"So This Is Love..."

I've decided that is going to be the name of Wally's quilt. :) Cue Disney song:

Here it is all layed out. Ready to be sewn together, then sashed. I do need to hit up Joann's (the one in Naperville) since I don't have enough Kona Ash to sash it! I am a bit worried about it not being long enough? I may have to add a nice border around the whole thing so it covers Wally's feet! I guess I hadn't thought of that. lol.

After laying it all out I took the chance to play with some of those scraps! These little guys may end up as a little doll quilt for my wall? I'm using the Joann's quilter's solid -- close to Kona med. grey. I think Kona Coal would be the best grey solid for this... or maybe the ash will be once it's all together. either way I love these colors. :) Finally some AMH purples!

Christmas projects list updated.

Here's my list to do (as posted about a week or so ago):

• Finish the top of Katee's Quilt.
• piece the backing, quilt, prepare binding, and attach binding (ready to be hand sewn at thanksgiving).

• Buy fabric for the backing of Gia's baby quilt. 
• quilt, prep binding, etc. Decide what hand embroidery to do.

• Start / finish / decide what I'm sending for the mug rug swap (Send date: Nov 22-29)
• Quilt, embroider, and finish two swap pillows for the Pillow Talk Swap (one for partner and one for me). (Send date: Dec. 15) --not sent yet though!
• Make pillow cases to match Katee and Rosemarie's quilts.
• Design quilt labels for Katee and Rosemarie's quilts.
• Buy fabric/start sewing quilt for Wally. (He wants me to make him one for Christmas... lofty goals I think! lol Part way pieced, need to buy a couple more yards of kona ash.
• Make another ruffle dress for Allie for Christmas.
• Make a pillow out of mod bento's from swap for a Christmas gift
  
  I've also gotten a couple other things finished.
  • One purse/wallet/clutch  for a Christmas present. (another is nearly finished... and will be once I'm done being frustrated with it! lol
  • One zip pouch for a Christmas present.
  • One pillowcase for another Christmas present.

So this is love....

 Yep, you're seeing correctly. I actually cut into my AMH Innocent Crush FQ's! All for my hubby! Ok so maybe it's not completely self giving... it's also because I so badly want to sew with this fabric, but I want it to stay in my house. :) So this will become a Color Block Quilt using the tutorial from Stitched in Color (now go over to her flickr group and ooh and ahh over all the color bricks!). I'm still not 100% sure that this is the best use of this fabric, but hey, DH is really excited (and it gets me out of shopping for a birthday and Christmas!), and it gives me the freedom to play with some of the scraps too! Another perk? I edited the FQ stack I'd bought, reserving the lighter purples/pinks so I can add them to my AMH stash and maybe even use some with those lighter Tula Pink fabrics. :) Possibly another quilt right there for me! :)
Oh and tomorrow's Fabric Tuesday, go on over and play along!

**EDIT**
I've already sewn these all together - one more step and I'll be forced to go buy more grey at the fabric store. Oh darn! :) This sure is a gift that keeps giving! :)

Delightful colors yes?

WOW!

I just made a Gathered Clutch from the tutorial by noodlhead. I decided to cut fabric for two of them, one for my mom, and one for my MIL. I am ok when it comes to sewing in zippers. I am pretty decent at most other sewing. Why did it take me almost three hours... maybe more... to assemble them? (ok to assemble one and partially assemble the other). I just don't get how to get those ends of the zipper looking so neat and tidy. It doesn't work so well for me. I can't ever figure out am I supposed to sew all the way to the edge here, or almost to the edge there, are those tabs supposed to be tucked under while I sew the body of the bag together? lol. The zipper itself was a breeze (ok almost a breeze), but those silly ends / sewing the body together just kicked my butt! I decided to set the second one aside (with just that last step to go) until tomorrow. lol. I'm not sure if my mediocre finished product is worth all the effort. I like the boxed pouches much better because when I was done sewing them I felt like the end product was worth the time taken to sew it. :) That's of course aided by the fact that while sewing the boxed pouches I didn't get frustrated nearly as often. lol. In theory I should be able to figure out how to neaten my sewing around those ends of the zipper. I hope! :)

PS - I used some of the new Tula Pink fabric for the pouch(s) - it sure is beautiful fabric!!

Creativity helps cure the blahs.

As you could probably tell from my post yesterday, I've been a bit blah. 

Today I fixed it (at least temporarily) by finishing my Pillow Talk {Swap} pillows! Finished that's right! I quilted one with a free motion stipple, I'm not entirely sure I'm in love with the way the stipple distracts from the stars, but I do LOVE the texture it lends. So for the second one I did a strait line quilt just at the edge of each square border. I may need to hand stitch a stitch or so in the middle to keep it perfect (batting is ok for quilting up to 10" apart, this area is 13" ... I think). I like both so much!!!

I decided to add interfacing to the back sides of the back pieces, mostly to cover the seam allowances from the piecing I did back there. It added a bit more sturdiness and durability to it. I'm very very pleased with the pink / yellow pattern-y stripe for that little bound edge!

I finished a quilt today...

but it doesn't come close to canceling out the rest of the crappy day. I'm not sure about you, but not being pregnant sucks. I'm going to get that out there right now. And on top of that trying to get pregnant for a year and a half sucks even more. And on top of that having one's landlord revoke use of the laundry facilities (for an unknown reason, by way of note on our doorstep - wuss!) sucks even more.

Now I have to go talk to the landlord tomorrow. Who knows what the issue is, but it's surely not easy getting laundry done as is - with a curious two year old - and a basement that has power tools laying around (the basement where the laundry is). It's certainly not going to be easier to have to PAY for laundry, AND leave the house for hours at a time to do it! Ack! Makes me wish we still had a lease.

Maybe the sun will be out tomorrow so I can show you the finished quilt.

Fabric Tuesday!!!

 Some of you may recognise some blocks from this quilt -- since you made them! That's right, Rosemarie's Cancer Killing Quilt and Katee's matching one are very nearly finished!!! I was on a major time crunch to finish Katee's (it was just a strip of blocks and an idea a week ago), since she and I will be working on hand stitching the bindings down on these two this week at Thanksgiving! All I need to do before we leave at the crack of dawn tomorrow is sew on that binding to Katee's quilt! I hadn't been worying too much about getting Katee's done too, but then my mom (who watches Katee while her parents are away with Rosemarie for her treatments) mentioned that Katee's really excited to see her quilt! I couldn't let that sweet 10 year old down!

Stopping in for the first time and don't understand what I'm talking about? Here's the first post and all the others. The short end of the story is that my four year old niece has cancer. She's been battling for three years and it makes me crazy that there's nothing I can do to make it better. We've rallied the forces and people from all over the world (I think like 6 countries... though I'd have to go back and count) have sent me pink and purple quilt blocks to make her and her older sister (Katee) quilts (since of course you can't make something for one sister and not the other). This project has warmed my soul in ways I can't describe. You all are amazing!

 Here are those raw edges, soon to be covered over with binding! It looks great doesn't it? The bindings (and back of Katee's quilt) are very scrappy. I used up almost all of everything that people had so very generously sent along with the blocks. These quilts are going to make AWESOME Christmas gifts! :)

Don't forget to head over to Quiltstory to see all the other goodies linked up for fabric Tuesday!