Sewing/Quilting Archives - Page 12 of 17 -

Mini Quilt Challenge

November 11, 2011 by Tsoniki 1 Comment

In the process of looking at all the beautiful projects people are working on through the W.I.P. Wednesday, I found a Sew & Tell Mini Quilt Challenge. Of course, I failed to notice the date at first and once I did, I knew I couldn’t have anything done in time. But I wanted to share how happy I am to have found so many really great quilters to follow online. I’ve been online for years now, primarily in the work at home mom (WAHM) arena. I don’t know why I didn’t find quilty bloggers until now, but I am thrilled that I have! The pictures shared, the numerous really active flickr groups, the challenges, the sewing summit (which I really want to attend next year!) and so much more is active in this community. I am inspired to finish more of the projects I am working on and share them with my new friends.

I didn’t get a mini quilt done, but click the button and see the amazing quilts others finished. I am heading to my sewing room to find fabric to put together a mini quilt this weekend!

W.I.P. Wednesday Two

November 2, 2011 by Tsoniki 5 Comments

A whole week already! What a sad state my sewing room looks like. Not much has changed actually. I left last Thursday for a conference and didn’t get home until late Sunday night, which really was early Monday morning because it was 1AM. Monday was spent cleaning up and getting ready for Halloween, and vegging – because I was just so tired from the amazing three days I had in Portland, OR, attending the first NIKE N7 Sport Summit. It was a fantastic experience and I am so excited to share what I learned! I’ll do a post here soon, I need to edit my pictures!

And so all that I managed to finish were my kids Halloween costumes.

But I can’t take credit for the hats! I bought them on etsy. I LOVE the blue one, it fits JW perfectly. I have to admit a slight disappointment with the black bird and green pig hats though. They are WAY bigger then my kids heads, bigger then I think they should be anyway, and the yarn that the green one is made of stretches very easily, so it’s totally stretched out already. Despite my slight disappointment, the kids loved them and wore them from the day they arrived and still do. I’m going to throw the pig in the wash and see if the agitation makes the yarn shrink.

Sure the sewing was super easy for the costumes, but I’m glad I got to work on a little something! I’m back now and am going to continue on my postage stamp project this weekend.

First W.I.P. Wednesday

October 25, 2011 by Tsoniki 9 Comments

I am thrilled to join in my first W.I.P. Wednesday. I always have W.I.P.s (works in progress) and love looking at what others are working on. The majority of my W.I.P.s are quilts or table runners that I need to finish. Once I make a quilt top, I usually fold it and put it away. Since moving into this house (almost two months ago) I decided to have my completed tops in a separate space. For right now, that means a small pile on a short bookcase. This is a huge reminder to me that I need to get these quilted!

Two of these quilts are at the top of my priority list. They are for Operation Kid Comfort. I have the batting already and I am sure I have backing, I am striving to get them both done by next weekend.

Another W.I.P. I’d like to share is a postage stamp quilt. This is a quilt along that was published earlier this year over at P.S. I Quilt and I cut the fabric the same week that the quilt along started. And that’s where the similarities end. It was a lot of sewing strips, and then a lot of cutting, and I am still sewing my block together. I divided them into the two groups and just finished one group yesterday. I have a short stack of strips left to sew together, than I can move on to the construction of the quilt. I’ve enjoyed this and really love the fabrics I am using.

And of course since Halloween is right around the corner, here are two projects I’m working on.

I meant here is the fabric for two projects I need to make. Oops. The top fabrics are for a reversible wall hanging and the bottom is for a table runner. I am going to quilt them in glow in the dark thread. I also have fabric for a Halloween quilt, and I am making it a goal to have it done by next year.

I have the best intentions but just wasn’t able to get my Halloween projects done this year! I am going to work on them anyway, over the next couple of weeks and then quit. I don’t have too much sewing I need to do for the holidays so I won’t be behind like I am here.

Anchor Baby Quilt

August 16, 2010 by Tsoniki Leave a Comment

Last weekend I attended a baby shower for a friend of mine, she and her husband are expecting their first child in a few months. They aren’t finding out if the baby is a boy or girl so I decided to make a gender neutral baby quilt.

I used six colors, white on white and a print. The colors were either batiks or color on color as well. I used red, green striped, yellow polka dot and orange strips in the backing and also for the binding. (All you quilters – you use the Clover bias tape tool right? This is an awesome product!!!)

I also learned freezer paper applique for this quilt! It is a lot easier then I thought it would be. I’ve never done any applique before so learning this really put my mind at ease.

I did the freezer paper applique technique on the four anchors because she loves anchors. An anchor is her sorority’s symbol, then add to that her husband is in the Navy so it gave her even more reason to like anchors.

You can’t see too closely in the photo, but the four anchors are quilted by outlining each anchor and also outlining the block. The rest of the quilt has a meandering pattern.

Quilt for Auction

August 2, 2010 by Tsoniki 1 Comment

This spring my Mom mentioned she might like to make a quilt for the NWIC T’laneq – which roughly translates to A Celebration. It’s an annual fundraising event the college puts on, inviting several dozen supporters. They ask for donations for a silent auction as well as a live auction, which is held during the dinner.

Preparing stencil of spindlewhorl owl

My Mom asked Stan Green, a local artist who designed a spindlewhorl owl for the college’s use, if she and I could use the design in a quilt. He very generously said yes. Several steps went into creating the design for the quilt: getting a large print of the owl, copying it to freezer paper, ironed freezer paper to material and cut out pieces we were going to sew down. Once we got to sewing, we both had to work on just this piece over a few days. It took an hour just to go around the circle!

Before we did the center applique, we worked on the border blocks. You can’t tell in the final pictures, but the center of the blocks is made up of one inch squares – I sewed six strips of brown together, cut into 1 1/2 inch strips, then resewed them together. They ended up looking like a square of basket weaving.

One thing the pictures does not show are the stars we sewed in the center of the four green corner squares. All in all it took about 60-70 hours to complete, and went for $1000 at the live auction. We are very proud of the work that we did and were so happy it raised such a large amount of money for the college!

Finished quilt “The Grandfather”

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