Pillow for Z’s Grandpa

I’ve made another pillow for Z’s grandpa this year. He loves the other one I made him, and I thought he could use a second one. Most of the scraps are from the quilts I made for Z last year and the year before, so the colors for this pillow are still patriotic but the prints are actually more nautical.

I started with 3″ squares organized in a four by six layout:

I added 2″ wide red borders.  (I made them a little too wide for the pillow form.)  I’d actually had another border planned, but I did my math wrong and cut the pieces too short.

For the back, I fussy cut this center scrap, which is leftover from the Storm at Sea quilt I made for Z.  The white fabric is leftover from his “What So Proudly We Hail” quilt.  It’s got little sea shells on it.

Pillowcases

I used this tutorial to make pillowcases for my goddaughter for Christmas.  One is made from a dinosaur skeleton fabric, and the other from Riley Blake’s Saltwater collection.  They both seemed perfect for a toddler!

It’s two-sided:

I love the turtles:

 

Hopkins Square Bee Blocks

Hi habibis!  Christmas is nearly upon us, and I have one last post beforehand.

You may recall that I asked for Hopkins Square blocks for my month of the stash bee in shades of red and gold, and my bee mates have been incredibly generous.  The ten of them sent me 16 blocks, plus extra block pieces and extra cuts of fabric!

Here’s a sample:

Don’t you love everyone’s fabric choices?

After the holidays I plan to buckle down and put together this quilt top.  It’s going to look great!

 

Improv doll quilts

I’ve made some more progress on the improv scrappy doll quilts I’ve been working on.  I showed you one set of blocks here.

The second set is more light blue with pink and teal, as I slowly ran out of pink scraps (from that particular scrap pull – I’m sure I have lots more pink scraps elsewhere).  Here are the blocks:

And here are my two finished tops.  I love the flying geese in the blue top.  I made them using leftover triangles from quilt bindings.  The idea for the pink, light blue, and teal came when I playing with scraps from the Pink Blossom quilt, and you may recognize many of the pinks from that.  I’ve actually used a lot of blue and teal this year, too.

I got very busy working on Christmas presents (which I’m still working on – right up to the wire!), so layering them and doing the quilting will definitely have to wait until the New Year.

 

 

Sunday Stash

My friend A is an academic who currently works in South Africa, and for Christmas she brought me back some gorgeous fabrics.

She tells me the purple floral print was something she saw that she thought was pretty, but the other four are traditional fabrics.  I’ll have to ask her to repeat the details – the fabrics are produced by different ethnic groups in South Africa.  I think they’re all amazing.  I love the colors and the patterns!

Quilted liner for a basket

My guild had a basket raffle as a fundraiser, where members brought baskets (or bags, or whatever) filled with fabrics, chocolates, gift cards, etc., and then we raffled them off.  I got a basket at Michael’s and decided it needed a liner for the bottom.  I chose a bright red and white polka dot print – a Christmas-y feel without screaming “Christmas” – and layered it over some batting.  I measured the basket and made it slightly larger than that.  Then I quilted a white spiral from the center outwards.

I trimmed the batting to fit in the basket, and then I folded over the edges of the polka dot fabric (which I hadn’t trimmed) and stitched along the edge.  It’s not perfect, but it works.

Here you can see how I did the edges:

It looks like it’s still slightly large for the basket bottom, but it served its purpose.  My basket included a couple of breakables (it was wine-themed) and I’d really wanted something to cushion the bottom of the basket, plus it’s so cute and bright.

Stuffed bear for charity

Mama S (Maria Sangria) made this cute bear for charity.  It got stuffed in a stocking and will be given to a needy child in our area.

Fabric storage

Habibis, I have a lot of fabric.  I mean, a LOT.  I may not have more than the average quilter, but I live in a one-bedroom apartment with my fiance in a city not known for spacious living quarters.

We have a loft space – which is amazing for storage – and I was very excited that I’d be able to keep all my fabric up there. Here’s what I’ve learned: the loft is great for storing things you don’t need regularly. The loft is not great for accessing and then returning your fabric.  It’s hard for me to search through everything I have when I’m crouching or bent over at the waist because of the low ceiling, and then I have to carry everything down the not 100% sturdy ladder. It makes it harder to put fabrics away, as well, and that’s what motivated the change. I’ve taken over more of our living room than I was supposed to, with piles of fabric.

So we ordered a cabinet from Amazon. We put it together and I finally filled it last week. First I had to hand my bins of fabric down to Z from the loft – I knew from my experience putting the bins up in the loft initially that I would have even more trouble getting them down the ladder. Then I filled the cabinet.

You can see how I have them kind of organized by color. Scrap fabrics is still an outstanding issue – I want to organize them better but I haven’t quite decided how.  Right now some are on the top shelf but some aren’t in the cabinet yet.  I’ll figure it out.

Improv scrap sewing

A while back I started playing with the leftover pink and teal scraps from the Pink Blossom quilt.  I added more of both shades, plus light blue, to improv piece nine blocks.  I squared them up to 8″ and here they are.  I’ve decided to make a doll quilt out of them.  I’ve already stitched them together but I haven’t taken a picture yet.

The mostly blue one with the butterfly print is the center block – I was running out of pinks.  (Actually, I’m sure I have tons of appropriate pink scraps in my stash, but my stash storage situation wasn’t working out.  More on that later.)

More drawstring gift bags

I saw some of my cousins this weekend, and since I wasn’t sure I’d see them at Christmas I brought their presents with me.  I also brought some wine when we visited Z’s family at Thanksgiving, and some birthday gifts for his dad and his grandpa.  I made some lovely gift bags and wine bags: