Happy Mail! Letters R and G for my ABC quilt!

Way back in April, I attended a retreat in Ft. Collins that Amanda Jean of Crazy Mom Quilts was attending as well.  I was working on my A block to finish up my sewconnected quilt, and it was fun because she was also in the Sewconnected Virtual Quilting Bee with me.  She offered to make me a couple more letters, and I jumped at the chance to not have to make 14 more blocks.  So a couple weeks later I mailed off some fabric to her and then mailed more this summer because I kept finding fun additions.   Last week, she mailed me my "G" and "R" blocks which I love!  Didn't they turn out great?

"G" is for grapes, golf, guitar, giraffe, ghost, garlic, and girl.

"R" is for rabbit, robot, roads, runners, rooster, rabbits, ruler, and rings.

Thank you, Amanda, again for making me such awesome blocks!  Maybe I can finish piecing the top together this weekend.  I might squeal with glee at this top when it is complete!:)

sewconnected and sewconnected2

This past weekend I finished some more blocks for the two swaps that I am in. The top two blocks are for my sewconnected group, and they are the last two blocks I need to send out! My month was December, so I am now just waiting for all my alphabet blocks to come back to me.

These two blocks are for Meg of luckyduckyday. She is making a Kaffe Fasset inspired quilt with solids an log cabinish blocks. It is going to be so beautiful with all of the saturated colors she has selected.

This one is for maddieandme for my sewconnected2 group. Her fabrics are so beautiful! She asked for an assortment of blocks, and I decided to make one with lots of triangles. Triangles are hard, but this one turned out pretty well I think. It is neat to look back and see how much better I have become at piecing together triangles over the last year.

Sewconnected and Sewconnected 2: September

I finished up my blocks for the two swap groups I am in this past week. Both John and Amandajean requested houses inspired by this quilt. Isn't it beautiful? It makes me want a house quilt of my own!

The first block is for quiltdad. He sent a lovely gray Kona cotton and we added scraps from our collection for the houses. I couldn't resist making a dog house.:)

I used the leftover gray to make two additional bonus houses for him. I ran out of the gray, so he will have to add it to make it 12.5 inches square. I just couldn't resist! Once I finished, I realized that the light purple is really too close in tonal value to the gray;it doesn't show up as much as I had hoped, but it is bonus or lagniappe so he could not use it if it doesn't work!

My last house is for amandajean. Her block is 15.5" square. I learned from my experience with the lavendar to use really bright colors and I played with the roof detail. It reminds me of the eaves on 1920's mission style houses or victorian houses that I see when I take my dog out for walks around the neighborhood.

It feels good to finally have something quilty to share! I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Sewconnected August and Sewconnected2 July

I finished some blocks for two of my swaps over the last week or so. I have been slow at posting the pictures though, so here they are. Amy, at acommonplacelife, is working on a quilt based on a quilt by Kafe Fassett with many blocks within blocks so she requested the same from us for her month of sewconnected.

I made an assortment of sizes ranging from 3.5" square to 9.5"square. In the picture above, there are 5-3.5" and 1-6.5". The little teeny tiny squares that you see in some of the blocks above are 1/4" square! She sent foundation papers to make the smallest ones. They were fun to make. The picture above is a little washed out; the true colors are closer to the pictures that follow.


The three blocks above are 9.5" square. I love the fabrics she sent for us to use. I did add the horse in the last block because it seemed to fit the rest of the fabrics to me.


I also finished this last block for Jacquie of Tallgrass Prairie Studio. She wanted us to make blocks based off a drawing one of her sons completed with the beautiful color palette she selected. I felt like I was back in college in one of my two dimensional design classes playing with the layout and composition of this block. I love how it turned out, but I did mess up on the block. She requested that the black lines be 1/2" wide but somehow I read 1" wide so I am hoping that she will be able to use it. I apologized and she gracefully stated that she was sure she would be able to use it, but I still feel horrible. When I realized my mistake, it was too late to go back and fix it because it was already in the mail. It also makes me mad at myself because I was so happy with the way it came out.

I started back to work last week, so I am having to adjust to not having as much time to sew, play, write on this blog, or keep up with other blogs. It is hectic getting everything ready since I will be taking a leave of absence once the baby comes-only 5 weeks give or take! I have a couple more pictures to share of things that I managed to get done last week and this past weekend to share but not much actual sewing has occurred in the last couple of days or probably will occur in the next week or so.

Sewconnected 2: July

I finished my July blocks for Emily of Carolina Patchworks today. I love these fabrics. This is the same line that I used to make my buttercup purse, but I used the green and gold colorway. She requested non-traditional blocks in increments of 5", so these are both 10.5 inches.

I wanted to showcase the lovely deer fabric with this one. I hope everyone had a lovely weekend!

sewconnected: June

I finished my blocks for the sewconnected group for June. These two are for krommama who always does these wonderful wonky houses. She asked that we make our own improvisational wonky log cabinish houses out of our scraps for her month. I had a lot of fun going through my scrap pile and pulling out strips. I think these little houses could easily become quite addictive!


I am calling this one the "money pit"-he he. I found the bathtub girl and the money and couldn't resist thowing them into this block together.

sewconnected2: May and June

I am catching up on my blocks! I have been on a roll this week with my sewconnected blocks. The one above is for Amanda for June. She asked for a 12.5 inch improvisational block including the letter strip. I love the letters she embroidered for everyone.

The next two blocks are for Tine for May. She sent these lovely solids and they just stumped me. I kept pulling them out of the envelope but could not figure out what to do with them until now. I don't know why the solids threw me for a loop, but they did! I used this pattern for the one above and made up the one below. I do like how they turned out and I like the boldness of the solid colors.


Happy Thursday!

SewConnected May

I finished my May block for Amy at ParkCityGirl yesterday for the SewConnected group that I am in! I love the fabrics she sent. The colors in the picture above are more accurate than the colors below.
I have the hardest time taking pictures of block straight on. Doesn't it look weird? It is 15.5" square, I promise! It will be in the mail today!

Sewconnected and Sewconnected 2: April

I got behind at the end of April and May, but I am slowly catching up with my blocks for the two sewconnected groups I am in!

These two blocks are for John, aka quiltdad who is the founding father of our group. I love the fabrics he sent out. He requested an assortment of sizes ranging from 6 1/2 inches square to 18 1/2 inches square and 6 1/2 x 12 1/2 to 12 1/2 x18 1/2 rectangular. I made him two blocks. The one above is 12 1/2 x 18 1/2.

The next block for John is 12 1/2 square. They were really fun to make, and I hope he enjoys them!

The next group of blocks is for Marilyn who requested a range of block sizes too! I made 5- 6 1/2" blocks for her. I started most of these in April and finally finished them.

Everything went in the mail yesterday so hopefully they will get to their final destination quickly and safely! I hope everyone is having a great weekend.

Sewconnected 2

Since we received another snow day on Friday, I spent most of the morning making 6.5" blocks for Marilyn who has April. I am working early this month on my blocks! She requested 6.5 or 12.5" blocks. The one above is a single irish chain.
The next block is a pinwheel and I love the blues against the pink.


Finally, I made a bearclaw. It was a lot of fun making the smaller blocks. I felt like they came together quickly and I could use more patterns. I also felt like I had more freedom in the choice of pattern to use because it was not going to be a large 12.5" block. I don't know if that makes sense, but it was liberating.


I will leave you with a couple of pictures of the snow as of Friday morning when the sun came out and the snow stopped falling. We received 11" in our backyard!

Is it Spring?

Is is Spring? We have had around ten inches of snow since yesterday morning. These pictures were taken around 4 yesterday when the snow total was 6". I am just not ready to go out in the cold again this morning for new pictures!


I am not complaining about the snow in the least because we have had snow days! Plus, we need the moisture.


I spent the day making this block for the sewconnected group. She requested that we use the center fabric and the peach fabric. All of the fabric is from vintage pillowcases.

This past month was my month to send out fabric for the sewconnected2 group. These are the blocks that I have received back so far. I am so excited about how this quilt is going to look! All of the blocks are beautiful.:)

Sewconnected: February Blocks

I got behind on my blocks for the sewconnected group this past month :(, but I am slowly catching up! The block above is for Stefanie and she wanted straight lines. I like the modern feel to all the solid fabrics and the color combination she used.
The next two blocks are for Katy. She sent Liberty fabrics which I was scared to cut up! I went with traditional patterns for these prints. Once again, I love the fabrics she sent. Her quilt will be beautiful!
I have started on the one block I need to make for March so it will be finished this week. It feels great to be catching up on projects!

Sewconnected2 Block for January

I finally finished my block for the sewconnected 2 virtual quilting group that I am a part of this year. I finished on Feb. 1st-one day late but I do like the way it turned out! I love the batiks she picked out.

SewConnected Block for SewHelpMe

I finished my sewconnected block for sewhelpme last week and it has been received so I wanted to share it here. I love the fabrics she chose! I started off with some flying geese units and slowly just started piecing it together. I did not use a pattern but I think a pattern may exist out there for this block. Either way, I am happy with the way this one came out.


On the other crafting front, I have been super busy with work so I don't have much to share right now. Plus, there is some Christmas gift crafting currently underway so I must be secretive... Happy Monday everyone!

Sew Connected: Block for Rita

I have joined another quilt block swap over at SewConnected on flickr. Big thanks to John at QuiltDad for letting me join! All of the quilters are so great that I am a little intimidated, but I hope my blocks turn out well for them.
I finished my October block for Ritapizza. She sent the little embroidered rabbit with the kite. I wanted to include something reminiscent of kites so I used flying geese. I like how the row on the right looks like a kite tail. Her fabrics are so beautiful!