I’m still here

I know it’s been a while since I’ve blogged. I was busy most of the summer preparing for and hiking across Oregon with my husband. We had a wonderful time. It was an experience I’ll cherish. If your interested, you can check out my hiking blog here http://hittingthetrail.wordpress.com
Lately I’ve been trying to finish some quilts that were in various stages. I finished piecing this one

I’m not sure if I like it. The pattern was easy enough, but it just doesn’t excite me.

I finished piecing this one. I didn’t have a pattern so I was just winging it. I think it looks like spinning wheels.

I’ve actually got it all together and the backing pieced, it’s ready to be quilted. It turned out different than I had in my mind, but I really like it. I’ve got myself on my quilting schedule so I can get it quilted. I’m not sure how I’m going to quilt it yet, but something will come to me. More than likely it’ll be an all over design. It’s pretty busy, wouldn’t you say.
I even made my first table runner. I’ve been quilting for about 10 years and I’ve never made one.

The pattern was from this book.

You can see all the little flags marking future projects. It was fun to make something small that didn’t take a bunch of time and fabric. I made this with scraps I had in my cupboard.
Today I’m quilting a Quilt of Valor quilt. I’ve been quilting for that organization for 8 or 9 years. I’ve been paired with a wonderful quilter who pieces the tops. Then I quilt them and she gets them to their destination. We make a good team.
I’d better get to work!

Losing my marbles

This is my latest piece titled, “Losing my marbles”. I made it for a guild challenge. We were given a random candy and were to make something using that candy as inspiration. I was lucky and got this package of M&M’s . When I poured them out, they rolled around like marbles. That gave me the inspiration. I used the color of the wrapper for my hand dyed background fabric. I then marbled some fabric for the marbles. I made those in gradating sizes to hopefully give the illusion of the marbles pouring out. The marbling was done with fabric ink and shaving cream.  You can see what I did on the Dharma Trading website. This link shows the product I used and the technique.

I hand appliqued the circles using an extra layer of batting to give them more definition. It was a fun project to work on and I have it hanging in my studio.

Something I’m working on

I’ve been working a little bit on a quilt I want to make. I don’t know what the block is called, or if it even has a name, but I like it. I also wanted to play with these certain colors (very different color scheme for me)

I made some sample blocks first so I could work out my measurements and how to use the 15 degree ruler.  When I was ready to cut into the “real” fabric and made these 2 blocks ( all Moda Bella Solids)

I’m really going to like it. I think they look like spokes. I got these 2 blocks out of 1 strip set. I still need to figure out how to cut these down to make a hexagon so I can avoid applique. My plan is to get all the strip sets sewn and cut so I can work on putting it together during a quilting retreat with my friends in a few weeks.
I haven’t worked on the Prism quilt since I last showed you the progress, so nothing new to show you on that one. I’ve been busy with client quilts, and hopefully I’ll be able to show a few pictures of those soon.

Here’s a few recent finishes

I recently finished this cute pansy quilt for a customer. I love the colors, and all those cute little pansies around the outside…so cute!   The center basket had these beautiful pansies made from ribbons. I enjoy doing feathers  The customer was very happy with how this turned out, and so am I.  After doing some custom work, I like to do some easier quilting. It gives my body and mind a break. This is a really cute little girl’s quilt that my customer made for her granddaughter. I quilted it with a pantograph called “Bubbles”.  She also made a very similar quilt for her grandson that I just finished with the same panto.

Guitar piece finished

It’s even hung on the wall already! I like the way it turned out. I decided to make a 1/8″ binding instead of trying to do just piping. I wanted it to lay flat on the canvas and I was afraid that if I tried for a piped edge it would’ve been bulky. I just wanted that tiny bit of turquoise around the edge. This worked out fine. I glued it to the canvas after the black paint was dry. It’s different, but lots of fun. The quilt finished at 12×18 and it’s mounted on a 18×24 canvas.

I finished quilting a customer quilt today that was a lot of fun to play on. The back is pretty cool too.