Celebrating Christmas in Cloth

Nativity I made for grandkiddos 9 years ago.  Wanted something they could play with and saw something somewhere online that inspired me.  It's all free form stitching using stitches on my machine except faces that I did with embroidery designs bought for my machine.

Saw this Swirly Christmas tree wallhanging on Craftsy

http://www.craftsy.com/pattern/quilting/home-decor/swirled-christmas-tree-quilt-pattern/17664 and had to have it.  Made three of them this year using Steam a Seam.  Used swirls in quilting, but they get a bit wonky in the colored areas where I was trying to get all the ends and edges of the prettiness.  In last one also sprinkled in some stars near the top.  

 The strip wallhanging uses leftovers from my Christmas quilt I've posted about over at The Christmas Quilt Festival  http://www.quilting-tutorials.blogspot.com/p/2012-christmas-quilt-show.html 

First saw the ornaments runner at my lqs: The Attic Window.  It's from the book My Runners that was found at Amazon, too.  Made it this year.  FMQ was swirls and stars with Merry Christmas written at either end near tree limbs.

Snowman quilt, made using free designs called Snowbound by Bunny Hill.  I used pinwheel blocks instead of what they suggested.  It's one of the favorite quilts I've ever made and my grandkiddos love it.

Christmas Quilt Show

There's a Christmas Quilt Show going on over at Michele Hester's:  http://www.quilting-tutorials.blogspot.com/p/2012-christmas-quilt-show.html

.  Have wanted to join this for a couple years but never remember to get it done.  This year I saw an email about it, so decided to add my quilt from a year or so ago.  I found a book with over 300 block ideas for Christmas and made a lot of blocks from those pictures and directions; also made some extras found online or made up such as the candy cane one.

Finished quilt...obviously not symmetrical, but it's how it came together considering all the different sized blocks I ended up with!!  The three large red squares have Christmas sayings, plus the red border and dividing pieces have some wording on them--like my grandchildren's names.

Backing--just kept growing and growing with scraps I had left over.

Got a Kate Spain Christmas fabric layer cake in 2010 I think and had lots of fun making up blocks. Most are from a book already mentioned on here: 301 Country Christmas Quilt Blocks by Cheri Saffiote, printed 2002.

One of my absolute favorite squares.

Made several star blocks using fussy-cut pieces for centers.

Love this little angel block.  Ended up making a lot of blocks and have several left overs
need to make into something small.

My daughter says this is her favorite...he's pretty cute I think, too.

http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=7854712989797547840#editor/target=post;postID=1843900617486082048
  shows several of the blocks sewn into sections.

Enjoy the festival.  And have a wonderful Christmas season.

BUSY, BUSY, BUSY!!

On top are the parts for one of the blocks that will go in the Snowbound snowman applique quilt. It's a different block than came with the directions and definitely in different colors, but I like it a lot. The next picture shows how I ended up sewing the two parts to make the pinwheels...kept having trouble with the seam allowances underneath bunching up, so remembered Mom used to use paper under finer materials sometimes and it worked well. Just tear away the paper carefully and easily! Just used computer paper. I'm not so sure I ever want to make more pinwheel blocks but sure think they're cute! I got the directions for this block from the 301 Country Christmas Quilt Blocks book.

It's the same book that most of the blocks I'm using for what I call my Christmas Quilt--creative name, eh!! These are the three sections for it. Most of the fabric is Kate Spain's 12 Days of Christmas fabric. It's not the most artful arrangement, I know, but I'm hoping by the time I get all the borders on, it will look better. Whatever, though, it'll be a fun quilt to snuggle under with the girlie girls and boyly boys--hopefully this Christmas! So many different blocks and techniques to chat about and maybe make up stories about.

Surely know I'm not the only one in the midst of lots of projects! Have been working on Christmas for quite some time and having lots of fun doing it. Except for a few things I've bought, (some to go with projects) everything is homemade this year and no one is getting unfinished gifts. That's a biggie in my family as for years I would wrap up unfinished things and give them. (I know! Crazy, but that was me) Now, if it's not finished for Christmas, hopefully it eventually gets finished and given for another holiday or birthday. At least I've gained some wisdom in my old age! At this point, almost every present is finished or very close to it...needing a couple buttonholes, a bit of extra hand sewing, etc. There is one project that's not been started, but hopefully will be soon. It needs a bit more input from the recipients, though.
These are adorable "grab" bags made for the twinnies. Aren't they the cutest? Pattern was on All People Quilt with a bunch of darling bag patterns http://www.allpeoplequilt.com/projects-ideas/bags-pillows/free-bag-patterns_ss11.html I made three regular sized ones and three half size for girlie girls. These bags could probably be reversible if you carefully sewed the lining shut. These particular ones are the reverse of each other. Fabrics are adorable, so thought twinnies needed them both.

In the middle of all this, someone needs a quilt just for them Thankfully, I have this lap quilt top done, so it's just a matter of sandwiching it, quilting and binding. The blocks are from Amy's Creative Side blog : http://amyscreativeside.com/2010/06/14/simple-sampler-quilt-along-details/ Of course, being me, I changed things around a lot. Think I explained before that I wanted blocks to be half size, but didn't know how to do them properly until DL told me how, so there are a lot of different sized blocks. Like how they float, though. It's a priority so expect to get that into major production tomorrow. The top is one I was sure would stay at my house, but somehow it needs to go to hers and I'm okay with that. I'm sure a large part of my being able to do that is reading all the inspirational things others have posted about giving for one reason or another. I love quilters--they're super cool, giving people. Aspire to be that sort of person...not always easy for me to do!

The last picture is a bit fuzzy, but of a fun thing my dear friend Shirley, gave us the other day...a baggie full of pretzels dipped in melted white chocolate and then in what's called firecracker glitter--HOT and sweet at same time. Super fun idea that would love to replicate for Christmas. Sailor Girl Gourmet in Washington State sells the glitter.

CHRISTMAS IS A COMIN' BUT NO GOOSE IS GETTIN' FAT HERE!

Winter has come to our area. Not ready for it, but sure does make things look pretty with snow on them. Look at this beautiful art Mother Nature left on my porch early this morning! Would love to try free motioning something like that someday.A few days ago it was cold outside but still some fragrant roses on my lovely arbor. I've been so happy to have this strong rosebush survive and bring me such joy.

The thought of eating goose or duck has always made me ill. For years I didn't know why until Mom reminded me of this experience...my father worked building trades when I was an eight year old and broke his arm that year with unemployment benefits not available to him. The only income was from my mom selling RealSilk door to door. (anyone remember that company?) As a result, we had enough to pay rent and that was about it. We did have a freezer locker full of geese and ducks my father had shot earlier in the year and had that for breakfast, lunch and dinner for about two months. I really don't remember eating the foul fowls, but obviously, it's instilled in memory!! Another fowl, however, is residing at my house for now...below are a couple sneak peaks.

Here's some more fowls living at my house right now. Aren't they adorable along with their snowman and snowwoman cohorts? They're from Bunny Hill's free Snowbound BOM. So far 11 blocks are done and I'm anxiously awaiting number 12. This week I'm working on the 13 blocks that will go between the snowbuddies ones. Will probably not be doing what the BOM suggests,

but we'll see.

Here's where I am so far on the ladybug quilt along at Ivory Spring. I changed things by halving all the sizes of each block, and used fabrics I had on hand. Aren't those Betty Boop corners just adorable? They worked out to be the exact size needed...is that cool or what?

Home Tweet Home was a BOM started last year, but I found it earlier this year as a completed pattern set that I couldn't resist. Wasn't sure I'd be able to do the applique by hand with old, old hands, but it worked well. I don't know what it's called, but I sewed light fusible pellon (right sides together) to each piece then turned them and ironed them in place. Took all the pieces to the ocean in September and turned and pinned them there. For the small berries, I made tiny yo yos for the best results. There are eight blocks of different sizes and some have darling pieced sections to them. Not sure this will get done before Christmas and at this point it's mine!! My daughter thinks it would look great on her living room wall, but for now all that work and the cuteness of it all means it's home tweet home is here!

Went to western Washington for boyly boy Adam's baptism. Got some really good pictures with my phone of him with his mom, dad and baby brother, Spencer. Trey (10 years old) gave a talk on baptism that was so great. Girlie girls, Sabrina and Sydney (they ARE twins) in the beautiful dresses Diannalynn made. And beautiful Sagie played all the music for the program. What a great weekend we had.

Cute Chef Gavin at his "kitchen" that fits conveniently under his mom's kitchen counter. His toque is from a free pattern I found online last year. He wouldn't have anything to do with it at the time--had to be bribed with a peanut butter sandwich to even try it on, but the other day he popped it on his head himself and Jenny got a quick picture while he was baking one of his Toy Story toys! The picture of my Adam and girlie girl Olivia was in Philadelphia last month. I love how she's grabbing Daddy's sleeve; what a sweetie pie!
The last picture is the head of one super cute and rambunctious little Spencer. Are those curls wonderful or what? He's so fun and just a joy to be around. Makes my life so full to have all these fantastic grandchildren to adore and Christmas time can't come soon enough for me to enjoy my whole family here.

MITERED BIAS CORNERS

This is part of a Christmas project I'm working on. Made continuous bias tape for the first time awhile ago...LOVE making it! Used some of it on the potholders posted about earlier. The first image is the back side of the bias and is the miter that I got after much playing with it all and hand stitching the corner parts together. The machine sewing directions are from Sew4Home's site.

This is inside the corner when it's been sewn and before turning over to other side.

This shows the miter that's formed sort of naturally after sewing. There are six corners on this project, so got plenty of practice!

This corner is on what is actually the front of this particular project, but I've figured out I should have paid attention to the directions and sewn it on the back so the natural miter would be on the front!! Lots of pins to hold everything in place. The pink pin in the corner is where the hand stitching started. After handsewing the corner miters into place, I'll do the rest on the machine with a decorative serpentine stitch as I did on the potholders.

Isn't this the cutest fabric!! I just love this Pure fabric by Sweetwater from Moda. I got three charm packs and then ordered a yard or two of several of the fabrics in the line...would just love to have some of a lot more of the variety. Some came from fabric.com, but I found the blue with the little brown flowers at a relatively local quilt shop and she was so nice to send it to me...called Woven Threads in Chelan, Washington. One day hope to actually get there as I'm very impressed by her quickness and customer service.

Look at that adorable ampersand fabric!! I just love it, but there are very few of the fabrics in the line that aren't just wonderful. This is a bit fuzzy as it was taken by my cell phone while the others were taken by sweet hubby with his nice camer!! It shows the handsewn corners. This particular bias is not as wide as the other I made, but it's on a child-sized project. It's about 1 1/2 inches wide while the bias for the adult is 2 inches wide. The pattern called for extra wide double fold. This was a pdf file that I printed and in order to make the child sized ones, I just set my printer to print two of the pattern pieces per page instead of one and it worked really well. I tried to make a teeny sized one for my littlest grandchild, but couldn't figure out how to do that through the printer, so tried to copy it by using thin paper and sizing the pdf to 25%...not sure if that's worked or not as the pieces haven't been glued together yet. Hopefully, it will work! I love experimenting with things like this.

CHRISTMAS QUILT PROGRESS & STACKS

This is the latest part of making up my Christmas quilt. I made about 30 different blocks with directions from the book I mentioned, things seen online and other ideas I found. Can you tell that wonky stars are a favorite? A few of the squares turned out a lot larger than can really be used in this project so will probably be pillows or tiny quilts unto themselves.

Am doing a lot of experimentation with placement and thinking there might have to be more squares, but there just might be some open areas that have embroidered Christmas sayings on them!! Will see. I had a lot of fun making all these squares up--like doing that to figure out if it's something a whole quilt would be to my liking. The material is mostly from a layer cake by Kate Spain for Moda. The colors are wonderful and look pretty good on here (taken with phone outside on deck bench). Don't have any idea about the other fabrics.

I know this isn't anything to do with quilting, but wanted to share this cool picture dh took today for me...it's stacked rocks someone did right off the highway on the way to our home. I hope they last for a long time. Usually, I zip past this area because BIG rocks occasionally come down there and deer are often seen/hit here. Mostly, I drive in the left lane near here but yesterday coming back from lunch I was in the right lane and happened to glance over to see this fun sight! A friend said someone has made similar stacks in the city park a few miles up the road. Whatever induced someone to do it, I'm thankful...a little piece of whimsy to enjoy. So, thanks to them!

Christmas Blocks

Got a Kate Spain Christmas fabric layer cake that's wonderful and having so much fun making up blocks. Most are from a book already mentioned on here: 301 Country Christmas Quilt Blocks by Cheri Saffiote, printed 2002. All sorts of techniques, but mostly doing pieced ones. I'm also using ideas from other places. Last nite the ones done and in progress counted up to 48! And that's not all I want to do, so obviously they're not all going to fit into one quilt, but I'm intrigued by trying so many different blocks. I've added in some other fabrics--in fact, looking at the poinsettia one I noticed there's not any Kate Spain fabrics in there, but most blocks do have hers in them. The blocks are turning out to be all sorts of sizes, but mostly less than 10 inches. A couple have turned out to be 12" so am thinking they will be a pillow top or a mini quilt or two.

So far my very favorite is one called Poinsettia Wreath. The directions in the book are quite minimal and don't make sense to me on some of them. The book has two or three blocks per page; includes a picture; includes some direcctions; and includes a black and white drawing. This one was just not working at all, so decided to draw the pattern out on printer paper, then trace each section on a separate paper and add seam allowances. I then numbered each section on the pattern in the order they'd be sewn. Am so pleased with it and just love the block. Did it so the background color (yellow) was two different yellows--wouldn't do that again, but it'll be ok. I can see a whole quilt done in this design. The design consists of four small blocks with a flower in each. Think this could be done in several colors and layouts. It looks a lot like tulips to me!





The second picture is what I call the eighth block. It's based on 2 1/4 inch squares--size before sewing. Since it's copyrighted, I don't feel like I can put the pattern on here, but will tell you how I did it, so maybe you can figure it out. You need 16 yellow and 8 green squares. I think you could look at the eighth block and draw that out like I did, figure each section and add 1/4 inch seam allowances. I can't think of what that odd red piece is called--a parrallelogram of some sort? For me the way I figured out to sew it was to sew the small red and yellow triangles together--one is sewn with yellow on top, other with red. EVERY time I sewed them I had to look at the diagram to figure it out! Then I sewed one set to the right side of a yellow square, then sewed the other triangle set to the bottom of the square. This produces a small triangle that then was sewn to the long side of the odd red piece. Then sew the green triangle to the shorter side of the odd red piece. (for part of the sewing, there will be points hanging over at one or both ends) This all forms a square. I sewed a yellow and green square together, and two yellows to a middle green square. These rectangles were then sewn to the red/green/yellow square. Cannot tell you how many times I had to pick things out because I wasn't paying attention!! So...pay attention a whole lot better than I did!!
This one is called Christmas Tulips

This one is called North Wind--love how it looks with the fabrics chosen:


Peppermint Candy is one of my favorites, too: There are lots of patterns for blocks out there--lots of free ones!! Try it to add up to a Christmas or any other holiday or no holiday quilt, so give it a go.