I've been quiet on the blog lately, but have been busy sewing. Just no photos of anything, so I thought I'd share a photo of the two cutest grandkids around.
I've been completing some quilt tops and spent yesterday pin basting 3 quilts. I really dislike the basting process and have been putting it off as long as possible. All 3 quilts I basted will be donation quilts and I'm going to work on my free motion skills while quilting them. I have a really hard time with the quilting step. I never seem to like the design or the technique I've used. The only way to get better is to practice, practice, practice!

I'll be sure to take photos before turning the quilts in to our community service coordinator.

She's 1 today

Obviously Hayden wants the world to know how old she is!

Birthday time

Hayden's first birthday is actually next Wednesday, but her birthday party was today. She enjoyed her cake! She also enjoyed eating melon with Grandpa. (click photos if you want a larger view)

Photos of recent work

Here are the photos from the projects I mentioned yesterday. This first photo is a faux log cabin from our quilters' day out session in May. We were all supposed to bring one jelly roll pack and were provided the pattern. I wanted to use a different layout-one that looked more like a log cabin-but I didn't have enough contrast for the layout I wanted so I ended up with this layout. Once I quilt this, I'll probably donate this to one of our guild's charity projects.


This table runner is the first of two I made while getting my precise piecing lesson from Karen. I finished the quilting after taking the photo and now need to finish the binding.




This sunflower wallhanging caused me a great deal of angst. This is the project started when 9 or 10 of us took a lesson from Judy Heyward up in Karen's studio. I wrote about the class here where you can also see a photo of what the original pattern looked like. I didn't want to make my project exactly like the pattern, but wasn't having much luck in making a composition I liked. I finally ended up with this design and while I don't love it, I don't hate it like I did an earlier version. The fabric for the inside of the sunflower and the brown border at the top and the left was made by weaving together thin strips of 3 fabrics. It was a lot of work for not much effect.


Finally here is my version of the origami bag which one of my fellow Ducks demoed for us last week. I put my handles too close to the edge. The bag starts out as a square and is folded in such a way to make some small pockets inside before stitching. This one measures about 14" x 16".


As always, click on the photos for a larger view.

Busy in the studio

I've actually been sewing lately. The summer heat hit with a vengeance this week and it's just easier to stay in the air conditioned house sewing. I don't have any photos yet, but I promise I have been working. I'll try to get some photos posted tomorrow.

Today I finished a top that I started at our guild's Quilters' Day Out in May. Earlier this week I finished the top I started in the Sunflower class we took with Judy Heyward. On Tuesday our mini-group, the Ducks, had a demo on the construction of an origami bag and I made one of those this week. Also today I quilted a table runner that I made in a piecing class with Karen. I'm not a precise piecer and Karen offered to give me a couple of lessons to improve my piecing technique. It's amazing how much better things look when you take your time and do it right!

Early today a group of us met at Sew n' Sew fabrics for their annual $1 fat quarter sale. Sew n' Sew is in a really small building and it's tight quarters on a normal day. Today is was shoulder to shoulder quilters pawing through the boxes of fat quarters. I didn't really need anything and just went along to join in the fun.