Kona Sale at Sew Sisters!

20% off continuous yardage until October 2!  This is your chance to stock up on fabulous Kona!  Flate rate shipping $9.99 in Canada.  Check out the details and get shopping at Sew Sisters!

Blogger's Quilt Festival: Inspired Broken Diamonds Mini

 Name: Inpsired Broken Diamonds Mini

Design:  Inspired by Broken Diamonds by Kati from the Blue Chair

Size: 12" by 12"

Fabric:  Kona Scraps and Kona White scraps

Quilted: by me with Aurifil 50 wt in white, 

Binding and Backing:  Kona Medium grey binding and backed with IKEA Britten numbers

I decided to enter this mini quilt in the Blogger's Quilt Festival mini quilt category.  I made it last spring as part of a swap between my quilt guild and the Maritime Modern Quilt Guild.  It is just little at 48" all around.  And it is a mini version of a big quilt that I made a few years ago.  It is right over here.    And both were inspired by a quilt made by Kati at the Blue Chair.  The link is up above.  

She did not have a pattern for the quilt at that time so I just went for it and came up with my own.  Kati has since published a pattern called Wonky Cabins and provides instructions on how to make the broken diamonds blocks in the pattern.    The little diamonds are make by foundation piecing string blocks.  You need 2 identical quarter string blocks for half of the diamond and another 2 identical but different quarter string blocks for the other half.  That way no two diamonds are the same.  Kind of cool.  The smallest diamond in this 12" by 12" mini is finished at 1.5" and the biggest finishes at 3.5".  Just a little fussy.  Let me just say that pulling the paper off such tiny blocks was not fun.  But it looks pretty awesome.  I used scraps of Kona solids, Kona white and used Kona Medium grey for the binding.  The quilting is dense straight line, 1/4" apart with Aurifil 50 wt in white.  Just snazzy.  

Because It Is Fall

   Name:  Because it is Fall

Design:  Log cabins around a 3" square, 8.5" blocks

Size:  83"" by 83""

Fabric: Stash fabrics 

Quilted: by me with Aurifil 50 wt in white and dove in the bobbin in an irregular grid

Backing:  Anna Maria Horner, Lizzy House and Kaffe Fasset prints

The end of summer seems to inspire a certain colour palette.  If I look back in my finished quilts, I find this is not the first time I have made a quilt at this time of year with rich purples, intense pinks and rich yellows.  It was my dahlias in bloom and the concord grapes ripening with the grape leaves beginning to turn and there I was pulling fabrics for this quilt.  Log cabins around a 3" square of a Lizzy House print in deep yellow.  The blocks are half low volume logs and half of the colours.  And then, because I was obviously having a crazy attack, I decided to make it bigger with just low volume cabins.  It is a big one.  83" square.  A bit of a beast to quilt but it is done.  The quilting is pretty dense.  White Aurifil 50 wt on the top and Dove in the bobbin.  The quilting is a bit of an irregular grid.  It shows up on the back if you take a close look.  Bound with a rich purple print from the stash and backed with a chunk of Anna Maria Horner's Sketchbook from the Hand Drawn Garden line.  I have been hoarding it for a special quilt back.  I did not have enough so added in some of the Lizzy House print and a length of a Kaffe Fasset print called Clover.  Just yum.

A 12 clothespin quilt, I might add.  It took a bit to get this hung on the clothesline without it tumbling down to the yard below.  And I am quite in love with this one.  

If you are stopping by from the Blogger's Quilt Festival, welcome!  I have entered this one in the large quilt category!

Sale Sunday at Sew Sisters!

Quilting season is back and Sew Sisters are ready with 20% off continuous yardage of clearance fabrics.  Check out all the details on their blog.  Flat rate shipping in Canada and the US.  Sunday only!  Get shopping!!!!

Fabric Happy Mail

I ordered a bundle of Alison Glass's Endpaper fabric when she had a bundle sale a few weeks ago. It arrived on Friday and let me just say it is so gorgeous.  Deep, glowing and intense colours.  Just what I was hoping for.  Her current look book was included in the package and is drool worthy. Just saying.

Chugging along

 School has started again and I have been busy getting the school year under way with my amazing staff.  The good news is that all the children are happy in their classrooms and it was an incredibly smooth start.  I have found some time to work on my current big quilt project and got it all quilted and bound this past weekend. Full reveal coming soon but I think I am going to enter it into the Blogger's Quilt Festival coming up soon.  Let me just say, this one is a big one and it was a bit of a beast to quilt but I got 'er done!  Thank goodness for my amazing long table that butts up against my sewing machine table.  It works so perfectly when quilting.  The chairs around the table also help to keep the quilt in place on the table.  What a system, I tell ya!

And then the binding.  See that little scrap of purple.  That is how close I was with the binding.  It was a squeaker!  I love it when that happens.