One Week - Three Blocks!

These little house blocks are fun to make! As you can see, I have made a couple of sizes and expect to make more. The six inch blocks are quite simple after making the three inch. I plan to mix and match them in my quilt. Hey, at three a week - I could still make 156! 

The most fun part is not thinking too hard on the fabrics. Now you can see I did put up some brick fabric for a house and found a quilter for the window, but mostly I'm just grabbing scraps, quickly making decisions and sewing. Improvisational color selection. For more houses, go to Building Houses from Scraps.

What Was I Thinking?

So yesterday I drew up my House Block in EQ7, printed out four to a page for paper piecing and began sewing. Hmmm, this is a tiny block!! I may have to rethink this size. Possibly four inch or even five inch would work better for me. Cute, though!

New Projects for 2012

 The above Chelsea wall quilt is my first project for the new year. I pieced the background last year and that was as far as I got so this week I've been choosing my applique fabrics and getting them ready to sew. I finished my flower pots and did not have another project ready so my hands are itching to stitch!! This is from Kaffe Fassett's book, Quilts in the Sun.

 Simple Graces is a book I've looked at for a long time so I treated myself in December and purchased it. The cover quilt is my favorite but it has many beautiful patterns.

 This nine patch book by Lisa Bongean & Carole Charles could not be resisted as they had a 'new' way to sew those tiny nine patches. A neat trick I must say! These are miniature quilts, tiny tiny pieces - what was I thinking???

 The above book I received for Christmas. My children know I keep a running list of quilt books I want so I was excited when I received it. It is a great way to use scraps and strips of fabric you have already sewn and did not know what to do with. I've done that many times, plus I always save leftover pieces from quilt projects together so I might make a small quilt with the leftover fabrics. Now I have a huge plastic container waiting for this book. I used to make many charity quilts like that but it has not happened lately.

And, last is another quilt book I received for Christmas - again on my wish list! Totally different than the other but I enjoy trying different types of quilting. It is filled with interesting stories from the farmer's wives and it was cool when I began reading and the contest from which this quilt was born, took place in 1922 - the year that both my parents were born. It made it rather special to connect with that date!

So, looking forward to lots of fun and varied projects in 2012. I've also signed up to work on the little 3" house blocks from Building Houses from Scraps.

Happy Stitching in 2012 and I hope to be able to show some progress with my quilting soon!

Through a Child's Eyes

 I just could not resist showing these precious photos of our grandson looking at the Christmas tree right before his first Christmas.

 The innocence and wonder in his eyes tells it all, doesn't it?

He likes to use his pointer finger and make the Christmas songs play from the book.

May you all have a very blest and joyous Christmas, as we celebrate the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ, and share the time with family and friends!!

Country Inn

Isn't this a beautiful applique project to start this time of year? That is what I thought last year when I took these pictures. However, I had my Flower Pots going and so I continued to work on it this past year instead. So, now I need a new applique project. My hands don't do well being idle when I'm in my comfy chair.

This book is Country Inn by Barb Adams and Alma Allen of Blackbird Designs. There are two versions of this quilt, Evening Bloom and Country Rose - this is Evening Bloom.

 

Now the interesting thing is that I bought these fabrics several years ago just because I liked them, having no particular project in mind. I have a tendency to do that and then later the perfect project comes along to use them. 

 I think this will be more fun than just copying their fabrics. I really do enjoy choosing fabrics for a quilt - one of my favorite parts of making a quilt.

So, now back to my freezer paper for the patterns. I started tracing my templates Friday while meeting with my small group. That's one of the nice things with applique, you can do it in small bits and eventually you have a lovely quilt! Happy Thanksgiving all! We are so blest!