I'm in the mood to sew lately and it's a good thing because I've been sewing a lot. If holiday sewing is the best kind of sewing, then I'm having lots of fun! In the past week I've worked on Christmas, Halloween, and Valentine's Day quilts.
It started with an email I got from the new quilt shop in town,
My Girlfriend's Quilt Shop, telling about their Christmas mystery quilt. I've always wanted to try a mystery quilt, and when I saw the quilt shop's Halloween mystery quilt I knew they were good at this kind of project. So I signed up. And loved every minute of it, although I was always (and still am) behind schedule. What you see above is the blocks I have finished but not put together - so it's not really how the quilt will look, just how I arranged them for the photo. I'm about half finished with the quilt...ahem...the ladies who stayed on schedule are all done by now. I'm not worried because it's on its way, and I vow that it will be hanging in my front entry starting the day after Thanksgiving. The black squiggly line you see is my embroidery floss - not quite done with the backstitching that will say " 'Tis the season to be merry." There are lots of elements left to make - cute yo yos and more embroidery and bows and holly leaves and more pieced blocks and appliqued words (joy, of course) and the borders and binding. I don't mind any of that, because I love the fabric and could just stare at it all day - it's mostly from
Moda's French General "FaLaLaLa" collection. So pretty.
I love his photo - I put it on Facebook when I finished stitching the quilt top. I get a kick out of the combination of my Halloween decorations next to the Valentine's quilt that I've been making out of ADORNit's new "Happy Hearts" collection of fabrics. This quilt is almost finished - it now has three big hearts appliqued on it, and it has lovely quilting with little hearts and swirls (quilted by my next-door neighbor
Carol, bless her HEART), and it will soon have a black pin-dot binding. The quilt is going to Houston Quilt Market in
Carolee's suitcase on Wednesday.
Here's another project that I've been thinking about since I picked up the pattern over a year ago. It's called Pumpkin Walk by
Julie Popa a quilt pattern designer who lives here in Cache Valley. Her company name is enough to make me want to buy her patterns,
Sunflower Hill Designs. I love the modern edge that the pattern has, though the fabrics I'm using won't give it much of a modern feel. Still, it's going to be great on my counter as a type of table runner...actually a counter runner.
I've had these fall-colored fabrics for a couple of years and have finally found a project to use a bit of them on. (In my photo, they're just arranged in the way I'll use them - I haven't cut or sewed anything yet.) I think they're perfect for this pattern. The darker one that looks black is actually purple with orange dots that are little pumpkins. There's a fall feeling without being overly theme-y, and that's a look I prefer. The dark brown gingham is a fabulous Moda check that just gives me chills. No, I'm serious.
