December Goal Done!

My final One Monthly Goal of 2018:  Mrs. Billings Coverlet.
 Finally!
This was the best photo I was able to get for now--laid out on the floor of the Pelican Lake Conservation Club. 

Helping me get to  the  finish was this little gizmo I picked up on Black Friday. It's a Reliable travel size steamer. It is a steamer only--no heat setting, no dials, just on and off. Also, there are no feet or stands--it lays flat Fortunately, the travel case is also a heat resistant "trivet". Anyway, it steams like crazy and I was able to flatten my nine yards of backing fabric in about 10 minutes. 

The quilting was only done in the light areas, except for some of the larger motifs on the quilt. I ended up having a lot of fun doing it--nothing over the top, but I think it's okay.  

In my search for a binding, I came across the leftover's from another quilt backing. It had all the right colors so I decided to give it a go--it's a little different, but I like think the results are kind of fun.
Whew! What a year!
Linking with One Monthly Goal HERE

Progress Report

The stars aligned, and my Mrs. Billings Coverlet is complete with a label as of yesterday! Before I could begin quilting her, I needed to get Sanjou off of the quilting machine. It's a small quilt, so it didn't take much time. 

I had pieces of this border print in two colorways, but not enough to really use effectively on the front of a quilt--a drawback when buying a FQ bundle. I think they make a fun back though. 

This stylish lady makes a good label for my French influenced table topper, no?

Willow says:  Here's my pink elephant--step away from the quilt and play with me!  

One More November Finish

I have one more November finish!  
I'm either way ahead or far behind in my seasonal sewing, but in any case, the Twilight quilt is done! 

The binding was finished on the last evening in November, and now Twilight will be packed away until next autumn. Hopefully I will remember where I put it--lol! 

Twilight designed by Buttermilk Basin

I used a water erasable pen to mark the ribbon candy quilt path.
When I do a repetitious quilting like this, I start to zone out and pretty soon I'm doing an entirely different design--lol! 

There are still a few "zoned out" areas, but I'm pretty happy with how it came out. 

I used this TIP from Natalia Bonner to remove the blue water erasable pen marking--amazing!!!!

More finishes coming soon..... 

December One Monthly Goal

Well, I guess it's about time I bite the bullet and make my Mrs. Billings quilt my One Monthly Goal for December.

This project has been on my list of things to finish since January. Now it's the last month of the year and Mrs. Billings still needs quilting--ack! It's going to be a lot of work, but you can see I have a willing helper.

Sanjou is on the machine at the moment, so I will have to finish it up ASAP. I was trying to squeeze in one more November finish but didn't quite make it.
I did get another top done though, and will share it later next week.

Wish me luck!!!

Linking with One Monthly Goal HERE

November Bonus

I couldn't resist getting my Temecula Quilt Company "Secret Santa" top quilted. 

I used the same meander pantograph that I used for my 4" x 5" Anthology quilt. 

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 I don't do a lot of Christmas decorating anymore, but this quilt will be a little spot of holiday cheer on the sofa--so cute! I should have made a Burgoyne Surrounded quilt a long time ago....
no half square triangles to square up, mostly strip piecing, and scrappy--what's not to love?!?

It looks like there are a lot of pieces in each block, but most of it is done with strip piecing (instructions HERE) and goes together super fast. 

For the backing, I used a Judie Rothermel black and cream piece (that I've had in my stash for a while) since all my background fabrics in the quilt are lights with black prints. I think I purchased this fabric as a background for an applique project. I have no idea what that project was at this point, so I'm happy to use it up on the back. 

With a little luck, I may get a third quilt finished before December. I'm determined to clear my design wall before the new year! 

November Finish

Some sweet friends helped hold up my quilt so I could get a photo--this is a really long quilt! 

The 4" x 5" Block Anthology quilt was my One Monthly Goal for November. 

I used a meander style pantograph to quilt it....

...and a silver gray Aurifil thread that blended into everything very nicely, I think. 

A label, of course! 

This month's Patches of Blue SAL block is the sleigh.
I have decided that I want my quilt to be a "year round" blue and white quilt, so I am leaving off the snow flake applique and subbing a different block from the book for the sleigh. 

I decided on the  Oak Leaf and Reel block which was too large to fit into the space, so I shrank it down a bit using my printer. Then, since the space is a rectangle, I made more stars (there are other stars around the quilt)  to fill up the space on the side. This is the final block, so now I can start putting everything together--can't wait to see how it will look!

Linking with One Monthly Goal HERE

Mid-month Update

It boggles my mind to think we are already  half way through the month of November and Thanksgiving is coming up next week--wow! 

On Tuesday our guild had a workshop with Pat Speth of Nickel Quilts fame. This is the block I finished in class. It was a really fun day and so interesting to see what project and fabrics every other quilter chose to work on. 

We were given many project choices and I opted for Sunny Lanes. It will be a donation quilt once it's complete.
I had a layer cake that I had won several years ago and calculated that I could cut the squares into quarters and have all the dark "nickels" or charms needed for the twin size quilt. Unfortunately, after starching and pressing, the layer cake squares only measured 10" x 9.75". Ack!  I had to dig through my stash to come up with some coordinating fabric. These aren't really the colors I have a lot of in my stash, so it was a bit of a struggle. The good news is that the parts of the layer cake squares that were too small to cut into nickels will be used for the border in some way. 

My Summer Circles aka Arctic Circles is almost finished. It will get one more round of black elongated hexagons. 

I'm all caught up on the Secret Santa clues from the Temecula Quilt Co. and can't wait for the next one coming tomorrow. And.....

SPOILER ALERT......

I think I may have cracked the secret--what do you think???
I hope I'm right--I've wanted to do a Burgoyne Surrounded quilt for ages! 

November Goal

I seem to have been on a piecing binge lately, and there are a lot of choices to be my November completion goal.

There are three options on the design wall. Town Square with the blue house border, Twilight with the tiny stars, and my French General version of Sanjou.
(Sorry about the sun spots in the photo, but it it so nice to not have clouds for a change that I had to open the blinds wide.) 

It would be quite a feat if I could get Mrs. Billings quilted this month, but..... 

......I am most taken with my 4 x 5 Anthology quilt. I got the final borders on it yesterday and dug through my stash to figure out a back for it last night. I'm making it my November One Monthly Goal to get this one quilted and bound!
Linking with One Monthly Goal HERE
 

October Mission Accomplished

My October One Monthly Goal was to get the final borders on my Mrs. Billings top.
 I got one border done at home and the final three were finished at the first retreat I attended this month. I'm thrilled to finally have this one done!!!

I have to admit that instead of cutting my background into pieces, I used it as an applique background so I didn't have to make a bazillion more hexies. Also, it's a stripe, so there's that issue--lol!  I've been so ready to be done with this project and couldn't face making all those background hexies. Instead, I made a template from hexagon papers to use for placement of the wedges. 

Confession:
Can you tell I machine appliqued the shapes?
I left the papers in the shapes, glued them in place with basting glue (avoiding the papers), and after sewing down, cut away the back and removed the papers. I used Medeira Monofil thread (it's wonderful!) and a very tiny zigzag.

It's a huge quilt--wish I could get a better picture. This is Mrs. Billing on the floor of the retreat center. Now to decide how to quilt her!

Linking with Elm Street Quilts for One Monthly Goal HERE 

A Few Accomplishments

I got a few things finished at my second retreat. 

After I put together Step One of Temecula's Secret Santa (sorry, no photo), I started on Twilight. I managed to get all the stars done on the first day, and finished the whole quilt on the second day of camp. 

This little quilt is so cute--it measures approximately 25" x 33" and the pattern is from Buttermilk Basin. 

My 4" x 5" Anthology Quilt so far.
Maybe I should have made this my first project to work on at camp, but I was too excited about digging into my new Twilight quilt.  I got some of the Anthology rows sewn at the earlier retreat and now all of the vertical rows are done. The rows have all been numbered, so it's just a matter of sewing them all together to complete the top. First though,  the plan is to cut out the Secret Santa Step Two 9 patches to use as leader/enders while I sew the rest of this quilt. 

This is going to be the extent of my Sanjou from the Humble Quilts SAL.
I wanted to make mine a bit bigger and intended to do the final border with square in a square blocks to look similar to Lori's inspiration quilt. Last night I came to my senses and just added a plain border. It now measures 28"square. Next decision: Red binding or scrappy? Or maybe scrappy red?
Linking with Humble Quilts HERE

A Little Update

Just checking in before I leave for my second retreat this month. 

I needed to get a couple Christmas stockings completed before I leave home again. Our guild makes up kits from donated fabric that we can pick up at meetings. After we turn them in, they are filled with goodies and distributed to children in crisis. I was able to get two stockings out of one of my kits with a little tweaking. 

We also make place mats that are given out on Christmas by Meals on Wheels. This one was made from a second stocking kit that I just couldn't figure out how to make without the directional fabric going different directions. So.....I pieced the two fabrics to place mat size and added my own rickrack and binding. 

I also wanted to get the latest Patches of Blue quilt along block, Blue Barn, finished before I forget about it. I'm sure this would have been a challenging block if I hadn't just made all those 6" houses for Town Square. This one is 10"--huge--lol! 

Since Lori of Humble Quilts's latest sew along was a pretty small project (and gave me an excuse to  use some of my French General fabrics) I decided I would make a version of Sanjou. After seeing Lori's inspiration quilt, I think I will keep going on this one for a couple more rounds.  

I've resisted several Temecula Quilt Co. sew along's (except for Summer Circles), so I am joining in on the new Secret Santa quilt . There was almost no cutting for step one since I raided my boxes of scrappy squares. I will work on these at the retreat this coming week. 

I've had this Buttermilk Basin pattern, Twilight,  along with the fabrics, sitting on my cutting table for ages. I got everything cut out last night to take to retreat. I already have several projects still to work on packed in my car from this last week's quilt camp, but I don't want to be in danger of running out of things to do--haha! 

I hope you find some time to do some sewing too!