilts! Oh well, you've probably figured out by now that I'm not scared of those tricky Medallion quilts. They seem to work well with the way my brain is wired...