Granny Squares Quilt finish....FINALLY!

Hello again, Heather here. I think I am the last person on the planet to finish a granny squares quilt. I loved them when they first came on the scene. I just had a hard time finishing. I wanted tons of variety, and I was being really selective about prints. I LOVE how it turned out. So much!

Sweet Logan from Chocolate Dipped Quilts quilted this for me. I am MORE than happy with how it turned out. I love the orange peel design she die throughout all the sashing. She made all the white really pop, and somehow the contrast is even stronger than before the quilting.

I love this quilt, and it was nice meeting Logan from Chocolate Dipped Quilts twice. She was really sweet to me, a perfect stranger, and I cried to her on the side of the freeway when we first met to swap the quilt. My Dad was in the hospital, and I was just so scared. She asked if I was off to do some Christmas shopping, when actually I was off to the hospital. I was so caught off guard I just cried to her. She gave me a really sweet hug, and words of advice. Just love this quilting community. 

This photo was after the first wash and drying. When all the quilting really shows. LOVE

PS this quilt is for me. Not my children. It looks like a baby quilt, but it is mine. I love pinks, yellows and blues, and super love pastels. 

A close up of the granny block. She did a large flowerish design. Really neat. 

Also, I did the snuggly soft rosette minky on the back. So soft and warm. I love it so. 

One of my favorite finishes to date. 

Hope you like this quilt as much as I do. Thanks again Chocolate Dipped Quilts, I love this quilt, and it was nice meeting you twice. Logan was really sweet to me, a perfect stranger, and I cried to her on the side of the freeway when we first met to swap the quilt. My Dad was in the hospital, and I was just so scared. She asked if I was off to do some Christmas shopping, when actually I was off to the hospital. I was so caught off guard I just cried to her. She gave me a really sweet hug, and words of advice. Just love this quilting community. 

Beach Cabins Quilt from Chezzetcook

Such a fresh happy feature today from Adrienne of Chezzetcook Modern Quilts. I love it! Modern and oh so pretty.  Great colors, design and pretty photos!!  Chezzetcook Modern Quilts is a sewing/quilting fun blog, she has a great tutorial here on quilting as you go...a method I MUST try, it's been on the list for a while. And for some lovely quilty-eye candy see her finishes. To find our more about Adrienne and her blog name see here.  Thanks for sharing!

The eagle has landed. Beach Cabins reached it's new home in Ottawa and I have heard that her new family loves her :) So now I can share!

This quilt started with a couple of pieces of blue and red gingham that my client gave me. She wanted something "beachy" and then left me to my own devices. After adding some more reds, blues and grays to the Tilted Cabins Pattern (from From The Blue Chair), Beach Cabins was born, and if I do say so myself, I think this quilt fits the "Beachy" bill. So of course I took it to the beach for it's photo shoot. 

This project marked the first time that I used the Quilt As You Go method of quilting, so I talked about it a lot! You can read the previous posts here and here. When this baby came out of the dryer all crinkly and soft I was so happy!  

I am not going to say how long it has been since I had a finish (so embarrassing), but it is all worth it to have one like this!
Adrienne

Previous Posts related to this quilt:
Post 1
Post 2
Post 3

Our Ten Memory Quilts

Last September our brother-in-law passed away.  Many many of you shared your hearts and prayers with us and we were so grateful.  Our sister and her husband have 10 children.  In the weeks and months after his passing we decided we wanted to make memory quilts using his shirts for the kids.  Greg was a Junior High science teacher and had a huge amount of button up shirts.  We didn't use any of his knit t-shirts, lots of the kids have taken those over as PJ's.  

Our mom was the major force in this project.  There were a couple nights with cousins and sisters-in-law where they were cutting squares but it was a huge amount of work from our mom.  Once the squares were cut our sister, Amy, separated them for each of her kids.  Certain shirts in the quilts they all remember and some shirts were special to specific kids.

All the squares for tops were spread out, I did 3 in Arizona and I know several more family members and friends helped here.  I don't know exactly who so my apologies for not recognizing you specifically.  From there our phenomenal amazing Aunt Wendy quilted every one of these.  Seriously.  We love her, she is so kind and generous.

None of these quilts have been washed.  Some shirts still smell like their daddy and we want to keep it that way for as long as possible.

I created a few bindings for these quilts but another step to label the quilts was supposed to be part of my contribution.  However my massive somewhat sudden move left me with no time.

I contacted Jennifer from Jennifer's Jewels.  She created the most beautiful personalized tags for our nieces and nephews.  All 10 have the child's name and then have the same personalized saying that our sister decided on.

I wasn't able to be there but Heather and my mom delivered the quilts to the family in their newly finished home.  9 out of 10 were there, the oldest is working up at school for the summer.  From what I was told it was a happy time and not sad.  That's good :)

Aren't they gorgeous??  That picture warms my heart.  Now they each have a piece of their dad forever.  They can snuggle it when they're missing him.  Each shirt may hold a memory of him.  I'm so happy I was able to be a small part of this project.

Also for any of you concerned please know that our sister Amy is getting her own memory quilt of her husband. She wanted a little more time and wants to really make it special with the shirts and design.  We also made her a quilt as an "I love you" a few months back.

I wanted to quickly again say THANK YOU to Jennifer.  She so generously donated her time and product for these kids, without asking for a single thing in return.  I would encourage you to use Jennifer's Jewels for your quilts labels.  Not only is she kind and generous but she creates beautiful custom tags.  Thank you Jennifer!

Garden Steps Quilt from Clover and Violet

The gorgeousness of this quilt is almost too much, it makes me so happy!!  So girly and pretty.  And when you read/look closer you'll see it is also embroidered.  It's from the Garden Steps Stitch & Quilt Along at Clover & Violet.  So darling right??  Jennie and Clara (mother-daughter duo) have some amazing projects they are always sharing and teaching like this darling Lone Quilt Block Pillow tutorial.  For all things inspiring like quilting, stitching and sewing you must add Clover & Violet to your list :)

My Garden Steps Stitch & Quilt Along!We are having nice weather here which made a good day for taking photos outdoors. I am glad to have another quilt finished, even quilted and bound. I had help finishing this quilt. Kathy from Stitch by Stitch, quilted it for me and I love the way it turned out!! Thank you Kathy, she is great to work with and does such nice quilting!!

She used a very light aqua thread to quilt it, it is a little out of my comfort zone but I took some advice and I think it works well because of all the aqua in the front and the back.

I am very happy that I used this blue Domestic Bliss for the backing!! Isn’t the back pretty with the floral quilting in an all over pattern!

Hope you are having a great day!

Modern Circuitry Quilt from Don't Call Me Betsy

This isn't our first time featuring Elizabeth from Don't Call Me Betsy, in fact I have no idea how many times we've featured her!! She is an awesome and creative quilter, we love her work!  She's sharing an awesome modern quilt today that was featured at QuiltCon! So cool! :)  Be sure to see Don't Call Me Betsy if you haven't, awesome tutorials (love this Mod 9 patch), classes if you happen to live near her, Quilt-A-Longs...you name it!

Checking Instagram the last day or two has been sheer torture. Photos are flooding in from QuiltCon, and gosh, I wish I were there. I am lucky enough to have a few pieces of me there at QuiltCon, but gosh I wish I could be there to take it all in. The next one will be in 2015, and I definitely plan to be there!

One of my quilts on display at QuiltCon is featured in the Modern Quilts Unlimited booth, #308. Modern Quilts Unlimited is a fantastic new modern quilting magazine, and I was super excited when they selected one of my designs to share at their booth. This quilt is something I designed a while back, while dreaming of rich Art Gallery solids, and it was a lot of fun to finally put it together.

The Art Gallery solids I used for this project are: Crystal Pink, Cabernet, Dark Citron, Light Citron, Cherry Lipstick, Festival Fuschia, Fresh Water, Empire Yellow, Burnt Orange, Tile Blue, Emerald, with Mystic Gray for the background and Caviar for the binding. You can find Art Gallery solids in stock atIntrepid Thread and Stash Modern Fabrics.

This is also the quilt that I used my Clamshell Loop FMQ design on, the one in the tiny sneak peek photo! This was the first larger quilt that I used that FMQ technique on, and it was really fun and easy to do.

I love how this quilt came together, and I am so happy that I got to see a photo of it on display in Austin at QuiltCon. Maybe next time, I can manage to have another quilt on display there and actually get a picture of me with it! Have a great weekend :)

Quilt Stats:

name: Modern Circuitry

size: 48" x 60"

fabrics: Art Gallery Pure Elements solids in Crystal Pink, Cabernet, Dark Citron, Light Citron, Cherry Lipstick, Festival Fuschia, Fresh Water, Empire Yellow, Burnt Orange, Tile Blue, Emerald, with Mystic Gray for the background

pattern: by me for Modern Quilts Unlimited, handed out at QuiltCon

quilting: Clamshell Loop by me in white 50 wt Aurifil thread

binding: Art Gallery Pure Elements solid in Caviar

Birthday String Quilt from So Sarah Sews

Sarah from SoSarahSews has a fabulous quilt to share with us all today.  I LOVE the bright happy colors, and I'm sure a teenage girl will love them even more!!  Sarah has a great list of her finished quilts, so yummy to look at it :)  Make sure to see her flickr for inspiration and check out SoSarahSews.  Thanks!!

Well, I'm moving to London, England in 6 short months.  And I've made a quilt for all my young nieces and nephews...the ones that have been born in the last few years.  But my goal for this year was to give my older nieces and nephews a quilt before I leave.

I took care of Grant, whose birthday was in December, with this camoflage quilt.

Next up is my oldest niece, Brooke.  Her birthday is 4 days after mine in February, and I'm happy to say I'm already done with her quilt!  (Only two more to go after her!)

 

Here it is.  She's going to be 15 this year.  I can't believe it.  I think this will suit her.  She told me she likes all these colors, but no yellow, which is funny because her room is yellow.

This is an up-close of the quilting. I did big flowers throughout the quilt. I like it. (Don't mind the string hanging off there...don't know how I missed that!)

The back is one fabric I chose that I thought she would like. The colors in the pic are a little off, but it's really nice in person. I hope she likes it!

I had a lot of little triangles left over when I trimmed the blocks.  I made a baby quilt with them, you can check it out here. 

I'll soon be sharing with you my newest nephew's quilt (See HERE) that will be on it's way to him soon. (He was born 12-12-12! How cool is that birthday?!)  

Last day to enter the Hand Dyed Fabric Giveaway!!  Winner announced tomorrow!

Our Sister's Quilt Story

Most of you have heard us talk about our brother-in-law who passed away suddenly last September.  He was married to our oldest sister and they have ten children.  It has been a really really sad and hard thing.  Sadly as many of you know there are no words to describe the grief.  BUT I don't want this to be a sad post! We love this family soooo much!!  These kids are so amazing and impress me constantly.

 Here they are recently in all their gorgeousness!

Yep, count em! TEN!  Eight girls and two boys.

I had Lucy two weeks after he passed away so my mom came down to be with me.  We all coordinated and created a quilt for Amy in those couple weeks.  Heather sent some fabric she knew Amy loved, I looked through Amy's pinterest boards for pattern ideas and it just came together!

Amy loves bunnies so the border print was our jumping off point.  We also knew she loved the pink and aqua combo...thank you pinterest.

It looks square in the photo but it is longer than wide.  A good size for getting cozy. 

This is gorgeous Britty, Amy's 6th.  This girls coloring is unreal, the prettiest red hair, blue eyes and creamy skin.  But she is seriously such a sweet heart.  She has been staying with Heather for the time being while a new home is being built for Amy's family so all the extended family can be closer together.

A quilt is absolutely nothing compared to the mountain this family is going through.  But it feels nice to have something tangible to do.  It was nice to do as sisters with our mom.  This is what quilts are for right?  To comfort the people that you love...to show them that you care for them and want so much to help and make everything better.  And you can't, no one can. I hope when Amy uses this quilt she's reminded how much we care about her.  We love you sister.

Whirlygig Quilt from My Quilt Diet

Heather met Marion of My Quilt Diet at her recent quilting retreat (of which I was very jealous!!).  I know Heather had tons of fun and really liked Marion :)  They both made these darling Giant Star Quilts while there.  Today's feature is another quilt Marion finished while at the retreat.  Anyway check out My Quilt Diet, read her ABOUT ME, I love her rules of what she has to do before she can quilt, I think I need to do those too!  And check out her amazing finishes, 2012 and 2013...unreal for quilting just over a year!!  

We've been up at a BEAUTIFUL lodge in Hobble Creek Canyon all weekend at Emily Herrick's Cabin Fever Retreat.

It has been SO much fun :)

I was able to quilt and bind the Whirlygig quilt for my sister.

Whirlygigs is one of Becky Morganson's $29 Mystery Quilts over at Stitches and Sew Forth.  They have a new $29 mystery quilt kit each month ;D  Oooh la la!

....and started a receiving blanket for my new niece Hadley who has just come home from the hospital :)