Cheddar Challenge and Doc Schnibbles is Cut

 Today I sewed up two more blocks of cheddary challenge bow ties.  I cut a few more too.

 This quilt is growing.  I really like it and think this will remain a favorite of mine for years to come.

 Kathy and I also cut out Doc Schnibbles.  I am using the Fairy Tale Friends fabric line.  I think it is going to be cute.

 I picked out these for fabrics for the Ugly Challenge.  I have no idea how my poor partner can figure out a way to put all of these in a quilt.  If mine are this ugly I will be taking Bonnie Hunter's advice and cutting it up SMALL!  For the record I really love the large flower one and made a bag out of it.  I just have no idea what else I would do with it and it has been in my stash too long.  I can't wait to see what fabrics I get and figure out what to do with it!

Finally Some Sewing Time!

June has been in the process of moving for a bit now...yesterday she had movers come take what we had packed and get it over to her new place in Paradise Valley.  I am excited for her to get a new start but bummed she will be so far from me.  We have lots more work to do over there, but I am amazed at what all we pulled off!

My new bedroom floor is in and I love it!  It sounds different in the room and we can hear every step the dogs make on it at night, but it is clean and looks good!  We also finally got our garage roof redone so it doesn't leak.  We have fixed it three different times (three different people) with absolutely no luck.  Can't wait for the rain to see if the professionals did better than we did.  

I also took some pictures of the reorganization of my quilting studio after the great fabric purchase.  All my modern fabrics are on the top shelf here with yarn and knitting and crochet stuff next to it.  To the far right which you can't really see is the stack of drawers that some of my smaller chunks of fabric are in.  They are stuffed full.

Here is the new (old) shelf that I added to the room.  All the bigger chunks of fabric are arranged by color or type and are easy to see (the old shelf is wider and the fabric was two deep so I couldn't see it all) which I really like.  We moved the microwave cart down to the kitchen and it is already filling up there too.

Close up of the fabric on the shelf.

Today Angela over at SoScrappy posted that yellow is this month's color for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I am happy to say I made my two yellow Jack in the Box blocks.  My bonus pinwheels were actually made a month or two ago from leftover scraps.  I will make more from the leftover bits of these blocks.

Here are all the blocks I have so far (I got bored one day and whipped up an orange one but we haven't had orange yet, lol!) and I am loving this scrappy quilt.  

My Stitch kitty is finally cooperating and is hanging out in the quilting studio.  She likes to be in the middle of whatever action is going and so as to slow us down!  

And the UFO of the month pick is number two which is my sister's crown quilt.  I have been really dreading getting going on this.  I am using a pattern but the color placement I have (based on another online quilt) doesn't work with any of my patterns so I had to figure some stuff out myself.  Add to that that I didn't realize there are actually FOUR different blocks in each of these big blocks (I thought there were two for some reason) I really struggled to get the first block together correctly.  Today I finally managed it and of course getting the second one made was much easier.  Kathy picked up cutting the Crown Royal bags where DJ left off and I made more hsts, so I may have hope of completing this top this month.  In any event it is seeing some progress which it would not have if not for the UFO pick!

Going to go to bingo tonight with Kathy and a few new friends.  We haven't gone in a long time so it should be fun!

My Weekend

 I finally finished a tribble scrubbie.  I had forgotten how to make them and there was much ripping and looking up things before I got it right.  It is might cute though so I will be making more of them.
Yesterday we all went up to New River to help my sister move into her new house and my parents move into theirs.  It is nowhere near done, but much progress was made.  Spent the day today helping June pack for her move.  I did the entire sewing room and fabric which was the best room to pack as far as I am concerned.  Randy helped me and Kathy and June worked on the kitchen.  There is a lot of work to be done!

I did sneak in a tiny bit of sewing this morning...made more tiny bow ties and this block.  Two more and I can add another row to my cheddar challenge quilts.

 I forgot to show you a picture of these four blocks I got last weekend.  They are paper pieced and were
from the estate fabric sale.  I think they will go into a QOV to donate.  I haven't taken pictures yet of the heart blocks I also got.

Late this afternoon we moved all the furniture, ripped the carpet and padding out of our room and prepped everything for our hardwood floor installation tomorrow.  I can hardly wait for it to be done.  I cleaned everything top to bottom as we moved it out and dusted the walls and shook dog hair and dust out of everything so it will all be super clean when it gets put back together tomorrow night.   I work til ten so it make take two days to get it all squared away but it is a new beginning which I am in desperate need of.  

Still missing DJ and haven't seen her at all.  Have heard lots of nasty rumors which all put together point to someone I don't even know.  I don't know what to believe and I guess it doesn't matter anyway, it is over.  I only wish I could have a mind wipe so it didn't hurt so bad:  

"How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!

The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!
Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd."
- Alexander Pope

A Review of Modern Quilts Illustrated!

All pictures were borrowed from Weeks Ringle's blog at craftnectar.com.  I am sure by now you have heard of the new modern quilting magazine that recently become available--I was one of the lucky ones to get a copy of the first edition to do a review on.  While Weeks Ringle and Bill Kerr have been on the forefront of modern quilting for a long time (my first modern quilts were all made with their designs--Outside the Box being my absolute favorite so far!) this magazine will appeal to quilters of all ages even if modern quilting isn't the only type of quilting they do.  

The table of contents includes a photo of each of the three featured patterns for quick reference.  There are two regular columns which include "The Cutting Table" and "Palette Chasing," the latter is pictured below.

While "Palette Chasing" shows an inspiring group of colors/fabrics (in this first issue they are Kona solids) with the inspiration photo--the library of congress' wall in Washington D.C., "The Cutting Table" is two full pages that are also graphically appealing (it looks like a design wall with inspiration all over it!) which includes tips and musing and much of said inspiration.  My favorite tip in this issue is a silver dog tag that encourages quilters to visit a website to get more information about adapting clothes for wounded service members. 

The photos are by Jim White and are gorgeously done and on quality paper.  The pages in this magazine are really more like a good quality art book.  

While the magazine is only seventeen pages plus cover and back, it is all content and no advertisements whatsoever.  Most quilting magazines are full of ads which thicken the magazine so I think for this type of publication this is a good size.  The editing is great and I didn't notice any typos or spelling errors (I am one of those people that spots things like that easily!).  

Each of the three original quilt patterns is shown in several different color variations--often changing up how many different colors are in the layout which really provides a lot of options for each quilt pattern and is really inspiring for people like me who tend to follow patterns as they are.  This gives me options to successfully create my quilt as I want it!  As you can see from the picture below, the directions for cutting and sewing are shown visually as well as written in words.  It is spread out and is very readable.  I never like magazines that try to save space by jumbling the directions all together and skipping steps or combining steps.  This step by step explanation is SO clear and easy to follow.   

Each quilt is introduced with a page that tells how it came about or why they chose it.  This page also includes suggestions for changing up the quilt or pattern.  These designers know and use color theory and make it easy for people to understand how to get the look they want with each quilt.  They also list exactly what fabrics were used for the pictured quilts for quilters to assemble it themselves and offer kits of the original fabric choices for sale in case the quilter doesn't want to hunt each fabric down.  

All in all I love this new modern quilting magazine.  I plan to subscribe to it myself and know I will learn a lot and will make more Modern Quilt Studio quilts.  If you want to know where to order it you can go to http://craftnectar.com/ and check out Weeks' blog.  Their new website is still under construction at http://modernquiltstudio.com/ so meanwhile you can check out http://funquilts.com/ for more information.  This publication gets five (modern looking) stars up from me.  Check it out and let me know what you think!

Shopping a Quilter in the Sky's Stash

BJ's good friend from high school, Gail, had an estate sale yesterday in which she was selling her sister's (a quilter in the sky) stash.  BJ and I were more than happy to make sure all this amazing fabric gets put to good quilting use.  I spent about 65 dollars and got bags and bags of fabric, a roll of batting, thread, patterns and various other things not even quilt related. I started out by organizing the fabric by color or style.  

 Batiks...I only took a few that I really liked because BJ is the batik lover so I mostly helped her gather those.  But I couldn't pass up the rainbow looking one and the dolphin one.

 These are the novelty looking fabrics I got.  Several larger chunks including one that has suitcases and says Paris that will wind up in a backing for my neice's wedding quilt (she loves Paris).  That yellow with the strawberries has already found its way into some burp cloths!

 Found these Halloween fabrics...I am hoping that they turn into a future Schnibbles!

 I took just about any Christmas fabric I could find even if I didn't particularly like it .  I didn't have much left after making lots of tablerunners last year and I figure I can use something sort of ugly for backing more tablerunners!  I love the blue with snowflakes and the pinkish red poinsettias!

 What a rainbow of color!  I was so happy to get so many blues because though it is my favorite color I never seem to buy much of it...I think I always assume I have lots of it, lol.  Kathy and Randy came along and we went to breakfast at IHop after with BJ...and Kathy spent her time looking for anything white because one can never have enough white on white.

 Just some of the thread I got, there was lots more.  I will not be needing thread for awhile!  These Chocolate Traveler tins I took because I thought I could make them into little sewing kits to gift or give away.

 I got a few pieces of Asian looking fabric to add to the five fat quarters I bought just after my Dad died.  I will eventually make something with them.  A few of those pieces might actually be civil way fabric, lol I couldn't tell!  There were also a few pre-cut squares of civil war and 30's fabric.  I seriously love so much of this fabric and I hope Gail's sister is smiling down as she sees it come together into quilts and such!

 Several patterns that I hope to make.  There were TONS of patterns, but most of them were not my style.

 I also got a ZILLION zippers in every color under the sun.  I filled my jar with them and next month for Christmas through the year I will be making zip up bags.  Zippers have gotten really expensive and I only had a few left so this is great.

 This rainbow fabric is one of my favorites!  Here is Bug helping me sew the backing for the Rainbow colored Pineapple Blossom quilt.  I used fabric ALL from my new stash.

 Here is the backing for it.

 After putting everything away in my drawers (it ALL fit because I really had used a lot of what I had) I only had a little bit left to fold and add to my shelf.  I couldn't believe that I had a place to put it all neatly!  It really was the best day I have had since losing DJ.  Fabric makes me happy.  Thank God!  I also used up the leftover squares to piece a backing for the Schnibbles Summer Day baby quilt that I think is going to Rachel (my honorary daughter) in Norway who is expecting her first baby.

 Here it is with the front of the quilt so you can remember what that looked like.  I also have been knitting again.  Finished up the orange one and completed the Suns colored one and weaved in the ends of the other two.  I am now working on a Tribble again...lol.  I am starting an intermediate knitting class next weekend and am looking forward to it.

Kathy and I are off to see her niece and then to help June get organized because it looks like she may be moving sooner than she expected.  Hope to sew more later!

Burp Cloths for Christmas Through the Year

I finally did my Christmas Through the Year project today!  I made six burp cloths following KJ's tutorial over at http://buttercreamsewingmachine.blogspot.com/2012/03/tutorial-quick-easy-burp-cloths.html !  They whipped up quickly and look great.  Now I have a few gifts for little ones on hand for Christmas!  

Liebster Award--for me?

Shannon over at Nunu's Quilt World gave me an award! This award is given by "one blogger to another for excellent, beautiful, humorous, or sparkling work." Liebster is apparently German for dearest or favorite, what an honor!

The Liebster is given to blogs that deserve to be recognized, but have less than 200 followers. The Award comes with just a few "rules", which are:

1) Post about your win on your blog.

2) Link back to the blogger who presented you with the award.

3) Copy and Paste the award to your blog.

4) Present the award to 5 blogs that have less than 200 followers that you think deserve to be recognized.

5) Let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.

So I picked:

http://skattebo-skattebo.blogspot.com/

http://ros-the-quilter.blogspot.com/

http://beckysbitsandpiecing.blogspot.com/

http://sandrakayedesigns.blogspot.com/

http://phoenixmodernquiltguild.blogspot.com/

Thank you Shannon for picking me--you made my week brighter!