Honey Honey Quilt Top

For the past few weeks I've been hard at work on some old projects that have been lying around just waiting to be finished.  I also decided to start something new!  I recently purchased a jelly roll of Kate Spain's newest line, Honey Honey, and just had to make something with it.  All the bright springy floral prints made me forget about winter for a while!  

Half of a quilt top!

It's still untitled.  I'm waiting for some inspiration to strike for a good name - suggestions are welcome!  It's approximately 64" x 84" although I haven't actually measured it and I'm apparently terrible at making a scant 1/4" seam.  You can kind of see that when I trimmed the bottom, I had to lop off a good bit of that bottom square.  Oh well.  That's how you know it's handmade, right?

Honey Honey Quilt Top

I'm hoping to get it basted in the next week so it can actually be in use during the spring!  I'm thinking of going for a solid on the back and a solid binding.  There are so many beautiful colors in this line, it's hard to decide which ones to use!  These pictures really don't do it justice - the next sunny day I will try to get some good photos!

If you're looking for the giveaway (who wants a charm pack!?), you can find that here.

Linking up to WIP Wednesday - be sure to click the button on the right and check out the rest of the awesome projects this week!

-Melissa

A Finish and a *Giveaway*

I recently finished up my Lucky Square quilt!  Out To Sea was a perfect selection for this pattern, it turned out even better than I had imagined :)  I picked up the fabric on a whim at Wexford Dry Goods (if you're in the Pittsburgh area, check it out - there's a huge selection of solids and some really great prints, too!) and found the right project for it!  The sun was still out a little bit when I got home today, so here's the photo shoot.

Lucky Square in Out To Sea

The back

Closeup of the back

So proud of the corners :)

Thanks to Lauren for suggesting the striped binding!  It turned out to be super cute!  I was worried about having to patch together a bunch of different colors, but I think it looks really fun. 

The quilt was finished up just in time - one of my good friends was pregnant and I figured I had some time (she's not due until sometime around the end of March) to get this surprise finished up.  But the little one arrived on Thursday!  So it's time to get this labeled and washed!

Now for what everyone's been waiting for... a giveaway!  My birthday is coming up next Monday and I want to celebrate by sending one of you a present!  I've pulled a charm pack of Twenty Three out of my stash for one lucky reader!

...this could all be yours!

All you have to do is leave a comment on this post!  A comment about anything at all.  If you can't think of something, tell me a funny birthday story.  And if you follow my blog, you get an extra entry (just leave a separate comment telling me you're a follower, new or old).  And if you really want a third entry, spread the news about this giveaway via Twitter, Facebook, your blog, or whatever.  I'll pick someone at random on Monday, March 4.

Good luck!
-Melissa

Determination

Some days your left middle finger is the salmon and your sewing machine is the bear. Especially days when you are determined to finish a quilt top. Maybe it will be finished by the weekend now...

I'm really not even sure how it happened, but I somehow managed to sew the left side of my left middle finger last night. You'd think it would be the index finger... My machine was in the "needle down" position so it took me a minute to figure out how to get unstuck! It's all a blur. Luckily it missed the nail and the bone and came out the side. And luckily I have a good roommate who made sure I didn't pass out and brought me ice to put on it! And luckily my tetanus booster is up to date! 

So if you ever sew your finger, just remember you're not the only one! If you Google "I sewed my finger" there are a lot of hits! Haha

-Melissa

T-Shirt Quilt: Finished!

The t-shirt quilt is finally finished up! And I got to use a clothesline to take photos yesterday while it was somewhat sunny out!  Unfortunately, the clothesline is in a valley that doesn't get much sun on winter afternoons, but at this time of year, who can complain about even THIS much light?? :)

Pete's T-shirt Quilt

As I mentioned before, this quilt is for Pete, a good friend of mine from college.  He lost his brother to cancer several years ago and asked me if I could make a t-shirt out of his brother's old shirts.  I was scared - the main quilt material is really a priceless, irreplaceable thing!  Plus, I'm not generally a fan of t-shirt quilts - usually they're just too busy.  But the solid t-shirts turned out to be really nice!  I used fusible interfacing on each shirt to stabilize them (I recently found even lighter weight interfacing than used on the shirts - it would probably give it a better drape with the thinner stuff, but this will be a nice cozy couch blanket).  Pete designed the quilt layout himself and I think it's fantastic with the color gradient!  The center block is his brother's hockey jersey and the block on the upper right is the Team M-Power logo.  The team has participated in many LiveStrong challenges, thousands and thousands of dollars for the cancer charity. 

The only printed shirt in the whole quilt!

I was really nervous about using the hockey jersey.  At least with the t-shirts, I could fudge something if I screwed up cutting.  If I screwed up cutting the hockey jersey, it could be problematic.  And I was worried it would melt when I put the interfacing on it.  And I was worried about quilting it.  It turned out to not be nearly as much of a big deal as I anticipated!  I avoided sewing over the numbers and just quilted around them.  They seemed too stiff for the needle to effectively go through them.

A nice backwards "13" on the back

The quilt sashing and backing are Kona Basil and the binding is Kona Khaki.  I hand stitched the binding then machine top stitched, just for extra security.  Plus I think it looks nice with the extra detail.

Blowing in the wind...

Overall, I'm really pleased with it.  And it's a great "guy" quilt!  I always find everything I make being a little on the feminine side.  Not this quilt!

So now the big question is, "How the heck do I get this to Delaware?"  I'm not going there any time soon.  I've never mailed a quilt before.  I'm so scared that it will be damaged or lost!  What's the best method?  US Mail, UPS, FedEx?  What's the most reasonable price?  What's the best way to package it?  Any feedback would be much appreciated!

-Melissa

Timber & Leaf

I recently purchased a half yard bundle of Timber & Leaf (Blend Fabrics) to make a quilt for my aunt and I'm not quite sure what to do with it!

Timber & Leaf

The color is slightly off in the photo - the sun was nearly gone.  It's sitting on white snow so use your imagination :)

I'm thinking of combining these with some solids and a cream/natural background and doing another Swoon.  Or perhaps something like this.  Someone recently made a pillow that was very similar and super cute but I can't find it :/  Which do you like better?  Or do you think I should make something totally different??

-Melissa

Binding Choices

Well, I've been quilting away and I have two baby quilts nearly finished!  One is made from the scraps of Flurry from my Swoon quilt (which is still just a pile of nine finished blocks).  One is a new one using Out To Sea.

Flurry Zig Zag

I love the look of color-coordinated scraps together and how all the various reds, blues, and greens look cohesive from a distance.  The bottom zig zag is hard to see because of the angle of the photo but it's just a mish-mash of HSTs.  It is quilted with echoing zig zags.  All that's left to do is bind it!  I think I will be using one of the red prints I have some yardage of (it's for the Swoon quilt... but I think there's enough to do both).

My other project is a baby quilt with the Lucky Squares pattern from Sew Crafty Jess.  I used some Out to Sea fat quarters I bought at Wexford Dry goods a few months ago. 

Lucky Squares in Out To Sea

It turned out soooooooooo cute!  It was an exercise in perfecting my quarter inch seams.  So that was a good lesson.  There's a little bit of a fudge factor to this, but I never realized just how far off my quarter inch seams were until lately!  This makes some other things make a lot more sense... ha

The back of my Lucky Squares quilt

The back used the leftover squares I had cut.  Not one was wasted!  I quilted straight lines on either side of the ditch.  It really complements the layout of the squares and creates a cute little grid on the back.

I've still got about a fat eighth of each print leftover.  I don't know if I should save it for another quilt or use it for the binding.  There's really nothing in my stash that matches any of the colors.  Except white or some other neutral.  Should I do pieced binding or just pick a solid and go with it??  Suggestions appreciated!

I'm linking up with WIP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced! 

-Melissa