Quick Quilt

Hey, all!  May is halfway over, can you believe it?!  I so want to enjoy this time in my life, savor each day, enjoy each little kick my son gives me as if to say, "Hey, mommy, just so you know, I'm here."  It's a struggle to find that balance, isn't it?  Looking to the future, but staying in the moment.  I succeed more often than I fail, but I still fail. 

As you know if you've read my blog before, I'm a quilter.  If you have not read my blog before, it should be noted that I am not by any means some sort of professional quilter.  I quilt for me, and for special people in my life, and that's pretty much it.  I have no grand dreams of someday seeing my masterpieces in some quilting show.  The dedication required to get someone to that point just doesn't exist in me.  I come up with designs on a whim, and being impatient by nature, I want the finished product now.  Spending more than a week or two on a single quilt is horribly boring for me.

In any event, I do enjoy making quilts for friends, and this is my go-to pattern for giveaway quilts because it's fun, lovely, easily customized, and something you can just snuggle underneath.  I had wanted to make a pattern that you could easily download and duplicate, but instead I took a photograph of my original design that could serve the same purpose.  If you would like to make this quilt and have questions, please either comment or email and I'd be delighted to help you however I can.

This version of my pattern was for a sweet friend who had surgery recently.  Food and flowers are nice, but I like quilts because it's something they can keep even after their recovery time as a reminder that friendship is always around them.  When I asked her what her favorite colors were, she gave me almost a dozen answers.  I selected a few that worked together, and Jayson helped me pick these fabrics.  All basic quilting fabrics, with the exception of the fleece backing.  The last quilt I made for myself had a fleece back, and I love it so much that I plan to use it from now on.  So soft, so warm, and I think you can get away with no batting inside because the fleece is thick enough.

 

And now, the quilting process as documented by my photographs:

No, I don't have man hands.  Those are Jayson's... he helps me
tie my quilts because he's the greatest husband in the world.

I may be something of a rusher, but it took me a total of 5 evenings to complete, one each for cutting, sewing squares, layout, piecing the top together, and edge.  It's such a nice gift to give to someone, and it's really not that time-consuming to do.  Please feel free to use my pattern for yourself, or for someone special to you.  And please comment if something isn't clear. 

Enjoy May before it runs off, too!

~ Sarah

Log Cabin Quilt (Finished)

Well, it's definitely a record for me... I've never finished a quilt this fast before.  It is lovely, warm, and our little family has been finding plenty of excuses to snuggle together underneath it.  :)

Our children are very snuggly...



 

Blanket stitch on the edge

 

Frustrated with this part, but

not enough so to re-do it. 

Enjoy your weekend!!

~ Sarah

PS:  In case you'd like to view the process, here are the previous posts on this quilt:  Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4

Log Cabin Quilt Part 4

I tried to work on the binding (the very last part!) for my log cabin quilt the other night, but I had a furry little obstacle...

...so I gave up and watched a movie instead.  ;)

See the fur?

I'm doing a blanket stitch, but it seems I'm going to have to hide somewhere to finish (my car, perhaps?); otherwise Gracie appears out of nowhere, like a ninja, and decides that my lap and the quilt belong to her.  I suppose they kinda do.  :)

By the way -- the fleece and the extra batting worked; it's really, REALLY warm!!

~ Sarah

Log Cabin Quilt Part 3

Happy new year to all!  I hate to jump the gun on wishing people a happy new year, so I continually wish everyone a happy old year until midnight has come.  But now that we're actually three days into the new year, I can express that I hope it will be happy and joyous for you all.

I am pleased to be able to brag that my year began beautifully.  Pizza with family, snuggling on the couch with Jayson, Remi and Gracie, watching good movies, quilting, and receiving a free coffee voucher for the long wait (which we didn't even notice.)  Side note: why do customers berate the poor workers when they're backed up and things aren't very speedy?  It's beyond me.  We thoroughly enjoyed our time in the drive-through - we could see an intersection near two large department stores and laughed continually at irate drivers.  We exchanged random thoughts about nonsense and sang along with the radio.  When the time came to receive our coffee, it had passed altogether too quickly, and the worker at the window kept apologizing profusely.  We exchanged a bewildered look, assured him we had no idea what he was talking about, and wound up with a voucher anyway.  He insisted that we accept simply for being his nicest customers that day.

So, back to the part where I mentioned quilting.  I've been itching for a break in my projects so that I could once again turn my attention to my log cabin quilt from earlier this year, and I'm pleased that I finally found one.  I finished piecing the squares together in a single afternoon, and I'm very happy with the result:

A close-up of one section:

Now it's time for my least favorite part - the quilt sandwich.  It's not that quilting is odious to me, but I never do it properly -- there are always puckers and things that need to be re-done.  I chose a thick, tan fleece as the backing, since I plan for this to be more practical than anything else, and doubled up on the batting so it would be thick and very, very warm. 

I chose to tie this quilt, partly because I think it's a good look for this style, and partly because I'm anxious to have it done, and tying is a fast shortcut.

I found that it was very difficult to keep Gracie and Remington off of my project, so in the end I gave up and worked around them.  ;)

I finished tying last night, and if I manage to finish the border tonight (*insert laugh here*) it will be ready for use. 

~ Sarah

Lone Star Quilt - Mulligan

Hey there!  It's September... cue the several-month marathon of feeling behind and overwhelmed. I made an appointment with one of my next year's brides for January the other day.  January!!  As we walked away from our meeting, we jokingly wished each other a Merry Christmas.  Oy vey!  Christmas!

Anyways.  Before I start making candy and baking cookies while listening to Sleigh Ride, we'll pause for a moment at my late-summer project.  :)

You may recall from earlier this week my lone star quilt fail, and my saying that I had to make the top twice.  It's not finished (not even close) but it certainly looks much more like a quilt than my first attempt.  Here are the pieces of the center put together:

I also made 'mini' stars for the corners of the quilt.

(Here is a picture of the different size pieces... the large is 3", the small, 1").

In other news, I managed to FINISH a quilt I started several years ago!  I've been working on it for a while (and by 'working on', I mean that I would periodically look at it, cock my head to one side, and think to myself, "I ought to finish that sometime.")  But it's done now!  It looked kindof country-ish to me, so I did basic rows of stitching (uneven), to make blocks.  I was very pleased with it.

  

The top



The back



~ Sarah

Lone Star Quilt - Fail

I seem to have come down with some sort of quilting bug.  It's kept me bent over my sewing maching for the last couple of weeks.  As with all viruses, some people are more prone to catching this than others.  If you tend to catch creative infections (or have experienced quilting bug symptoms in the past) you may wish to steer clear of me for a while, as it is highly contagious.  Naturally, I suggested that Jayson quarantine me, as this will limit the scope of the infection to my living room, but he seems convinced that exposure to sunlight and the real world will help to reduce the symptoms more quickly.  We will, of course, keep you apprised if there are any changes in my condition.  : )

I visited the fair last week.  We saw the sheep, the tractors, the bunnies, the horses... and then, we stopped in the quilting house.  After making his third round of the building and returning to find me still inspecting the stitches on the first quilt, Jayson agreed to leave me there, enraptured, and come back a while later.  I spent the better part of an hour carefully studying the quilts and trying to remember each detail that I would like to try, myself. 

My poor log cabin quilt from a few weeks ago... it's sitting patiently now.  Why?  Because I wanted (no, needed) to start this new quilt before I forgot it. 

I could've drawn a diagram, planned it, etc., but I rarely do that.  So I just started cutting and sewing, and this was one of the few times I horribly regretted it.  I've actually made the top twice, because the first attempt was such a disaster that I had to start over (and it was only Jayson coming to my rescue that helped me figure it out the second time!)

After that, I wised up and drew this...

Generally speaking, Lone Star quilts are made up only of 'diamond' shapes, starting with a darker color in the center and lighter on the end.  This much I DID know: you need to cut strips of the fabrics, sew the strips together in order, and then cut them on a 45 degree angle together.

So, that part was right.  And that was all that was right. 

I didn't realize that each point of the star makes one large diamond-shaped piece, which is what you put together first (if I had a diagram, that would've been obvious, of course.)  I started sewing at the place where the large diamonds should meet, and worked my way out. 

FAIL!!!

Looking at this picture now, I can see that it obviously wouldn't work.  But believe it or not, I actually sewed on several more strips before I became completely puzzled as to what the problem could be.  When I finally realized my enormous mistake, I had the choice of ripping a thousand seams, or starting over.  So I started over.   lol

Pics to follow as I encounter more success than I have so far (hopefully!)  : )

~ Sarah

Log Cabin Quilt (Sneak Peak #2)

Alright, fair warning... when I start quilting, weird things start happening.  I forget other things, like cooking, cleaning, sleeping, eating... I enter a whole new world.  I even dream of a humming sewing machine (when I actually go to bed.)  It is, admittedly, a full-blown obsession (which is why I go long periods of time without quilting!)

That being said, I've made a few more squares for my log cabin quilt, and I think I've finally settled on a design.  What do you think?

Now, that's a queen-sized bed, so I think "lap quilt" will be a little under-stated.  But that's alright... it will be a lap quilt for two.  ;-)

~ Sarah

Log Cabin Quilt (Sneak Peak)

Hey there!

As stated yesterday, I've been caught up working on a new quilt.  It's been forever since I've quilted (at least it seems that way), and it feels so wonderful to have fabric in my hands again.

I love quilts that let me delve into my basket of scraps.  I have many, most of them from other quilts or projects.  I like keeping them in this basket so I can periodically look at them affectionately.  {Yes, I feel affectionate about my fabric.  Don't you?}

For my newest quilt, I chose fabrics that are more-or-less in the browns/greens/maroons/beige color wheel, with a few different ones, and cut them into 2" strips.

Some of my finished squares...

There's no rhyme or reason.  I use whatever pattern stands up,
waves its hand at me and says, "hey, hey!" at that moment.

So far, I've finished 17 squares, and I played around last night with the design a little bit.  I love log cabin quilts because you can make many different designs just by turning the squares one way or the other.  This is the most common, with the light and dark sections appearing as diagonal lines.

Jayson calls this the "Zig-Zag."

But I liked this one, as well:

Jayson calls this the "What Exactly is It?"

Anyways... I haven't decided how exactly I want to position them, but it doesn't really matter.  I'll keep sewing until I run out of scraps, and make the coolest design possible from the squares I happen to finish.  :)

~ Sarah