Rocky Mountain Puzzle for Do Good

This is my last quilt finish for the do good stitches charity bee, at least for a while. It's a little sad to not be making fun plans for my next one right now, but I know I can always join the bee again down the road if the time is right. I just needed to simplify some things and make a little more time for my responsibilities as the Cincinnati Modern Quilt Guild president. 

Anyway, I can honestly say that my 2 years with the Harmony circle was so enjoyable and I would recommend this bee to anyone wanting to learn new things and give back with their quilting. It's really a wonderful project, and you can find out more about joining right here. 

This quilt was completely inspired by Amy of Badskirt's version that I saw here on Flickr. I instantly had a quilt crush on it. It's all kinds of amazing. So I told my group of stitchers to make Rocky Mountain Puzzle blocks using this tutorial, but I changed the measurements to make 12" finished blocks instead of 8." To do that, make the center square and HST units 3.5" with a 2" border around that center square.  I said to use bright saturated rainbow colors, everything but purple. Not sure why I excluded poor purple, it's a color I love. But I'm glad it's left out in the end. You don't belong here purple! This quilt is so cliquey.  Plus they could use black fabrics, and had to use low volume prints for the background of the blocks. 

The most fun part of this bee is when you start to get the blocks trickling in in the mail and you can imagine how they will harmonize in the finished quilt. It's so cool to see a bunch of scrappy blocks come together like this and really work. These two above are a couple of the blocks that I made. Everyone did a really great job at picking something fun to put in that center square.

For quilting I did simple straight lines, following the diagonal direction created by the arrangement of HST's. It's fine enough, but I kind of wish I had done vertical straight lines, or maybe a crosshatch. If I'm being honest, I would do straight lines about 3/8" apart across every quilt I ever make if I had the time. That is one quilting decision I never regret. But in the end, this one just needed to be done quickly. This quilting does at least give is a really soft easy drape, which will be nice for this kid that gets it through Project Linus.

The back has three extra blocks and a nice aqua Art Gallery print from Sewn Studio. I like how the little triangles scattered in it give a nod to the triangle design on the front. For the binding I chose an orange on pink dot by Kaffe Fassett. I loooooove the way his dots feel. It took me forever to settle on the binding for some reason, and I'm a little surprised I landed here. I must be having a hot pink moment lately. 

The quilt is about 60" by 48" and I'm really happy to be done with it and giving it away! Thanks for all your help on this one Harmony Circle, I miss you guys already :)

do. Good Stitches Flying V Quilt

I finished this quilt a few weeks ago and finally took pictures today. This is definitely my favorite DGS quilt yet! Do Good Stitches is a charity bee I've been in for nearly two years. Every few months, I get to be the designer of the quilt my circle of the bee makes. 

This one was inspired by my friend Andie's minimalist flying geese quilt, featured in her awesome book. 

Of course, mine couldn't be quite as minimalist as hers, or else my group wouldn't have had much sewing to do! Instead of the standard 2 12" blocks, I instructed everyone to send me a strip of 12 flying geese units all joined together going the same direction and on a white background. They each finish at 6" x 3". 

I told them to block the colors together instead of mixing them all up, and to use this block for color inspiration:

They matched those colors pretty perfectly right? It's my most favorite block from my scrappy Japanese +&x quilt.  

So once I had everyone's strips in the mail and made my own, (second from the right side is mine) I added more white fabric on either side of the geese and joined them together, staggering one unit off with each one, and alternating directions. Originally, I imagined them all going one direction and all facing to the side of the quilt, rather than going vertically. But once I laid everything out, this way just looked much better. Flexibility is my middle name. (Actually, it's Elaine... I know you were wondering.)

I did straight line quilting, vertically just like the geese, about 1/2" apart. With all that white space, I knew I wanted to do heavy quilting. I think the simple straight lines are just perfect here. Always my favorite. 

The binding is the dictionary text print from Moda's Mama Said Sew, ordered a while back from Pink Castle. Except that one little spot where I ran out and had to use some Flea Market Fancy. (See? Jessica Flexibility McFlexyFace!)

The backing is all this pretty Vintage Modern print (Bonnie & Camille for Moda) from Sewn Studio on clearance. I just love the color.

I didn't wash this quilt before taking pictures, which is the opposite of my norm. I just wanted the smooth look for pictures, but I'll definitely be giving it a good wash-n-crinkle before dropping it at Project Linus this week. It's a good thing, because I've already got most of the blocks in for my next do good quilt!

Quilts for Boston (and a winner)

You may have heard about the Boston Modern Quilt Guild project to collect quilt blocks and assemble them to give to those effected in the marathon bombing.

The deadline is past to send in your blocks, but a few days ago, their blog said they had collected over 1200 from around the world. Amazing. They have quite a job ahead of them finishing up all those quilts! Thank you so much to the BMQG for providing us with a tangible way to sew up some love for that city.

So these are the four blocks I made to send in. The design I ended up with was a very happy accident that started at our last sew-in with the CincyMQG. I had planned on working on some Boston blocks there, but I was running late for the sew in and ended up just grabbing another project that was ready to go. But when I got there, member Sheila was also working on some great HST blocks for Boston. Her problem was that she had cut way too much fabric and wouldn't be able to assemble them in time, so I was excited to start sewing her fabric up. 

Instead of making HST's with the 6" squares she had cut out, I made disappearing 9 patches. But they ended up way to big for the 12.5" block requirement. So I slashed them up (disappeared them?) again, mixing all the pieces up. Then they were a tad to small so I slashed a couple more times and inserted a scrappy 2" wide strip in each direction. Those were actually they only parts that were my own fabric. 

I love the way they turned out! I definitely want to make a whole quilt this way at some point. Maybe using all low-volume and solid scraps? 

Make sure to check out the BMQG site for pictures of the quilt tops they are already beginning to finish up. And I also like to check the #quiltsforboston tag on instagram sometimes. (I'm alittlegressica there.)

Looking for the Roly Poly Pinafore giveaway winner?

It's #33 Mary Ann. Congrats!! And a have a great holiday weekend everyone!

Walk in the Woods Quilt

I love when I am motivated to actually finish a project that's been in waiting far too long. I don't have too many of those, because I really like to finish quilts. (Let's all just forget about my 2 Swoon blocks languishing in purgatory.) Finishing is the best feeling, plus I am usually making some kind of gift with a deadline. 

But this was a quilt top I made back in November for no reason in particular. The patchwork in the middle is made from a small sample pack of Aneela Hoey's Walk in the Woods line that my boss brought me back from fall quilt market. After I sewed all the squares together, I thought maybe it could become a baby girl quilt pretty easily, so I used some things from my stash to improv some log cabin stuff around it. That pink and red wave is from Liesl Gibson's Modern Workshop line, and I love how well it works with Walk in the Woods. I also love how the large Ikea script print works in the quilt. 

I'm pretty excited about the free-motion quilting here. It's only my second or third attempt, and it came out just like I envisioned it. All the loopty loops just go in horizontal lines across the quilt with a couple inches between. I feel like at this point the only way that I can handle FMQ is to go generally in one direction. I'm not good at the all-over every direction stuff because I get too stressed out. Maybe I try to go to fast? Maybe I need to make a better plan of attack about where I will travel? I don't know, I'll work on it. 

The entire back is the same AMH Mixed Signals print in blue that I used some on the top. That particular print seems to be useful for many things, so I'm glad I still have a couple yards hanging around. The binding is from Bonnie and Camille's Ruby line, plus a little of the Modern Workshop waves again in the corner. 

Here is a section of the quilting you can see a bit better. I still prefer straight line quilting for lots of reasons, but I really think this design works with this quilt and fabric line well. Plus it was SO fast to do. Sometimes fast is necessary and ok, so maybe I should make better friends with free-motion quilting. (Lately I've seen and heard many great things about this FMQ book)



So I'm really glad the 100 Quilts for Kids charity drive gave me the push to finish this one up. More info on that right here.

AND since I just heard yesterday that the newest Craft Hope project is all about quilts for the wildfire victims out West, I've decided to ship this one to Pheonix Quilts in Utah. The project runs until September 15, but they are even accepting unfinished quilt tops and blocks. So maybe you have something waiting in quilt purgatory too that would rather be used in Utah? 

tutus and pillows for a cause

The crafty/ mom blog , Samster Mommy is having a tutu drive. I'm kind of late to the game, because her goal is to get 100 sent in by the end of July, which happens to be Saturday. They will go to the Princess Alexa Foundation, which gives dress up clothes to terminally ill kids. But I wanted to let you know because there is still plenty of time if you make one in the next couple days. And the great part is, you don' even need to sew to make one. See all the info about the drive here, and how to make a no sew tutu here. (I'm sure you could even hot glue the elastic instead of stitching it.)  

  Here is the one I made with blue and pink tulle. Wish I had a cute little girl around to model it.  

  

  

 

   Just to give you an idea of their poofy adorableness, here is Lily in her garden fairy costume I made last Halloween. Hendrix was a garden  gnome.  

  

In other charitable making news, I came across this article yesterday on the etsy blog about another challenge to get one million pillow cases made for people in need. I love the ambition of that goal! Pillowcases are now next on my list. Find out more about it here.                                

 
Does anyone know of any other opportunities like this going on right now? Let me know in the comments!