improv block

Tuesday night at the McKinney Modern Quilt Guild meeting, we received a small bundle of fabric and were challenged to create an improv block finishing at 12". The 3 fabrics on the right are the challenge fabrics....

I added the two solids on the left. I had an improv style I had been wanting to play around with, so I jumped right in this week. Here's my completed block...

I had a lot of fun with the slice & insert method and really like the way it turned out!

Our blocks will all be put together after the next meeting and made into charity quilts for Alberta's Hope, our charity that benefits cancer patients. Have you done any improv quilting?

Halloween tote swap

Tuesday night was our October  McKinney Modern Quilt Guild meeting. Those meetings are always a blast! This time we swapped Halloween totes that we had made. I don't usually go the "cutesy" route, but when I saw this free pattern at Orchid Owl Quilts for a foundation paper pieced monster I couldn't resist!

He has so much character! So I put him on one side of my bag...

put together some Halloween hexies for the other side....

Added some pockets and a zipper at the top. I was pretty happy with it. Holly took it home & she seemed to like it too. Oh, and I slipped this fun zipper pouch inside that she can use year round...

I added some of the fun pompoms that came home with me from Purl Soho in NYC.

And check out the fun tote I came home with....

Made by Kena. It's the perfect size and has lots of pockets. I LOVE IT! What fun swaps have you participated in lately?

another word quilt

I finished another word of the year quilt for my series! This one is for my 2013 word, Strength....

I chose an anchor to represent God as my anchor and the fact that I find all of my strength in Him.

I used this tutorial by Hopeful Homemaker to make the anchor block out of a variety of low volume prints. Then, as with the other quilts, I used the Quilt Talk book to paper piece the letters at 50% size. The background fabric is the new Moda Concrete Basics in Teal. I love the look of it!

That makes three of my Word of the Year quilts finished so far and I love them. I have two more to finish before I choose a new word for 2016!

if you want to know more.....

If you want to know more about me and my sewing/quilting journey, Catherine interviewed me for the McKinney Modern Quilt Guild blog..... she makes me sound really interesting! You can read all about me (more than you ever wanted to know!) here...

text me mini quilt received

A while back I showed you the quilt I made for the Text me Mini Quilt Swap, but I never shared with you the fun quilt I received from Emily!

 Look at all those wonderful blocks, each one with a text print in it, along with my favorite colors and lots of polka dots. I love it! This is my favorite block though, with the sweet fussy cuts...

What a fun swap this was. And now I get to enjoy this one every day!

Raskog ironing space

My pal Mahriam had the brilliant idea to create a small ironing table on top of her IKEA Raskog cart. You can read about her creation here at Three Owls Handmade. I decided I needed one too, used her idea as a jumping off point and made my own variation (with lots of help from my sweet hubby)....

We started with an 18"x20" piece of plywood, bigger than Mahriams. It hangs out over the edge of the cart top....

we added 2 12" strips of wood so that it won't slide off of the cart. Hubby nailed these on from the top, with the inner edge of the strips 2 3/4" in from the side edges....

For padding, I layered a piece of Insulbright (20"x22")and a piece of cotton batting (20"x22") on top of my fabric (cut 24"x26") for the fabric I used a vintage sheet because I loved the colors and the stripe. Also, I have plenty left over for a cover for my regular ironing board...

We wrapped the batting and fabric tightly around the board and stapled it to the back with a staple gun (tip, you'll want to get short staples, we used 1/4", so they don't poke through the top!), mitering the corners and neatly tucking the edges under. My cover is not removable which is fine with me, I can always add another layer over the top if it gets yucky (WHEN it gets yucky!) or remove it and begin again.

I love how it fits perfectly next to my machine!

Ready for my next piecing project!

spice of life cal update

I have to tell you, I am so excited about the Spice of Life crochet along that I bounce out of bed on Tuesday mornings & head straight to my computer for the next set of instructions. This week it took me a whopping 2 days to finish up the new rows....

I'm usually really slow at crochet, so this is amazing to me! This week we added stacked grannys, a zipper section and stacked shells. It's so much fun to see each section come together

I assure you the top row is not ripply, I just didn't lay it flat. oops.

And now I impatiently wait for Tuesday to come again...