Finish It Friday: Chain Link

Last week I stopped in my local quilt shop and saw this on the counter. It's the newest issue of Modern Patchwork.

It was exciting to see it out in the wild. Because...on page 52...

is Chain Link!

Here are some closer shots. Taken in my backyard.

 

 

 

I'm so happy with this quilt. I used a lovely set of fat eighths from Cherrywood.

This was not my original plan for setting the blocks. But thanks to a lovely weekend with Elizabeth, we played around with the blocks on her living room floor and she helped me come up with this setting. Quilting friends are the BEST!

On the subject of quilting friends, Anne Diester's pillows are on the cover! This is Anne's second time as a cover girl. She is crazy talented so I hope you will check out her blog if you haven't been there before.

Anne and I are going to be roomies at QuiltCon, and the thought of meeting her in person and spending a weekend together makes me so happy.

I'm linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts and TGIFF. Have a great weekend!

Tale of Two Cities

I've been away from the computer for awhile, and it has felt really good. And I've been spending more time in my sewing room. Which has also felt really good!

I have been working on my "temperature quilt" (idea from Rachel), keeping track of high and low temperatures for each day, in Fresno and in St. Paul. Thus, "Tale of Two Cities." The top 2 1/2 rows are Fresno, the lower 2 1/2 rows are St. Paul. Since I'm doing highs and lows from each day (Rachel is only doing one temperature rather than two), I decided that I needed to separate the months and decided on 1/2" strip of black (the black over on the far right completes the June strip since there are only 30 days, but I'm thinking of changing to charcoal grey as the black seems kind of jarring to me). Oh, and the little tiny strip of black (July 9) is because we broke a record high from 1902. Man, I hating breaking records like that...

When I originally chose my fabrics--Grunge by Basic Grey for Moda, I ordered a fat quarter stack of the pretty new colors. Since I'm actually making two quilts, I have quickly found out that a fat quarter stack is not going to be nearly enough, especially for some of the common temperatures, which lately have been the equivalent of highs in St. Paul and lows in Fresno.

So I'm ordering another fat quarter stack from Fat Quarter Shop ASAP, not only before I run out, but because of this great sale--good through July 18th.

What are you working on? I hope you are keeping cool. Or warm. Depending on the temperature tale happening in your city!

July 2014

Fused glass flag by Mark (Double Diamond Glass)

I have decided to take a little break for the month of July. Or at least a break from the regularly scheduled Really Random Thursday. I'll be in and out, and will be posting now and then.

So I'll see you when I see you. Keep track of your randomness and we'll share it again in August.

Finish It Friday: Liberty Lake

 

Several months ago, I received a bundle of the Lakes collection from Oakshott fabrics. Oakshott describes the fabric in this way: "A collection with a luminous blue warp set off by 16 different, shimmering colourways woven into the weft." Just like all of their fabrics, these are stunning.

I gazed at them for quite awhile, and then when I ordered some scrap packs of Liberty prints, I knew they needed to be in the same quilt.

With 4" blocks, this is a fairly small quilt, 24" x 28". I ended up cutting 1" strips of the Liberty prints, and inserting a little square of Oakshott, then randomly cutting squares of Oakshott and inserting the little strip. Improv, but still controlled. With a couple of blocks, I made the cut at an angle. And didn't like it at all. But that's just me...living within a nice square box.

Then I handquilted the whole thing with a combination of 12 wt Aurifil and number 8 perle cotton. And took some pictures at Huntington Lake.

I hadn't stitched the binding down at this point, and you can barely see the lake in the background

I'm linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts and TGIFF. Have a lovely weekend.

Really Random Thursday, 6/26/14: The Late Edition

I'm not sure what happened, but I woke up this morning, realizing it was Thursday. Really Random Thursday, and no post.

I'm going to blame it on the fact that I have been distracted by the thought of being nearly completely retired by the end of the work day tomorrow. I do medical transcription at home and the new electronic medical records mandates have made us pretty much a thing of the past.

The cons: Less money to spend on fabric going into the household budget.

The pros: More time to spend sewing. So it's a good thing I already have a HUGE fabric stash some fabric to use for quilts.

This was fun.

Okay, it's your turn.

An InLinkz Link-up

Finish It Friday: 9-Patch Puzzle

One of my favorite quilters is Nikki from The Girl Who Quilts. A really long time ago Awhile back, she asked for pattern testers for the 9-Patch Puzzle, so I volunteered (pattern here). She had several versions of it, one of which required a lot of piecing. I loved the look of that version, and thought I had the perfect fabric that would give that look without all the piecing, the Kona Modern Quilts line by Cynthia Frenette for Robert Kaufman.

See all that intricate "piecing"--those are just 8" squares sewn together. Fabulous, right?

I was able to quickly piece the whole quilt top together. I even had the back nearly completed. And then some time passed before I finally had it ready to be quilted. Nikki graciously agreed to do the quilting. And wow, did she do a spectacular job!

Here is the front.

 

For the back I used up some 2 1/2" jelly roll strips along with the wedding ring print.

When it came time to bind, I couldn't find the fabric I had set aside specifically for the binding. So I pieced together the trimmings left over when I squared it up in preparation for binding and just sewed them together.Of course, as soon as the binding was on, I found the set-side fabric, but I really like the pieced binding better.

 

I really love this quilt. Thanks, Nikki, for letting me test the pattern, but especially for being patient while it took me forever to show it off!

Of course, I had to do a "waterlogue" app version too. Isn't it pretty?

I'm linking up Crazy Mom Quilts at Finish It Friday and Lorna who is hosting TGIFF. Have a lovely weekend.

Really Random Thursday, 6/19/14

Does the place where you live have trash pick-up where you can set out things that have been collecting all year because they are too big for regular pick-up? We have that once a year. Just put all your tree trimmings/junk in the gutter and the city will pick it up.

If the "junk pickers" don't get to it first, that is... About a week before the trash pickup, you start seeing people driving slowly down the street looking for anything they might use/upcycle/recycle, etc. Usually they are in cars or pickups. Because the stuff is often bulky.

This year we set out some plastic trash bins that we had replaced because they had cracks. So a girl driving by on a bicycle asked if she could have them. Um, yeah...She had a baby carrier on the back of her bike that came in quite handy as a garbage bin carrier...

I had seen a mug like this somewhere..Instagram, Pinterest? Not quite sure. Anyway, I made one for someone I really love a lot. It may have been our daughter-in-law. Our son recommended that I make sure she was fully caffeinated before giving it to her was sure she would really like it.

Every month or so, Mark gets up on the roof to hose off the solar panels, to make them function more efficiently. Our neighbor took this picture of him from next door. It looks like he is trying to cool off the sun.

These inspire me to make a summery quilt.

Paul from @evildemondevildog had requested a fused glass version of the block I designed for the Modern Bee book (you can see more of his work here). Mark was happy to make one for him. Here is the fused glass version of my Neon Ninja Star block.

Of course I need to end with some good advice. Choose the one that seems right for you today.

Mary Fons posted this in her IG feed

Your turn.

An InLinkz Link-up