A Mother's Love

And since I'm no longer letting my lack of good photography skills deter me from posting my quilts - here's my most recent project.

After my sweet grandmother passed away I was able to gather some of her fabric and old house dresses and bed sheets. All the memories of my grandparents came back as I worked to cut up the squares for this quilt! It was so fun to remember grandma wearing that dress or sleeping over at grandma's in a bed with the old flower sheets. Some of my favorite things I didn't have the heart to cut up (at least not yet) but for the most part I was able to incorporate some of grandma's classics - as well as scraps from her own sewing stuff.

It was a bit of a challenge to find a pattern that would work with so many different fabrics and still look good together. I also wanted a more traditional pattern....settled on a single Irish chain design. It worked...right? Hopefully the white breaks it up enough to balance all the colors.

The whole quilt is original fabric with the exception of the green border and the white fabric for the back. I needed the green because I just couldn't find something of grandma's to tie it all together and it turned out so large that she didn't have enough plain white sheeting to cover the whole back (it took 5 1/2 yards for the back!)

The yellow border was an old sheet - it had so much color and darling flowers....I just couldn't help but keep it for the outside.

This quilt was a mothers day present for my sweet mom! I hope it will always bring back good memories! Love you mom!

a scrap quilt for kate

Dont interpret the fact that it's been almost a year since I posted anything as I haven't been working on fun projects! It's just been a little extra crazy around here! And honestly, my lack of ability to take cool photos is a slight deterrent to post anything! Hopefully I can take some half decent pictures and share some of the stuff I've been working on. Any suggestions on how to take good photos of fabric and quilts?

My sister was in town last month and mentioned to me my Kate (#3 child) didn't have a blanket to call her own. In reality...I've made several little quilts for her but they have all been commandeered by her little sister. I found this cute quilt top that I had made out of scraps and even had quilted a couple years ago but never ended up finishing it. Perfect....how easy is it to just put a binding on something! So Sarah - here's Kate's new quilt....and yes, Alli knows it's not hers!

(found this darling mini dot fabric for the binding)

(the back is white minky....so soft!)

my own superheroes!

Made reversible superhero capes for my kids! My little boy's is superman/batman and the girls all got an initial and a different logo (superman, heart and princess crown). Doing them reversible was a great idea They were so patient while I was making them and have had so much fun playing with them.

I looked online for some ideas but finally ended up holding a piece of newspaper against my little boy's back and trying to find the perfect length and cut. For safety reasons (and so I wasn't tying strings every time they wanted to put them on) ended up doing a velcro attachment in the front.

vintage baby quilt

I saw this darling design at quilt shop down in St. George a couple months ago out shopping with my sister. It was fun and super easy to make! I used an Oz for Moda charm pack (5 inch squares) and cut each of the squares in 4. I'm determined that this quilt would be the perfect use for my scraps so next time I'm going to try and do this with what's already leftover in my sewing basket!

Basically you make a fabric sandwich to start out - take the back fabric, turn it upside down on your work surface and tape the corners down to hold it in place. Use a light spray of adhesive and then lay the batting on top. Another light spray and put on the top background fabric. It's a little tricky with the fabric being sticky but make sure there aren't any bumps and both fabric pieces and the batting are lined up correctly. Then take a quilting pencil and draw a grid on the fabric and position the squares evenly. After the squares were arranged (my 3 year old did this part and I just fixed a few to balance out the colors) just a small dot of adhesive (or even elmers glue) will hold the squares in place while you sew a grid over the whole quilt. Put on a binding, throw it in the wash to fray the edges and wash out the glue and you're done!

Mine is about 40" finished.

Finished Starling Quilts!

I finally finished my second starling quilt! I've been waiting for it to stop snowing to take photos outside but it's been so cold and raining/snowing the last couple days that I thought I'd just do the best I can with the lighting inside!

The minky on the back turned out exactly as I hoped it would! My little girls love to cuddle up in something soft and this is the perfect bright and cuddly quilt for them to share!

The quilting is done in this darling daisy pattern! It doesn't show up so vividly when you are just looking at the quilt (especially on the front) but it's something you can definately see on the back.

For the binding I just rolled the minky from the back over and did a little zig-zag stitch! I was advised that the minky binding would wear through quickly but since the extra fabric was already there I just did it anyway! I haven't had problems with any of my other minky quilts? If I have to put a new binding on in a couple years...no big deal! Does anyone have any bad experiences with minky bindings?

Just to show how different these two starling quilts turned out:

This is one I made last year with the same Alexander Henry Starling fabric. This one was done with a white linen blend for the sashing which gives it a fancier feel. The photos aren't that great...but at least you can see the difference.

For the squares I focused on red, blue, green, yellow, pink and black and white. Finished the edge with a black and white binding. I love these little birds! They are all different with fun colors and designs!

The back is mostly the main fabric (that the birds were fussy cut from) but there is a big off-center stripe made of an extra square and leftover strips!

These quilts have been so much fun to make! I love the different colors and patterns all mixed together that somehow work out. It was a fun challenge to take the same little birds and make two unique projects.

Starling Swap Quilt

This is my most recent project and I love how it has all come together! My plan is to back it with some pink minky and let my girls just use it as a play blanket! You can see from the crease marks that it's been folded up in my sewing basket just waiting to get finished and quilted!

All the blocks were made as part of a swap with some friends! They are built around a little startling bird - fussy cut from some Alexander Henry fabric. All the little starlings are so different and colorful! It's so fun to see how all the different fabrics work together! I ended up using a little pink dot fabric for sashing and using some leftover fabric for posts!

I couldn't pick which fabric I wanted to use for a border - so I ended up using both of the ones I loved! The stop border has a black and yellow print on plain white and the bigger border is just a deep bright pink print! This quilt has been so much fun to make!

This is actually the 2nd blanket I've made with this Alexander Henry starling fabric...the first one I did on my own and turned out so different. I'll have to post pictures of it sometime. It's amazing how things can start with the same fabric and turn out so different!