Pink Orange Peel

This was a trial run for another quilt that I had in mind to make,  I just got the die so I decided to play with it first.  this one was made with fabric that I had in my stash.  

I really like the look of the background fabric, the border and the binding all being the same fabric.  in this case I had a lot to use, but it really blends well.  

 looking back I think I over quilted the middle of the stars, but like I said I can remember it for next time.

 this is the back.  

I gave this one to Evie Stone.

Denim Darling

I have thought about making a denim quilt for a while, they are so heavy you don't even need to put batting in them.   This was a fun quilt to make.  but I don't think I would make another one.  at least not one of only denim.  it was soooo heavy to sew through.  I used a big thick needle made for demin but I swear it was still rough on my machine.   

 Kim Flandro had a bunch of old jeans that she had started to cut up from her boys clothes.  I used my triangle cutter to cut up the denim.

 I played with both the chevron and the herringbone pattern.  I ended up not having enough triangles for both so I just made the chevron one.

here it is sewn into strips.  

 and finished.  I had the idea to sew on buttons while I was tying it but they just looked strange so I ended up cutting them off.  

 here it is completely done.  I didn't quilt it because it would have been a bear to stitch.  so I tied it without the strings hanging off.

I knew from early on that although I wanted to try to make a denim quilt I didn't really need another one, and much of the fabric came from Kim Flandro.  So when I finished the quilt I gave it back to Kim.  I just used some green and blue flannel scraps that I had for the back.

a few weeks ago Kim was telling me that she had gone in for surgery a month earlier, and this quilt was one of the things that she took to the hospital with her.  I loved to hear that.  I am glad that I decided that she was the one to keep this one.

Umbrella Fun

Like so many of the quilts I make this one started with a new die.  I bought the umbrella die and used scraps for the umbrellas.  I appliqued all of the umbrellas onto the white squares, then sewed the squares together.  

 the border is called piano keys I had a lot of the scraps that I had used for the umbrellas so I used them to make the borders.  then when I was quilting them I just sewed on either side of the seams and it produced a really fun effect

 all done ready for binding.  

Stella and Jason had just moved to Seattle, I figured that this quilt would  help with the rainy months there.  I think they really liked it.  

Christmas Star

 a few years ago when I was first starting to quilt I made a quilt for my parents and one for Soren's parents that had Christmas gifts on them.  I had a bunch of 2.5in strips left over from that project.  I knew that eventually I would find something else to do with those.  

so begins the Christmas star project.  

I think I had also recently gotten a new die that cut triangles and squares from 2.5in strips so I started to play.  

 the pieces were pretty little and sometimes a pain in the neck to work with. 

 they came to about a 12 inch block

 I added the sashing 

 here it is in black and white

 and then the borders.  

 I finished it with some Christmas toys on the back.  quilted mostly in the ditch around the stars.  and I gave it to Grandma Ford for Christmas 2015.  I figured it would be a fun size to sit on her lap.  

English Paper Piecing

 This is english paper piecing.  Everything is done by hand.  It is slow but not really that difficult.  I wanted to give it a chance.  First I went through my scraps and cut hexagons out of the little bits of fabric I had.  there were a lot of scraps that didn't really go with anything it was just left over.  Then I used a paper punch to punch out the hexagon shapes out of index cards.  i felt like i had so many shapes but i used every last one on this quilt.  

then I put the fabric on the back of the hexagon shape and basically sewed the fabric around it.  once each hexagon was covered with fabric.  I had to stitch the hexagons to each other.  Once the hexagons were joined to another one I could then remove the paper in the middle.  

 I chose this project because I wanted to give it a try and I was pretty pregnant with Gus and it was something that I could do sitting on the couch while I watched the kids play.  it was all by hand so there was no big machine.  just a needle and thread.   I ended up stitching it to the front of another piece of cloth and then sewing around it.  Then I tied it to finish it.  since this picture the ties have gotten a little frayed and maybe someday I will retie it with string instead of yarn but it is a soft comfy blanket.  Rhys calls it the flower blanket.   While I think sometimes how much time it took to make it i am happy when he asks for that one, for his choice of blankets at night.

(the above picture is baby Gus with the flower blanket)

Circle Twist

There is a woman in our ward that does new born photography.  I was thinking the other day that we could barter I would make her a quilt in exchange for her taking little baby Gus's pictures.  After she took the pictures of gus I was looking around her house to see kind of what her color scheme of her house was.  She liked the orangy coral color and aquas.  So I decided on that.  When I first started I was expecting that this quit would be just random circles, but then I started playing with placement.  Soren who was working on things for work at the time gave me the idea for swirls.  

 here they were just sitting on the cloth.

 it gives it a really fun movement to the quilt.  

 I am not sure if I have a finished picture but I ironed then appliqued all the circles on.  once the top was finished I basted it like normal and then stitched pebbled in the white background.  There were a lot of circles in this quilt but it was fun.  I think there will be more circle quilts in my future.

Here is the finished project

this was the fabric on the back.  I found the fabric and then chose the colors for the front from the back.