Another to read, to use, and to implement in your blogging life! My friend Lynette publishes a yearly blogging planner and calendar and the 2015 version is ready to go! Head over to Blog Energizer to get your free blogging planner now.
[youtube]https://youtu.be/UeG3XHW-2q0[/youtube]
I am forever double checking the size of a quilt when I am looking at a new pattern. I want to be sure that any design I make falls within a common quilt size or what do I need to add so it will fall within those sizes. Check out this long list of sizes for everything from placemats up to a king waterbed! I have a postcard from Pink Chalk Fabrics hung right above my sewing machine because they print some common sizes of quilts and this long list is a great compliment to that list for me, I hope you can use it too.
We love watching movies but since living overseas, I think we’ve been to the movies once in a year. And yeah, going to the movies can be expensive so we also wait until something is released before we watch it. Oh, I take that back, we went to the movies twice – if one of the two times was our daughter going with her friends. The other time was us going when we were on vacation – what does one do in Dublin – take in a movie in English! 🙂 But we saw Guardians of the Galaxy and like so many others, we loved it. I can’t wait to get this – and you can pre-order Guardians of the Galaxy now on iTunes.
If you have any of the 18″ dolls and you make clothes for them, you have to head over to Imagine Gnats to make the Chloe cardi and tee (free sewing tutorial!). I had dolls when I was a little girl and I am sure my Mom, Grandma, and/or Auntie made them clothes. I know that Barbie clothes were made, and those are so tiny!
I know the basics of taking a good picture – natural light, but not direct light, pay attention to where the subjects in the frame, natural pics vs pose – but here are seven photography tricks that are so cool! I love the glass in the water one, and using your headphones to click to take a picture. I knew that trick but always forget about it (and I lose my headphones – I’ve lost two pairs recently!). I also like the panodash. Watch the video below.
[youtube]https://youtu.be/fTz4Nhgm_SQ[/youtube]
For the past few weeks I have been participating in a quilt along put on by Bloomerie Fabrics. The QA started in October and this is the last week for it. I quickly picked out my Botanica fabrics for this quilt!
I did a really good job of keeping up with the schedule and I am so excited I was able to do that! In the past I have found quilt alongs when they were already finished or maybe I wasn’t going to be home when they were happening, so participating in real time was so fun. 
I like quilt alongs because seeing what other people are doing can be great motivation for you to work on your quilt, and it’s fun to sew along with others.
This serves as a big reminder to not assume that you know what you are doing! So often we read a quilt pattern and think, “awesome, I got this!” and get to sewing. But if you are like me, and you end up having multiple projects going on at once, you can forget what the next step is or what you should sew. 
I only needed one print on each of the larger white squares but instead I have all four. I only did these two white squares before I realized my mistake. I am SO glad I only did two!
This is the Wallflowers pattern by Cluck Cluck Sew and for the quilt along we were to make nine blocks. These are large blocks and the quilt ends up being a lap size quilt.
After I finished I sent a picture to a friend of mine and she loved it. I decided to give it to her for Christmas, but I want it to be a larger quilt. I had to add borders and this is when stashing half yards of fabric isn’t the best because a half yard just isn’t enough to give you a bigger border. I did the first border in two separate colors (but from the same fabric line) and the second border in the same fabric (also from the same line). I like to buy half yard bundles of fabric collections sometimes, then I’ll buy yardage of my favorites later (but before it’s gone!).
The quilt ended up with two and a half borders because I only did the final border on the top and bottom so it would be long and not square. I used one of the Chicopee fabrics for that final border. This made the quilt 73 X 81 – which is not really a “normal” size for a quilt, but it works for me. It is nearest to a twin size quilt I think.
I haven’t decided how to quilt this, and I don’t have a backing fabric yet! I am working on the backing over the weekend and next week though because I do want to finish this soon. Oh and I’m calling it Tic Tac Toe, for obvious to me reasons which are usually not that obvious to anyone else. 🙂
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Welcome to episode 007 of the Me Being Crafty podcast, where we explore creativity in your life.
In this episode I talk to Rebecca Roach, a quilter and quilt designer living in Austin, Texas. She and I had a great conversation about the first thing she sewed as a young girl and how that was just not fun and she wasn’t interested in sewing again for years. We talk about the tv show she watched that inspired her to take up quilting again and her journey into becoming a quilt designer and what she has coming up. Rebecca is thinking of more quilt designs and fabric designs. Living in Austin, she has access to resources that will allow her to create a small fabric collection and I am excited for what she has to come!
Rebecca and I visit about symbols used in Hawaiian quilting and how she didn’t feel comfortable using the same symbols, since being Hawaiian isn’t part of her culture. I feel the same as Rebecca and I am very aware of my culture and belief system when I am designing something because of that awareness. I would love to have fabric with Native American symbols not be pan-Indian in nature. Scratch that, I would love to have fabric designed by Native Americans. It’s an important topic for us to talk about in terms of the what is out there and is representative of who we are as a people.
Rebecca
I am a member of the Modern Quilt Guild and one of the perks of being a member is that we receive quilt patterns that were designed by fellow guild members. Rebecca’s Broken Bars pattern was the first one we all received in January 2014 and I started following her then. I loved visiting with Rebecca and hope you enjoy our conversation. Thanks again for being on the show Rebecca!
Where you can find Rebecca – Frybread Quilts on facebook – Rebecca on instagram – Rebecca’s shop – Rebecca on flickr
Links for what we talked about – Aunt Debbie quilting, she is no longer here with us and her granddaughter teaches Hawaiian quilting although according to the website, she isn’t teaching currently; Austin Modern Quilt Guild; Fresh Modern Quilts on flickr; Abby Glassenberg: An Inside Look at What Fabric Designers Earn; Nike N7
Listen to episode 007 and let me know if you once really didn’t like the creative thing you do now. It can be a common occurrence – if we have a bad experience with something, it will take some work to bring us back to trying it out again.
Leave me a comment and let me know how you were creative today. Me, I’m designing a few baby quilts!