My Spring Splash

This is Spring Splash by McCall's.  The construction was fairly simple, an abbreviated construction was in my previous blog  "Spring Wall hanging." This was my first serious attempt at a larger free motion quilting project, since I have been hand quilting for well over 40 years , one forgets how "painful" & " not the prettiest stitches" feels...

But as with all things I know that practice makes perfect, so, I will keep practicing  :-) It looks just fine hanging over my fireplace.

And below is my last BOW, got the next one today, have a class tonight so probably won't get it done until Sat....but then, one never knows...

Wishing you and your Family a Blessed Easter!

National Quilting Day Project....

 But I had to wait to show it until my recipient (my daughter) got it; and my helpful four-legged friends would let me take a picture without attacking it. Like leaves..they just can't resist a running jump into anything I want to take a picture of.

I used a Block Party Studios Fruit of the Spirit Kit because it matched the colors I wanted. I love their panels and use them very often.







Of course unless they are acting like angels:

And my block of the week--finally. This was one of those blocks that just gave me fits. No particular reason. It did, I am glad its done--and yes it required frogging...

We have been very busy with family birthdays and Easter coming on way too quick...

And the first day of spring, we have wind, not the promised rain, we need some water :-( Droughts are no fun, especially in the desert...

Mondo Bag...It really is!

I have been working on a (well 2) Quiltsmart Mondo Bags. I had seen several and decided they would be good for lugging stuff back and forth to class....but oh how much it holds. This first one s done from the leftover Jellyroll of a lap/baby sized mystery quilt. (can't show the quilt yet because the class is not finished-wouldn't want to spoil the surprise for the students)

So you can make a baby quilt and a diaper bag from the Mondo bag by getting just a bit more (1.25 yards) of backing  :-)

Quiltsamrt products make hard things easy. The Mondo bag is full of Quiltsmart projects anxiously waiting their turn.

The printed interfacing looks like this:

For the Mondo (and Midi) bag you need lots of these cut from your Jelly Roll Strips

You lay them  out and iron them on the interfacing--don't forget to use your non-stick pressing sheet!

Sew some seams, folding along the printed lines

Clip according to the directions and press seams according to the arrows (if you do not you will wish you had)

Then you sew the panels together, make the straps, line and:

this is the next one ready to assemble

Besides actual sewing/quilting , a friend and I are working on getting  a Quilting retreat together at Lake Tahoe. What is your favorite part of a retreat?

Spring Wall Hanging......

It was next in the top project bucket (yes I have more than one) of cut projects from my cutting spree.

 First to sew strip sets for easy 9 patch blocks

 Trim up the strip set

And then do more cutting--

Then you have more smaller strips to make the nine-patches from

 Then you sew the nine patches together for what will become a border











After you iron them of course

Now we move on to half square triangles--Love my gypsy cutter
















And wallla!

They are supposed to be like the one on the right not the one below--time for the frog stitch  :-/













Now add some more pieces--and iron some more













And then you have the center below















And top finished below--It hasn't let me know how it wants to be quilted yet....so I will move on to some bags while it decides...

St Patrick's Day

And my first real foray into freehand machine quilting. Cheated a bit, straight lines and echos...but one has to start somewhere. I have machine quilted with the walking foot, but it is well, limiting.

 This is a new block of the week quilt-front of the block. I have been on kind of a Batik tear, so I decided to do a few projects a little more on the traditional side.The prints are Hoffman's except one, the light green is a Northcott. The background is a Michael Miller's Vanilla Painter's Canvas--I liked it so much I bought a whole bolt and decided this was the project to cut into the bolt for.

 And by request, the back of a block...like it when they are pretty :-) Makes the quilting easier.

 And this is block 12 of the batik block of the month. Get the last block first Saturday next month, and then it will be time to decide how to set them...do I use the directions...or do it my own way....bets????

 I will have a spring wall hanging soon to share with you. We got some rain yesterday, rain and snow forecast later in the week, and though I am not a snow lover, I will take it since we are way behind in our snow-pack and looking at another drought year if we don't get some serious water soon :-(