Progress! And Success!

I had a nice, few days off. Friday morning I got to pick out the fabrics I wanted to use for my quilt!

Like I mentioned last time, my goal was to use Parisville and Hello Pilgrim to make two easy quilt tops to whittle down my stash. What I love about both of these lines is how graphic and colorful they are - I'm a big fan of using color in quilts, and these two were definitely must-haves for me.

Not only did I use nearly the entire collection of Parisville (with a few exceptions), I paired it with some Cotton Couture solids. I'm not sure about all of the names at the moment - some of them were paired with Michael Miller's "Secret Garden" line, and some others were picked because they were major eye candy. That green in there, for instance, is called "Mermaid". How could I resist?

I ended up using an old pattern I've done before, by Oh Fransson - the "Charm Squares Baby Quilt". Except that this one will be more like a "Charm Squares Semi-Adult" quilt. 

By the end of my morning off, I'd cut up all the pieces I needed to begin. Everything got put on the pack burner until Sunday, when I had the whole day off - instead of starting on the Parisville quilt, I ironed and cut my "Hello Pilgrim" fabrics.

I'm a huge fan of those jewel fabrics, and this line did not disappoint. I've bought nearly all of them in yardage for future use because I'm a dork. And I love, love, love the colors in this line - so bright, so happy. It reminds me of a meadow. I'm saving all of my Lizzy House fabrics to make a bigger, more intricate quilt, so this was perfect to just use half of these fat quarters!

And here's some preliminary layouts. Nothing too final. I would have gotten further, but when you've been cutting for a while and you're watching Doctor Who and your dog is barking because you're not paying attention, well, it's probably time to call it a day.

Besides, who could say no to this face? 

That's all she wrote for today, folks. I can't wait for Sunday so I can start really working on these quilts - who knows, I might knock one of the two out!

 - Later Days,

Kait

On Goals and Toothaches

I hate having toothaches. I've always had problems with my teeth - from impacted teeth, to dental surgeries, to a propensity for cavities, you name it. But toothaches are the worst, aren't they? So it's lukewarm water and foods for me until this goes away. Although I was so frustrated by the lack of aid the aspirin was rendering that I drank a beer for the first time in nearly a year. It didn't make the pain go away, but it knocked me right out!

I pulled out my stack of Parisville fabrics - I've got most of the collection, not all - and have decided to make a larger version of Oh Fransson's Charm Squares Baby Quilt.

For me, a big part of deciding what pattern to use is whether or not it'll work with the large-scale prints a collection might have. As I've grown as a quilter, I have definitely become someone who likes to make quilts featuring collections rather than color schemes. I'll feature fabrics from other collections as accents, but mostly it's the collection itself I'm fond of (i.e. the "Little Folks Voile' quilt, or the 'Innocent Crush' string quilt).

Parisville has some beautiful, large-scale prints that I would hate to cut in half. Elizabeth's pattern is kind of perfect for it, plus it's easy, so it should finish quicker than the string quilt I recently did for 'Habitat'.

I also decided to do a large-scale, HST quilt for Hello Pilgrim. This line is great because it could work with a pattern with smaller piecing, but the pattern I've got in mind for it should a.) piece easily and b.) accent the colors. I love the scheme she chose, and as with all my Lizzy House fabric I'm saving certain pieces of it for a quilt featuring all of it later on!

I'm really looking forward to this weekend. I'm hoping to get some sewing done on both of these quilts and finish up some blocks for my Outfoxed Nine-Patch. Ya'll have a great day!

- Kait

except for the sound of bouzoukia...

... good golly, miss Molly, it's been a slow afternoon.

We've had two customers in the last two hours. Blame in on the fall, but the busy season is over. With my office work done - even the filing, which is a miracle - and bills paid, I've had the afternoon to think.

What do I want to accomplish as this year draws to a close? I brought my quilt books with me this morning, since I have to close - two of the many, that is - and I was thinking about what quilts to start next when I realized I had a lot more quilt tops made than I've had quilts finished.

So I think that's one of my goals. I'd like to have a few quilts finished by the end of the year, and a tangible place to have them - which means a little cleaning out of the ol' apartment. I've been meaning to do it anyway with the addition of Sulli to my household, but now it's kind of cemented. So that's goal two: clean the house.

Here's my simple list of goals for these last few months of the year:

1. Quilt and bind at least three of the tops I have in my closet. At least one of those should be for my bed, because there's at least four for that size!

2. I want to try out my new machine's free-motion quilting attachment.

3. Pot Holders! I've got all I need to make them, I just need to - well - make them... I love bright colors in my home to contrast with the white and black color scheme of the furniture and walls, so these are all from the 'snip snip' prints from Half Moon Modern, Wonderland, and the tiny deer from Oh Deer!

4. Clean the apartment! Or rather, re-organize and get rid of things I'll never wear (or fit into...)

5. Make some quick, easy quilt tops with fabric I've been meaning to use. So far, I'm thinking Parisville, Hello Pilgrim, and maybe Cocoon; I've got the first two planned and the last one I'm still thinking about :)

6. Design some stuffed sea creatures for my nephew's mobile. This one I need to get on STAT.


So there you have it. My list. Many things disguised as six things, but I think I can handle it! I'm still working on getting this darn google plus app to work, but I'll be back later this week with some pictures of quilt tops I've finished and other fun stuff.

Later days! - Kait

Sulli

There's a new top dog in town! After living by myself for the last three years, I finally got a roommate.

Her name is Sulli. She was about five weeks when I got her (in the picture above) and I think she's about three months or so now. She's got a really sweet disposition, if not a little bitey ... it's been a major transition to go from having only myself to think about to spending multitudes of time looking after a little creature, but I'm enjoying it. I think we'll be fast friends.

It's Been Awhile

I looked today and realized that wow, I hadn't updated in a long, long time!

Chalk that up to summer. Working in a restaurant is not conducive to having any time to do anything, especially when you live on an island. It's difficult to get anything done when you're working 12 hour days, much less blogging.

But life goes on! Despite the hectic schedule, I have managed to finish three more quilt tops! I'm rather proud of these, I have to say! More on these later.

I've curbed my fabric buying, but it hasn't stopped completely. How could it, with all of my favorite designers coming out with new lines? You're now looking at a proud owner of Field Study, The Birds and the Bees, Chicopee, and Out to Sea. I'm also pretty psyched about some lines of fabric that are coming out soon ... super, super psyched!

I also took in this little girl. Her name is Sulli, she's a Chihuahua, and she's about three months old. A friend of mine at work was giving them away, and I figured, "What the hell?" I've lived alone for the last three years, so we're still adjusting to each other ... but it's pretty awesome when to cut up fabric and have her grab a toy and sit at my feet. Pretty nice indeed. And besides a few accidents (one of which was on my newly finished Habitat top), we're doing alright!

All in all, I'm working on making this a better blog. I now have internet at the house (wi-fi!) on a laptop that works (hooray!), which is going to make it ten times easier to actually BLOG the things I'm doing. And with Instagram, who needs a digital camera anyway?

I'll be back later this week with some photos of the quilts I've done and some more insight on those! Later Days!

tea-dying and fabric buying

You know how sometimes you get a LOT done, and you want to write about it, but you can't sit yourself down at a computer to do so? Yeah. This week has been like that. But I have, you know, gotten a lot done! I'm very excited. It makes me glad to go home and know that everything is all nice, neat, and in-progress!

- I finished the first four desserts of the "Dessert-of-the-Month" club! I'm anxiously awaiting the confection for May (my birth month!)

- Having loved completing that so much, I bought the Fruit-of-the-Month club pattern, too! One week and nearly all of the thread later (JoAnn's was out of some), I'm nearly ready to begin!

- Because it seems as though places only carry either white or cream cross-stitch fabric, I tea-dyed mine. I have been having SO MUCH FUN tea-dying fabrics! I have an entire post ready to dedicate to this - hopefully it'll be up next week, when I've experimented yet more!

- Guess who finally got their air-filters changed? Me, that's who :) I'm trying to avoid the eventuality of my air conditioner breaking down (like it's done the past two summers ... le sigh)

- Watched "The Witches of Oz". It was cute, and Sean Astin and Billy Boyd were in it, so that was a plus for me!

- I may have bought some movies (like The Incredible Hulk, Pebble and the Penguin, Nemo's Adventure to Slumberland, Flight of Dragons...) and the artbook for the Avengers ... and some more Funko! Pop dolls ... which I may or may not be collecting.

- And some of Valori Wells' "Cocoon" may have found it's way to my house. The colors are the bomb in person, just sayin'. And I may have taken advantage of the FMF sale at Fabricworm and ordered some more prints that I initially planned. Ahem.

All in all, it's been a very good, very productive week. I'm looking forward to sewing tonight, and cleaning, and eating with my brothers!

P.S. Is anyone PSYCHED about the fabric coming out this spring? Nightshade, Tula Pink's other collection, Anna Maria's next collection, Guising, Winterkist... does anyone need a kidney donated? Because I think my collection is about to increase. Ya'll have a good weekend. See you later!

Progress!

I didn't get to spend nearly as much time as I'd have liked sewing on those two days I was off, but I definitely got some things accomplished!

- I finished my Scrappy Strings quilt top! In the end, after adding some colorful, modern prints to it and vetoing some of the darker ones, it has a fun, eclectic patchy feel to it, which was the point all along. I really loved the final product!

- Nearly all of my "Outfoxed" blocks are organized. I only have five more, and only because I ran out of squares for a couple prints! Strange, because I could have sworn I cut them all out exactly, but I have extras of those prints so it's a-ok!

- Put together some piles for my brothers and dad's quilts!

- Finally put some graphite in the door so that my key will be easier to turn! Gah!

- Picked up some quilting stuff: batting by the yard (on major sale at Hobby Lobby - only $8.99 a yard!) as well as some kona white and misc prints for quilts. Love love love! I also snagged a quilting frame for $9.00, a pretty sweet deal!

- We went and saw "Wrath of the Titans". And while (spoiler alert!) I'm not a fan of the idea of the Greek Gods just dying and fading away, I still really enjoyed the movie. It's an excellent 3-D movie, and the only actor who felt out of place was the gentleman who played Ares (he felt a bit robotic when he spoke his lines at times).

- In other super exciting news, I found more green Library Stripe! From Denyse Schmidt's Greenfield Hill line, Library Stripe has to be one of my favorite prints of all time, much less of Ms. Schmidt's! I've been looking for more ever since I accidentally threw away a bag of scraps it was in - and lo and behold, it was on quilthome.com! I definitely recommend checking them out if you're looking for an older print - they tend to have what I'm looking for!

For this next off day, I'd really like to sit back, relax, and do some real sewing! If I complete my Outfoxed top next, and then finish my green QAYG, I'd like to finish my Poseidon top or start on my Habitat quilt. Although maybe I need to actually QUILT some of the ones I've got in my closet first :)

Ya'll have a great Easter weekend!