Another Red Letter Day ?!?!?

I'm still needing a few more Christmas quilt finishes if I'm going to meet my goal of giving Christmas quilts to family and friends this year.  Here's my 5th Christmas quilt finish for 2018. 

This is Lifetime Quilt Number 234

The pattern is Red Letter Day by Camille Roskelley for Thimble Blossoms. 

The fabric is Overnight Delivery by Sweetwater for Moda

It finished at 68" x 68"

It has approximately 657 pieces.

This pattern packs a lot of punch for such a small time commitment.  I pieced this top in 4 afternoons.  I thought it was a good choice for the Overnight Delivery fabric, the big block pieces allow the festive prints to really shine.

This is the third time I've used this pattern.

I made this fall Red Letter Day version for my brother and his wife.

And this summer version that I made 4 years ago has been on my bed every August since.

Two more Christmas finishes would be nice, but all the Halloween projects on social media are calling my name, maybe I can squeeze in one more Christmas finish before October.

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Fallville

This is the third time I've made Camille at Thimble Blossoms quilt pattern Summerville.  Although this time I went with more of a Fallville.  I just love this pattern, I think it's the houses, but it may also be how easily this quilt top goes together.  I've made it the same way each time, first I piece the stars, because those pieces use big chunks of fabric, then I piece the houses, because they use an assortment of fabric, then the 9 patches, because they use the scraps from the first two rounds of sewing, and finally the outer blocks.  Once all the blocks are done it's an easy afternoon of sewing putting it all together.

This is Lifetime Quilt Number 214

The pattern is Summerville by Camille Roskelley for thimble blossoms (available here)

The fabric is just an assortment of oranges, grays, and blacks from my stash, not one family.  

It finished at 70" x 70" ( my favorite size and shape)

And has approximately 876 pieces.

I love this pattern so much I may have to make a Snowville to go with my Summerville and Fallville.

It appears as if October is the month for repeat patterns. Next up is Lucy,  which I made and loved but the quilt now happily lives in California with my favorite daughter and grandpup.  I think I need one too.

I hope you're squeezing in some fall sewing, theres' nothing like sewing with fall fabric in October especially when it feels like summer outside.

Sinta at Pink Pincushion sewed her own version of Fallville with me, I think I have more of a Booville compared to Sinta's beautiful fabric choices and pattern changes.  Check out her blog for her progress.

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Hometown USA

I've gotten a few requests for  information regarding the raffle for my Hometown USA quilt.  Well the raffle has officially started.  The quilt is currently on display at the Mt. Carmel Illinois Public Library.

Here I am with the quilt and the library foundation board president, Donnie Price, also know as Thelma's brother.  Not really, that's the family joke, when I come to town I'm known as Don Price's sister, but that's OK, I couldn't ask for a better baby brother.  Plus he's lived in my hometown almost all his life, I left 40 years ago.

Just in case you've forgotten, this is Lifetime Quilt Number 185

I've named this quilt Hometown, USA

I combined the patterns Summerville and Stars and Stripes by Camille Roskelley for Thimble Blossoms.  

The fabric is Vintage Picnic by Bonnie and Camille for Moda

It finished at 98" x 98"

It has approximately 1,912 pieces.

Connie Lancaster at Quilts Plus in Indianapolis, IN did the custom quilting.  

Tickets are on sale at the library, by library and foundation board members, and me.  The tickets are $5 per ticket or 5 for $20.  The drawing will be held on June 10, 2017.

If you're interested in purchasing a ticket drop me an email and I'll get with you on further details.

When not working on Due South I've been thinking about my other Year of Thelma 2017 Quilting Goals.  Piecing a red and white quilt is on that list.  I've been spending my evenings admiring all the quilts in this book.

My new problem is trying to narrow down my favorite to just one pattern.   I may have to start piecing a red a white quilt every year for the next 10 years.

The thing about a red and white quilt, they never go out of style.

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Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah I'm Done

Zipper's all pieced, hurray.  I started this quilt in 2015.  I've been known to say "quilts take a long time, when you don't work on them".  I can now add, "or when they sit in a project box".

This is Lifetime Quilt Number 196

It finished has 66" x 78"

The pattern is Zipper by Camille Roskelly for Thimble Blossoms. (available here)

The fabric is an assortment of Little Black Dress, Little Black Dress 2 and Black Tie Affair by Basic Grey for Moda.

It has approximately 570 pieces.

Even though this project spanned several years, I enjoyed piecing it together.

The pattern has several interesting looks and is a great stash buster.

Are you working on selecting your Miss Rosie pattern and fabric for the sew along?  I'm going to spend a couple of weeks working on my Long Time Gone project and don't expect I'll be starting my Due South until the middle of March, but don't wait for me, get started whenever you like.

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What's been happening in my world

There's not been much sewing going on at my house.

I tagged along with my husband on a business trip, which I would do more often if his business destinations were in great places, like this trip, on the beach.   Most of the time his travels are less scenic, and the weather not much better than where I am.

While sitting on the beach I studied this book,  Long Time Gone by Jen Kingwell.

I studied this book so hard the staples came out and all the pages came loose.  There's a whole lot of sewing going on in this quilt.

So much sewing that I've decided to spread the fun out over this entire year, making this my special Year of Thelma quilt.

The pattern is broken down into 6 sections.  I think I'm going to start with Section 2, it looks the easiest and least time consuming.  Section 5 will probably take me all summer.

Now I just need to decide on some fabric and get going.

Another task that I completed that was quilty related but not sewing related was my quarterly quilt refold.  If the quilt is folded outside I switch it to inside, folded lengthwise becomes widthwise, and so on.  I enjoy looking at all my quilts, organizing them again, usually by season, and putting them neatly back on my quilt racks and shelves.  They were a mess after my Pride of Prairie Trunk Show.  It normally doesn't take all that long, but my arms sure are tired when I'm done.

And finally, this is back out on my design wall, Zipper by Camille Roskelley for Thimbleblossoms.  When I blogged about losing my loving feeling for this top I got some great comments.  One quilter suggested making it a table runner, which I thought was a good idea, but making a bed runner an even better idea, and initially my plan.  Someone else pointed out that this quilt top was too pretty not to finish.  Well when I got this project back out I discovered I had more completed than I remembered, and it was too long and too narrow for a bed runner for my kingsize bed.

So now I've decided it is too pretty not to finish, I only need to add around 15 more rows.  I also now remember why I put this project in a project box.  I started the project using Little Black Dress, then decided to jazz it up by adding  Black Tie Affair,  both by Basic Grey for Moda.  To get the two fabrics to blend together I needed to un-sew a few rows, add some Black Tie Affair, then sew them back together.  That's where I am right now, separating what's already combined, then I'll sew some new rows.  The pieces are  all cut and ready, they just need to be sewn together, easy peasy.  And I'm not stopping until it's done!

And finally, thanks so much for the great response on Miss Rosie's Quilt Co's new book, Farmhouse Favorites, and joining me on a sew along.  There was such an enthusiastic response Carrie donated two books and I'm donating one.   The winners are Peggy in NJ, Debra from MD and Nancy Lewis from PA.  Nancy and Peggy, I sent you an email, I need your mailing address please. 

As far as the sew along goes, it's going to be very simple. Start when you want, do any Miss Rosie's Quilt Co pattern and finish by the end of 2017.  A nice way to wrap up the Year of Thelma.  I plan to start Due South the end of March.  Send me updates and pictures as you progress, I'll blog about any updates on Fridays throughout the year.  If you have a blog send a link and I'll add you to my blog roll call list.  And at the end of the year we'll have a parade of all the finishes.  I can hardly wait to see what you make, Due South so far seems to be the most popular pattern choice, I love nothing better than seeing the same pattern made with different fabric.  

Whew, I think that's it! Just one blog post this week, but a long one, I hope you made it to the end!

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Fireworks in August

Camille's Fireworks pattern has been on my To Do list ever since it was released back in 2012.  Camille used Happy Go Lucky for her Fireworks, one of my all time favorite families of fabric, but I'm hoarding my bundle of Happy Go Lucky so I've been searching for another family of fabric to use, searching for 4 years.  Earlier this year I tried matching up some Miss Kate fat quarters for this pattern but it didn't really excite me, so I put the pattern away, again.

Last month, on Instagram, I saw a Fireworks quilt made with Daysail, and fell in love.   I made the Fat Quarter Shop's Snapshots quilt using Daysail, but I donated that quilt for a charity raffle.  Luckily I had another Daysail bundle that I was also hoarding but willing to use.

This is Lifetime Quilt Number 184

The pattern is Fireworks by Camille Roskelley for Thimble Blossoms

The fabric is Daysail by Bonnie and Camille for Moda

It finished at 68"x 68"

It has approximately 1,076 pieces.

This was the perfect summer project to work on after a July of Christmas Sewing. I think I have time for one more summer project!

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Christmas in July

I've got my first finish for my Christmas in July sewing marathon.

This is Lifetime Quilt Number 182

The pattern is Round and Round by Camille Roskelley for thimble blossoms 

The fabric is Mostly Manor by Victoria Findlay Wolfe for Marcus Brothers Fabrics

It finished at 72" x 72" (my favorite size)

It has approximately 634 pieces.

This is my second Round and Round finish, I made this quilt in December 2013,  using Kate Spain Christmas fabric.

I really enjoyed all the white space after my last project.  Now on to the next, I'm hoping to get at least one more Christmas quilt done, two more would be better, I'm just not sure how long I'll be able to stand working with Christmas fabric this time of year.

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Summerville

I was asked to make a shop sample of Camille's pattern Summerville using Bonnie and Camille's latest line Vintage Picnic.  

It gave me a week of happy sewing in my sewing room.

I started with the stars,

then I made the houses,

added these 9 patches,

the house border, 

and the final border.  And just like that I was done.  The pattern cover says this is a "Sweet & Simple" pattern, I could not agree more.  Plus it was fun, and made me happy the whole time I worked on it.  I think it was a combination of the wonderful fabric and easy piecing.  The bird fabric was my favorite.    I wasn't sure Bonnie and Camille could design a family of fabric I liked better than Happy Go Lucky, but they did.

I think this pattern would also look great if you used holiday themed fabric, like Halloween or Christmas, or even went totally scrappy.   Which is a good thing, Vintage Picnic won't be hitting stores until February, 2016.

This is Lifetime Quilt Number 162

The pattern is Summerville by Camille Roskelley for thimble blossoms, (available here)

The fabric is Vintage Picnic by Bonnie and Camille for Moda

It finished at 70" x 70" ( my favorite size and shape)

And has approximately 876 pieces.

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Friday Finish!

It sure doesn't take long to finish a quilt top when half the blocks are already pieced.  Although I enjoyed making the Lollies blocks so much I was sort of sad when I made the last one.  This is a pattern I would enjoy making again, and maybe not in holiday themed fabric, although I think this pattern is very well suited for Christmas fabric.

This is Lifetime Quilt Number 168 - Christmas Lollies

The pattern is Lollies by Camille Roskelley for thimble blossoms

The fabric is an assortment of Kate Spain for Moda Christmas fabric

It finished at 64" x 74"

It has approximately 698 pieces.

The Lollies pattern is available here.

Have you been drooling over all social media pictures of fall market?  Black Tie Affair by Basic Grey, Spooky Delight by Anne Sutton of Bunny Hill Designs,  and Carkai by Carolyn Friedlander  are lines of fabric that are on the top of my wish list.   Now we just have to wait for it to show up in stores, which seems to take forever.  For the first time I was able to watch some great Market broadcasts on Periscope.  Did you give that a try?  It was almost like being there, except I couldn't buy anything at that Sample Spree!

And I can't let the day go by without saying happy birthday to someone who spends almost as much time in my sewing room as I do.

Happy 7th Birthday Cooper!

This is Cooper when we brought him home.

This is Cooper now,

I should maybe get him a bigger bed for his birthday.

Are you sewing this weekend? I'm hoping I am!!

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No More Lollie-gagging

Over Memorial Day weekend a friend and I had a Lollies weekend sew-along.  I stopped working on Short Line and pieced 15 blocks.  Then the weekend was over and I packed up my Lollies and went back to Short Line, and forgot about Lollies.

I've decided I better finish this quilt quickly if I want to be using it for this Christmas.  I'm using Kate Spain Christmas fabric for my Lollies.  The pattern is by Camille Roskelley for Thimbleblossoms.

I don't stop projects before I finish them very often, but it sure is nice restarting this project with half the blocks pieced!

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Rise and Shine-ish is a Finish

So once I got all the blocks on my design wall, and created the perfect layout, I thought maybe those corners would look better with some triangles.

So I added them!

This is Rise and Shine-ish

It is Lifetime Quilt Number 167

It finished at 64" x 64"

It has approximately 1,004 pieces.

The inspiration for this quilt was the pattern Rise and Shine by Camille Roskelley for Thimble Blossoms.

I'm very happy with how this project turned out.  I have a nice stack of scraps leftover and plan to add to the stack over the next year so I can make another Halloween quilt next year.  

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Fresh Start, or another start

Hello, thanks for stopping by, yes I'm blogging today!!  Whoop Whoop !!!

First, thanks to all who listened to my radio interview with Pat Sloan either live or the podcast.  Pat had given me a list of around 12 topics that we would try to cover during our chat. I was so nervous that we would get through all the topics and still have 10 minutes worth of time to fill, well I guess I was in a chatty mood because we maybe covered 3 of the topics. One topic that I had given some thought and prepared for was accurate piecing.  I plan to cover my thoughts on that topic in an upcoming blog post.

Speaking of blogging, my blogging has been hit or miss all year long, but that's about to change.  The main reason I didn't blog last week was because new carpet was installed in my house.  The last step of a year long remodel job.  My house has been in some sort of chaos for 12 months, but now it's all done.  Or as done as any home and maintenance ever gets. It's sort of like laundry, you're never done, unless you're running around your house naked.

We bought this house 11 years ago thinking we would live here maybe 3 years then move, that had been our pattern for our entire married life.  But a funny thing happened, 3 years passed, then 6, then the next thing we knew, we'd been here 10 years and hadn't made a single change to a house that was 5 years old when we bought it.  So since it seems like we're going to be staying here a few more years we decided to make some changes to suit our needs and give the place a facelift.

Here's a list of what we did, and I'm sure I'm forgetting something:
replaced all the sliders and french doors
took down all the wallpaper
painted every wall, ceiling, and closet and all the woodwork
updated all the floors with new hardwood or carpet
all new kitchen appliances
added tiled kitchen backsplash
replaced all the light fixtures
swapped out the ugly shiny brass fixtures with oil rubbed bronze fixtures
took all the bathrooms down to the studs and started over, replacing everything
sealed and painted front sidewalk and porch
created an office for my husband
moved my sewing room to a new room
customized all the closets (California Closets, I love you)
replaced half the furniture
added new blinds

I've not had pictures on the walls for over a year, and have been shuffling boxes of who knows what that was packed last year from the garage, to the basement, then back to the garage and dusting and dusting and dusting.   When our closets were being updated, our clothes hung on racks in the garage.  So now it's time to finally settle in, unpack all the boxes and enjoy our space.  We've had bedroom stuff in the office and office stuff in my sewing room, any room with extra space has served multiple purposes.

While all this was going on I would start a project in my sewing room, have to stop, then when I started back up start something else.  So I definitely have some catching up to do in that area.

But that didn't stop me from starting something new this month.  Since my favorite daughter thought Lucy would look great in her apartment I sent it her way. Using Lucy scraps and adding some new prints but in the same colors I've started a new Halloween quilt with the same feel, just a little different look.

The pattern is Rise and Shine by Camille Roskelley for thimble blossoms.

And finally, I'm not sure I've ever formally mentioned that I use Instagram, almost daily, look for ThelmaCupcake if you're an instagram user.

So this week I'll need to piece my Snapshots block, it's the car with the surfboard, and I can hardly wait, do a little organizing and settling in, get out a few Halloween decorations, and blog!

Talk to you soon!

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