Blessing Baskets

I’ve been participating in Temecula’s Blessing Baskets quilt along.  Four blocks done and looking forward to what comes next.

Doing pretty good so far…

At this rate, I’ve averaged three a day instead of one.  Can you tell I’m taking advantage of my enthusiasm right now. It feels good to have a head start.  I love making these tiny houses…they are 3” of sweetness!

I lay out the little blocks and my granddaughter likes looking at them and finding all the things in the windows.  We’re both having fun with them.

Ready to start building houses

I am so excited to be joining in on Jeaneke’s “Building Houses From Scraps” challenge.  The goal is 365 little 3” houses throughout the year… one for each day of 2012.  This will be a test of my “stick-to-it-ive-ness” abilities for sure.

So I sat down and prepared myself to succeed.  I rummaged through my tiniest scraps, cut them into appropriate sizes and sorted them into their own little quarters.  Now when I want to sew up a house, I just need to grab the pieces and go right to work at the sewing machine.

  

It seemed pretty simple so I gave the system a few test runs and so far it working pretty good for me.  Now I’m ready to start in January.

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BTW..I’m paper piecing my houses and adding scrappy black borders on the blocks instead of sashings and cornerstones.  And I’m trying to have something or someone peeking out of every window.

It’s going to be a fun 2012! 

I’m hoping it will be a great New Year for all of us.

One down…

 

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I recently finished 5 quilts and took them all in a bundle to my quilter, JoLynn.  She is amazing!!  She finished them all in one week.  If you click on the album you can get a better look at how beautiful her quilting is.

  

I finished binding the first one last night.  Such a great feeling!

 

And look what Mr. Sunshine noticed while I was taking my pictures… my miniature Dresden quilt sitting in the background.  I didn’t do that on purpose.  But what a fun contrast. 

Now on to the next quilt.  I kind of enjoy binding quilts.  But I’m questioning the fun of doing 5 at once. 

Keep going Annette!

New Kid on the Block

I just finished this doll quilt…made special for my new cradle.  The blocks are 3”.

And I’m still working on Cheddar Cheese and Crackers from Lori’s quilt-along.  Although my cheddar is more Sunshine Yellow.  While putting it together, I kept thinking it was sort of like working a Sudoku puzzle…and I really like doing those.  I’m hand quilting it now.  I’m going to love this little quilt.

For the moment, however, everything is being pushed aside to make room for the new kid on the block…

 

An apple core quilt! 

The apple cores are just 3” long so can be a little fiddly but the more I do the easier it gets and now I’m so hooked on these little guys.

I’ve been stitching them into nine patches first.  My idea calls for 21 blocks.  6 done over the weekend and 15 more to go.  Then sew those all together into another little doll quilt.

A Sweet “Just Because…”

My walls and tabletops are covered with little quilts and so I was talking about other ways I could display them. 

Then the other day, Mr. Sunshine gave me this adorable little doll cradle as a gift…for “just because”…

And I have had so much fun sewing a little pillow and pillowcase and mattress and arranging my quilts… and rearranging my quilts.

 

And starting another project for it.

 

Is it any wonder why I am so in love with Mr. Sunshine.

tiny pieces of fabric… too pretty to toss

Yesterday morning I sorted through all my tiniest scraps

And trimmed them up nice and neat to about one inch (give or take a bit)

And by the end of the day they had become this.  An 18 x 24 inch quilt. 

 

And I went to bed happy.

For my dolls

A quick little quilt for dolls.

All washed and soft and ready…

…for my granddaughters to cuddle with their dollies.

A little project to start off 2011

I was so close to finishing the top for this little quilt late last night that I stayed up stitching away till 1:00 a.m.  I should know better than to work on details such as measuring and cutting sashing when I’m tired because I got it wrong and had to come back this morning to fix things.  It made it very close for the sashing fabric…I started with less than a quarter yard scrap and after having to redo it, all I have leftover are crumbs… almost dust!  I was holding my breath!

Now to quilt and bind it and then I’m going to display it in a ready made frame.  The quilt is 18” x 24” and so it will fit just right. 

Honey I shrunk the quilt!

On page 30 of the latest AP&Q magazine is an awesome quilt called “Summer Salsa” designed by Kathie Holland.  It just jumped right out and begged me to make it!  (Maybe it’s all that sunshine yellow).   But I already have a few too many unfinished quilts going at the moment and I don’t dare start another one.  So, instead, I decided to shrink it down into a small project. 

The original quilt is 77” x 85” with 6” blocks.  My little quilt has 1 1/2” blocks and finished at 17” x 19.” 

It was a fun thing to try!  

(By the way, I’ve decided the skitty-wampus blocks together with the wavy lines could possibly make one a bit seasick, so I will be more careful with that from now on).

Sisters

Today I finished another Jo’s Little Women Club quilt called “Sisters”. 

 

It’s 12 inches square.  The women in the center were a challenge as each sister is about an inch in size and very detailed.  I just about went blind trying to stitch that tiny!

This quilt has extra special meaning for me because I grew up as one of four sisters. 

This is me (far left) and my younger sisters 35 or so years ago.  I hope my sisters are okay with me posting this.  We don’t get pictures together anymore as we live so far away from each other and especially since my youngest sister has passed away (far right).  So pictures like this with us together mean a lot to me.  But my two sisters and I do keep in close touch with each other through email. 

I love my sisters!

Autumn Crossing …in Springtime?

 

 

Yeah! We’re finally having beautiful Spring weather here, even though yesterday I finished a quilt called Autumn Crossing.  Perhaps a little untimely, but oh well.  It measures about 18 x 22 inches and is hand quilted.  The smallest squares are three quarters of an inch.  For now, I’m going to use it as a topper for a cabinet where it fits perfectly.  I have been participating in a local Jo’s Little Women’s Club making small quilts like this.  The patterns are so sweet! 

Some Assembly Required

My very thoughtful Mr. Sunshine recently took me shopping and let me pick out some beautiful fabrics and patterns.  Later, when my son-in-law saw it, he joked, “Here’s your gift, go put it together.”  But Mr. Sunshine knows that he was giving me the gift of doing one of my favorite things.  And I had such a super time “assembling” this little 13 x 17 inch quilt.

My mother understands that too.  One day, many years ago, when I was first married and living far away from family, there came a big box in the mail.  Inside I found fabric, yarn, needles, crochet hooks, hoops, a conglomeration of all sorts of stuff like that.  Wonderful stuff.  I was intrigued and went right to work with it.  I grew up sewing, mostly clothes, but this started my passion for sewing to be creative.  That gift made a big difference to my life and is treasured to this very day.

The pattern is by Jo Morton and the blocks are just 3 inches square.

It looks just great on my little quilt wall.

Thank you Mr. Sunshine!

A good little house

It’s been fun watching our children settle down to family life in their own houses….which happen to be lots bigger than our house.  Of course we are quite comfy in our home of 25 years and hope to live out our days here.

I saw this quote the other day and it got me to thinking.  So I found a pattern for a tiny 3 1/2 inch house in the book, Little Bits of Whimsy, by Kathleen Brooks.  I stitched everything together and now have this hanging on a wall in our humble little house.

Big and Little

Quite a while ago I set myself a goal to see how far I could go in stitching hexagons. So far I have made 17 pretty hexagon flowers and have several more cut and ready to go.   Now I don’t know when I will stop!

I also stitched up these tiny 1/2 inch hexies and turned them into a little 13 inch quilt…all finished.

I love making hexie flowers!

I was also working on a dresden quilt.  I have the blocks all done and am deciding how to design them into a quilt….sashing and all…you know.

While I’m thinking through that, I took time to sew some sweet 3 inch dresdens for these little projects:

My inspiration came from Virginia, of Galloping Pony.  I love her designs.  She has such a beautiful talent.