A Buggy Finish!

I have been working on and off on this 'bug' quilt all summer. It is going to Quilts From the Heart at our Guild this month. The quilts will be donated to various organizations, but mostly to shelters in our area. This one measures approximately 38in by 52in. I hope it is not too big. I did my own thing with this one.

Can you tell I'm addicted to nine-patches? I wonder how many more I will have to make before that's out of my system. Oh, well. At least one more of my UFOs is in the finished pile. Now back to the sewing room. I am trying to tidy up a bit. I can't find anything at the moment! And that drives me crazy!

Winter Berries - A June Finish!

Ahhhh! How sweet it is! I finished my 'Winter Berries' wall hanging. This is the quilt I was working on when my machine broke down last month. It has taken me two weeks to get up the courage to try again. I had less than one hour of quilting to do. But now it's done!

I started this quilt in January. It is my original design. I wanted something winter-like, no flowers, so I chose berries and seedpods. (My interpretation of berries and seedpods, anyway.) It is machine pieced, hand appliqued and machine quilted and measures about 40in. by 40in. No fabrics were bought for this quilt. Every piece came from my scrap bin. Here is a close-up of the appliqued centre.

I can't understand why no cats have come to sit on it as I was photographing it. Usually they won't leave me alone when I spread something out on the floor. Maybe they don't like this quilt.

"Hey Mimi! Don't you like my quilt?"

"Meow! Can't you see I'm busy? I'm doing my ears and face and later I will do my nails and tail. Just go away. It's not easy being a cat - so much preening, so little time! Meow!"

Scraps From the Heart

Ahhhhh! How sweet it is! My first finish for May! A couple of weeks ago, Carol of Giraffe Dreams, showed a quilt that had been made by alternating scrap blocks and plain blocks. I thought it would be a great way to use up scraps. And it was! Thanks Carol! This is a charity quilt going to our Guild's 'Quilts from the Heart". It will be donated to a local women's shelter. It measures 35" X 45". I loved making the scrap blocks. It was a kind of mindless activity that I like to do sometimes. Even the binding is pieced out of strips of left-over fabrics from other quilts.

A Cat Quilt

Hi Folks!

If you have come to my blog to view my favourite quilt for the Bloggers Quilt Festival - Welcome! Please scroll down to Friday's post.

If you have just come to look around - Welcome also! I have a small quilt to show you. I finished it a few weeks ago, but I couldn't post about it because it was a present for my uncle who lives in Holland. Since he has now received it, I can show it. It is just a small quilt, made especially for his special cat! I used a lot of cat prints and some colourful fabrics to make it interesting.

Oscar loves the quilt. Don't you my boy?

"Meow! Yeah! KEWL! Can I keep it?"

"No, sorry Oscar. This one is not for you."

"Ah, please. Pretty please with sardines on it? I just want to nap on it. I won't hurt it. Ahhh, this feels so good!"

I know it is difficult for your little cat brain to understand this Oscar, but not all the quilts I make are for you. This one is for Whitey. Here is a photo of Whitey on his new quilt. My uncle put it on a table in front of a window, where Whitey likes to sit. I think he likes it! My goodness! Now that I look at the photo of Whitey I realize he looks a lot like you Oscar! You guys could be brothers!

I also made a couple of place mats for my uncle so that he wouldn't feel left out.

Baby Bears

My first finish for April! Yippeeeee! I showed you a part (the little blue bear) of this quilt a few weeks ago. I finished quilting it this morning. There was not much left to do. I had already put the binding on.

It was started at a Bee Night held by our Quilting Guild many years ago. The lesson was half log cabin blocks. I was not happy with the layout of the blocks, so I changed them, laying them out with large white areas in order to leave room for some applique. The bears are my own design. I just drew them and then appliqued them using the freezer paper method. I call this quilt, Baby Bears.

Am I Anal or What?

I have had this 'Quilts From the Heart' kit for several months. There is nothing difficult about it. In fact the pieces for the top were meant to be put together in one large block. Very simple. So why couldn't I just pick it up and finish it?
Okay. Here is where the 'anal' part comes in. The focus fabric had a school theme. There were pencils, and crayons, books and slates, other related school items and a couple of test sheets. And that is where my problem started. One of the test sheets had received an A+. There were no mistakes on it. Or were there? Take a look. Since when does 4 x 4 = 8?

I know it's not a big deal, but I just wasn't able to put the quilt together with this mistake in it. I imagined some poor, unsuspecting child sleeping under it, all the while learning the multiplications facts incorrectly! I was laughed at when I told anyone about my little neurosis! "No one else will ever notice it", I was told. "Just put the darn quilt together and get it done."

So a couple of days ago that is exactly what I did. I tried not to think about the mistakes. I tried to focus on the task. I tried to enjoy myself. But the only one enjoying the fruits of my labour was Mimi!

She slept on it at every stage. I just couldn't keep her off it. She helped me sandwich it and she tested it out to make sure it was okay.

"Meow! Just putting the love in. Meow!"

Yeah! I know your are!!!

So the quilt passed the Mimi test! And I finally figured out how to satisfy my own obsession. I put a little red line under each 8 on the test papers in the fabric. Just a little red line to say that the answer is not correct.

I guess it is the teacher in me - although I never marked a student's math paper with a red marker! The kids in our class had enough problems with self esteem! They didn't need to be reminded about their errors! I used to put a little 'dot', in pencil, under the wrong answer. Then the student could fix it and I could eventually mark it and no one ever needed to know how many tries it took to get the correct answer. I never liked finding mistakes.

Since it is the last day of February, this quilt counts towards my finishes for this month! Yippee! My 'Math Problems' charity quilt is done! I completed three items this month!

Down Under

Remember that workshop I took last November with Australian fibre artist, lecturer and instructor, Gloria Loughman? Well, I finally finished the wall hanging she taught us that day at the workshop. The technique was called 'Layer by Layer'. Each section was done using a different technique. Some of it was fused, some was appliqued and some was pieced. Once the sections were completed they were joined together. The whole thing was then sandwiched and quilted. I used invisible thread for the quilting. If my wall hanging looks very similar to Gloria's it's because I used one of her patterns. She had several of them for sale on the day of the workshop. I only bought one, so from here on in I am going to have to create my own landscapes. And I am looking forward to doing just that. I call this piece, "Down Under". It measures 17in. X 25in. (44cm X 63cm).

The felines were noisy today. There was a lot of activity in the solarium - a great deal of running around, jumping on things and, for lack of a better term, play fighting. But each time I went to see what was going on, I was met with these rather vacant, guilty stares.

It was warmer today. And the sun was shining. Perhaps winter is on its way out and my furry family was just suffering from a case of spring fever.

I Heart Scraps

I finished a second project for this year! And it's just in time for Valentine's Day! I call this one "I Heart Scraps" because I only used scraps to make the hearts and other blocks. It is my own design and measures about 32in. by 26in. I felt like doing some paper piecing a couple of weeks ago. When I looked through my paper pieced patterns I found lots of hearts, so I started making them. Putting the whole thing together was a bit of a challenge because all the hearts were different sizes. I added a few machine appliqued hearts and some blocks with words to fill up the spaces that were left over. This quilt will hang in my DD's vestibule for the month of February.

Late or Early?

I have finished my first quilt for this year! I know it's a Christmas quilt, but I started it in early December. I just couldn't get it done before Christmas. Because I didn't want it to end up in my UFO bin, I decided to finish it. So, the question is..... am I late or am I early? I will count this as my first finish for this month in the One Project a Month Challenge. (See side bar)

I used Christmas-themed scraps, which were fun to work with in December. I found the pattern on the internet. It's called Nine-Patch Christmas scrap quilt. See it here. It measures 50in. by 61in. (127cm by 155cm) Almost big enough for a single bed, but nice and cosy for a lap quilt.

Mimi likes it. She couldn't help jumping up on it as soon as I threw it over a chair to take a photo. I didn't even see her until she was up on the quilt and I had already put my camera away. I tried to take another photo, but wouldn't you know it! My batteries were dead! Why does that always happen to me? I guess I should heed the 'low battery' message on the screen!

Does this quilt meet with your approval, Mimi?

"Yeah. meow. It's okay. I see a fabric with some cardinals on it, but absolutely no cat fabric! What's with that?"

Not every quilt can have cat fabric in it, Mimi!

"Okay, consider it approved! But next time use some nicer fabrics, like cat prints or something! Now I'm going to kick Oscar off my favourite chair. I feel a nap coming on! Meow."



I also downloaded this cute little snowman applique from a Block Of the Month by Bunny Hill . It was supposed to have a heart button at the top, but I could only find an apple button. I know I have some heart buttons somewhere, but where? I think this made a very cute little block and since the temperature is only -21C today (windchill is -30C), it's quite appropriate! Because this is a BOM I guess there will be more blocks to follow. If I have time I would love to make them all!