More pix of the Quilt Show

One of the first things that I looked at was the architectural quilts.  Wow.  The talents of the quilters is very inspiring.

International Quilt Show - Chicago Pictures

I thought I'd start to post some pictures from the International Quilt Show at Chicago (Rosemont, IL) that I went to.  First of all I love the Yurt.  Here is some of the sides of it.  Now, after going through 153 pictures, I'm going to bed.  LOL.

International Quilt Show Swag!

I took plenty of pictures but I will upload them another day.  I am soooo tired but had a great time with Diane.  Thanks again for driving Diane.  I had a ball!

Of course I spent money at the show but actually found some great deals.  Here is what I bought.  If you look at some of the patterns you'll see that I caught a sale on them (look for orange stickers).  I also picked up some Pearle Cotton which Bird Brain Designs had for $3.  It's a great price.  Anyway, here is the initial swag.

In addition to picking up a program booklet, I decided to get a pin this year.

Yep, that's right.  I got the patterns and rules for $1 or under

The pink flashlight is going to be for mom, the African Dancers pattern I will use some Ghana fabric on.  The stiletto was advertised as African Porcupine Quill.  Not sure if I believe that but I needed something like that anyway.  I also bought white Aurifill thread.  Never used that before so will try it out. 

From Bird Brain Designs.  The thread only cost $3 and the thread holders were only $1.

This is a nifty thing.  You can rinse of the rollers (sticky when dry) so you don't have to keep buying it.  It came with a long telescoping one, two small purse size, and a medium size.  Saw it pick up everything a quarter to needles, etc.  

Some more cheap patterns

And even more cheap patterns

My new tote bag/purse.  I love it!

Diane and I ate there and, of course, it was expensive.  Like ball park expensive.  $10 for a cheeseburger and a small diet drink.  But that's ok.  It was part of its charm and we looked forward to setting down to rest.  LOL.

In the next day or two I'll start to post pictures that I took.

I hope your day was as great as mine was.

One Day to Go!

I know that you all be glad when the International Quilt Show will be over with so you won't see all these posts about it.  LOL.  Of course I still will be posting some pictures of it.

Today has been somewhat productive.  In between chatting on the phone with various friends, I managed to get a couple more blocks fused on for the Inspiration wall hanging.

I think I will get all the blocks fused first and the stitch them down.  I will only have 2-3 more blocks to fuse and then will start on the stitching.

I also started to work on the snowman blocks.  I have them fused on but haven't stitched them.  I think when I go to the Show tomorrow I might try to stop by Birdbrain Designs and look over their supply of DMC Perle Cotton.  I have taken some snippets of the wool that I used for the Snowmen blocks and will try to match them a little bit.

Well off to figure out what I'm going to wear and which bag...I mean purse...I will be using.  I've already put aside some extra batteries for the camera.

Everybody behave and I'll see you in a couple of days.

Wednesday - On vacation!

Ahhh, Vacation. A time when you dream of getting away or staying home and getting stuff done. I say dream because I've never had a vacation yet which I accomplished what I wanted to. I still am enjoying it and that is what is important. To celebrate vacation I started to buy stuff. We can never have enough fabric or quilting goodies can we? Let's see. To start out with here is the next two snowmen for my snowmen BOM. With gas around $4 a gallon, I wasn't looking forward to driving 45 minutes or so to pick them up and was totally pleased to hear that they would mail it to me (at no extra charge).


 

 This is going to be a totally cute quilt when done. I'm not sure how I will quilt it or square up everything since I don't have a lot of room in my efficiency apartment but that's down the road and I'm not going to worry about that yet. I also learned from my friend Connie that there is a new quilt and yarn shop that opened up in Rochelle, IL. That is only about 20 minutes from me so I went to investigate it. It's a small store and named Needles. I managed to pick up a couple of projects to work up in wool although I think I might make the fern one with cotton fabrics. I managed to pick up the wool kit for the patriotic one but I'm not sure I'll use it. I might just keep those wool pieces and do it in cotton. That idea is still percolating around in the my head.

I also found myself ordering some stuff from Missouri Quilt Company.  It's hard to see in this picture but that small square is 2.5" squares  of Moda fabric (chateau rouge by French General).
I also got their half hexi (for charm packs) and the large wedge.  I have no idea what I'll do with them but I'll figure it out sooner or later.  LOL.

I think I bought some charm packs also but couldn't find them to take a picture.  Guess I'll have to post them next time.  I did find some fabric from JoAnne's that was cute.  It was time to get some patriotic fabric and I loved how these looked.

Last but not least, I started to work on my Inspired by Inspired by Tradition wall hanging.  I increased the size of the blocks to 18-20" (I'll cut them back after I stitch them) and think it will turn out ok.  I messed up and had to go to JoAnne's to get more of the background fabric and the green but they still had it.  THEN I fused one of the oak leaves and cherries on the wrong side of the fabric.  It will be ok as long as I remember to do the last corner square on the back side.  I can then alternate the blocks.

That's it for now.  On Friday I get to go to the International Quilt Show with my friend Diane.  Obviously I'll take a lot of pictures and will post some of them.

Everybody have a good day.

Until next time...happy quilting.

In memory of....

I don't have anything to show yet but have given thought to a small block and/or mug rug. Yesterday I found out that a gaming friend of mine, Kevin "Casey" Clement, passed away. This came as a surprise for even though I knew he hadn't been feeling very good I thought he was recovering. I had never met Kevin in person but he was the one responsible for introducing me to online gaming which opened up a HUGE door for which many new friends walked through. That was back around 2001 or 2002 and ever since then, I've been blessed with many online friends. There are a couple of things which I remember Kevin by. One is his penchant for red Fez. He would dress up at Halloween so that he could wear a red Fez. The other thing that I remember about Kevin was his character names. He always had such good names and the first one that I remember was Brown Fox. In memory of Kevin, I thought I would applique a brown fox on a mug rug and have it wear a Red Fez. Rest in peace Kevin. I'm sure that you can now wear your red Fez as often as you like and eat to your hearts content all the wasabi peas that you want. :)

The Adventure of Quilting Continues

Just when you think something went right, life remind you that you haven't figured out everything.  Yes I am talking about quilting.  What happened you say?  Sit down and let me tell you about it.

I was looking at my layout for my Inspired by Tradition blocks and decided to cut one out to see how it would look.  I am using oak leaf and cherries for the four corners.  After cutting out the oak leaves for all four corners I wasn't looking forward to doing all the cherries.  THEN I had a brilliant idea.  I went to my GO! dies and pulled out the Grapes of Wrath die.  The grapes were the same size as the cherries!  So in no time at all I had my cherries.  I also noticed that the cherries in the eagle block are the same size.  WOO HOO!

It didn't take long to cut out small bits of fabric with fusible on it to run through the GO!

In no time at all I have my cherries all cut out.

Armed with my success I pulled out my white on white background fabric which I had cut out before and got ready to press.

Hmmm.  something isn't right here!  I cut my fabric larger and it's still not large enough.  I think my dimensions are off on my pattern.  That's not the worst.  I can always use the WOW fabric for something else.  I'll just have to recut the back ground fabric.  I'll probably have to make it 16".  That just means this will be larger than I thought so I'll send it out to be quilted.

Back to the drawing board.  LOL.

Wool Project

I had decided to do a small candle mat in wool to figure out if I liked working with wool.  Hmmm.  The verdict is still out on that.  I sort of like it and can see the advantage of working with wool.  Not sure how often, after the snowman wall hanging, that I will work with wool but I am glad that I tried it.  Here is my candle mat.

I also heard that there is a yarn/quilting shop that opened up in Rochelle.  I think it is called Needles.  I think I will check it out next week while on vacation.

I also think that this time I will have this month's snowman blocks mailed to me.  The cost of gas is still over $4 a gallon and if I were to drive to pick it up at the store, it would cost me more than in gas than it would to have the store ship it to me.  I will have to check with the store to be sure on how much they would charge but it might be the better option.

It's getting late and I'm not feeling the greatest so I'm off to bed.  Everybody have a good night.

Patriotic Mug Rug

Why is it that when you get an extra long weekend it seems like you STILL don't get much accomplished?  I suppose that I did but it just doesn't seem like it because of the lack of finished projects.  I did manage to finish my patriotic mug rug.  The applique was done by hand.  The stars and flags came from the applique BOM from Custom Quilt Kits by Rose Hall.  The are pre cut and already have their adhesive on them.  It's for $5.  This wasn't all that was in the packet so you get quite a bit for that $5.

Check out her blog. She's starting up a Civil War BOM where she includes the fabric etc for $10 a month.

http://www.customquiltkits.blogspot.com/

I did manage to also finish up the second block in the snowman BOM.  I should have made the stars at the top a little larger but I can change that if it bothers me too much.  I will wait until I can put it together a bit and see how it looks.  I will be picking up the next two blocks (you get two blocks at a time) probably while on vacation.

It's getting late so I had better get to bed.  Tomorrow is another 10 hour day.

Good night everybody.

Snowmen in Progress

I've started on the Snowmen BOM that I am doing.  It's a wool on cotton BOM and pretty easy so far.  I've not worked on wool before so this is interesting.  They say to use a fusible on it but I've found that I have to press down a lot harder in order for it to stick.  We'll see if get better at it.  Here is one of the blocks.

I also managed to get the mini block of the month from The Quilt Pattern Magazine done.  It is a tie and I wanted to give it a little traditional look.  All black didn't work out well though so I used the same material that I used for the Moonshine Serenade.  That too didn't look right but the third time WAS the charm.  I reversed the material and then it showed up nicely.  The reversed side showed more of the silver/grey swirls in the fabric and now I am happy with it.

Well that's it for this short break.  Time to get back to stitching.  Have a great day everybody.

better pictures

I managed to take some better photos of Moonshine Serenade and thought to post them. 

You can see the color selection a bit better in this picture

There was a lot of embroidery on this.  All those little buds coming out the first of spring.

There were also little shrubs to add.  This picture also better shows the gravel/ground fabric around the frozen pond.

 

 

 

The binding is the reverse side of the background fabric.  The grey swirls really show up on the binding.

I also think that I will be collecting a new Block of the Month Series.... A Steampunk one.  That is a nice cross between my gaming and my sewing.  So far there is a key, goggles, a corset (might have to get some lace for that one), and an airship. 

If you want to check it out here is the link.

http://www.wired.com/geekmom/2013/03/march-steampunk-block-of-the-month-quilt/