Short and sweet (well, short, at least)

I am trying really hard to whittle down the pile of little, unquilted tops in my sewing room.

This little quilt has been waiting a long time for completion.  It is from a SAL on the quiltsbycheri blog from way back in January of 2013. Cheri called it Simply Sweet. Mine is much darker than the original and I haven't yet thought of a name.

 

These two photos show more of the quilting from the front and the back. Love the texture.

Are you making "Tucker" from Pam Buda's recent SAL? Haven't sewn the outer round of blocks together, but I am pretty sure I will finish it that way.
As I shared a couple of posts back, I got the layout wrong on my first section, and was not in the mood to unpick. I waited for the reveal on Friday and then worked with the parts Pam used to come up with something that I felt worked with my design-challenged creation. It will probably finish at 12" square.
 
This beautiful bundle of Miniature Gatherings fabrics from Primitive Gatherings, and their fun little book of mini quilts recently came to live at my house. So I got out the Itty Bitty Eights rulers, polished them up, and now I am ready to tackle some new minis. But, alas, it will probably have to wait until after the holidays.  Have a few gifts to get stitched first!




That's all for now.
Until next time, 
Janet O.
 

Oh My Stars!!

And they are my stars now, but I didn't make them. Aren't they beautiful? These were made by Karen (Log Cabin Quilter blog). Apparently she has been sorting through UFOs--shedding the projects that she no longer cares to finish. She had told me something was coming my way, but I had no idea what to expect. Two boxes arrived at my door the other day. This shows the contents! I was floored!

Not only the stars were within, but the pattern and parts to finish the quilt,
along with makings for an apple core quilt, a half log cabin, and the
beginnings of a Sister's Choice quilt. Oh, and some shirt parts.
It was an early Christmas!!

 Another piece of fun mail was this Australian magazine from Liz (quilterie blog). She is featured inside along with a wonderful quilt she designed. Isn't this great? It is a wonderful issue about traditional patterns with a modern twist. I love what Liz has done. Click to see it larger.

Aside from opening fun mail, I have mostly been working on some swap projects and birthday gifts, which can't be shown yet. But I can show you my slow progress on Bonnie Hunter's (Quiltville blog) Crabapples (aka It's So Vermonty). I  have around 1/3 of the blocks made. I've been trying to decide on a sashing color and have tentatively settled on a really dark brown tonal print. However, I am open to suggestions.

I know I said I wasn't doing any more SALs right now, but I needed more leader/enders and I had some already cut pieces just the right size for many of these, and the others were really easy to cut and it hardly took any time at all, and I just cut from the scraps that were sitting on my cutting table. Have I justified this enough? Of course, this is a SAL from Cheri (quiltsbycheri blog). She calls it "a piecework sampler." I just have three more little blocks to make and then each block gets bordered and the whole thing gets sashed. You can see Cheri's version here.
It works up very quickly and there is really no excuse not to make it--at least I couldn't find one.

I hope you have time for some fabric therapy today.
Until next time,
Janet O.

Why do I do this?

Do you recall the problem I had when Temecula Quilt Co. posted their Blessings Baskets SAL? I couldn't stop and ended up making 4 of those (you can see them all HERE).
So I wasn't going to do that with their Summer Stars SAL, and I didn't. I only made three sets, (but there is a fourth one playing with my mind). This was the first. In my last post I was struggling with the dark sashing overpowering it and asked for input. I tried the options and advice and this is how it finished. The narrow band of blue at the top is the tryout for the binding.

Before they posted the setting I decided to make the "Fall"-ing Stars mini using their star block patterns and I put it in the setting of their Blessings Baskets (see it HERE, along with info on how you could win it by donating to Dravet Syndrome research). Both SALs use 4 1/2" blocks, so they are interchangeable. I thought that was handy.

I liked it well enough that I decided to make another one as a gift, but using only five of the stars. I tried narrower sashing on this one, and I liked it, so I used the narrower sashing on the first one (I assembled it last of the three).

Here we have all three.

Maybe I should just stop following the Temecula blog. Their little quilts are like Lay's Potato Chips--I can't do just one. You may recall a few posts ago I showed a mini rail fence quilt I made using a quilt on their blog as inspiration. Then I made a second one with the leftover rail blocks. And a third mini materialized from the trimmings. I had to take the border off of the third one to finish the sashing on the star quilt at the top of the post, so I finally bordered this little piece with something else and yesterday I quilted it and finished the binding today. This is a 7 1/2" square. The little squares are 1/2" finished. Would you say this is a Super-Sized mug rug or a very tiny quilt? I can't decide.

 You can see the quilting a little better on the back. Nothing fancy.

Recently my very kind blog friend, Teresa, loaned me her Marti Michell templates to finish cutting my "Ramblin' Rose Meets Jamestown" (aka Random Roses in Jamestown) BOM blocks. So they are now all cut (much more easily than without the templates) and I finally got last month's block stitched up. It is top, left. The blocks along the bottom are on design boards, waiting their turn to be stitched. The pattern calls for log cabins as setting blocks. I think I may use chain blocks instead.

Finally, in keeping with my lack of self-restraint, I'm showing what I did after Cheri shared some little quilts on Labor Day.  These finish at 8 1/2" by 10 1/2". I needed some quick leader/enders while I made the star quilts and the BOM. My CW scrap basket was handy, so this was a no-brainer. But why couldn't I just make one?

Lately I have really been going overboard on the minis. I need to get serious about finishing a big quilt for a change. But first I need to quilt some of these minis that are soon to be gifts. I'd better go warm up  Gidget. 

Until next time, 

Janet O.