Happy Halloween!!

Hope everyone has a Happy Halloween! Love this cute kitty picture!

 

My daughter dressed up as Lucy from the Peanuts. She works for such a fun company. They had lunch sent in for employees and had a contest for best costume. So nice to have fun at work!

Enjoy but stay safe!

Finishes 1.5

This quilt is finally fully finished! The body of this quilt seemed to take me a very long time to quilt.  I couldn't pick up speed with all those appliqued flowers all over the place! I outlined each flower and leaf but not every petal. I felt that was enough. It looks fine to me.

 

Here's a close up of my border quilting.  I tried to quilt a teardrop, echoed it twice and then echoed petals twice around that! It's so hard to see it since everything sort of blends so nicely. It gave the quilt a wonderful texture. I decided to bind the quilt with the same fabric I used for the backing.

Here's my half finish! One sock is done but one more to go!!I just love this yarn. It makes such great waves of color throughout the sock. Almost too nice for socks!!

Now I have to decide if I should knit the next sock or sew down the binding?? I think I'll finish up the binding. That sock will take awhile but I can probably get that binding done in a couple of days.

Secret Santa!

I just found that you can sign up to be a Secret Santa with another blogger. Doesn't that sound like fun?? The link with this badge isn't working for me but you can go here to read about it and sign up!

It just sounds like great fun. You have until October 31 to sign. However, it's limited to only 60 people so sign up soon if that's what you decide!

You never know, I may be your Secret Santa!! That would be so fun!!

A Little Progress

I've been diligently machine quilting away on my latest quilt.  I finished the narrow inner border and just have the larger border left. I think you can see my loops going back and forth on the darker fabric. The thread matches the fabric quite well so it's a bit hard to see. This is the corner which gives you a better idea of what this border looks like.

 



This is just a view of the straight portion of the inner border. I love quilting these loops. They're fast, fun and add a great amount of texture to the quilt.

 

I also decided my ornaments needed a little something else.  I decided to add a little embroidery to dress them up a little. I just embroidered a little green chain stitch to the ends of the gold applique. It helps the ornament look more polished and more finished. It's quite subtle but it's a nice effect.

I have a few more ornaments to go and then I'll be able to applique them onto the table runner. I also have to decide how to machine quilt that larger border. Too many decisions to make!

 

 

Knitting Socks

I was invited to a baby shower and I knew my friend was having a boy. I usually knit booties but I thought socks would be fun. They're so cute and little! They don't take very long to make and they're fun.  It's a nice, fast project that you know will be loved. I found the pattern online. There are many baby sock patterns that are have very similar directions.

Someone at work asked me to make them a pair of socks so I decided to make this person a Christmas gift. I used this book that has a ton of very interesting sock patterns. It's actually a collection of sock patterns that were winning designs from a contest sponsored by Knitter's Magazine. There are sock patterns in this book I've never seen anywhere. I had to buy the book although I don't need any more new books. I have too many as it is!

This is the beginning of the socks I chose to make. It uses cables but I'm crazy about this yarn! It's a very subtle stripe that features purple, teal and a shade of blue that seems to fit perfectly! I bought the yarn at Knitpicks. They have very reasonable prices on great quality yarn. They're a sister website to Connecting Threads. Lots of nice stuff!

More FMQ!!

These are the 3 blocks I've been working on. Each corner is the same so I've done each block 4 times! I used the same book from my last post to come up with ideas for quilting. They're all very similar but one is using swirls whereas one is more leaf like. I just love quilting them! Practice definitely makes it easier.

This block uses swirls in the middle and hearts outside of the pieced star.

This block uses more loop designs but leaves in the pink and green portions of the star. So fun to quilt!

 



 

This is the center of the quilt. I made feathers flowing from the center into each corner. I know it's hard to see with all those colors.  Here's the back.

 

 

 

It may be easier to see from the back on just one fabric.

 

I have 2 borders left. I still haven't decided how to quilt them! I'm looking through books and on websites for ideas. Hoping to post pictures of a finished quilt very soon! I'll be linking up with Leah Day for Free Motion Friday which you can see here.

 

Hope you all have a wonderful long weekend. Unfortunately, I'll be working most of it. On a brighter note, it's my daughter's birthday today. Hoping to have a little party for her Sunday. Happy Birthday, Becca!!



Free Motion Friday

 

 

I have 12 blocks to quilt in my latest quilt. There are 3 different blocks in each corner. I started by machine quilting this pinwheel star. I have tried making this picture clearer but nothing is working! I've taken 3 different pictures but they all look the same.  I think you can make out the leaf shapes. There are leaf shapes over each blade of the pinwheel as well as around the pieced 8-pointed star.

 

 

I used this book to choose how I was going to quilt the block. It has nice variations and examples of ways to quilt different blocks. You can see the photo I used.

There are nice examples of continuous line quilting ideas. I did this block using 2 different lines. I used one for the inside of the pieced pinwheel and one for the outside. It went very fast especially since I didn't have to mark anything.

 

I left the quilt on the floor of my family room.  My cat, Lily, has decided to take a nice nap on it! Oh, well, I can clean up later!

 

I'm linking up over at Leah Day's blog. Check it out! Fridays are always fun over there!

 



October already?

I can't believe it's already October! What happened to September? I just thought I'd update my projects. Time is going by so fast!

As you can see, the table runner is coming along fine. I have 3 more ornaments to make but they all still need to be appliqued. I'm supposed to add bows to each ornament to show that they are hanging. I may just tie a bow to each ornament and made it 3-dimensional. I haven't fully decided. There are directions to glue, couch or sew ribbon with a zigzag stitch. I'm not sure I like any of those methods. I guess I'll make the decision as I get closer to that step.

 

Here is my latest piecing project. This is a pattern but Cluck Cluck Sew.  It's called Basket Case. I think of it as interlocking ribbons. I'm using Honey Honey by Kate Spain. My daughter saw this pattern and just loved it so I had to make it for her! Isn't that what we quilting moms do?? It's such fun to make. I have to make a total of 30 blocks so I have a ways to go. I'm in no rush and neither is my daughter! (Good thing!)

I'm getting very close to reaching the borders on my machine quilting project. It's taking forever but I do like how it's coming out. Just so slow! I will post pictures when I'm done a little more.

That's it for now! Happy October!!