Welcome Gnome pillow complete!

I finished the Welcome Gnome pillow in time to submit to the Pillow Collective at Amy's Creative Side.

I learned a lot making this pillow, not the least of which is remember to stuff your pillow before you stitch it shut. :)

  I like how it turned out. I ended up using the red border fabric I purchased for it on the back and used a dot from my stash instead. I polled the fam and they all agreed it was the better choice.



I Scotch-Garded both this pillow and the star pillow I made to make it easy to spot clean them. This one especially needed it since it is not a cover but stuffed and stitched shut. I won't be throwing this in the washer.

Again, this pattern is from Schlosser Designs and can be purchased for a limited time HERE.

 

Pillow Collective Entry

I tried paper piecing again! The pattern was at Amy's Creative Side as part of the Pillow Collective Blog Hop.

My pillow has no name and I am taking suggestions. :)

Here it is:

The back is envelope style and I did an overcast stitch along the edges inside to keep the unraveling to a minimum.

A couple of fabric choices I regret but I am not going to say which.

Bias edges in my blocks made for waviness and I had to look up how to put borders on correctly to fix it after 2 rounds of wavy borders. I was surprised at how changing how I put them on helped.

I used spray baste to quilt it and it caused me no end of grief. So many broken threads from gummed up needles! So, there is a lot less quilting on it than I had originally planned. I just couldn't take it anymore! :)

Making this pillow was good practice for a few skills and any project that turns out nice and allows for practice is a success.

See other pillows at Amy's Creative Side Pillow Collective link up HERE.

The Pillow Collective tutorial links are HERE.

 

Applique practice

I picked up a cute mug rug kit at the local quilt shop in November. I got it to make as a birthday gift, but ended up not having time to make it, so yesterday I made it for myself.

 It was quick and fun, once I figured out the applique order and chose an applique method. (Thank you Google and MIL!) The extent of the instructions for this kit were: "Your background fabric has been quilted... Sewwww all you need to do is add the applique, french knot for the bird's eye and place a button on the wing. Bind your mug rug and you're done!" The kit came with  ribbon and a piece of rickrack as well. Not sure what those were for. I took a photo of the sample at the suggestion of the shop clerk and those items were not on it. So I guess I got a bonus! :)

*Note for kit/pattern makers. It is my opinion that instructions should assume you know little to nothing about what you are doing. In fact, I think beginners pick up kits like these more often than experienced sewers. So even brief step by step instructions or tips would have been very much appreciated.  I summed up my process in 10 steps when I was done on the pattern sheet. Not too tough and now I know what to do next time.

 My applique is improving. I had some trouble with my Wonder Under. It did not want to stay on the fabric. I had to do the branch 2 times because when I peeled the backing paper off, the Wonder Under peeled off with it and also shredded the edges of the piece.

After listening to a recent podcast on mini quilts, I used MamaCJT's tips on using single fold binding to bind the quilt.

  I am not sure how big mug rugs run, but this seems a tad large for that category. It is closer to place mat size. It is now hanging on my wall with clips recommended by another podcaster (or 2) .

 

Baby Quilt done!

Quilt pattern is a disappearing nine patch, machine quilted with straight line quilting in a super-size crosshatch with squares in the centers.
I used a marker directly on the quilt to label it, though it faded a lot in the wash, it was still legible.
It says: Made by Amy W.... for E.....H.....W...... Vista CA, 07-16-2013

This quilt was machine quilted originally with a meander in the blue areas, with some custom doodles, like the baby's name, but it had to all be un-sewn due to major folding and bunching of the backing fabric. After hours of ripping stitches, I had to walk away from it for a while. When I came back I decided to go with straight lines instead.
On the first try it had just been pin basted. Second go round, I tried basting spray with a few pins around the edges. Not sure I like the spray much. See how wrinkly the back is? This is before I washed it. It helped up nicely for quilting and I had no trouble at all with bunching or folds in the back. But, it also gummed up the needles.
I actually hand bound this one, even though it is going to used. I usually prefer to machine bind for sturdiness but I had some down time at the dentist coming, so I used the opportunity to improve my binding talents. :)

One more UFO off the list.

UFO number 2 in the bag!

When the cat's away the mice shall play. :)

My husband is gone to Arizona for the weekend for a funeral and that leaves me with free time in the evenings after the kids are in bed to sew. So... another one bites the dust!

The year old UFO Jolly Holiday Pillow is complete. (Well, minus a pillow form. The one I used is one of the pillows that decorates my bed and does not fit well at all!)

Jolly Holiday Pillow - 01/26/13 10:06 PM - Amy

It was my first time making pleats and I was very glad I had my cheap little seam-guide-maker-thingy.

 I don't intend to keep up this pace.This just happened because I would like to complete  2 UFOs a month and I am running out of month and have a couple of other sewing commitments to finish. So I picked a small UFO to see if I could knock it out. Yay!

 

FNSI results

In spite of multiple interruptions from a certain 3 year old who did not want to stay in bed, I accomplished a fair amount last night during my Friday Night Sew In time. :)
  

 For starters, I cut the infinity scarf I am making for my sister to give to her friend.
A little Prince Charming anyone? :) Her friend likes frogs and I immediately thought of this line. I was lucky enough to find some for a very good price and my sister liked it. I hope to get it stitched up today and into the mail.

The I finished quilting the last 6 squares on the Christmas Table Topper.

I trimmed it up and made the binding and attached it.

That is one UFO complete!  25 left to go. :)
 

 

I did it! They are done!

A finish

This isn't actually my finish, but my son's. He finally has his doll frog quilt!
We enlisted Grandma Lorry to help us and she finished the binding before we left Texas.