Sunday, March 31, 2013

Cutting it close!

I finally have managed to complete my March challenge for the "Lovely Year of Finishes"!  I had started a second quilt from the last MysteryQuilts4Military - code named Glint.  I planned to finish my red, white and green version of it for the Feb. finish, but mis-sewed a number of the blocks, and just ran out of time.  I hoped to finish it this month, but I found that working on my second Glint quilt was enough of a challenge.  I finally got the top finished last night, too late to take a pic (my husband assists me with the pics, and he was much too tired to stand up, leave alone hold up a quilt for photography!)
Sew, here's the teal and cream version of Glint:
In the written pattern, the suggestion was for a border made up of HSTs - and I planned to finish it that way, with a few strips of the 3 different fabrics used for the quilt.  Unfortunately I cut all of the strips at 2 1/2", and then cut the squares for the HSTs at 2 1/2" as well - and there's no way that they'll sew up to 2  1/2" squares.....and I had no cream fabric left to cut up.  SO, the border is just fabric strips, in various lengths for some interest.  It's nice to have this top done finally!  I'm starting to amass quite the pile of tops too - so, one of these months, I'll dedicate my month to quilting and binding a few quilts - but not April - I have 2 new quilts started, and one of them will be my April project - you'll have to check here to see which one I choose!

Friday, March 15, 2013

I promised you some cards...

I have to quickly share a few cards - tomorrow is National Quilting Day, and there are bound to be some quilt-themed projects occupying this space, so I thought I'd better get the cards posted while I have the chance.
I went to a card-making workshop with a friend a few weeks ago - I definitely needed a card-making "kick in the butt", and the workshop helped me in that department!  We made 4 cards, but one has already been sent out, and another one is for someone special (and they read my blog), so it has to stay under wraps for the time being.
The first one used a stamp set that is available for a very limited time - and I chose this image because I think it resembles a Tardis, and a few of my kids are Dr. Who fans.  The second card is a little more traditional - and it's fairly simple, but at the same time has a lot going on.  The card front is embossed; then 2 panels are punched with border punches.  The small ovals are added on top of the larger ones, and then the stamped butterflies are cut out.  The butterflies are stamped in one of the 3 colours already used on the card; then 3 smaller flowers are punched out and added to a butterfly of a different colour.  I didn't put a sentiment on it - that makes it easier to use for a variety of occasions.

Now that the cards are posted, I can get ready for my NQD project - check back later to see what I made!

Thursday, March 7, 2013

Another Mystery Quilt...

I'm still committed to finishing a few quilting projects this year - I'm just not doing so terribly well yet.  I totally missed the deadline for posting my January challenge; I posted my Feb. challenge pic, and even posted my mid-way progress pics here on my blog (as directed)...  Unfortunately, I totally mixed up 2 VERY similar blocks, and ended up sewing 12 blocks with the wrong center blocks.  Needless to say, I didn't get my Feb. project finished!  Now it's March - and I'm once again very optimistic that I'll get a project done, and it should be fairly easy - it's a repeat of the mystery quilt that I worked so hard on for last month.  At least, this time I won't make the same block mistake!  I am planning to finish February's project too - I've taken all of the wrong squares out of the blocks, and some of them are already re-sewn.
So, here's a pic of the March blocks in progress:

And, I promise to post some card pics soon!  I haven't made very many in the past 2 months (I'm so thankful for my stash of already-made cards!) - but, I have lots of inspiration pics, and it shouldn't take me long to pull a few together!