Thursday, May 31, 2018

OMG I Finished my May OMG

Two days ago, I saw a couple of OMG finishes, and thought, 'Did I sign up for one? And if I did, what was it?'  So I looked back through my posts, and yup, I did, when I did my Throwback Thursday post for May, it was embarrassingly apparent that the cushion cover I was featuring was incomplete...

No more!


I Like/Love #16

It is the last Thursday of the month, which means I write my gratitude post. I'm starting to get back into a routine, if only teaching yoga classes as usual this week, and trying to get back to the blog schedule. I realized yesterday I missed May DrEAMi! so I think I'll have that on Saturday June 2. If your regularly-planned quilting schedule got derailed by a just-have-to-make project this past month, then I hope you'll link it up. Squirrels are like rabbits right: multiplying in a blink!

Here are my notes of gratitude for the month of May. Interesting, in that Yvonne, the chaplain who directed Mum's Celebration of Life said in her talk, "Gratitude shifts everything. Even in the darkest of times, there's always something to be thankful for, if we are willing to look for it."

1. I love Spring. This is a photo taken on the public pathway between two houses in here (not ours) of the wonderful violets that carpet the grasses in early May, with a Forsythia (always associated with our five years here in the late 80s, as we had a beauty in our front yard then) and a towering Magnolia in the background. Such colours, perfect for a quilt right?

Tuesday, May 29, 2018

Plus Playtime QAL: Row 2 Construction

I'm wondering how many of you are already done part, or all, of row 2?! This second quilt I am making as part of the QAL was started as a leader/ender, and it wasn't long before it sort of took centre stage and I had several blocks together! The main page with links to all the steps is here.

Saturday, May 26, 2018

Plus Playtime QAL: Row 1 Construction

My apologies for being late with this post. You can find the ezine issue with this pattern by going to Sew in Love With Fabric where you will find the newest issue, and can scroll back to January for the one that my quilt is in.

This week we are making the three blocks for row one. Follow the diagrams in the pattern in the ezine to make Block 1. Remember that you construct the blocks in columns. Below you see segments two and three using this method:

Sunday, May 20, 2018

Hands2Help

Today is the final day to show your quilts for Sarah's Confessions of a Fabric Addict Hands2Help charity quilt drive. This is one of the quilts on my Q2FAL list.

I have one of my two almost ready (just needs binding) to be dropped off for Syrian refugees coming to Canada, who are making a new home in the Windsor area.


Monday, May 14, 2018

Week 4 New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop

Welcome to week four of the New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop where we introduce quilt bloggers who are new to Quilting BlogLand. My hive named themselves In Stitches.
Carrie of Carrie Bee Creates made our button. That's one of her own quilts!

We hope you had a great week 3, and that you enjoy this last week of the hop!  This week Tracy at It's a T-Sweet Day, Joni of For the Love of Thread, and Sandy of Gray Barn Designs, are introducing themselves to you. I hope you can find some time to visit and leave them some comment love. Thank you so much to everyone who has been along on all four weeks of this hop! You will find Week 3 winners on last week's post.

Once again there is a terrific giveaway with lots of awesome prizes from our very generous sponsors.

I hope you will also have time to hop over to my co-hosts' blogs, Beth @ Cooking Up Quilts, Tish @ Tish N Wonderland, and Jen @ Dizzy Quilter where you will find links to the bloggers in their hives who are also posting today.

All you need to do for all the new bloggers posting today is leave a comment and then come back here to enter the giveaway for some truly wonderful prizes.


We are so very grateful to our 18 very generous sponsors for this year's hop:


                                                
The giveaway is the same on all four of the co-hosts' blogs, so you only need to enter once. The giveaway will run from May 14 12:00 am to May 19 at 12:00 am EST. Winners will be announced on Sunday, May 20, notified by email and posted to the Rafflecopter widget below.

Have fun!
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Friday, May 11, 2018

Hands 2 Help Check In

I haven't written much about my Hands2Help quilts, but trust me, they are in production, both of them. I wanted to do a quick post to show you the flimsy of the first one.

Here's how it evolved:
Last year Preeti of Sew Preeti Quilts won a $25 gift certificate to Sew Sisters Quilt Shop (big sale this weekend, no affiliation, just enabling, as per usual). Well Preeti gave the gc to me because she said the postage would take the majority of it. I said well, I'd put it toward some Canada fabric that I wanted to use for a Syrian refugee quilt as one of my 2017 H2H charities. She approved! So I spent it and then some ha, and got a bunch of Canada fabric. However, the quilt didn't get made last year; I made the originally planned one for refugees.

So this year is the year. I just hadn't decided what pattern to do, and was letting it percolate, and getting a few ideas.... Then came the Humboldt bus crash tragedy. I made a half dozen blocks for the call for quilts. That pattern was it!
I played with arrangement: all the same orientation, or twist and turn?
Not only are mine and Preeti's fabrics in here, but also there is the Canadian cities fabric my brother sent me, leftovers from a jacket he had made for a Canada 150th Sesquicentennial thing at work. You will also see more Canada fabric he sent me which I'm using for the backing, in my finish post. Or maybe it will be an added pic or two to this one as it's about to be loaded onto Avril my longarm.

I settled upon alternating every other block and sewed up the twelve blocks in no time at all, entirely pieced on Tillie my little '51 Featherweight. It's her turn right now to work; Billie, my little '47 girl, is resting, but wanting to come out to play and keep in gear, nice and oiled and smooth too!
Oops, I see I have it upside down there; I aimed to have the big blocks of text fabric all one way.
Here is a funny outtake that I wish you could see 'live' in the Photos app, typical of often windy days here by Lake Erie.

I might not be on top of responses to comments this next little bit, so I hope (well I know) you'll forgive me. Brady will be 'in the house' in a few hours! I made him some new pj shorts as he's grown right out of his Frozen ones I made him a couple of years ago.
They turned out great! Sure hope they fit him okay but I made size 12 hoping they'll be baggy, as pjs should be. This is some of the fabric I bought off my friend who is de-stashing.

Speaking of her fabric, here are two pics of some more of it, 'Woodland' by Natalie Lymer of Cinderberry Stitches for Lecien Fabrics.

Please shoot me an email ephdra(at) gmail (dot) com if you are interested in buying any of this. It has been pre-washed, but is from a non-smoking home. $4/yard, minimum half yard cut. Postage extra!

A quick note:💥💝🎉🎊Starting today, this weekend is a free Watchathon at Craftsy (no code necessary) that I know I'll be partaking in... well, I hope to, here and there, especially when MacGyver and Brady are pounding away in the new garage that is now complete, well, inside it they'll be putting up drywall...
All done but finishing off the inside!
Linking up with the last check-in at Confessions of a Fabric Addict.

Oh, and one more thing: this is the final day for Week 3 of the New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop. Go here for the links to the blogger in my hive and the co-hosts, and the giveaway. Winners will be announced on Sunday.



Wednesday, May 9, 2018

Popstar

Better late than never, right? Here we go...again! This is one of my goals on my Q2 FAL list.


April's challenge was to create a new, modern version of a vintage quilt or quilt block. I love stars; it's no secret they are my favourite block along with the schoolhouse one. So I knew I wanted to do something with stars. The gorgeous rich batiks were provided to me by Island Batik, the threads by Aurifil and the batting by Hobbs. I just love working with these fibres!

Tuesday, May 8, 2018

Plus Playtime QAL: Cutting Tips

I've seen a fair amount of fabric flying around on blogs and on Instagram posts, and one or two finished tops already! I think this is wonderful, so that others see what some quilters have done, and it can help with decision-making, or perhaps convince others sitting on the fence to jump in with the rest of us.

So last week we saw the dive-right-in-dolphin Louise's flimsy, and this week here is eager Canadian beaver Anja's of Anja Quilts:


I just love the two greens she used in her background, genius!

Alright, cutting. By now you have looked through the pattern and seen that the construction of this quilt is a bit different: the quilt is one giant 9-patch (not so different at all), but the blocks are constructed in columns (ahhh, different). You cut various sizes of rectangles and squares.

Major tip #1: background and large plus

  • the background requires 8 strips @ 3.5" wide
  • the large plus in the background, aka the shadow plus, requires 9 strips @ 3.5" wide


Major tip #2 - background:
  • two strips will give you enough for your 3.5" squares for the background and two more for the 3.5X6.5" rectangles will give you 12; cut the 13th from the leftover strip from 3.5" squares
  • three strips will yield the correct number of 3.5X9.5" rectangles
  • one strips will yield the two 3.5X12.5" rectangles
Major tip #3 - large shadow plus:
  • two strips will give you enough for your 3.5" squares
  • four strips will give you your 3.5X6.5" rectangles
  • three strips will give you twelve 3.5X9.5" rectangles; cut the 13th from the leftover strip from the 3.5X6.5" rectangles 
For organizing purposes, you can just stack or you could use baggies to keep the pieces together. Easy!

Small plus blocks:
  • There are 28 in total.
  • 25 are full pluses, meaning one 3.5X9.5" rectangle and two 3.5" squares.
  •  Three are partial pluses, meaning one 3.5X9.5" rectangle and one 3.5" square.
  • You will find these partial pluses at the end of rows 1 and 3, and at the beginning of row 2. See below.

Here is my adult Plus Playtime quilt at the 9-block stage on the design wall. 

I'm allowing two weeks to cut out all your pieces. It seems like a hefty chunk of time, but Mother's Day happens on May 13 in the US and Canada...I think it was a month or two ago in the UK, no? Yes, a quick Google and it was March 11, the fourth Sunday in Lent. And looks like you Aussies and Kiwis celebrate it the same as us, on the second Sunday in May! I love learning all this stuff, and feeling connected.😍🌏🌎🌍😍 
Anyhow, May is a busy month everywhere: here in Canada we have the May long weekend, celebrating Victoria Day on May 21. It was a Bank Holiday in England and Ireland, Scotland too, I presume, on May 7, and Labour Day in Australia, and it's Memorial Day the last weekend in May in the US, so a busy month everywhere. Let me know, Jean, if there is a Bank Holiday in NZ in May; couldn't see any public holiday in May according to Google.

No linkup today, but please remember to tag me on Instagram @mmmquilts and also hashtag is #plusplaytimeqal if you feel like showing an and all progress!

Any questions, please either ask in the comments, or shoot me an email: ephdra (at) gmail (dot) com

If you haven't checked out the new bloggers for week 3 go here where you will find links to Linda in my hive who is posting, as well as the other co-hosts' blogs, and of course be sure to enter the giveaway on the Rafflecopter!

Monday, May 7, 2018

Week 3 New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop

Welcome to week three of the New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop where we introduce quilt bloggers who are new to Quilting BlogLand. My hive named themselves In Stitches.
Carrie of Carrie Bee Creates made our button. That's one of her own quilts!

We hope you had a great week off from extra visiting, and are geared up for the last two weeks of the hop!  This week Linda at Cozy Quilts is introducing herself to you. I hope you can find some time to visit and leave her some comment love.

Once again there is a terrific giveaway with lots of awesome prizes from our very generous sponsors.

I hope you will also have time to hop over to my co-hosts' blogs, Beth @ Cooking Up Quilts, Tish @ Tish N Wonderland, and Jen @ Dizzy Quilter where you will find links to the bloggers in their hives who are also posting today.

All you need to do for all eight new bloggers posting today is leave a comment and then come back here to enter the giveaway for some truly wonderful prizes.


We are so very grateful to our 18 very generous sponsors for this year's hop:


                                                
The giveaway is the same on all four of the co-hosts' blogs, so you only need to enter once. The giveaway will run from May 7 12:00 am to May 12 at 12:00 am EST. Winners will be announced on Sunday, May 13, notified by email and posted to the Rafflecopter widget below.

Have fun!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thursday, May 3, 2018

Throwback Thursday #5 Herbs Cushion Cover & OMG

When I decided upon just which pre-blogging quilt I would write about, I realized this post would serve as my TBT as well as my OMG! Heh? How can that be? Read on to find out. Guilty secrets, true confessions, baring my UFO soul for all to see...


That is the pillow as it lives, for the past oh, 9-10 years, on my bed amongst several others. All the others there are tout fini. All finished. They range in age from the candle-wicking one, made in 1984-ish, to the Meadow Dance aqua/white/black one made in September 2017.

I'd already embroidered one Crabapple Hill pattern, and fallen in love with her designs. I always, always had some kind of handwork with me, be it knitting or embroidery, and this was so portable. I need to get back in that habit. I think aging eyes 😩 that don't see up close very well anymore are part of the reason I don't embroider like I used to. Here it is on the freshly mowed, new, I-could-just-chomp-on-it spring grass, off the pillow form:


I love these soft feminine colours, both the fabrics and threads. The 9-patch that is the centre is comprised of nine different cream low-volume fabrics before low-volume was a 'thing'. There's a little of my hoarded precious Nancy Halvorsen ' True Friends' fabrics by Benartex...who knew all these years later, this company would be such a huge part of my quilting life. The main floral fabric is a piece I'd bought thinking of using it for a kaleidoscope background fabric, but it was just so perfect for this cushion cover, that I used it all up here. The pink single-fold binding is machine-stitched to the front and hand-stitched down to the back. It's a left over piece of Moda Marbles--(How do I remember things like that? Oh, but I do. However, where I set my phone down 15 minutes ago? No clue. MacGyver threatened today to fix some kind of idiot strings to it...) --Moda Marbles from my mum's 70th birthday quilt. Okay then. That tells me it would be about 11 years old then as my mum is 81. See the value of quilt labels? I'm ticked I didn't put one on this.

Here is the back:


And this brings me to the OMG part of this TBT.  I zoomed in for you:


The blanket stitch on the back envelope edge is about 1/3 done. I had a feeling at the time that I shouldn't put it onto a pillow form because I might never finish that edge, stitched with a strand of the soft green and one of the soft pink, nor would I put on the two buttons required to close the flap. Oh, and make the buttonholes. So there it has sat (But no one will know! Well now everyone does....) for the past 11 years. So it is not just an OMG it's also a UFO! I see this on a daily basis; I pick it off my bed and set it back on the bed each day, so I touch it twice a day(!!), and it just keeps waiting patiently, every once in awhile giving me the spectacles slipped down the nose, eye-piercing look over the tops of them, 'So uh, hello? Anytime... You could finish me properly...' So I would like to finish embroidering that edge and make the buttonholes, sew on the buttons and call it done! I hope to do this by the end of May.

You may think this is a rather cheesy UFO/OMG, like I've had a lot more ambitious ones, try last month's? Two!! Both of which I did not complete... So I'm keeping it simple, but it's also got a catch: I have NO clue where, well a vague idea, my embroidery threads are. They sat in the Storage Box for five months last year and because I knew this loft was going to be renovated, I haven't set all my sewing stuff up, just the stuff I really need and use daily, so embroidery threads? Nuh-uh. The other hard part of this UFO/OMG is finding buttons. Same reason as embroidery thread. But also, did I buy some for this project? Or must I go out and buy some? So you see, not as easy-peasy a goal as it first appears.

Wish me luck!

Let's see what pre-blogging quilts with their stories (I love love love the stories) you've got for us this month!

But first! Free shipping at Craftsy! Today only! May 3! US orders only (booo, but it helps to have a daughter who lives across the river in Michigan!) and one time use only per customer.
Code: 24HRFREESHIP

and...

Be sure to check out Craftsy's new platform, much like Netflix (can't wait until I get my TV set up in this loft) where you pay monthly or annually, and you can watch classes 24/7! Do remember though that it still works like it always did: if you prefer to buy individual classes, they are yours forever to watch and rewatch time and again!
FREE 7 Day Craftsy Unlimited Trial at Craftsy.com

Linking up
Elm Street Quilts
Tish N Wonderland




Tuesday, May 1, 2018

Plus Playtime QAL Fabric Requirements and Tips

Here we go with the first post about the actual quilt for the Plus Playtime Quilt Along! You may want to hop over to the sponsors post, as three more have been added, two PDF patterns from Cindy at Stitchin' At Home, a 6-month subscription to Make Modern, and a beautiful handmade wooden bowl and frog pencil/tools holder by Jean's husband. Jean's blog is All Points of the Compass. I do hope you will take a little time to check all three out!

Now, let's talk fabric. This post will give some tips and advice when choosing your fabrics. If you didn't already know, you will find three kits available for the small pluses, one from Mad About Patchwork and two options from Clinton Modern Creative.

You will find the fabric requirements in the ezine on the Benartex blog, Sew in Love With Fabric. Note that there are 28 plus blocks, three of which are partial blocks. Here are a few things to consider:
  • You can choose to go scrappy and use 28 fabrics from your stash for the plus blocks.
  • Perhaps you choose to repeat some. Fourteen fat eighths will allow two pluses out of each fabric.
  • You may like to consider cutting a plus or two from your binding fabric; the yardage allows for that.
  • The large shadow plus requires one yard; you may choose to cut a small plus or a partial one, as I did, out of this fabric as well. If you do this, note that this plus block would have to float on the background, not the shadow plus.
  • If your mind works like mine, several of you will notice on the quilt layout that there are places in the background (the yellow in the ezine) where you could use one 9.5" square instead of three 3.5X9.5" strips. Feel free to make that call, and alter the cutting directions accordingly. Your piecing for those blocks will differ from the column construction method that is given, however.
I may be getting a little ahead of the game plan for this week, cutting being next week, but once you've cut all the pieces, this quilt is best organized by laying it out in its entirety on a design wall before starting to sew. Both times I've made it, I've been too excited to see what a couple of blocks look like, and I've started the piecing. Then, when I do lay out the rest of the quilt, in both cases, I have gone back and ripped and switched placement of a few plus blocks. So, resist the temptation! 
The more adult version of the quilt, in progress on the design wall

Make sure there is good contrast between your background and large plus shadow, and be sure that all your small plus blocks will show up well on both. Sometimes, you may choose to have that little 'aha!' moment for the viewer when a plus block or two almost blend in. You can see the navy does that against the black in the top right corner block of mine. It's not as dark as in the photo though.

One eager beaver, or maybe I should say, dive-right-in dolphin, on a boat in the Turks and Caicos as I type, has completed her hot, hot, spicy top, so I have another example to show you. (Tish posted her EQ drawing of what she's thinking, for yet another example, think sexy and classy together.) I first referred to the one in the photo below as Red Hot Chili Peppers...
Just look at that pristine water; makes the red even more vibrant!
Right now Louise, of Quilt Odyssey, to whom it belongs, is calling it 'Five Alarm Chili' quilt. Love that! When I asked if I could use her photo, she sent me five more! Five... two with feet!
So much to love about this photo.
Isn't that name and the fabric, just SO à propos for having been pieced in the Caribbean? (I feel like I need to add a 'mon' after that.) Thank you Louise! Incidentally, if you're looking for a fabulous book, actually two, to read about a basically year-long sailing voyage a couple took to the Caribbean islands, and which I think Louise and Sean are pretty much living, you must read An Embarrassment of Mangoes by Ann Vanderhoof (that's the first one). My sister Linda recommended it to me, and it is such an excellent read. Louise made a red cross in honour of the Red Cross, which is the original name of my quilt which I designed in last year's 30 Quilt Designs Challenge...

When I designed it, I was just so impressed by the efforts of the Red Cross, how they just go in and help, unconditionally, and without a hidden agenda. Louise and her husband volunteered with the American Red Cross, so this is her nod to that...or perhaps something else as well, but you'll just have to head over to her blog to find out what! Isn't it marvellous that she didn't know the symbolism behind my design when she made her quilt! Ah, synchronicity, I know and love and appreciate you well.

Let's show off our fabric selection in the linky below! Instagram, Flickr, blog post, all acceptable. This is a good time to visit each other, and if you have questions, ask! It's usually 'protocol' to visit the link before and after your own; this helps keep Quilting BlogLand as rosy a place as always.😍💕