a beautiful day for a quilt show

It was such a beautiful day on Saturday when the outdoor quilt show was held at Heritage Park - a large historic village.  There were something like 750 quilts in the show!  Here follows some of my favorites.  

This one was near the entrance.  So pretty and pink in the morning sunshine :0)

 I loved the quilting on this hexagon quilt. 

 This pineapple quilt was lovely.  When I got close I was surprised to see that most of the fabrics were not to my taste yet I think this quilt is wonderful.

 I always love a quilt with lots of flying geese.

 This is the finished zoo quilt that my guild made together.  It was sold at the show and the money raised will help purchase batting and backing for future charity quilt projects.  You might remember I contributed the panda bear :0)

 There were a number of very nice alphabet quilts in the show.  I thought this one was very cool.

 This one was smaller - I like it too.

 I liked the color combination in this one.

 And what great blocks!  The sunflowers are just coming up in my garden outside.

 I just love star quilts with a little bit of applique :0)

 More flying geese.

 This one is very striking - the flowers just glow on the dark background.

There was also an exhibit of antique and vintage quilts.  I'll save that for another post.
I'm making great progress on my ufo project.  I almost have the blocks together and I'll post my progress soon.
Happy Quilting!!

An annual May finish

It seems every year - the day before I have to take it - I finish a quilt for the outdoor quilt show at Heritage Park.  I think having this annual deadline must be good for me :0)  This year's finish is a single bed size quilt for my DD#1.

The pattern is  Rosy Posies from the May/June 2011 Quiltmaker magazine.  I added an extra row of flowers to make it longer -  it is 66"x 100" in size.

 I kinda got talked into using a solid for the sashing/borders.  It works I think - but I still think prints are more interesting :0)

I'm so very pleased with how the quilted feathers turned out.  I usually do the boringest machine quilting so this much feathering surprises me.  They are far from perfect but at least I tried and practice makes perfect (or something like that)

 I even think the back looks interesting.  You can spy a label in the upper right corner.  I almost never label any of my quilts but DD#1 insisted on it.  (I'm usually too excited about starting the next project I guess)

Speaking of next projects...  I have a ufo all picked out and I'm excited to get working on it! 

I'll be sure to take pictures at the quilt show this weekend to share.
Happy Quilting!!

more 6 inch blocks

I am still having fun playing in my scraps.  Six more blocks have been added to the pile.

 Most of the recent blocks come from this Once More around the Block book.  I have about 10 more block patterns all picked out.  I can't stop now!

 I wasn't planning on making a big quilt of 6 inch blocks but - maybe... 

This weekend I noticed that 2 of the blocks are the exact same pattern. One is scrappier than the other - can you spot it?  :0)

 I decided to try free motion quilting in the petals.  I settled on feathers -the only shape I can free motion quilt with any confidence. 

Now I have to stay focused - I'm giving myself one week to finish all the petals.  2 weeks from today the quilt needs to be bound and delivered to the show venue.  Will I make it??

Happy Quilting!

Doll swap link up

Lori of Humble Quilts hosted a doll quilt swap.  She has a link up posted on her blog now so you can see some of the sweet doll quilts swapped all around the world.  Go see them here - enjoy!

 

This is the little quilt I made for Barbara.  She doesn't have a blog so I'm posting it for her. 

Happy Quilting!!

soccer season quilting

Soccer season continues here at our house.  With 3 kids in 3 different leagues there is soccer every day but Friday.  The weather has been pretty good so far which means I've been able to do some sidelines stitching on my stars.  This is such a great take along project - my little tin of supplies fits easily into my purse.

 

 I think this will be the 3rd season for this project.  How far will I get with it this year?  :0) 

 

 I've also been spending as much time as I can machine quilting this Cheddar posies quilt.

 DD#1 wants it to be in the quiltshow the last weekend of May.  Deadlines are good for me to get things finished.  I hope I make it - there's still quite a bit of quilting to do yet. 

I dislike turning big projects with my machine so instead of going in the ditch around the flowers (my usual method of machine quilting) I am putting diagonal lines in the blue.  I still haven't decided what to quilt in the petals.  I may try to free motion quilt something if I'm feeling brave.  I'm open to suggestions if you have any :0)

Happy Quilting!!

a gift given, a gift received

Lori of Humble Quilts is hosting a doll quilt swap and I couldn't resist joining in. We were supposed to use Civil war repro fabrics and immediately I knew I wanted to use Turkey reds.  

 Here is the doll quilt I made.  I flipped through several books looking for a pattern but in the end I just chose a 6 inch block and made 4 of them followed by a few borders.

 I would have liked to have quilted it by hand but it had to be mailed by April 20 and I wouldn't have been able to make that deadline quilting by hand.  Here is a closer picture showing the machine quilting and the fabrics a little closer.  I mailed it yesterday - I hope my swap partner likes it!  It was fun to make. :0)
On Monday my mailbox had a large exciting envelope in it!  My swap partner Anne from California had her doll quilt in the mail early!  What a pretty, sweet surprise inside. 

These colors are perfect for spring and for Easter!  She raided a friend's stash for the fabrics - I'd like to raid that friend's stash too - I love the fabrics :0)  Thanks so much Anne - I love my little quilt! 

 

Thanks to Lori too for hosting the doll quilt swap!  I look forward to the "link up" so we can see all of the little quilts made for this swap.

 

Happy Quilting!





circle in a square

I finally got back to my Circle Game quilt again this week.  It has to be on hold for a bit because I am working on it with a friend and during soccer season my evenings are very full of (obviously) soccer!



 So this past Monday my friend had the day off and we spent the morning sewing together.  I was sure I would get so much done.  However, it took over 2 hours to get this one circle inside a square.  (the before picture is below) and it's still not done because it still needs the center circle to appliqued down.

 I'm sure the rest of the circles will go into their squares much faster...  lol!  The upside to this is I am getting a lot more confident with set in seams :0)

 Here are four more 6 inch blocks.  I'm up to 20 now and I'm still having so much fun playing in my scraps.  Maybe I'm making a big quilt of these after all??  I know there are scraps enough to make more than one large quilt :0)

And, I embroidered another bird crest.  The stitches might be a bit wobbly but progress is happening.  There are still no faces yet.  Slow progress is still progress!

Happy Quilting!!