2016 Finish-A-Long

Have you heard of FAL or Finish-A-Long?  

Yes, I have joined the 2016 FAL for two main reasons.  

One is to stay focus and finish my projects; two is to get back to writing and journaling my quilting journey on a regular basis on this blog.

 Since last week, I have spent a few hours looking through different sites and found this Finish-A-Long.   I think this low key challenge is the key (haha) to keep me motivated.   There's no penalty if I don't get my projects done, and there are prizes involved.... gotta love that! 

I'm linking up with the 2016 FAL host.  This is my list for the first quarter.

1.  I'm designing a quilt for my LQS for the Spring Fling shop hop coming up at the end of February/early March.  I can't show the pattern just yet.  This collection (except for the green) is Sundress by Meg Hawkey for Red Rooster Fabrics.

2.  This scrappy pineapple quilt still needs binding.   I started this one last January.  Here it is on the quilting machine back in June 2015. 

3.  Stack-n-Whack blocks waiting to set into quilt top for the last two years.

4.  This ZigZag top needs quilting.  It is a gift so I better get on it right away.  Made from half of a Layer Cake, Dot Dot Dash.

5.  These squares are the other half of Dot Dot Dash Layer Cake that I used to make ZigZag top.  It will be another ZigZag quilt and a gift also.

6.  Old Glory Flag, a Buggy Barn pattern, waiting in line for quilting.  I still need to find backing for it.  It is for my brother.

7.   I forgot what this one calls, but I just need to do the hand sewing on the binding.   It's been sitting on my shelf for a long time now.

8.  Strings blocks need to turn into a quilt top.

9.  Basket Weave Strings needs borders, then quilting.  This one is for my son's bed.





10.  Vintage Farm Girl by Lori Holt blocks.  These were so much fun to make, but now I am dragging my feet to put it together.











11.  I worked on Mini Pineapple top at the same time as the Scrappy Pineapple from #2.  It is 18" finished.



12.  The last one is my slow stitching Hexagon Wreaths that I started right before Christmas.  I know for sure that this one will roll over to the next quarter.  You can find the pattern in Handmade Holidays by Pat Wys.


...And that is my list.  Twelve projects for the next 3 month.

See you again soon,
Rhonda

A Finish!.... + ....

My first finish for October!!

It's a baby quilt that I've been working on here and there for the last two weeks. This quilt is for a my sister's friend who just had a baby girl recently. This so-said friend whom I like very much is happened to be the same person who introduced the Dachshund breed to us... so I guess you can said that we are "kindred spirits".

The pattern, Merry-Go-Round, came from McCall's Quilting magazine. It called for two Jelly Rolls to make a good-sized lap quilt or is it a twin-sized?... anyway, I used only one jelly roll.

Yep, one jelly roll makes a perfect-sized Merry-Go-Round baby quilt. The fabric collection is called Gypsy Rose by Joanna Figueroa of Moda.

If you are wondering what the plus sign in the title for....

I am now on Facebook ------------------->

Actually, I've been on FB since August and have been on there a lot more lately.... that may explained my absents here. *lol* However, you may see me more here in blogland as I am working on managing and scheduling my times differently. And I must apologized if I have not visit any of my bloggy friends lately... that will change as I am working on that too. Ahh... so many things to do, so little time.

Talk to you later.

Blog Award and Baby Shower

Oops! In my last post, I mentioned that the SSCS is due on Nov. 1, but don't panic! The mailing date is from Nov. 10th to Nov. 25th. Thanks to Julie for straighten me out on that one. Now, I can relax a little bit.

Awhile ago, Julie and Peg awarded me with this award. Sorry it's taken me so long to post this; I really appreciated that you thought of me. The rule said that I have to pick 5 other bloggers to pass this award onto, but I could not decided which blogs to pick. So I have decided to give it to everyone on my favorite list. If I visited your blog and commented, then this award is for you 'cause I love you all. Each one has inspired me one way or another. :-)

My BIL and his wife, Annette, are expecting their first baby. Yesterday was the baby shower. I gave them the Pink Lemonade quilt along with Miss Milly... because.... IT'S A GIRL!!! They are expecting a Christmas baby... her due date is Dec.25th! Sorry the pix is so blurry...

Susan's Giveaway

If you have been following my blog, you know that Susan, my SIL, is working on her first quilt and recently started a blog, Ape Over Quilting. Well, pop on over to her site to take a look at her first block... she did a wonderful job... way to go, Susan!! Wish we live closer... I'm in southern California, and she's in Washington... we could be having weekend sewing every weekend!

Not only did she just started her blog, Susan is also doing a giveaway already... can't wait to see what she has in mind. :-)

Susan asked for us to blog about our first quilt...

I started quilting back in 2001. My first quilt was a handquilted queen size purple/green/white Irish Chain. On and off, it took me about two years to complete that quilt because we were selling our house and moved at that time. However, like most of my beginning quilts back then, I didn't take any pics.

So the Irish Chain was the first quilt that I started, but it was not really the first one that I finished.

That doggy quilt in the photo is the first completely done quilt... top pieced and appliqued, machine quilted, and bound in a couple of months from start to finish. Before quilting life, I did a lot of cross stitches, so it was natural for me to design the dog on graph paper and sewn from a grid.

I forgot all about that quilt. It's for our little niece on John's side of the family. About a month ago, we stopped by John's sister and discovered that she still has the quilt... of course, I had to get a pic. Now, I have a photo to remind me of my earlier quilt. :-D

A Finish

Yeah!! My first finish for Peg's Challenge and another baby quilt for Project Linus. All I had left to do was to sew the binding down yesterday which took about 15 minutes because I machine-stitched it. I usually like to do it by machine on donation and utilitarian quilts.

I used a fabric with butterflies on it for the backing and quilted loopy butterflies in the center in yellow thread. It was scarry at first to use a color thread on white background, but I like how it looks and was able to see where I was quilting.

I love the look of feathers in quilts so for the border, I quilted "whimsical feathers". The inspirations came from here; she has free patterns and her quiltings are amazing.

Now, don't look too close to my feathers; it is something not to be look at too closely except for when you're on a galloping horse going by it at a high speed... LOL... but I'm happy with my second attempt of feathers. I think my brain is starting to get it because it was much easier to form the feathers, made them smaller, and going around corners were not as difficult.

Back to Quilting

It's true! My Dolly has been neglected and collected dust for this past few weeks.



Then came along Peg's challenge of finishing five quilts by the end of July. So I got up earlier this morning and loaded this baby quilt onto Dolly. If this quilt looks familiar, then you are right. It has the same fabrics as my Summer Breeze quilt. I had cut too much for Summer Breeze that I made Summer Breeze 2 and still had enough leftover fabrics that I made Dancing Butterflies.

This quilt will be for Project Linus. My goal this year is to complete a quilt for each month for the total of 12 to donate. However, I'm falling behind with only two quilts so far. Therefore, I'm happy to almost have this one done; I only need to sew the binding down.

Crumbs, Crumbs, Crumbs Madness

This is what my sewing desk looked like lately.... filled with little bits and scraps of fabrics from other projects that I could not bare to throw away. I have a huge laundry bag of scraps, and this is just a micro bit of what I pulled out!

There were times when I thought of throwing out the bag of little scraps but just couldn't. Then when Bonnie posted her Crumbs tutorial last month, I knew that THERE IS a reason to my madness in keeping all of those crumbs. LOL

This is the result of all those crumbs. I called this one, I Heart Crumbs! It's a baby quilt and for a little girl... can't you tell? lol Perfect for donating to Project Linus for this month... don't you think so?

Yeah! My machine quilting is improving! :-)) With this quilt, I focused on even stitches and am quite happy with how it turned out. I quilted loops in the borders and around the hearts, echoed hearts in the heart-shaped blocks and cornerstones. The quilted hearts came out a bit wonky in a few places, but that's OK.... I'm happy with the even stitches. I found a piece of pink and white checkered flannel and used that for the backing.

This is the center of another crumbs top that I'm currently working on. I'm planning to add borders and applique vines and leaves... will post my progress when I have it done.

It's Done!

Here it is! The SuperBowl Baby Bargellow quilted and bound! I'm on a roll... second quilt for 2008! That's a big accomplishment for me! Normally, my quilt tops get to sit and aged before becoming a quilt! *U*

My journey to better machine quilting has improved with this one also. I did an overall meandering for the first time and it looked decent! lol

This quilt will be donated to my local chapter of Project Linus and will go to the same hospital where Hannah was borned.

Thanks, Bonnie, for a fun project! I think I will make another one since I still have a bunch of strips leftover.

James' Pinwheels

This special quilt was made for my soon-to-arrive nephew. Yes, you guessed it! IT'S A BOY! Do you know what his name will be? *U*

The theme of this quilt is firefighters (James' DGP was a fireman). I found these Hoffman fabrics at my local quilt shop (LQS), Quilter's Cocoon, and knew that I had to use them.

The design on this quilt just happened. I knew I wanted pinwheels, used 2 1/2" strips, and to try out the new little ruler, Easy Angle. Well, note to myself, I must read the directions first before using a new tool. Somehow using the new ruler, I managed to cut the fabrics wrong, and the pinwheels came out smaller than what I wanted. But I do like the way how it turned out, I guessed you can said that it's a serendipity.



This is the label and back side of the quilt. Can you see the firefighters fabric? My quilting on this quilt is not very good... well, it's quite bad really. But I wanted to do spirals and found out that I cannot follow the drawn lines. I probably won't be doing any more spirals on my domestic machine. It was very difficult. Overall, I like how the spirals add texture to the quilt if I stood back about ten feet from it. lol
Click on the photo for larger view of the label, but be warned, don't look at the quilting too closely. *U*

With the leftover fabrics, I made a Mini Pinwheels. This mini is about 8"x8", and the pinwheels are a little more than one inch.



The mini quilt is for the teddy bear of course.