Yearly Archives: 2015

Sharing Ideas

OK- I feel like I made the greatest discovery. Not earth shattering or life changing (well, maybe a bit life changing for me) but so cool!

I have been making clothespin bags which I sell in my Etsy shop. They are fun to make and I have sold a number of them. Today I wanted to trim one out and decided to use rick rack. I love the cheerful look that rick rack gives to anything! It is such a classic trim. However, I don’t like the way it is usually attached. Often you will see it attached with a seam straight down the middle. However, this means that once it is washed, the edges of the trim will curl up around the seam. I debated sewing two straight seams down each edge to catch the edges but then you have stitching between each angle. This didn’t make me happy. I did what any self-respecting seamstress would do and turned to Pinterest. As one would expect, there are lots of ideas to be had. Many people are embroidering the trim down. This looks really cute but is too laborious. I can’t charge enough for these little bags to spend that kind of time stitching. I came across a pin that linked back to Craft Nectar (which is the blog for Weeks and Bill over at Modern Quilt Studio). Weeks posted an idea about attaching rick rack by dropping the feed dogs and using your FMQ foot (aka darning foot). Ah ha!! Perfect. I never thought of that. It was so simple.

I did reduce the stitch speed on my machine – it takes a bit of effort to keep the trim straight and stitch along the edges. Next time I think I will pull out the glue stick and use that to attach the trim first. That should make it even easier. The inside looks pretty good!

Here is the finished bag hanging from my clothesline.

On an unrelated note, I am so excited about the New Quilt Blogger bloghop event that is getting started. Hosted by Yvonne at Quilting Jetgirl, Stephanie at Late Night Quilter, Cheryl @ Meadow Mist Designs and Terri Ann at Childlike Fascination, this is a great opportunity to learn more about blogging and to interact with others in the community. I signed up this morning and thought I would put this out there in case any of you are interested.

The parameters they have set for joining are that you currently have a blog:

mainly about modern quilting*,
for less than 2 years,
writing at least 4 posts a month,
are willing to agree to be actively involved in the blog hop through visiting and commenting on the other blogger’s hop posts,
and have or are willing to open a Facebook account to participate in the group discussions,

If you are interested, please visit and fill out the 2015 New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop Sign Up Form.

(*Modern quilting to you is modern quilting to us.)

Note: They plan to accept 100 participants for the blog hop this year. The sign up form will be available until May 31, 2015, or until they reach 100 participants.

This looks like an amazing opportunity and I am really looking forward to learning from everyone involved. If you feel like it would be right for you, I encourage you to check it out.

That’s it for now! Hope you are all having a great week!

Linking to Connie at Freemotion by the River, and Tips and Tutorials Tuesday.

Lazy Sunday

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Yesterday was a busy day so to balance that out, today is not! I am not a fan of jam packed weekends. This morning I was up early and spent quite a while in my sewing room cutting pieces. I cut everything I need for the May blocks for my RSC15 row quilt. The color is dark green and I am hoping to piece those blocks (at least some of them) later today. I also cut the binding strips for the Alison Glass miniquilt that I am trying to finish up. I should easily get that binding taken care of as the quilt is only 24 x 24 inches. Then I cut the pieces for a cute little zippered pouch using the scraps from the AG mini. I will send that along to my swap partner with the quilt.

Yesterday was a little crazy. Julia had a science/math competition that she took part in. She did well, placing 7th (they did a 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4 ‘honorable mentions’) She was happy to place within the honorable mentions. The test was really difficult. After that we spent the afternoon at a picnic for the incoming freshman at her new high school. She had a great time meeting her new classmates.

We got home at about 4:00 and I was wandering around the garden, letting the dog run around a bit since she was cooped up all day. So many things are blooming right now. My garden is definitely a spring garden. It really peaks in May. Looking at the peonies and iris, I nearly tripped over this huge snake. It startled the heck out of me. Because of it’s color and the pattern down the length of it, I immediately looked to its tail to be sure it wasn’t a rattler. We have quite a few snakes around here and a somewhat large number of rattlesnakes. (The mascot for Julia’s middle school is the “Rattlers” if that gives you any indication.) The garter snake on my grass was a good four feet long. While snakes don’t scare me too much, it is somewhat disturbing to nearly step on one. I went to get my phone from the car (we’d just gotten home) to text a picture to Ray but by the time I returned the snake was gone.

Deciding it was time to go inside, I called Lady (our dog) to come in. She came bounding over to me and had the head of a rabbit hanging from her mouth. Snakes I can handle, dead animals – not so much.The sight of this made me gag. Honestly, I just didn’t know what to do about it. I yelled for her to drop it and she looks at me like, ‘are you kidding?’ She ran to her crate in the garage and put her treasure in the crate. Yuk. To be honest, living on acreage, we have our share of dead animal tasks to deal with. But that is Ray’s job. I want no part of it. Unfortunately, Ray was up at the house in Downieville. I texted my advisory board, aka my sister’s, for their advice and hmmm…. surprisingly, it wasn’t all that helpful. A lot of ewww, gross, and call the neighbor for help. Gagging all the while I managed to deal with the yuk in La dy’scrate. But the visual of my dog’s trophy piece stuck in my head for a long while (it’s still bouncing around in there, if you must know). I went inside and had a glass of wine which is unusual for me (hypoglycemia = no alcohol). Julia was teasing me; dealing with the horrorific experience with alcohol Mom? Eighth graders think they are so wise.

Enough of that nastiness, I need to move on, get over it, clear my mind! Let’s talk about quilt shows and silent auctions instead. That topic is much more pleasing. Two weeks ago was our guild’s local quilt show and I worked at the silent auction table. We had so many wonderful donations and I bid on quite a few. I wasn’t there at the end of the day to actively try to outbid people on the items I wanted but I did manage to win two items.

Below is a stitchery of bamboo done on dark green batik. Green is my favorite color and I have quite a bit of it in my home. I love the simplicity of this piece. It is hanging in the dining room.

The other piece that I took home is a whole cloth mini quilt. It was made by a friend of mine and I love it. She did a lovely job with the quilting. The fabric has a wonderful shimmer to it. I use a lot of lavender in one of our bathrooms and plan to hang it in there. I need to put a sleeve on it first though.

When I was working the silent auction table it surprised me how little activity there was. I think it wasn’t in the best place as far as traffic goes. Also, I noticed that most of the activity came at the end of the day when people would actively try to win items and out bid other people. It seems like there must be a way to encourage more activity during the day. I would really appreciate hearing how other guilds handle the silent auction at a show. Would it work to have the bidding for certain items end mid-day rather than at the end? Seems like that might encourage that active bidding process to happen at different points throughout the day. Plus people that don’t stay at the show all day long could have the fun of trying to win items before they left. Thoughts? Please leave me some hints on this in the comments section.

Treasure Bags

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Several weeks ago, a friend asked me if I would do some custom work for her. She has two grand daughters and they frequently spend the night. They have bunk beds – actually I think it is like a loft bed since both girls sleep up on top. She wanted to be able to hang a bag on the railing of the bunk so they had a place to put their books, stuffed animals, or maybe a water bottle at night. Since they are up on top, they don’t have a nightstand available or the floor right there to put their books on. My friend, Joy, had seen the clothespin bags that I sell on Etsy and thought if I modified that idea, the girls could hang a bag from their bed. Her only request was that I use lots of pink and make some way for the girls to differentiate the bags; so they knew which one was “their bag”. Sounded fun!

For fabric, I went straight to Hawthorne Threads. I wanted to get a twill for the outside so the bags had some body. (For the clothespin bags, I generally use upcycled burlap or upcycled denim, which gives the bag some shape.) I found a hot pink polka dot twill by Riley Blake. I knew what I wanted to use for the lining. Wee Wander’s “Wander Woods” in Petal. The print is sweet and girly, perfect for these two sisters.

Sarah Jane - Wee Wander - Wander Woods in Petal Riley Blake Designs - Home Decor Basics - Medium Dot in Hot Pink

I made a mock up with some muslin scraps to figure out the size. I knew I wanted to put three straps across the top of the bag as the girls are likely to put some weight into their bags. After playing around with it a bit, I decided on the sizing. The bags finished out at 9″ tall, 14″ wide, and 3″ deep.

The three straps fold toward the inside of the bag so that the buttons are easily accessible from the railing of the bed. I double stitched them to reinforce the straps. When I first made them, I didn’t have that stitching that is between the first two straps. The bag hung open too far so I ran a stitch vertically which created a compartment for the bag and kept it from gapping open.

I boxed the corners at the bottom of the bag to create width in the bag. Also, with the help of my quilting buddy, Sophia, I was able to add their initial to the front of the bag. Sophia has an embroidery machine which made quick work of this. I stitched a circle around the initial to set it off.

I love how these turned out and hopefully, the girls will love them as well! Plenty of room for books, stuffies, and any other treasures they might want to have nearby at bedtime. I am debating offering these as a custom item in my Etsy shop. If I pre-make them, I won’t be able to add the monogram. Maybe I will make one or two up and see how they do in the shop.

Linking to Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Amanda Jean at Crazy Mom Quilts as well as Lorna at Let’s Bee Social. Links to all to these wonderful sites are available at the top of the page, under Link Ups.

Gratitude-Part 6

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I haven’t done a gratitude post for a couple of weeks but this week I have one to share. I am grateful for these two people.

Mom and Dad are celebrating their 60th anniversary tomorrow. Sixty years! That’s a long time to live side by side with someone. They are truly soulmates and their marriage has long been an inspiration to me. I am grateful for the example their marriage set for me and my sisters, over the years. With the high rate of divorce in the US, we are very fortunate to have grown up with parents that stayed (happily) married. They enjoy and respect each other, which created a solid home life for their six children.

Research shows that growing up in a home where the parents marriage remains intact, decreases the likeilhood of the childrens’ future marriage ending in divorce. Having a healthy marriage modeled for you teaches a person what it takes to successfully marry. It appears to create a stronger commitment to the institution of marriage. The study showed that this increased level of confidence was more apparent in females than males who grew up in homes with intact parental marriage. I was blessed to grow up in such a home. Thank you Mom and Dad.

This is a fun picture of the legacy they created. Taken at Thanksgiving of 2012, there are a couple of the grandchildren missing, so the group wasn’t quite complete. Since this picture was taken, two more great granchildren have been born so the group is even a bit bigger now. I think our family (their six children, our spouses, their 21 grandchildren, and their eight great-grandchildren) tallies 45 people now. Little did they know what they were starting when they said “I do” back in May of 1955.

Linking to Yvonne over at Quilting Jetgirl.

Mother’s Day Giveaway Winner

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It was a great weekend! I hope everyone was able to celebrate Mother’s Day in some fashion! I wanted to share a couple of things. One is that I drew the lucky winner for the Sew Mama Sew giveway that Needle and Foot participated in. I had so many wonderful comments to read through and the lucky winner (by random drawing) is number 80!

Peggy wrote that a favorite memory of her mom was “Seeing the excitement on my mom’s face when she was getting ready to go for a long awaited visit to her family in VA. and seeing the photos/video of her visit afterwards.”

When I set up this giveway, I asked readers to share a memory about their mom, being a mom, or really anything to do with motherhood. I knew I was drawing the winner on Mother’s Day so it was perfect to honor mom’s everywhere. Wow, what a great response! I loved all of the comments and thought I would share a few with you. Really touching to read these. Hope you enjoy them.

From Judy: As a kid I always wanted 12 children. My mom told me I should marry a farmer if that were the case. Well, I didn’t marry a farmer but managed to collect 12 children through the years. By the way I was an only child. You always want what you don’t have.

From Gene: My favorite memory of mom comes from a very scary time in our lives. My mom was very sick with pancreatitis and had been in a coma for over a month. She was in an ICU unit and we could only visit for brief periods each day. One day we walked in and were met by her nurse – a guy with a BIG smile – who said ” I have a surprise for you today” He pulled back the curtain around the bed and Mom was awake. She smiled so sweetly at us. Although it was still a long recovery, MOM was back with us and hope was restored. Years later, Mom is still with me and her sweet smile makes my heart sing.

From Kathy: I lived for a time in Seoul, South Korea. My Mom came to visit me, but had not told me she quit dyeing her hair. What a shock to see her so gray! I never thought of my parents as getting older until then. Mothers and fathers should always be here. I just visited her grave for the first time on Sunday (600 miles away). I talked to her and Dad. I miss them so much and can’t believe it’s been 5 and 7 years. I still find myself thinking that I have to tell her this or that and start to reach for the phone.

From Diana: One of my favorite memories of my mom is her helping me fix up my first home – painting the kitchen and planting 2 lilac bushes in the back yard. Lilacs were both our favorite.

From Betsy: The best part is seeing my babies in my grandchildren. It’s like a second chance at seeing a loved child grow

From Linda: I am a coffeeholic! My son learned at a VERY young age (3-4) that the way to mommy’s heart was through coffee and chocolate…so he did both. One morning he used my one cup coffeemaker to make me a cup of coffee. He used THREE SCOOPS of coffee in my one cup maker. Yes, it was MUD. To make it flavored he melted an entire Hershey Bar into the coffee. He brought it up to my bedroom and put it under my nose next to the edge of the bed to wake me up. The best part of waking up…my kid. YES, I drank it….chocolate covered grounds and all.

From Doris: My favorite memory of my mom is when she would bring me lilacs from her yard. My mom passed on Mother’s Day several years ago.

From Karen: My mom loved to sing! She has Alzheimer’s now, but when I am with her, I put on a little Perry Como or Ansy Williams and watch her eyes light up as she sings along.

From Melissa: My mom passed away five years ago. I really miss her especially when I’m sewing because she taught me how to sew . When I miss her the most I create a quilt and give it to the nursing home where she spent her last days .

From Ramona: I have so many wonderful memories of my mom. Unfortunately, this is my first mother’s day without her and I am trying to think of all the fun memories. She loved to sew, knit and create! She passed that love down to me and taught me how to sew which we shared. I will be bringing her 1950’s Singer machine home with me this summer. I learned to sew on this machine so it will be a treasure.

Thank to everyone that left a comment. There are many more memories that were shared. Too many to include here. If you would like to read more of them, check out the comments section on this post.

Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day

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Hello and welcome to Needle and Foot. As you probably know, today is the spring giveaway day for Sew Mama Sew. I love these events. It’s a great way to meet lots of bloggers that I might not have come across otherwise. I know that you are likely hopping from one blog to the next today, checking out the giveaways — so I will be brief!

Having been quilting fanatically for the past three years, I started this blog last summer to further immerse myself in the quilting community. I have a passion for all fabric and lately have been on the hunt for vintage fabric. If you would like to learn more about me, check out my “About” page up at the top of my site. I have pictures of my finished projects available for you on the “Quilt Gallery” page; the link is at the top. To get to know what I am all about, you might like to read some of my more popular posts written over the past ten months that I have been blogging. I hope you will enjoy taking a peek at my world and that I get a chance to get to know you through your comments.

Four Weddings and Four Dresses

Honeymoon Quilt – 16 Years Late

A Finish With a Flange

Paying Homage to High School Home Ec

I am happy to be offering this wonderful collection of Kaffe Fassett fabric for one lucky person.

These are 1/2 yard cuts and will be a fun addition to some lucky person’s stash.

Green is one of my favorite colors and it pairs well with the lavendar shot cotton.

To enter the giveaway, please leave me a comment telling of a favorite memory about your mother or about your experiences being a mom. Actually, anything to do with motherhood since Mother’s Day will be celebrated this weekend. If you are following me, that is worthy of a second entry. Just let me know how you follow me. If you would like to start following me, please enter your email address at the top right side of the screen to subscribe or follow me on Bloglovin and you can also have a second entry. (This giveaway is open through Sunday, May 10th at 6:00 pm pacific standard time.) <THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.>

Thanks so much for stopping by Needle and Foot. Wishing you the best of luck with all of the giveaways today. Happy sewing to you all.

(I am sorry to say that due to the cost of postage, this giveaway is open to participants in the United States only.)

The Plan for May

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OK, May is going to be busy. We have my daughter’s 14th birthday (yikes!). I have a family trip planned that lasts nearly one week and we have my daughter-in-law’s graduation from medical school (double yikes!!) Lots of activity going on so I am trying to be reasonable.

My main goal for the month (which will by my ALYOF goal for May) has to be the completion of my Allison Glass Mini Quilt. The swap has to be mailed out in the first part of June so this needs to be at the top of the list. It shouldn’t be a problem as the top of the mini is done. I need to make the back and quilt it up. I want to make the quilting shine and as I still consider myself a newbie, I need to spend some time with this. I also want to make an “extra” giftie to include with the mini using some of the Allison Glass scrap. Here is what I have left to make the backing with as well as an extra. I should have plenty of fabric.

Second to the Allison Glass Mini is a custom order I am doing for a friend. She frequently has her granddaughters for the night and they sleep in bunkbeds. She asked me to make two hanging bags so they can have books and stuffies up on the bunk with them. The bags will hang from the rails of the beds. These are already cut and 1/2 way done so I shouldn’t have any trouble finishing them up. Hoping to do that this week. I am using a polka dot twill by Riley Blake and lining the bags with the lovely “Wander Woods” print from Wee Wander.

Third on the list is to make this month’s row for my Classic Stitches Row Quilt that I am doing with Mari over at Academic Quilter as my RSC15 project. Tomorrow she will post the block that is to be made for this month. Luckily May’s color is green – I love green and have a bundle of scraps for it.

That is it for goals. Anything that is accomplished beyond that is a bonus.

This weekend was our local quilt show. It was great fun and so inspiring. I want to share the quilt that won Best of Show. This local artist, Sandra Bruce, is amazing. I posted about a class that I took with her last spring to learn her process called “Material Matrix”. It is a great process that takes a photo and divides it into patchwork squares by overlaying a grid on it. Sandra is an excellent teacher and a brilliant artist. Her portrait of Clair is approximately 4′ x 5′. Really striking, it is a perfect portrait of this sweet girl. When I was oohing and ahhing over the portrait, Sandra pointed out Clair to me. I asked her to pose for a picture and, while she probably thinks I am some sort of stalker, she did it for me.

Below is a closer look at the quilt. Sandra’s ability to create the human expression with bits of fabric never ceases to amaze me. If I remember correctly, she used 2 1/2″ squares to create this. Click on the link above if you want to check out her gallery. She does travel and teach so you never know, maybe she’ll be in your area some time. If she is, it’s totally worth your time to work with her for a day or two!

Finally, have you seen the list for some of the instructors at 2016 Quilt Con??? This was in today’s issue of the Modern Quilt Guild Newsletter. Absolutely. Amazing. I am so excited and am considering whether this might be my first time attending. It is in Southern CA in February of 2016 so it would be fairly easy for me to attend.

Big question is, how would a person even choose which one(s) to take a class with??? Most of my quilty heros are in this line up. It’s too good to be true!! Are you going? C’mon, you have a nearly a year to figure it out!

Linking to Sew Cute Tuesday, FreeMotion by the River and ALYOF at Sew Bittersweet Designs.

Vintage Collection, Part 2

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Last week I wrote a post about the amazing gift of vintage fabrics I was given by a woman I met up in Downieville. There is so much to the collection that I decided I would divide it into a couple of posts. Here we go with part two! Again, this is post is a bit longer than usual.

I was up at the house in Downieville one day last week. While I was there, I visited with a few of the women in the quilt guild. When I told them about this gift, they were all smiles. Knowing my love of vintage pieces, this fabric had found a good home. I asked about the history of the woman the fabric originally belonged to. They gave me a bit of information. Her name was Cornelia but everyone called her Nela. She had two daughters (one of which was the person that gave me the fabric.) Her husband, Dewey, was the sherrif of Downieville from sometime in the 1940’s to the 1960’s. I like having this bit of history. Kind of nice to be able to imagine where all of these little lovelies came from.

As I mentioned last week, included in the bags of fabric were these little bundles. Nela took all the pieces of a particular fabric and rolled them up, tying them with a strand of that same fabric. I have been unrolling the bundles and have been surprised to find she had taken apart “ready-made” dresses, probably to use the fabric. The first dress could almost be reassembled. I am missing the back of the bodice but all of the other pieces are here. The gores of the skirt, the top bodice, two sleeves and the sash. It is really tiny. Take a look.

I held the bodice up and quickly realized that this would have been made for a very slender woman. The fabric is adorable, though faded in parts. Clearly, this dress was worn a great deal.

Here is another dress that had been taken apart. The fabric is in much better shape. I am thinking it was made for a young girl. The sleeves are small and didn’t wrap around my arm or Julia’s.

Again, the most of the parts to dress are here, less one piece of the collar. The dress reminds me of the uniform I wore when I was a volunteer “candy-striper” at the local hospital during high school. I love the bodice with the trim pieces.

In addition to these two dresses, there were a few items that had not been taken apart. There were also pieces that were cut and bundled but never sewn. She had a lot of projects going on here! I love this little apron that was in the bag. Julia was modeling for me here. She looks good in an apron!

Here is a skirt that I found. The waist is about 23″ so it’s certainly not fitting me!! Very tiny.

The waistband buttons in the back and then there is a sash that wraps and ties in the front. The flowers are huge and bright. I would guess this is from the 1950’s?

Finally, my favorite. This sweet little dress looks like it would fit a girl of about five years or so.

The sheer fabric that is inserted into the bodice is a mystery to me. It is very, very thin and the fabric is definitely compromised just from age. It seems an odd choice for a child’s dress. I suppose she would have expected the child to wear something underneath the dress.

I love the sash that ties on the back side. I haven’t found the rest of the pieces, though I still have a large pile of scrap to sort through. It looks like Nela was making this dress. The neckline is still unfinished and while she put the placket in for the buttons on the back, there are no button holes. Only one sleeve is in place and the bottom of the sleeve is not in place.

I have accumulated quite a bin of vintage fabrics as a result of this awesome gift. It is going to be so much fun to make something with it. Now how to decide what pattern to use and which fabrics to put together. I need to sort them into colorways which will help me to get a plan together.

Linking to Linda at Coastal Charms and Molli Sparkle’s Sunday Stash.

Purple Mountains Majesty

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Well, I didn’t think I would get to these this month but I did! For RSC15 (Rainbow Scrap Challenge), April’s color is purple. I have been following along with Mari’s Classic Stitches BOM over at Academic Quilter and the block for April is a simple one titled Delectable Mountains. Lucky thing she was doing a simple block because this has been a really busy month. I just managed to squeak these out in time. I didn’t want to fall behind. Skip a month, thinking you’ll come back to it, and somehow it gets shoved aside.

I love these blocks though. Simple strips of the main color and the background, does it get much easier than that?

A whole mountain range of majestic purples!

The row quilt is growing!

While I did manage to make my April row for the row quilt, I didn’t finish all three of my goals for April’s ALYOF. My hope was to make two table runners (which I did) and one mini quilt. I finished the top of the mini for the Allison Glass Mini Swap but felt like I would really be rushing things to sandwich, quilt and bind it before the end of the month. Since this is going to someone else, I really want a great finish on it. I am debating doing a circular quilting pattern on it and that will take some time. So, I won’t link up with the April finishes over at Sew Bittersweet Designs. Just couldn’t get it all done. Oh well. The top looks great though.

The colors are wonderful.

Two out of three isn’t bad. Sorting and washing all of the vintage fabric that I have been posting about has been time consuming. Also I had a number of Etsy orders to deal with so April went by in a blink. I will have to really think when I plan what I can accomplish next month. May is going to be a crazy, busy time around here and I doubt I will have as much sewing time as usual.

Hope everyone had a wonderful week and got in at least a little bit of sewing time.

Linking to Crazy Mom Quilts and Confessions of a Fabric Addict as well as So Scrappy.

Putting myself out there

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This weekend is the annual quilt show for our local guild. I love this event – wandering around and looking at everyone’s work is absolutely inspiring. It is also intimidating. Depending on my mood that day, I might come away thinking, “wow, I want to make something like that” or it might be, “dang, why can’t I quilt like that?” Hopefully I can refrain from comparing my abilities with that of others this weekend and just enjoy all of the gorgeous quilts that will be displayed.

I am pushing myself a bit and hanging two of my quilts. I didn’t enter them to be judged, they are just being shown. I don’t think it is a good idea to have a quilt judged unless that was the plan from the get go. There are so many little details that need to be done properly if a quilt is to be judged and since I didn’t make these two pieces with that in mind, I am only showing them. This is the first time I have shown my quilts at our local show (or any show, for that matter.) It is a little scary and makes me feel kind of exposed. I have a quilting buddy that is also entering a couple of her pieces to show for the first time so at least we are in this together!

Today I made hanging sleeves and labels for them. I decided to show my modern quilt, Garden Patch, because I think it is unusual and I am very happy with it overall.

Garden Patch
May, 2014

The other quilt that I chose is the Aurifil BOM quilt that I finished in December. The colors are bold, vibrant and eye-catching. I love (most of) the blocks and the scrappy binding sets it off well. I regret having washed this quilt as it is soft and crinkled now. Does that affect how it will show? Not sure…. I will have a go at pressing it to see if that helps.

At the quilt show we always have a silent auction booth. I made a fabric basket using the “one hour basket” pattern over at Kelby Sews. The fabric was actually a piece leftover from a tablecloth that I have. I accidentally bought the wrong size tablecloth so I had to cut a substantial length off of it. The fabric is heavy and strong so the shape of the basket holds nicely.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of it when I filled it. It was stuffed with five fat quarters, a new Easy Quilts Magazine, loads of chocolate, a sweet pair of embroidery scissors and some of those pins with the flat flower heads. Hopefully it will bring in a few dollars for the guild.

I am looking forward to this weekend. Lots of friends, quilts, and of course, fabric vendors. Sounds good to me!

Linking to Sew Cute Tuesday, Freemotion by the River, and Let’s Bee Social. Links to all three of these sites are listed at the top of the page, under Link Ups. One more link up – Show and Tell Tuesday. Hope you’ll stop by some of these sites and peruse some of the projects that are shared on each.