Double Star in Thirteen Color Combinations

Over two years ago I made this Double Star block as part of the Skill Builder Sampler and last week I thought that I would revisit it.

This is the block I made.  Much lighter and more open than the original.  Before I came up with this coloring I played with quite a few others.  You see, I bought myself EQ7 as an early Christmas present and had to make it earn it's keep.  ;)  (I love that program!)  After trying a few different color combos I kept coloring to see how many different color/value combinations I make. 

The first time I saw this block the quilter used this rainbow fabric placement.  I really love the look.  I might have to make another block.  :)  Here are the other designs I came up with:

  "Fire Star" blocks for my 4 year-old super hero girl.

 

I love the navy and blue color combo! 

 I grant you, there are probably easier ways of piecing some of these variations, but wow!  Pretty amazing what differences color placement and value can make.  You can find the tutorial for this block here.  

I hope you had a Merry Christmas and have a Happy Sewing New Year!
Keep warm!  The high here tomorrow is going to be -8F/-22C.  I'll be staying inside (and hopefully sewing).  :)

The AQS Show

On Wednesday I went to the AQS Quilt Show in Des Moines.  The highlight of the show was seeing Marlene's We Can Do It! Skill Builder Sampler on display.  Not only was it on display, but it won 2nd place in the bed quilt category!!!!  It know it is all her work, but I do have to admit to a feeling of pride and a quite a bit of "Hey, look!  That quilt is from my quilt along!"  :)

Here are Marlene and I in front of the quilt.  It was great to meet her and see all of the quilt details up close.  

Pick me up mom!  She later crawled up and down the aisles.

Our time together was interrupted as my darling children spilled a bunch of pretzels on the floor.  Good times.  I didn't stay at the show for long, but I did decide one thing as I looked at all of the quilts.  I want to use more color in my background fabrics.  I was really drawn to quilts with bright backgrounds.

White is my go-to safe choice and looks fresh and clean, but what about yellow?

 Or green?

 Or Red?

More yummy yellow?

Or Orange?

I think it is time to say, "I can do it!" and mix things up with new background colors.  What is your favorite background color?  What was the most crazy background color you have ever used?  I think mine is the scrappy black backgrounds in my Star Flowers quilt.  Yeah, I'm not very daring.  ;)

Skill Builder Sampler Quilt #2 - Colleen's Flower Quilt

The idea for this quilt started over two years ago.  There were a series of online conversations that made me wonder if I was doing all I could quilting wise.  There were so many things I wanted to make, but I was scared and intimidated to try them. Foundation paper piecing, applique, curves and working with templates scared me.  I figured I wasn't the only one out there with those feelings so I decided to start a quilt along where we would focus on one skill each month and make three blocks (easy, medium and challenging) with each skill.

I decided to call it the We Can Do It!  Skill Builder Sampler.  I love Rosie the Riveter and the feeling of "yeah, this is tough, but we can do it!"  And we did.  I learned that the hardest part of any block was overcoming the feelings of intimidation and being overwhelmed.  Not all of my blocks turned out perfect and I don't think I will ever like working with templates, but that is ok.  I tried it and in my book that is a success.

So for 12 months (with a two month break due to morning sickness!) we made 3 blocks a month.  You can take a look at all the great blocks and quilts the other women made in our flickr group.  I was originally going to put all 36 blocks into one queen sized quilt, but half way through I decided to make coordinating quilts for three of my girls.  Colleen loved all of the flower, rainbow and butterfly blocks so they all made it into her quilt.

This was such a learning experience!  I am entering this quilt in the Blogger's Quilt Festival in the Bed Quilt Category.  Head on over to nominate your favorite quilt!

Quilt Stats:

Size:  Approx. 64 x 92

Fabrics:  Kona White and mostly Holly Holderman

15 twelve inch blocks with 2 inch sashing

Custom quilted by me on a rented long arm machine

Skill Builder Sampler #1 - Baby Quilt

I am entering Kate's Skill Builder Sampler quilt in the ROYGBIV Category of the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  I picked my favorite blocks out of the We Can Do It! Skill Builder Sampler to make this baby sized quilt.  I was so proud of myself when I made the Circle of Geese Block!  I love the cheery rainbow colors.

Shouldn't every play area have a quilt on it?

Quilt Stats:

Size:  33 x 48 inches
6 twelve inch blocks with 3 inch sashing

Fabric:  Kona White and Mostly Holly Holderman

Finished Date:  February 2013

Head on over to the Blogger's Quilt Festival to see more wonderful quilts and don't forget to nominate your favorite!

This Week...

This week my Aunt Janie came to visit.  She insisted that she wanted to see my quilts, so I happily obliged.  Little did she know there would be so many.  Little did I know - and I didn't even end up showing her all of them!  I think they have been multiplying.  :)

Today I rented time on a long arm machine and quilted Julie's Skill Builder Sampler quilt.   Don't you love the colors she used?   It was fun to quilt it up for her!

Tomorrow I need to focus on the garden.  It is time to do some planting, weeding and mowing!  My reward for working hard in the garden?  A full day of sewing on Saturday with the DMS Modern Quilt Guild!!!  It doesn't get much better than that.  :)

Good News, Bad News, Best News

Good News!  Yesterday I rented time on a long arm quilting machine and worked on my Skill Builder Sampler Quilt!  I had a lot of fun trying new things in each of the blocks.  None of them are perfect, but it is a Skill Builder, right?

 There were swirls.

 Squares.  I had a lot of fun doing this one but my husband thinks it is ugly, whatever...It is awesome!

 Pebbles and flowers.

 Stars.  Not my best design choice to fill in the negative space, but live and learn.  Husband thinks they look like witches' stars...They are just regular stars!  Men...

 Big swirl.

I borrowed a stencil to do something special in the middle of the feathered star.

 I even tried my hand at feathers.  Can you see them in the white?

 But my favorite block is this one.  I loved the block to begin with and I love the flowers and leaves around the edges.  I may be bad at feathers, but I can free motion quilt me flowers like no one else!  :)

Bad News...my backing wasn't long enough!  @#$%#  It stopped about six inches before the end of the quilt!   So I am cleaning the house, posting this and basically procrastinating so I won't have to deal with adding on an extra strip of backing, basting and quilting the bottom.  Ick.  I hate messing up!  I'm trying to tell myself that it won't be so bad, just take a deep breath and do it, right?  :)

Best News.  I have the best baby in the whole world.  No, don't bother to argue, it is true.  :)  I took her to the quilt shop with me and she played happily on the floor the whole time.  Some fussing when she had a messy diaper or was hungry or ready for a nap, but she was Amazing!  I brought an exersaucer for her to play in and a backpack carrier for her to ride in, but didn't have to use them at all.  She just played on the floor with her toys - thankfully she can't crawl yet!  I figured taking care of her added an extra hour onto the quilting process, but it was well worth the extra rental time to finally have the quilt done...well, almost done...
Wish me luck!

Updated:  I did it!  And it wasn't even that bad.  ;)  Off to bind!

QuiltCon Post #2

Before going to QuiltCon I felt rather obligated - in a good way! - to make some cool, handmade stuff to take.  I used some fabric from the Heather Ross Fabric Swap I hosted last fall to make this awesome triple-zip bag to hold my English paper piecing  (tutorial found here) and sunglasses case.  I made the case much like this tutorial, except I added a magnetic snap and decorative button and stitching.  Love!  And I love that I had to use the sunglasses even more!

 I also finished binding this quilt for Becca to use.  It almost didn't make it - I literally pulled the quilt out of the dryer and stuffed it into my bag minutes before going to the airport.  But man, I love all of those rainbow colors.

Becca had fun playing on it during some of the lectures at the conference.  She also had fun playing with my show pass and name tag.

I made this name tag a few weeks ago to take too.  I am loving the thread on the sewing machine!  I'm not keen on the bow, but it was necessary to cover a stain.   Not as many people at the conference had quilted name tags as I had expected.  My husband thought I was kidding when I mentioned that it was encouraged in our local guild to make a name tag to wear at the meetings - we're a crazy bunch!

I hope you aren't sick of QuiltCon yet, because I have a few more posts to go and a small giveaway coming up next week!  Have a great weekend!

Skill Builder Sampler Roundup!

Yea!!!  I finally finished sewing my We Can Do It! Skill Builder Sampler blocks together!!  I love how they look!  I love all of the things that I have learned doing this sampler!  I can't believe that just a year ago I had never tried paper piecing, or inset seams and that I was scared of templates and curved piecing!  I still don't like tracing templates and cutting fabric without my rotary cutter but now I know it isn't impossible.  :)

I decided to sew my blocks together into three different quilts for my three girls that share a room.  (Got to have matching quilts, right?)  Aleah really liked the star blocks, so I pulled all the blocks that had a star feel for her.  Thankfully, Colleen was enamored with the flower and butterfly blocks, so she got them.  Her quilt has a more cohesive/matchy feel, but I like them both.

I put my very favorite stars in the middle of Aleah's quilt.  They aren't perfect but man do I like them and am quite proud of the learning and effort that went into making them.

I love the look of applique blocks on this quilt and am sure to be doing more of it in the future too!  Practice makes perfect.

I pulled some of my favorite blocks from the group to make Kate's little quilt.  I really like how this group looks together!  We made so many fun blocks this year!

And now I proudly present the beautiful work of those who participated long term in the Skill Builder Sampler!!!

(Disclaimer:  Not all of the pictures on flickr would let me copy them and I am brain dead from lack of regular sleep, so if your quilt or blocks are not in the mosaic, please forgive me and send me a link to where I can find them and I will add them to the post.)

1. It's Christmas time!, 2. Skill builder Sampler quilt, 3. Skill Builder Sampler, 4. Red and White quilt blocks, 5. skill builder front #2 (7 blocks on back), 6. Skill Builder Quilt Top in progress, 7. skill builder quilt, 8. Skill builder - all done, 9. so far, 10. Skill Builder Sampler 1-18, 11. SBS QAL, 12. DSCN3759, 13. Skill Builder Quilt #2, 14. Skill Builder Sampler Blocks - FINISHED!, 15. All 36 SBS Blocks!, 16. P1030340, 17. DSC_0117, 18. Blocks 1-36, 19. we can do it - skill builder sampler, 20. Skill Builder Quilt #1

I cannot say enough about the beauty and skill represented by these quilts and blocks!   All of the color combos, sashing options and quilting just blow me away.  Please follow the links or pop over to the Skill Builder Sampler Flickr Group and give these ladies some love!  They deserve it!!!  Here are some close ups of finished full sized tops:

Tanya's - Whenever I saw her blocks I would think, "I really like those colors and fabric...oh wait, we are using the same line of fabric that's why!"  Great minds think alike!  Look at the tiny pieced sashing!  I can't even imagine piecing all of that!  The girl's got skills!

Cassie's-  I love this color combo too!  Consistently beautiful blocks - I love how the quilting makes it all crinkly and ready to cuddle up with.

 

Vanessa's was finished and hand quilted before anyone had even sewn all of their blocks together!  Bee-you-ti-ful!!  It looks like spring!

Marlene ran with the We Can Do It! theme for her beautiful quilt.  I love the center panel and We-Can-Do-It colors!  The rivets around the edge are awesome.  What a great reminder of this year of sewing and learning!

Thank you to everyone who participated in the Sampler!  I would never have kept it up and learned all that I did if you weren't following along.  If you are just discovering the We Can Do It! Skill Builder Sampler, please keep making the blocks and posting them to the flickr page!  I will keep checking in and will highlight Skill Builder progress here.  

For those who made all (or almost all) of the blocks but who haven't put them together into a quilt -- get going!  ;)  It makes me feel guilty, knowing that I am leaving you with a stack of blocks cluttering up your sewing area.  Sew it up and show it off to friends and family this holiday season!

Again, Thank You! Thank You!  Thank You! for your support!  

And remember, WE CAN DO IT!