ZigZag Quilt

Making quilts from your stash: Quilt #1

So, if you are like me you buy fabric at random, sometimes you have a certain pattern in mind for it, most of the time you just “love” the fabric and know that if you don’t buy it now, you may never see it again. Some people buy 2 yards if they “love” it, some buy 1 yard… I buy a half of a yard if I “love” it. I realized after stashing fabrics for awhile I bought a lot of fat quarters and soon got frustrated with my stash, there wasn’t enough of it when I finally decided to use it. So now if I “like” the fabric I get the half yard.

Now, the stash has been growing for the past few years. I realize it’s pretty small compared to a lot of my fellow quilters, but honestly… I don’t need more (who does?) I decided to embark on a mission to make three quilts from my stash. I’m not saying who they are for, but they are Christmas gifts, I have until mid-December to get them finished.

I’ve showed the beginnings of the “Americana” quilt, asking you what layout to use with my half square triangles. I decided on the zigzag layout. My friend Charissa said it is like a waving flag! Perfect right? I even had a nice flannel for the backing in the stash.

If you are interested in making a quilt out of half square triangles, I’ve found an excellent tutorial at the blog P.S. I Quilt on how to make them, they are so simple and leave no waste… which is why I love them.

This quilt top used A LOT of fat quarters I’d been stashing for years of Americana prints. I love Red, White and Blue quilts. There was also random yardage here and there from previous quilts I used up. So, this took up quite a bit of fabric (I am not sure on exactly how much, I didn’t keep track, I just started cutting) The quilt size is: 70" x 70" This is the bigger quilt I was doing the straight line quilting on. Love the grid! It also lays really flat, which is nice.

Quilt #2 and #3 are in the works, both tops are completed, now I need to baste and quilt.

A Fall Exchange with Marie!!

I had emailed Marie back in February about doing a fall exchange with me. I love Marie, and I love her work. She is the best finisher I’ve seen! She was so nice and agreed to exchange with me, thanks Marie! I have been wanting to make another project bag, so I chose a design I could put her initial in. The chart is free, you can find it at My Aunt’s Attic. It’s a really neat website. A lady found old patterns in her Aunt’s attic and converted them electronically, and put them on the web all for free. They are beautiful patterns, when you get some time go and check them out. I’ve stitched a few of them now.

The thread I used was variegated in every fall color you can imagine. When I first started stitching it, I got half way done and almost started over, it wasn’t looking right to me. I decided to finish it and see if I liked it. I am glad I did, it turned out pretty I think. The linen used was the leftover piece from my Shores of Hawk Run project :) It is a 32 count linen.

The fabric to make the bag was in my unruly, large stash, it matched perfect!

For those of you wondering, does Heather even cross stitch anymore? I do still stitch, just not nearly like I was a few years ago. I have picked up a WIP, Bent Creek Snapperville. I have many projects started, I am going to work on them until I finish them. I just haven’t been in the mood to stitch, I am pretty sure I got burned out, so I am holding back for awhile :) Quilting has been my siren call as of late.

When Curren and I were working on homework tonight, the doorbell rang and Garth the mailman had a box in his hand for me! Marie made some beautiful things for me.

She stitched a turkey from a Prairie Schooler chart and has this adorable Anna Lee doll holding it (how creative is THAT?)

Curren loves it.

She also made a lid topper for a jar full of chocolate. Her tiny over one stitching amazes me.

Thank you Marie! Now I need to go decorate for fall :)

State Fair Schnibbles Quilt Finish

Are you all sick of seeing this little quilt yet? I like to show it on this blog an awful lot as of late. I finally finished it, and had to post about it one last time. The quilt has been basted for two months just waiting for me to get to it. I could not decide how to quilt it at all, I was stumped.

Finally I was inspired by Red Pepper Quilts. She has been doing a lot of straight line quilting, and I love how it looks. Go check out her blog, wow! I decided to stitch ¼” from the seam on each side. I like the grid look of the quilting. I used white thread and tried to keep my lines straight. It wasn’t too bad to try out. Also, I used a walking foot, which made a world of difference.

The binding is a pink grunge fabric by Basic Grey, love that stuff.

I liked this straight line quilting so much I am currently doing the same thing on another quilt, this time a BIG one, I’m half way done now. It’s not too bad really, just slow… I don’t do slow well, but I can try to learn a little patience ;)

Fabric Goodies

While surfing blogs, I came across a post on Cluck, Cluck, Sew. Have you been to this blog? It’s so awesome, and I love the quilts that she makes, total eye candy.

She posted about a giveaway at Fresh Squeezed Fabrics, a fabric shop on Etsy. I decided to go ahead and enter the giveaway, even though there was a lot of other people that did too. I won!! There were close to 800 comments. Woohoo! Randi was giving away 10 fat quarters and one of the patterns from Cluck, Cluck, Sew called Skipping Squares.

I ordered some Castle Peeps fabric from her site. Look how FUN! There have been some adorable projects made from this fabric that I’ve seen online. I can’t wait to use it up.

The giveaway was for 10 fat quarters, enough to make the quilt pattern. I chose 10 fat quarters from Holiday Happy. The fabric is designed by Monica over at Happy Zombie. Who is a fellow Oregonian! She lives in Astoria. Well, I got to meet Monica at the last Portland Modern Quilt Guild meeting. She was super duper nice. Look at this cute fabric, awwww!!!

So many quilts to make, so little time. *sigh*