My next project is a baby quilt for my cousin’s first baby.  She’s having a girl and is due Feb. 11.  I’m so excited to work on a baby quilt!  I’ve been working on such big quilts lately that it’s going to be nice to work with one that is relatively small…quick to piece, quick to quilt, and quick to finish.  Baby quilts are so satisfying!

One of my favorite fabric lines is Butterfly Fling by Me & My Sisters Design for Moda.  This is the line I made my very first quilt (other than the wall hanging I made in my beginning quilting class).  This fabric is so fun and cute and it’s not babyish.

The pattern is Baby Mine by Camille Roskelley.  This pattern is a great deal because you get 2 patterns…one for a girl quilt and one for a boy quilt.

I’m finding it hard to get motivated today.  I guess I should blame the long weekend, although I welcome long weekends with open arms!  Or maybe I should blame the weather…it’s pretty warm (ok, it’s down right hot), and it’s overcast.  The overcast gets to me much more than the heat, and it’s days like this I wonder how I ever lived in the Pacific Northwest, where it’s overcast for about 9 months of the year.

Anyway, my mailbox was stuffed this afternoon.

Stuffed with goodness.

A few weeks ago I ordered some layer cakes and charm packs from Cotton Patch Quilting.  The Snippets layer cakes were on closeout for only $15 each and the Sultry charm packs were on closeout for $5.  How could I pass it up?  Well, I didn’t, and I bought them out of the layer cakes and the charm packs.  And because my order got temporarily lost in translation (I blame cyberspace) they sent me 2 additional charm packs of the Hampton Blues.  Awesome!!!

Snippets layer cake

Sultry charm packs

Surprise Hampton Blues

Not sure what I’m going to make with the Snippets layer cake, but perhaps one of these awesome paterns from Thimble Blossoms (pattern already ordered).  Perhaps a few of the Sultry charm packs will be made into a quilt that will be donated to a silent auction, and when I looked at the colors I realized that it goes perfectly with some Amy Butler fat quarters that I already have.  As for the surprise Hampton Blues, they are destined for a blue and white themed quilt that I’ve already started collecting fabric for.  The creative wheels are turning!

Oh, and on Friday I took Ellie to one of my LQS and we went to the basement, where the sales are.  They were having and extra big sale…all fabric in the basement was $4/yd.  I found this beautiful fabric by Free Spirit that retails for $9.50/yd and I just couldn’t pass it up seeing that it was reduced to $4/yd.  The next big question was how much to buy.  Sale fabrics have a minimum of 1 yd, but I really liked this fabric.  One of my next quilts is going to be a simple red and aqua squares (probably 4 inch squares), and this fabric would be perfect for the backing, squares, and/or binding.  So I did what any rational quitler does at a sale like this…I bought the entire bolt!  They only charged me for 7 yards (they guessed how much and then rounded down).  So for now the bolt sits next to my ever increasing fabric collection (no longer a stash, but a collection).

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My sister-in-law, Jen, asked me to make a quilt for her and my brother-in-law.  They just moved into a new house, and they now have a guest room, and she would like a queen sized quilt for the guest bed.  Of course I am so honored that she likes my work enough to ask me to make it, but I have to admit I’m a bit nervous.  One, I’ve never made anything that big before, two there is no pattern for the quilt, and of course I hope the finished product meets whatever vision she has in her head about what it will look like.

She bought some beautiful scrap fabric –mostly linen and linen and cotton blends.  Did I mention I’ve never sewn with linen before?

Anyway, the scraps are all hand painted with a flower.

I ‘ve been thinking about how to design this quilt for days now, and I think I’ve finally designed the pattern.  It’s going to be pretty modern blocks that highlight the hand painted fabrics.  And it’s going to be 95 x 95.  She asked for 90 x 90, but I’m making it bigger to account for some shrinkage.

The name of the quilt is: Urban Nature.

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We are back from vacation, and my sewing machine is back from getting a good cleaning and tune up…yay!  I managed to finish quilting the Ellie Fun quiltop, and now it’s on to the binding.  I’ve got the binding sewed on to to the front and now am in the beginning stages of hand sewing the binding to the back of the quilt.

I usually like to finish a project before starting a new one, but I was feeling the need to be creative a few nights ago, so I broke out my Merry & Bright layer cake and got started.  I’ve got the quilt top done, and last night I finished piecing the back.  It’s a gift, so you’ll have to wait until December to see the completed project, but I may give some sneak peaks!   I just love this line…so much so that I bought a layer cake for myself to someday turn it into something fabulous, but my quilt will have to wait for another day.

Merry & Bright by Sandy Gervais for Moda

I saw this elephant fabric at my local quilt shop, and I thought it was adorable.  I took a quilting class this past Saturday and it was all about using the trendy conversational prints that are so popular these days.  Since I loved the elephants so, I chose the elephants as my focus fabric.  I’m going to name this quilt “Ellie Fun” because my daughter’s name is Ellie and that just happens to be the name of the elephant fabric line (the elephants, red with flowers and hearts, and the floral are all Ellie Fun by Karen Neuburger for Quilting Treasures)!  Too cute

I’ve been itching to use this fabric ever since I bought it a few months ago.  I keep meaning to get started, but every evening something seems to come up.  Hopefully tonight I’ll be able to cut the fabric.  Love, love, love Sandi Henderson’s Farmer’s Market line.

I absolutely love Lila Tueller’s Woodland Bloom fabric line.  I found a zig zag pattern in the Fons & Porter Baby Quilts, Winter 2008 magazine that I thought would be perfect.  I used 1 jelly roll plus another 10 strips or so to make the quilt bigger than the originally published finished quilt of 47 x 47.  My quilt is 67 x 72, and I absolutely love it!  It’s not quilted…yet.

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