Plum Kebab

Remember the KCMQG No Prints Allowed Challenge I mentioned a few posts back?  Well, I finished it up.  If you happen to be at Quilt Market this week, you can see it in Robert Kaufman's booth. If you're not lucky enough to be at market, I'll indulge you with a few pictures.  :)

Oliver's Fox

This quilt was a commissioned project for my good friend, Michael.  Michael's sister, Nicola is expecting her second son, Oliver.  Oliver's middle name will be Fox.  How cool is that?

Michael's only requests for this quilt were to have it grey to match the baby's room and it should have something with a fox.  Pretty simple, right?  Here's the final product:



This is made from mostly Kona Solids.  The only color that is not a Kona is the light tan, which is a Quilter's Solid from Joann.  I couldn't find another tan I liked in the Kona, thus the switch in fabric lines.



See the great texture that came from the quilting?  Here's my theory on how I that happens...

1. I prewash my fabrics.  
2. I do not shrink my batting before sandwiching the quilt.  
3. I quilt fairly densely.
4. I wash and dry.  This allows the batting to shrink slightly, which allows the fabric to bunch nicely.   

Here's the back.  I used a solid black flannel and pieced it with a solid grey flannel.  The thread is a dark grey.  I think it's pretty cool the way it give a texture on the solid colors.



See the texture?



Here's the label I did on the quilt.  I forgot to photograph it after I put the title on, though.  Oops!  At the top it now says Oliver's Fox.

So, that's it.  That's Oliver's Fox.  I'll be putting the free pattern up *hopefully* pretty soon.  Watch my Free Patterns section!

Gifts from the Garden

This is the third quilt I made for Fabri-Quilt.  This is from their fabric line, Urban Garden.  I've titled this quilt "Gifts from the Garden" because it reminds me of little presents. 

I love how the yellow fabric in this really pops.


I think the block is kind of fun.  This is the more complex of the two blocks I have in the quilt. 


I love the colors of this line. 


You can really see how I quilted this on on the back.  I used yellow thread and traced the ribbons of the presents. 

This quilt will be joining Astral Summer and Flower Power in Las Vegas very soon.  The project sheet will be available here before too long. 

Astral Summer

I mentioned recently in my post Hello.  Goodbye. that I was super busy.  Remember when I told you that I was working on a few different projects for Fabri-Quilt?  Well... they're all done and ready to head to a show in Las Vegas very soon.  I thought you'd probably like to see a few photos of what I've been working on. 


You know how you can buy quilting gloves?  Well, I raided my closet and pulled out these gloves with rubbery snowflakes on the bottom.  They worked beautifully for gripping the fabric as I quilted.  I'm not sure which is dorkier... have specific quilting gloves or wearing my red winter gloves when I quilt. 

Also, that's my new studio I'm working in.  I'm hoping to find some different furniture for in there this weekend.  The old stuff I've been using doesn't work the best in the new room.


This is the quilt that I finished up after somebody else had started it.  It's from a pattern by Jame Crow called "Daisies Do Tell".  I would totally make this pattern again.  It was easy to do.  The most time consuming part was cutting out all the petals. 

All of the fabric with the exception of the backing is from Fabri-Quilt's "Astral Summer" line.  The colors are rich and the patterns are gorgeous.


You can see how I quilted this one.  I used my walking foot and guide to follow different parts of the green background.


And just because I love quilt photos from fun angles...


The back is really simple.  Kind of a khaki color with a brown binding from the fabric line.

This quilt will be shown in Las Vegas pretty soon. 

Check back over the next few days to see photos of the other two quilts I did for them as well as photos of our new house!

Blogger Quilt Festival

Amy at Amy's Creative Side is once again hosting the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  The quilt I'm going to share for the Spring 2010 festival is the Bastille Baby Quilt.

This quilt was made a few months ago for my sister-in-law's baby-boy-to-be (phew!  That's a lot of hyphens!).  Baby Bastille got his name because of his due date.  He's due on July 14th, Bastille Day.  Don't worry, the baby won't actually be named Bastille.  We just refer to him as that because his name hasn't been decided just yet.  The last baby to be born in the family we called Giblet, but he turned out to be a Lucas, so things will work out I'm sure.  :)

So, the Baby Bastille Quilt is one of my own designs.  I was inspired by Oh, Fransson's Canasta Quilts.  I wanted my blocks smaller, so I came up with 4 different block designs.  I did 3 of each block, giving me a total of twelve 10" (finished) blocks.  I added sashing in my design.  I also used the same fabric in each of the center blocks.

The final result:

I think the photograph below does a pretty good job of showing how much the quilting wrinkled when I washed it.  It was the most that has ever happened on one of my quilts.  I love it! 

I think the back looks like an elephant's skin.

For the quilting on this one, I did a custom pattern.  Jason and I scanned in the fabric I used for the sashing.  We traced a few of the leaves and made templates for me to trace on the quilt. 

Here's a detail shot of one of the blocks on the front.  I did a 10" block with 4 rings around the focus fabric. 

Here's a detail shot of the little guys I put on the back.  I did 5" blocks with only two rings around the center focus fabric. 


It was a fun quilt to make.  I'm working on my first quilt-along using this pattern.  Look for it sometime in July (I hope). 

Thanks, Amy for putting together another festival.  It's fun to see what others are working on & your festival is a great place to see a lot at once.  :)

Bastille's Baby Quilt

So, the quilt has been revealed. I think they liked it. :D That means I can now show it off to all of you!

Here are a few shots for your viewing pleasure.

The front:


A close-up of the lion block on the front:


The back:


The flamingo block on the back:


I tried a few new things on this baby quilt.

1. I kind of figured out how to use the quilting foot on my machine. I was able to do a free-motion quilting pattern Jason and I created on the computer.

2. I thought I should try to push myself to do something really cool with the quilting on this one. It was screaming to be something other than a geometric quilting design. I didn't want to do stitch-in-the-ditch because it never comes out perfectly. Jason and I brainstormed and came up with something we thought was perfect for this quilt. We scanned in the fabric I used for sashing. Then we traced the outlines of a few leaves in Photoshop. We ended up with an image that looked like this:

We printed it onto some cardstock. Cut it out and traced it with chalk onto the quilt top. I then traced the chalk lines with my needle and thread. I think it turned out pretty neat.

3. Since I was working on the quilting on International Quilting Day, The Quilt Show opened up their shows for free. (Thanks to Jamie for sharing that big of info with the KCMQG.) One of the episodes I watched was this one with Philippa Naylor. She gave this brilliant tip. Use some of the non-skid pads for in your kitchen cabinets as a gripper for quilting. (I had been considering some gloves, but couldn't find any, didn't want to spend the time hunting, and have decided I like this better!) I immediately went into the kitchen and cut off a piece of the gripper I have under a rug. Brilliant! It works beautifully for maneuvering the quilt easily. Love it!

4. I designed my own pattern. It was fairly simple to make and I like the way it turned out.

I had a thought after finishing this quilt. I was thinking it could be a fun and easy quilt to do a quilt-along here on the blog. What are your thoughts? Would anyone be interested in participating?

Sneak Peek!

I'm heading to a baby shower today for my sister-in-law, Elle who is pregnant with little Bastille. Here's a sneak peek of what I made for her.



I'll post the rest soon. I don't want to ruin any of the surprise, so this is all I'm sharing for now.

It all started with a dream...

and now it's completed!

This is the quilt I made for my friend's baby shower. The shower is tomorrow morning, so I finished this up just in time. I'm really happy with it for it being my first attempt at an applique like technique. There's definitely things I'll do differently next time, but I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out.

This is a photo of the full top. The finished size is about 3'-0"x4'-6".

The picture below is shot from right above the quilt looking up the tree trunk.

This next two are from right above the binding, looking up at the daffodils.


This is of the bird at the top of the quilt. The three birds in the quilt symbolize their family; mommy, daddy, and baby.

The flower shown here, a clementis, is probably my favorite part of the quilt. I love the amount of texture and delicacy that shows up in these.



The next two are of the leaves. Aren't the vein sort of things pretty neat?


This is the bird in the middle of the quilt.

I love how the tree bark wrinkled up when I washed it. I think it enhances the texture I implemented by quilting.


Don't you think the grass turned out nicely?

This is the baby bird at the bottom of the quilt. She's being watched over by mom and dad who are above. She's slightly smaller than the other two birds.

Here's a few photos of the back. I wanted all the thread on the back to be purple, so it would just look like a line drawing mirroring the front. Unfortunately, the stitches I used didn't necessarily follow my plan. I don't think it was a tension problem, but more of a stitch choice issue. This is one thing I'd definitely do differently next time around.




All in all I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. This is only the third time I've machine quilted anything and the first time I used my new machine to do it. It's the first time I've tried anything resembling applique. I think for being pretty new at these techniques, this is a pretty good accomplishment. I'm pretty happy with it and will definitely try something similar again. And just think... it all started with a dream I had.