New Bee on the Block - Test Block

I am exhausted.  I spent the entire evening cleaning and rearranging and organizing my sewing/scrapbooking/getting ready room.  I think this is the first time it's been properly clean in the 2 years I've been living here.  It feels soooo good to have it all done!!

After I finished cleaning I was wiped, but I still had a little time to do some sewing.  Holly sent out fabric and posted instructions for her block for the New Bee on the Block quilting bee yesterday.  The fabric is coming from the States, so it'll probably be a few days. In the mean time I thought I'd test her block with some of my own fabric.  I decided to use the fabrics I am using for the We Can Do It!  quilt along so that I could add it to that quilt if I wanted.

The pattern made me laugh.  Every so often it would say to do something 'carefully'.  Carefully cut this... carefully measure that... carefully sew together...  When am I ever not careful?!  If you know me, you know I'm a bit lot of a perfectionist, so I'm always careful.  I thought it was cute.

 Anyway, I was pretty happy with how it turned out!

Now I feel like I can handle this block and not mess it up and ruin Holly's fabrics!

Skill Builder Sampler QAL - Block #3

I don't have much to say about this block, except that I finished it!  Yay!

It's blurry.  I was too lazy to retake and reupload the picture, so I left it like this...

WIP Wednesday #4

Here's a special WIP Wednesday Thursday edition!

Completed Projects

1)  Coffee Cup Sleeve

More info on this further in the post!

2) Mended Jeans

I fixed a tiny hole in a pair of jeans in exchange for a little shelving unit to store my fabric.  A pretty good swap, I'd say!

3)  Hot Pads

I actually finished these quite a while ago, but never shared them.  I love to crochet hot pads, and so when I started sewing, naturally they were the first thing I made!

Ongoing Projects

1)  Spring All Over Quilt

Like the new name?  Martha came up with it!  When I was trying my hardest and not succeeding to come up with a clever name for this quilt, I wanted to somehow incorporate 'spring' into it.  I love it!  Martha will be receiving the coffee cup sleeve pictured above! 

I finished the quilting...

...trimmed the edges...

...made the binding...

...and started sewing it on!

I didn't realize how long hand sewing the binding takes.  I spent about 40 minutes on it and only got 4 feet.  But it was a good excuse to sit down and watch some TV while still being productive!

2) Wedding Placemats

I haven't actually done any work on these, but I was able to order the fabric last week!  Well, not all the fabric I wanted.  Due to the delay and the postal strike most of the fabrics I wanted were sold out.  But I still got some great ones!

3)  Skill Builder Sampler QAL

I made some more progress on this!  Read more about it here.

4)  Olive Circles Dress

Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of this.  I went over to my mom's house on Monday night and we worked on it.  Well, she worked on it while I looked through and ironed her fabric.

It's coming along and is starting to look like a dress!  I just need to get some wide bias tape.  They were out at the fabric store.  :(

5)  Kaleidoscope Quilt-Along

Cutting instructions were posted last week, but I haven't gotten to it yet.  I did finally pick out my fabrics for it, though!

I'm going to make the kaleidoscopes red and black and white with a black background.  The black circly-flowery fabric is for the binding, and the white is for the back.  It's actually a tone-on-tone print of leaves and ivy, but you can't see it in the picture.  You can barely see it in real life!

6)  Retro Trees Skirt

I bought the pattern for this one:

It's hard to tell in the picture, but it has cute pleats on the side!  

On Hold

1)  New Bee on the Block Quilting Bee

2)  2 Dresses

3)  Cosmo Bag

New Projects

1)  Tinkerbell PJ Pants

I love Tinkerbell!  She's my favorite Disney character.  I was perusing at the fabric store the other day and found some fun flannelette for 60% off.  You can never have too many pj pants!  :)  The remnant matches a lot better in real life than in the photo. 

As usual, Cleo was hanging in the sewing room with me while I was working in there.  She's afraid she might miss the action if she's not right there!  Of course, no WIP Wednesday post is complete without a picture of her.  The thing with her, though, is she hates pictures.  Whenever I aim the camera at her this is what she does:

We have this duck and chicken jerky that is actually a dog treat.  She loves the stuff, and knows the word 'jerky'.  So I decided to bribe her with some jerky to get a decent shot.

That's better!

Skill Builder Sampler QAL - Block #2

The second block was announced last Friday - a Value 9 Patch.  I saw it at work and printed out the instructions.  I looked it all over and figured it was easy enough!  Check it out:

Photo courtesy of Sewn

I was in Waterton all weekend and didn't have a chance to work on my block until Sunday evening.  I figured it was easy-peasy and didn't need to refresh my memory by looking at the instructions.  Here's how my block turned out:

I was so proud of it!  All (but one) of the corners lined up and were so nice and crisp!  But then I took a look at what we were supposed to make, and that's when I realized I was waaaaay off!  So I had to make a second correct block:

And it even passed the black and white test:

I think I'll still keep the wrong square and add it to the quilt somewhere.  I still like it and am happy with how it turned out!

WIP Wednesday #3

Unfortunately not much got done this week  :(  I was focused on the party all last week and then was gone to Golden for white water rafting on the weekend.  But, I did get a little done!

New Projects

1)  Amy Butler's Cosmo Bag

I found some left over home decor weight material that I had bought to recover my vanity stool.  The pattern is a little larger, so I thought it would be perfect for this bag!

Ongoing Projects

1)  Pink and Green Quilt

Ok, I need to pick an original name for this one.  Any suggestions?  If you have any, leave a comment!  I'll pick my fave and the winner will receive a cute coffee mug sleeve :)

Anyway, I have almost finished the quilting for this one!  I'm probably about 3/4 the way through!

Now I just have to cut and sew on the binding.  I'm going to use this for the binding:

It's getting so close! I'm so excited to be almost done my first quilt!  I couldn't have done it without Cleo; she was such a big help.

2)  Wedding Placemats

Unfortunately due to the lame Canada Post strike, we weren't able to order the fabrics I wanted from Hawthorne Threads.  So I might not get these done in time.  The wedding is at the end of July.  Bah.

3)  Skill Builder Sampler QAL

You can see my progress here.

4)  Olive Circles Dress

I got the pattern and material cut out for this one.  I now just have to book a time with my mom to go over to her place and use her serger.

On Hold

1)  Kaleidescope Quilt-Along

2)  New Bee on the Block Quilting Bee

3)  Retro Trees Skirt 

4)  2 Dresses

Completed

1)  Pillowcase Skirt

Well, this one isn't actually completed.  I had cut it the length I wanted, made the space for the elastic waistband, and threaded the elastic through when I finally decided to try it on.  It was too small for my big bum!  I was so disappointed!  So I'm just going to take it apart, keep the elastic for something else, and cut it up for a quilt.  Oh well, you win some and you lose some.

Skill Builder Sampler QAL - First Block

Yay!  The first block for the Skill Builder Sampler QAL was announced last week.  Since I had Cleo's Birthday Party on Friday night, and then was whitewater rafting on Saturday, I didn't get a chance to make the block until Sunday.  But first, I wanted to rearrange and organize my sewing space a bit better.  Here's what I came up with:

I'm still organizing and trying to turn my 'office' from more of a scrapbooking/crocheting focus to a sewing area as well.

Anyway, once I got this area tidied, I decided it was time to get to work on my Log Cabin square.  Since I am still a relatively new sewer, I don't have a whole lot of scraps, but since I am frugal and have made it my goal to use second hand fabrics and sheets wherever possible, I'm just using what I have.

Here's how it turned out:

That was fun.  Now I just have to wait for the second block...

Am I Crazy?!

I think I might be.  I have never quilted before and just signed up for my second quilt-along.  Not second ever, but second for the same period of time.

Elizabeth at Don't Call Me Betsy is hosting a Kaleidescope Quilt-Along that looks like so much fun!  Be sure to head over to her blog to check it out.

We'll see how long I last keeping up with two quilt-alongs plus my own side projects...