Help Me Decide!

I have a dilemma!  I have made a quilt top for my newest grand baby. It was super easy and it's super cute using only black & white solids.  My DIL saw a picture of it somewhere and I went from there. Made entirely of HSTs.

I found a white/black print for the back, and the aqua will be used for the binding. I plan to applique the baby's name on the back with the aqua also.

SO - I have no idea of what color of thread to quilt it with! Black? White? Gray? Clear? Maybe change colors to match the fabric in each section? I just can't decide, so I'm hoping someone will give me a solution and steer me in the right direction! And any suggestions on a quilting design would be greatly appreciated too!

Last weekend I had an itch to make a quick small project, so this is what I ended up doing.

Allover meandering turned out pretty well the very first time I used my new sewing machine.

It's a Juki and I'm really liking it so far.

Halfway June

Hard to believe that June is half over already. DD#1 & her hubby have gone to Cancun so I have their little boy for the week. Yep, feels a little like deja vu since I did the same thing for DD#2 a month ago! Sure do love those little ones, but I know why we have kids when we're young ourselves. Whew!

I met with one of my rug groups last week and there was some good show & tell. Kim hadn't done any hooking, but showed us her beautiful blocks for a square-in-a-square quilt she's making. She'd planned to make it for herself, but her younger son is making wedding plans so she decided it would be made for the newlyweds instead. Beautiful fabrics!

Sandy's husband designed and hand drew this awesome rug for her entry way. It's at least 4' x 6' - maybe a bit bigger. She plans to hook is using only brown & cream wool - very classic and totally awesome! I have several friends who's husbands are interested in their rug hooking and it always amazes me to hear of their support, since my hubby isn't like that. Lucky gals!

Yesterday I met with the Salt Lake Group - our newest member had finished her very first rug hooking project - a floral pillow inspired by a piece of fabric. The back and piping were black velvet - very rich looking.

I love the way she added bits of purple fabric to the black background when she hooked it.

Yvonne is making progress on her bright floral rug - plans to put it in the guest room where her grand daughters sleep when they come to visit. Isn't it happy looking?

Nancy is nearing a finish on her rug - she often includes clever and/or inspiring sayings in her projects and this one is a goody.

Myra has been very busy and brought two sewing buckets that are spectacular. She designed several of the motifs on the outer pockets to reflect the owner - this one is her's......

....and this is for one of her daughters. She has plans to make many more. What lucky family members she has! Makes me wish she would adopt me! LOL Over the weekend our guild had a workshop and made Nuno felted scarves. Sadly, I was too busy helping put in a sprinkler system and couldn't attend, but Myra brought her scarf and it was just beautiful. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of that. I'm hoping to try this technique myself some day!

Mary Jane featured one of my rugs on her blog yesterday - I was honored that she asked to do so - she did a great job on it! You can read her entry here.

Just a Couple of Things

I'm attending a baby shower for my niece on Saturday so I made her a cute little quilt for her baby girl. I think I'm getting pretty good at making these modern quilts that are WAY out of my comfort zone!  This one was very easy to do - just one big star block and a few flying geese.

I added the baby's name to the back - have never heard this one before! It rhymes with Navy.

Straight line quilting made it pretty fast to do.

I saw this old hooked rug at an antique store today. It was about 30" x 50" with a $40 price tag.

Fun to flip it over and see how bright the colors used to be. Don't see these for sale in Utah very often. I did not bring it home with me!

...

Quilting Up a Storm

It's too hot outside to go anywhere, so I've been holed up in my studio for the last couple of weeks doing a lot of quilting - and I'm accomplishing quite a bit! I've had this small Kim Diehl quilt pieced and layered for a couple of years and I finally quilted it and got the binding on. Measures about 36" square.

Not sure why the edges turned out kinda ruffly - especially since I basted the perimeter before adding the binding. I usually like to wash my quilts when they're all finished, but I'm hesitant to do that with this one because of the wool applique - I'm afraid the colors might bleed out and ruin the whole quilt. Does any have any suggestions or experience doing this? Help would be appreciated!

I worked more on my Now & Later quilt - when I start sewing the blocks together I usually do it this way - I think it's called spider webbing? Anyway, makes it so the rows don't get out of order - easy peasy.

I had extra blocks left over so pieced them together and added them to the back which makes it interesting and more fun.

I love this Jan Patek print I found for the back - it was on clearance at my LQS for $4.99 yd. Yay!

When I work on a quilt this big (60" x 80") I like to take it over to the church and lay it out on the carpeted floor in a classroom to do the pin basting since I don't have that much free space in my house. Sure makes it easier!

Years ago I bought some grapefruit spoons at the dollar store that work perfectly for this job. I know there are special quilt tools designed to do the same thing, but they cost a lot more than $1!

I quilted it with a cinnamon roll swirl that is kinda fun to do - and used a variegated thread.

I'll share one more picture of this quilt when I finish stitching down the binding in a few days - that's a nighttime TV watching job -  and put it through the wash. Sure do love that cozy crinkly look it gets afterwards. Meanwhile, a few Delectable Mountain quilts caught my eye one day on Pinterest, so I pulled out a bunch of blue and tan fabrics from my stash and started making one. It's kinda strange to make quilt blocks that aren't square - doesn't happen too often!

Sure wish I was brave enough to quilt feathers in a zig zag pattern, but will probably settle for something much, much easier. Anyway, I'm really liking this color combo! I'd like to think of a clever name for this quilt that pertains to the Wasatch Mountains that I live near.

Sure feels good to be spending some quality time in my studio!

Summertime & Americana

I got a few quilts and rugs displayed last weekend for Memorial Day and will leave them out for most of the summer. First of all, I finished my red white & blue reproduction of an antique rug I saw on Pinterest awhile ago. I'm really pleased with the way it turned out, except for the way it seems to bow out on the sides. Not sure why that happened since 97% of it is straight-line hooking! Oh well. It measures 24" x 40" and is hooked in an 8.5 cut.

I hooked this several years ago from a pattern that was designed for wool applique. It was in a Create & Decorate magazine and I still like it!

I pulled all my small Americana quilts to display just inside my front door. This is the newest one I made a couple weeks ago.

And this was made the week before that....lots of 9-patches going on, eh? I'm not in love with this one because it seems blurry to me - must be the prints that I used - and maybe the 9-patches should have had the light colored fabrics in the corners? Oh well.

I have them attached to the lattice railing with clothespins.

And this one is clipped on a magnetic towel rack on my metal front door. True, it covers the peep hole that's there, but I can live with that. LOL!

I have visitors coming from California next week which I'm looking forward to! Yay for family!

Projects

I've been busy as a bee stitching up several different projects. Today I made this little quilt that measures 9" x 11".  While looking around the house for a good place to photograph it, I discovered how nice it looks with some of my yellowware bowls. The ones with blue stripes have always been my favorite and I have many of them. It was fun to find the perfect striped fabric which I fussy cut for the sashing between the rows.

It worked up quickly since I had the pieced blocks left over from a small quilt I made for Lauren a couple years ago. Only had to make two extra and I had enough. I can never remember if these are hourglass blocks or broken dishes....

Last week I finally gifted DD#2 with a completed quilt. She will use it mostly for TV watching in the evenings when it feels chilly in her basement.

The colors are happy and it was a fun project to make for her, though it took me a lot longer than I thought it would. She was very patient with me and was very appreciative when I gave it to her.

I also stitched up a 'PLUS' quilt and gave it to the gal who does my hair. She's expecting a baby boy in June and told me the nursery colors are navy and gray. I think this will do the trick. She was very surprised when I showed up without an appointment to give it to her.

I quilted it with a simple and easy meandering design. 40" square.

I've finished the border on my hooked rug and I'm ready to tackle the remainder of the inside section.

I recently did a little cleaning in my studio and found six small crazy quilt blocks that I probably made 10+ years ago. I have no idea of what my original plan for them was, so I stitched them up similarly to a quilt I saw on a Facebook page. Not sure if the wool flowers and stems are showing up on such a busy background - any suggestions? Maybe I should unpick the stems and just have the applique in the center section? (please notice the mitered corners on the border - I haven't done that for ages!)

Done - And Getting Done

In my last post I shared a small quilt that I was doing the big stitch on. It's all finished now and I'm so pleased with the way it turned out!

Really fun to make those big stitches using a ball of crochet cotton that I found at the thrift store years ago.

I just use a whip stitch to attach my wool applique pieces after learning from Maggie Banonomi that that's what she does.

And I'm making good progress on hooked rug that I began in a class years ago - why on earth did it take me so long to get back to it?

I forgot to share this delightful little wool woman that I received as a gift last month. It was made from a kit by ArtGirlz and I just love the metal face & crown & hands that embellish this gal.

I have some show & tell to share from a couple of meetings I attended earlier this month. First up is the Polly Minick fish rug that Jeanette is working on - this is the third version I've seen hooked and each one has be just delightful!

She showed us this beautiful penny rug that she had finished.

Her stitches are perfection!

Sharon has a tradition of making very small gift items to send to her grandchildren on their birthdays each year. This is the year of the owl for her and a gift of cash will be included with these cute little guys!

I can't remember who hooked this little Americana piece - was it Sandy? Someone help me out here and I'll post better information. The stars have nice sharp points, which is something I always struggle with!

Angela brought two of her rugs that are in-progress - each one is just beautiful! Her loops are perfectly even and I doubt she ever has to steam a rug when she's done hooking it!

Marliss has made a lot of progress on her Sharon Smith rug since our last meeting. See what happens when you set yourself a goal? I need to take a lesson from her!

At my quilt group, Janet shared a tumbler quilt that she had just completed. She and her sister shared 30's reproduction fabrics to make the exact same pattern and it was cute! I forgot to take a picture of a small quilt and dress that she had made for her grand daughter's American Girl doll. Maybe I'll get to sew fun stuff like that when my little gal gets a bit older and shows interest in that.

Please go over to Tonia's blog and see her beautiful finished rug - she is SUCH a creative person!

HandiQuilter is headquartered here in Utah and this morning I took a little drive to their warehouse to have a look around because I had heard they have lots of quilts on display. A lot of them were art quilts and modern quilts, but I did find a few that appealed to me. Fun to see them hanging in the halls of their office!