Design Pile Monday

Oh, I am just dreaming of the day that title says "wall" again.  Wendy, I might do as you suggested eventually, but for right now the space is still too cramped and the main purpose of this room *is* still sleeping.  Also, there's a much bigger open wall on the other side of the room I plan to repurpose for my own quilting needs.

Anyways.

Here's the pile:

Left -> Right -> Bottom:
Gabby the Gremlin, who we all know and love. Orange/yellow fat quarters for this flower project, and the first flower. Quilts for kids. On bottom, a finished one, on top a finished top.  The backing for the top is the same as the 1 inch border.  Next, Paddington.  Still haven't done anything with him. Next, Ride a Cowboy.  Haven't had space or time to get that basted.  On the bottom, a finish!  Fencing Matilda is done and will be shipped today.  I'll have a close up of that in just a second.

My goal for today is to get Paddington, the skater QFK, and Ride a Cowboy basted.  If I can do that, it will be a successful quilting day. Oh, and Fencing Matilda, gotta get that mailed.  Anyone out there have a good source for boxes?  I'm finding that the Flat Rate thing isn't as good a deal for shipping quilts as it is for shipping, say, bowling balls.

So some close ups.

I don't think I was supposed to see this.  She's usually very secretive, but I *have* been up at all hours of the night lately, so I think she just didn't expect me.

Of course, once she knew I knew, I had to ask her to take a picture with her masterpiece.  She obliged, but hid her face. 

A little bit better of a close up of the flower.  I originally tried this with a smaller button and stitching the pedals through the middle then the bottom.  Going through the top corners then the bottom corners worked like a charm.  I like the pearled button too. I haven't figured out exactly how many of these I'm going to make, but it's entirely possible there might be 50+ by the end of it.  If you have orange/yellow fat quarters you don't want anymore, feel free to donate.  It's not a good cause (hopefully I can tell you exactly what the cause is in a couple of posts...I know what it is, but it's secret for now), but your fabrics will be well-loved if you need a new home for them.

And of course, the reason I've been up at all hours:

She's so smart!  We had a puppy play n learn on Saturday, and she just went NUTS!  She's super good at sitting though, and is getting the hang of sitting and being calm for her food too.  Not so much at sitting at the open door, but most of the time that's probably because she really has to pee.  I think she's also figured out that if she squats like she's peeing, even if she doesn't actually pee, she gets praise.  We've been setting alarms to take her out proactively, but in the end she still ends up crying to be let out at some unholy hour anyways. Thank God for my evolutionary womanhood, I can hear her before she pees in her crate.  Doesn't always register, but I can hear her anyways.  We'll get there.

So that's that.  I'm hoping to have 3 quilts basted tonight and the same 3 quilts quilted by the end of the week.

I've also decided to go a different direction with Mai's quilt...something simpler since I just don't have the tools or the time to do the hunter's star the way it should be done.  I'll post pictures when it's ready to be shown.  :-)

And, of course, once I get all 4 of those settled (Mai's might get pushed back since I still have until June to finish hers), I need to get cracking on both the Wrapped in Hope quilt (due in like 2 weeks) and Arman's play mat.  I may never sleep again.

Quick Plug

Before I start working today (yes, it's sunny out but it's also cold and I'm feeling anti-social) I wanted to put in a quick plug for Cindy's Fabrics.  I ordered another 4 sets of her 5-1/2 inch I Spy squares for Arman's quilt-turned-playmat (and suggestions on fabric to use as the backing for this are much appreciated) and she's been just wonderful.  I've emailed her with a list of characters and concepts that Arman likes or is learning, and she's been doing a fantastic job of hunting down just the right fabrics to make this quilt perfect for him.  I can't tell you enough how responsive she's been, and how much effort she's put in for me already!  I will definitely keep requesting these from her, and I highly recommend her to you if you're looking for something similar.  She's got other stuff in her shop, but I've been so enamored with her I Spy squares that, honestly, I haven't really looked. :-)

What's everyone working on today?  I finished the QFK quilt last night (just need to finish the binding now) and I have 32 of 63 blocks done for Alishia's string quilt too.  Man, strings are fun and all, but I can tell I'm going to be burned out on them by the end of this.  I'm thinking of starting on Mai's quilt today, to see how hard/fun/intense Hunter's Star blocks are.  I just think that the one I saw here is so pretty, and would look really good with some red thrown in (as per Mai's favorite color combination).  I guess I could start on Mom's Paddington quilt, but I've only just barely gotten all the parts in one place for that.  In fact, I just realized that the backing fabric is actually still in the car.  That one feels like it's not quite ripe yet.  So I guess Mai and Alishia it is!  :-)

Oh, and at some point I'm going to make something for myself...haven't figured out what yet, but it's going to be queen-sized to fit Nick's bed.  Did I just hear the Jaws theme?

SFO FTW!

Best airport ever!  (FTW = "for the win" for those of you not up on the nerd lingo)  I was sitting in the domestic terminal before, because I had a bottle of water and wanted to finish it before going through security again. I wandered around some, then found out that...bam!  No security to get to the international terminal! There's a secret passage by gate 75 that takes you right to the international terminal, close enough to security that you can thumb your nose at those poor suckers, but not actually outside of security!  w00t!  Now I just gotta chill out for 2.5 hours before I get on a plane and sit some more...for another...16 hours.  That's two full working days!  Yikes! 

Good news is, my plane is already here:

On the plane here, I started a new journal, daydreaming about quilts I'm going to make.  The list is as follows (in no particular order):

• Quilts for Kids -  I just got the kit before I left, so I'm itching to get back to this one.  I think I'm going to try free motion quilting for the first time.  Tips would be appreciated. 
• Alishia's string quilt - I still need to name this one, but I haven't figured out the pattern of the strings yet, so that's hard.  
• Mai's graduation quilt - this one is going to be black, white, and red.  I'm thinking of doing a heartstrings quilt for this, but I'm not sure.  I have about 2 dozen fat quarters up for grabs for this one so far, as well as a few fun remnants.  It'll definitely be a work of chaos.  Suggestions for this one are welcome too...keep in mind that Mai is my 17-year-old mentee, who's graduating high school in June.  My mom made me a quilt when I went off to college and it helped me be not so homesick...I figured Mai could use the same. 
• Alishia's donation quilt - This one has to be a HeartStrings donation, because I said so lol.  Should be fairly straightforward...I'll need new reds, but I have PLENTY of blues left over from my mom's quilt. 
• Mai's donation quilt - I haven't decided on a charity for this one, but it seems fitting that it should be something that helps teens...specifically teens in trouble.  Maybe I'll find a shelter around Boston, sort of like here.
• Mom's Paddington quilt - As previously described.  I won that panel, so that rocks.  I'll have to see how big the inside is when I get it, then plan the rest out from there.  
• Arman's I Spy quilt - I'm hoping to find some flexible, toddler-friendly velcro someplace so I can make the pictures movable but still semi-permanent.  I'll keep you posted on how that goes. 
• The t-shirt quilt - I think I'm not even going to plan this out until I have a better feel for the size of the shirt cuts. 
• A crumb quilt - I've been seeing a lot of these in various blogs lately, and I LOVE the idea!  I want to make this one for myself.  I have a trunk that Nick got me for my birthday (an old steamer trunk) that really needs some quilts in it.  Sadly, everything I own is currently used to keep me warm at night, so I don't have anything in there!  
• A memory quilt - this one I came up with when I was thinking about what I'll be doing in Queenstown.  There's a fabric store about 15 minutes walking from my hostel, which I fully intend to patronize.  I was thinking that it would be REALLY cool to get fabrics from there (and make this a tradition for every place I go), then make a quilt of them.  Each block would have a picture from the trip printed on fabric in the center, then the fabric I buy on the trip would surround it in some pattern.  Make a few of those blocks and bam!  You got yerself a memory quilt!  We'll see how that works out.  

Of those 10 projects, 7 I want to have finished by July.  Yikes.  We'll see how that goes.  Nick is apparently going down to Florida the week after I get back, so I'll have all night every night (except Wednesday, which is class night) to sew to my heart's content.  I'm absolutely looking forward to it.  (Which isn't to say I won't miss him, it's just I get to feeling guilty (ha! almost typed "quilty") when he's around and I'm ignoring him for the sewing machine.)  

On that note, I'm gonna hulu it up while I still can (you can't get hulu outside the US) and blow the next 2 hours watching TV and writing postcards (which I won't be able to send until I'm back because they no longer have mail boxes in airports...for security reasons.  Riddle me that.)

Hello San Francisco!

I bought myself a TMobile HotSpot daypass just so I could log on and blog (on), so I hope y'all appreciate this!  :-P  I have about 4 hours until my next flight, and I've already eaten whatever meal I was hungry for (I've been going since about 8 this morning, EST.  It's about 4 PST, which is 7 EST, which is my dinner time...I think. I get in to Auckland around 5 AM Auckland time, but that's 5 AM on the 18th...2 days from now.  BUT that's only noon on the 17th EST, so I'll be getting in for breakfast time but be craving lunch.  My poor poor body.)

In any case.

I was up finishing the binding on the pink one until about midnight last night, but I got it done...that's what counts, right?  Nick will put the boxes (one to San Antonio and one to Centerville, UT for Levi) in the mail for me on Monday.  I learned a very very important lesson last night.  Just because the kids' scissors are cheaper, it is absolutely worth the extra cash to buy the big-girl scissors.  Especially when all you need them for is to cut thread and "rag" a rag quilt.  Ouch. 

That's me up at the top of the board there!  

I'm going to cut this post short and move stations.  People, if you're eating a tuna sandwich and there's lots of chairs available, please do us all a favor...don't sit near, well, anyone.  Doesn't matter if you like it, tuna stinks.  Blech.

First Guild Meeting!

Tonight, I went to the monthly meeting for the Mothertown Guild, in Lancaster.  It was so much fun!  I learned to do English paper piecing:

Seems like it could be fun if I cut the pieces before a long road trip...not sure I can bring needles on a plane though, so I'm pretty sure I won't try this weekend. Actually...this makes it seem like I could bring needles but not scissors of any kind.  I'm not sure I want to bring sewing stuff to New Zealand, but maybe for the next trip. 

I had a lot of fun at Mothertown tonight.  Everyone was super nice, and they even invited me to their retreat!  I'm not sure if I'll be able to make it or not, but it would be nice to get away for a weekend...well, get away with other women for a change.  We'll see.

So some pictures of the latest projects:

Here's Alishia's quilt.  I was doing the numbers:

And figured out that, in order to make a twin-sized quilt it'd be best to add an inch of sashing between each block.  I was debating the darker fabric above, but I don't think I'll have enough.

Instead, here's the lighter fabric I like...it's cream/tan roses (called "tea time" I think).

Here's the pre-hand-stitched fleece blanket.  With any luck, I'll have this and the I Spy quilt done by Thursday, in time to ship to SAPD on Friday.