Saturday, November 19, 2011

Finally have the quilt top done!

Another Friday Night Sew-In has come and gone, and what do I have to show for it? A quilt top! I've been working on it for a few months, off and on (I think I've shown some of the blocks on a previous FNSI post). I'm not exactly sure that it's big enough - it's supposed to fit a single bed, and I don't have any single beds... So, I hope it's big enough to actually start quilting!
And the picture (it's definitely scrappy!):
I was hoping to start another project - I'm doing a hand-made ornament exchange with some of my online quilting friends, and part of it will be a quilted object. Sorry I can't say more about it just yet - but you never know who'll be reading your blog!

Monday, November 14, 2011

I must be crazy!

Here were are, just a few weeks shy of Christmas, and I have a pile of to-do items as high as my head. Kind of typical for a lot of crafters... So, what did I do to make that list just a wee bit shorter, you ask? Well, truth be told - absolutely nothing! I actually started another project.
It's not my fault really - last week was kind of a tough week, and I just headed out to one of my local quilt shops - I had $10.00 worth of "coupons", and I needed a specific kind of fabric to make ornaments for my quilt group's ornament exchange. That's all I needed - honestly! Well, I did want to pick up a pattern too, but that was it. And then I saw the rulers on the wall, and the Dresden Plate ruler started calling my name.
I've never made a Dresden Plate quilt before, but I've recently seen a few tutorials showing how easy they are to make using the rulers and a sneaky sewing method, and it looks SO do-able. So, I bought the ruler too... and when I got home, I had to cut a strip of fabric, just to try the ruler out - that's my story, and I'm sticking to it! The next thing I knew, I had cut about 20 strips, so then I had to cut the wedges... and now I have this on my table:
I don't know if you can see my fancy "turntable" cutting mat under all of those wedges - I won it last spring in our local shop-hop, and it was exactly what I needed to cut all of these pieces. So, I'm off to do some sewing! What do you have on your schedule today?

Monday, November 7, 2011

Starting November with cards!

What's this? 2 blog posts, back to back, with birthday cards in them?! What is going on? Well, it's like this - I painted my craft room a few weeks ago, and life hasn't been the same since! I have a tiny spot cleared on my cutting table, and it's where I've been doing whatever crafting I have time for - and that doesn't seem like much time lately. I've been working on 2 or 3 quilts, but a lot of that has been cutting parts - not too exciting! I hope to have fabric-related pics soon, but I'm hoping that you'll be SO amazed with my cards that you'll totally forget that I haven't posted quilty stuff for a few weeks. *crossing her fingers*
So, on to the pics! The first card uses my new favourite stamp set, Delicate Doilies. I stamped them using Cherry Cobbler, Kiwi Kiss and Close to Cocoa inks; I mounted the stamped panel on Close to Cocoa C/S, and then mounted it onto the Kiwi Kiss card base. This is going to be the card for my mom's 83rd birthday Nov. 8th. Happy birthday mom - we love you! The second card features a stamped motif; brads mark the 3 visible corners. That panel is applied to C/S with a piece of Designer Paper glued onto it. A label and a petite oval from my collection of Nestabilities draw your eye to the sentiment, and a ribbon ties the whole card together.