Vacation time

I finally get to take some time off from work and life.  The boyfriend is coming into town and we are going to visit San Francisco! My first time there and his too!  And of course Disneyland too.

While I'm out playing I have many projects in mind to make soon.

Halloween Costume - Rapunzel

Diamond Pillow - more colorful of course

Bow Pillow

And my brother's Wedding Quilt

Plus so many more it is difficult to remember them all and find time for them.  

I should be back in about a week, not that too many people read this blog anyways besides my mom and boyfriend anyways!

A complete quilt

Another day, another quilt finished.  This quilt has been in the works for about 6 years.  Probably about 4 years of that being dormant, waiting for me to come back to it. 

I love the colors and the pattern.  It is a visually strong.  Once again this is a queen size pictured full size bed.

I'm thrilled it is finally done.  It will have a happy home with my boyfriend in Kansas City.  Now to work on my brother's quilt.  Only a little over a month until the wedding.  I really want to finish it before!

Wedding Clutch

My brother's wedding is coming up in about 6 weeks.  I just got the invitation in the mail yesterday.

I found a clutch on Purl Bee a while ago and always wanted to make it.  It is called a wedding clutch.  Sounds like perfect timing to me!

 I love suit pants.  I always wear them and rarely wear jeans so this might be a nice addition to my wardrobe. I love the magnet snap!

The finished size is 11" by 7".  I like the idea of this clutch but for me it is too big!  Tomorrow I going to alter it and reduce the size.  Possibly 9" x 6" or even smaller.  I could use it for the wedding and for a wallet inside a large bag.  Until tomorrow.

And that new Harry Potter movie, it's excellent!

A project that needed finishing a long time ago

This quilt is the first big quilt I ever made.  I found the pattern at Quilters Cache.  It is called Irish Plaid.  The pattern is beautiful and complicated.  The pieces cross each other and create diamonds within diamonds.

I incorporated my favorite color of teal.  I love this teal fabric which has turtles in it.  It is a Hoffman Batik that they no longer make.  I had to find 3 different retailers for this fabric because I kept needing more and they had retired it by the time I needed more!

I liked black as a base color.  These days I lean more towards white.  I often use muslin as a color or base.  I like the texture in the fabric, it is never just a flat piece of fabric.

I have been fortunate enough to visit Hawaii a couple of times and I am on the lookout for turtles on my visit.

My mom always hand quilted her quilts or tied them off.  This was a pattern that seemed to need hand quilting.  I had never done hand quilting before and needless to say it has taken about 6 years to finish this poor quilt off!

When I opened it up I was shocked on how little there was left to do.  Only about 4 embroidery hoops worth of quilting left on it!  Last night I knocked out most the quilting that was left.  A bit more left to do today and turning the edges and then it is finally done!

I starting making this quilt in 2005.  I was a different person back then and so were my skills.  How far I have come in my skills in 6 years.

The seams, not so great!  In fact hey are awful! Those mistakes in the quilt that probably only I would notice.

Hopefully I will be finish this quilt today.  Off to Joanns to buy more supplies for millions of new projects!

The first quilt done!

I had to take a couple days off from my flog.  My work schedule doesn't always allow for time to work on projects or have time to post them.  Only a couple more pieces of this quilt to finish.  Well, at the least the top is almost done.  This much I finished yesterday.

And today it is done!

 I laid it on a full size bed but it was made to fit a queen.  It looks great!

 And only a small injury in the process!

If you know me, I can't just work on one project at a time.  Back to work my brother's wedding quilt.  Here is a preview of it.

Creating a rainbow

If I am putting together a quilt that I found online, I always like to have some reference to go to when I am creating my own.  A big color picture and a short tutorial always helps the process.

Right now the quilt is in two separate pieces.  I need 7 more blocks to complete the row on the side.  To make it a queen size quilt I have to add 3 more rows to the width.

All of my Harry Potter watching is complete.  Ready for the final movie at the end of this week.

Putting together rainbows

I was planning on going to the beach today, well needless to say, that didn't happen.  I laid out the majority of the rest of the quilt.  I had to cut some extra pieces of teal, orange and yellow.  I thought I might be able to make my quilt with no fabric repeating but I was wrong.  So close!  But my stash is probably big enough as it is.

I was able to sew together 3 more rows today.  Only 4 more to go from what I set out in the picture above.  

Only need to add about 3 or 4 more rows to the width to make a queen size.

My project stack is growing!  And this is only part of what I'm working on above.  I've got a whole resuable bag full of projects just waiting for their turn.

4 1/2 Harry Potter movies down, 2 1/2 more to go! 

Piecing together

I finished cutting up most of the pieces of the quilt yesterday and starting piecing them together today. 

It is hard to tell the complete pattern, the floor that I work on is very distracting.  When I add in the white between the colors it will make a huge difference.

I will have to piece together all of these and then add additional rows afterwords.  I don't have a lot of crafting space in this house.  Have to be creative with not only crafts but construction!

3 rows down, 8 to go.  3 Harry Potter movies down, 4 to go.  Off to work, the quilt will wait until tomorrow.

Starting another quilt

I saw this quilt online and wanted to make it.

It's gorgeous.  I finally found the website again at Fresh Lemons Quilts and it had a tutorial on how to make it.  

I starting cutting up the pieces from my fabric collection.  

3 days of cutting will do it, when work gets in the way

Time will fly by while watching a Harry Potter Movie Marathon before the last movie comes out.

Diamond pillow

I made another pillow for my bed.  They don't match but they are tons of fun.  I really enjoy the summer colors.

I made this pillow out of a 16 by 16 inches pillow form.  The white diamond in the center is 8 1/2 inches square.  In retrospect I should have make it 8 by 8 inches.  That would leave more space around the edges to sew the two pieces together

The color blocks are 2 by 2 inches.  The pieces did not line up perfectly at the end of each row but practice makes perfect.  I almost like the scrappy look anyways.

The finishing touch on this pillow is a 1/4 inch teal border.  I'd never done one before but I think it ended up working very nicely.  But I gotta work on the corners!

I'm thinking about making some more and selling them on Etsy.  So far I have not sold any items on Etsy but I will keep trying!  

Starting my own blog

I wanted to start a new chapter in my life by devoting more time to my imagination and talent, or at least my mom says so, when it comes to working on craft projects.  I am always truly inspired by what I find online while visiting other blogs so I thought I would start my own.  Working on quilts and pillows has taken up a great deal of my time lately and I have been enjoying every minute of it.

As Walt Disney said "If you can dream it, you can do it." and that is what I hope to do!