July Goal: Baby Quilt Finish

I finished the baby quilt!

It's the second one from a jelly roll my friend gave me.

Both quilts will be donated to new moms in need.

The red butterfly binding is a great frame for the mostly pastel quilt.

I quilted a few twisting ribbons with my walking foot--nothing fancy.

Visit Patty and her guests at Elm Street Quilts

to enjoy some other finishes.

July Goal: Baby Charity Quilt

It's time to set a new monthly sewing goal!

A friend gave me a sweet jelly roll that I used to make two rail fence baby quilts.

The first used the strips with more red and brighter colors.

This pastel quilt needs to be finished and donated to my friend's charity!

My July goal is to sandwich, quilt, and bind this baby gift.  I have the fabric--now to find the time!

Check out other sewer's goals at Elm Street Quilts.

June Goal--Success!

It's time to check in to see who's accomplished the June One Monthly Goal,

 hosted by Patty at Elm Street Quilts.

 I did finish piecing the citrus quilt.  Yes, it's very simple.

Now I'm working on the quilting plan.  I want to quilt large citrus slices all over.

My sample has a 9" diameter.  

I traced a circle onto freezer paper and ironed it onto a quilt sandwich.

Next I FMQ'd rings around the circle, then removed the paper and quilted the segments.

 It looks pretty bad, but I'm satisfied with it as practice #1.

If I use a walking foot for the circles they will look better, but I'll be doing a lot more maneuvering of the quilt.  If I go that route I'll walk all the circles then go back to FMQ the segments.

I will quilt with white thread which won't be as obvious as this red on white. 

Thanks again, Patty, for the motivation!

June Goal: Citrus Quilt

Participating in Patty's One Monthly Goal has been a terrific motivator for me, 

helping me actually do the sewing I want to do.  

I just missed my goal in May (finishing enough star blocks to make 20) 

but have now completed it and then some--I'm up to 22 now.

This past weekend I attended my guild's annual quilt show.  

I have yet to contribute a quilt--hopefully next year.

I did find and purchase some gorgeous fat quarters.  After seeing a flying geese quilt made of gigantic HST, I was inspired to make something similar.  The citrus design is so large that it would be a shame to cut it into tiny pieces.  I went back to the vendor for more fabric, but came up a little short, requiring an online search.

Meanwhile my college daughter fell in love with the fabric and we decided she deserves this (hopefully) quick quilt.  I bought more citrus online (not much left out there) and on Monday we drove to a local store for coordinating solids.  I washed, dried, and pressed everything and today managed a bit of cutting and sewing.

 The HST are made with yellow and coral.  

There will be a blue border and the binding will be more citrus fabric; 

daughter and I both love the multi-colored vibe.

Tonight we played around with layouts and this chevron was the winner.  I also liked the flying geese (3 yellow pointed one way and 3 coral pointed the other) but this is not my quilt!

(The colors in the top photo are more accurate than the faded ones here.)

My goal for June is to finish this quilt top (chevrons plus border).  I also want to plan and begin the quilting.  I've only FMQ on small projects so far, and it typically looks pretty bad.  What I'm hoping to have the guts to do is a combination of walking foot and FMQ.  I want to mimic the citrus slices with large walking foot rings filled in with free motion segments.  We'll see.

To see the goals of Patty's other participants, visit her link up at Elm Street Quilts.

May One Monthly Goal: 10 More Star Blocks

I'm slowly, slowly progressing towards a king-size quilt for our bed.  

I've resized the no point stars block from Allison at Cluck Cluck Sew.

The last time I did any sewing was at my quilting retreat weekend in March.  I have cut more pieces (with only a few scraps left from each prewashed fat quarter) to make mini kits.

My goal for May is to finish sewing the half done March blocks plus my newly cut squares for a total of 20 completed blocks.  I'll then be 28% done with the 72 blocks I need for this quilt!  Honestly, if this is done by winter 2019 I'll be thrilled.

Thank you to Patty at Elm Street Quilts for the monthly inspiration.  

Check out her blog to see lots of other folks' May goals.

February Goal: I Spy Quilt

I gave my granddaughter an "I Spy" quilt for her birthday last month--sort  of.

 I actually presented several large pieces of the top.  

Perhaps you can see the gaps below where seams have not yet been sewn.

I love the "I Spy" concept, and this quilt has 160 unique blocks!

 Border, binding, and backing fabrics have already been selected. 

My goal for February is to complete this quilt--borders, backing, quilting, and binding.

I'm joining Patty and many others at Elm Street Quilts in setting sewing goals for the month.

Follow the link to see what everyone else is up to.

Happy stitching!

January Finish--Weighted Blanket

I've now participated in my first One Monthly Goal event--success!

I started and finished a weighted blanket for my grandson.

Inspired by a tutorial from CJ of the I Love My Kids blog as well as size and weight ideas from Mosaic Weighted Blankets, I tweaked the procedure to use batting instead of polyfil stuffing.

 The fabrics his parents chose are a bit simple but they coordinate with his "I Spy" quilt.

Filling the columns and sewing around the pellets was challenging at first, but I got the hang of it by the end of this project.  I've written a tutorial for my version in case you're interested.

Thanks to Patty of Elm Street Quilts for inspiring this finish!  Visit her link up to see what other folks have accomplished.

One Monthly Goal:  Weighted Blanket

January 2019

I enjoy my newish craft of sewing and quilting but still struggle to make time for it.  I'm hoping that participating in Patty's One Monthly Goal link up will motivate me to keep moving forward.

From the  Mosaic Weighted Blankets website:  "A weighted blanket is like a firm hug that can help you relax and sleep better. Weighted blankets lower stress and create a calm feeling by raising serotonin levels in the brain."

I hope my young grandson will sleep better with a blanket like this.  An occupational therapist friend strongly recommended these blankets in general and this company in particular.  

MWB offers many fabric, size, and weight choices as well as DIY kits, but I decided to go my own way.  Without the benefit of buying in bulk or having a giant stash I'm not saving much money over the kit price, but this should be fun and the fabrics are more customizeable.

I showed my daughter and her husband some novelty fabrics (construction related) but they chose these simpler patterns.  

I'm planning to tweak a tutorial I found online at the "I Love My Kids" blog.  Wish me luck and check out others' goals at January's OMG link up!