Quilt Bee - September Challenge

September's challenge is for Janneke's improv houses from fabric scraps from France. Ooo-la-la! They are very pretty scraps.

The request was for an improv house from these scraps, but the background must be solid. The finished square is 10 1/2 inches. I was going for a house with a garage, but end up with a row home. 

Emergency Wallet

Yikes! My wallet was getting old and I was thinking about replacing it, but never found anything a liked. Poof! the stitching on seams gave out. Amy Butler's book "Style Stitches" there is an checkbook cover. A search up the internet and I found a way to tweak the pattern and add some credit card pockets. I used a tutorial from That *Darn* Kat for a quilted wallet with credit card holders. A little math to shrink it down and a little finger crossing that I am guessing correctly and I converted a check book cover to a new wallet.Using fabric from my other Amy Butler bag and its pal. I made the wallet.

In hindsight the wallet should be half inch wider (to accommodate the width of the credit cards) and an inch longer (to accommodate the bulk when it is folded).

Between medical, credit and store cards there is not enough room in my compact wallet. I made Key Keeper Coin Purse for to hold the spill over for the less frequently used cards. Now I know why so many people rattle off their phone numbers instead of carry cards.

Swallowtails 2014

This has not been a good butterfly year. I am not sure if it because I did not plant flowers in my deck boxes or the butterfly bush took a beating over the winter and was late coming into bloom or my parsley pot is closer to the house.

We had three caterpillar before we left for vacation.

2 of the 3

I found two when we returned.

The two caterpillars disappeared. I have seen a swallowtail flying around. Last week we discovered where one crawled off to metamorphosis. Clever caterpillar although he hiked about 20 feet across the house to nestle under the kitchen bay window.

Quilt Bee - August's Challenge

I joined the quilt bee with my guild. Amy has August and asked us to paper piece patches for her expected baby. Amy gave us the paper piecing and fabric scraps. I have the word "baby". My choice for blue letters on low volume background or low volume letters on a blue background. I choose the former.

I once pieced a sample square in a class but it was much larger. These pieces are small. I am using my light table to see the fabric coverage.

Amy want a scrappy looked and asked that all fabric be used, but I am not to keen on the large white dots because the pieces are so small and I think there is not enough blue. There were some tiny pieces, especially letter 'a'. I'm not sure you tell which fabric is which. Letter 'y' was a breeze - the pieces were soooo big. Ha! The big white dots works better on 'y'.

Charity Baby Quilt

My quilt guild is making 20 baby quilts for a center for new moms. I did not piece this quilt. I machine quilted it. A first for me. I ask for one that would look good with straight lines. Here it is.

Next, machine binding so it can hold up to multiple washings. Another first.

Machine quilting is okay. Maybe the straight lines were too monotonous. My machine binding is crooked. I'm not sure how people keep the back even. I did listen to the last episode of History Detectives and two episodes of Secrets of the Dead. If I hand quilted I would have listened to all the episodes of Secrets of the Dead and finished 2 months instead of two days! :)

Hockey Sweater

This isn't a Hockey Sweater but rather a sweater make at hockey. The pattern is Miette. The pattern is at Untangling Knots . The yarn is Ashley by Yarn Bee. It is from Hobby Lobby. The color is Pale Aqua. It is 56% wool 44% polyester blend. I started this project in November at the start of the Winter Hockey season and finished in June at the end of the Spring Hockey season. It is not a complicated pattern so it works well when one eye is on the action in the rink.

The pattern is close fitted. I prefer tailored, to tight. If I made it again I would leave out the front bust darts so it would have a looser fit.

I love the knit from the top down with no seams. I lengthened the arms to full length sleeves and need to lengthen the bodice 2 inches because I prefer it at my waist. It is a top down knitting  pattern which allowed me to try on the sweater to see if it fit. So much better than holding pieces up to your body.

After I finished my Michael Miller quilt, I added the buttons. Some how I miss read the directions and the button holes are backward. The top to buttons are two close and the bottom on is to high. Oops!

I can tell you wool is very warm in the summer. I planning on knitting a cotton sweater this hockey season. I am still searching out patterns and yarns. Only 4 weeks to till we are back at the rink!

Michael Miller Fabric Challenge - Pinwheels

I have completed the Michael Miller Fabric Challenge. I named my quilt "Pinwheels". It is a 45 x 51 inch baby quilt.

 It is my first modern quilt. The solid fabric is from JoAnn's and border is from the challenge fabric.

It is hand quilted using size 20 pearl cotton. My design idea was to give the illusion of wind spinning the pinwheels.

This thread  is too thick for a regular quilting needle so I could not use my hoop.

Instead I used a running stitch and "oven mit" method to hold the fabric.

I used Mountain Mist batting. It puffier then other batting I have used, but still has a soft drape and is very light weight..

Big R said "You finished another quilt? Aren't quilts suppose to take a long time." For me, the answer is "yes". But if you spend all your spare hours (and are lucky pond hockey is now at the prep school with a clean lobby) you can make one "quickly". It also helps the challenge deadline was extended a month.:)

I joined the quilt bee with my guild. It will be piecing blocks for a while. My turn is not until June. There will be no more quilts this year.