Busy Wonderful June

June has been busy. Lots of school activities, sports and birthday parties. No complaints from me although it meant less time sewing. My youngest turned 8 and this is the amazing cake my SIL made him. Since it was last day of school that day also the theme was 'Summer Holiday' - is the snowman sun bathing not just too funny?

We went to Sweden over the weekend and celebrated no less than two birthdays - my sons and my brothers. Besides the opportunty to be with my family I was also able to work a bit on the star quilt. It is almost there :) Almost. Just need to piece the two parts together and I can start adding borders. My brave Mom (yes, the woman who never quilted before and dived right in the deep end with a huge hand quilt) and I decided the border colors and we also went though different quilting options. Will most likely end up with quilting just around and inside the stars to keep it simple.

I am halfway done with quilting the instant satisfaction quilt. Not so instant after all since life all of a sudden became very busy. I decided however that I will keep the quilt myself - first time I dont give it away. Moda Freebird was the first fabric line I completely fell in love with so I feel something special for this quilt. Can't wait to snuggle up on my couch with it. That is if my cats don't beat me to it. They seem to have a preference for sleeping on quilts no matter what line of fabric it is ;)

 

Mr. Green and I are not best of friends…

The fabric for my Freebird backing and binding came today and I managed to get the kids too bed early so I could  sew the back. Bad Mommy!  I will hopefully be able to baste and quilt over the weekend – that is if my kids decide to behave themselves and provide entertainment to each other.

While waiting for the backing to come from the UK I started a new quilt. Pink and green. These are VERY unusual colors for me – don’t think I have ever made something pink before. To me it screams sun, summer, strawberries and enjoying a glass of cool white wine with my sweetheart. I made some simple blocks and then decided I needed a  bright green solid to go with it. Very sure of myself I went to the local quilt store WITHOUT the blocks and picked out the green.

Of course it turned out it was too bright, too yellow and thus didn’t have the effect I was looking for.  This is not the first time I mess up with green. Seems like Mr. Green and I have a little problem. Opposite Mr. Blue and me - we rarely (if ever) mess up.

It’s not really as bad as the pictures display. It is greener in ‘real life’ but no matter what it was not going to work. So the summer blanket is on hold for a little while longer - at least until I can drag myself to the store again..

Meanwhile I found another fabric piece I bought a while ago – and luckily it looks perfect with the green. And adding a little of my trustful Kaffe Fasset teal  only makes it better.  This could end up being a really good quilt…

Coming Home

A little update on the ‘Coming Home’ quilt….The colors are a bit on the wild side but I can’t help loving it even though. 

I finished the blocks and just ordered fabric for the border and backing. I was planning to do a 5x6 block quilt but decided I wanted a square instead so I made another row today and it's now 6x6. It will take a weeks time before the border fabric comes so I will have plenty of time to plan a back. Or I could just go ahead and start a new quilt  ;)

Do you know the feeling of a detail that always catches your eyes? For me it is the green block in the top row. One of them has a white dot that blends in with the neutral background. Arghhh! Why did I not see this when I laid up the blocks?

I had a bit of a struggle picking the color for the border. The quilt it self is very intense. Wanted to go red to frame it a bit but they were is sold out (have to get it from the UK for tax reasons) so I opted for a green border instead.

Funny thing I noticed today while sewing was that the Freebird fabric matches the poster I have over my table perfectly. Isn’t that funny? Guess I must really like the Freebird colors :) 

Ohhh my....

My Mom just sent her part to me and I couldn't resist taking a picture of the progress. I still need to make two more rows. Notice my foot in the bottom of the picture - it looks so small and I'm otherwise known as Mrs. Bigfoot around here. I tell you... this quilt will be gigantic.

Instant satisfaction

I needed some instant satisfaction on the quilting front. We have a long weekend (yeah) and its filled with social activities, family visits and a bat mitzvah so I wanted to whip something up that I could spend a few minutes on here and there without losing the red thread.

I saw the ‘Coming Home’ pattern in Camille Roskelleys ‘Simplify’ and thought it would be great with the 4 Moda Freebird charm packs I had. So far I used  3 and have 5x6 rows. It is so much fun to make this... just what I needed :)