Wednesday, July 27, 2016

Summer Solstice QAL- Half Square Triangles

This week in the Summer Solstice Quiltalong we made Half Square Triangles.  Super easy and once again I was glad that I am only making 1 giant block!


And since I tend to be very impatient to see what the final product will look like, I hung up the pieces on my design wall early :)

I LOVE the way this looks!!!!  Except I think that I need to dissect two of the center flying geese and exchange some triangles so that the gradient flows correctly, otherwise it will bug me forever.  I can't wait to add the drunkard's path blocks next!

Wednesday Fabric Love #4

I found this great new line of fabric this week, "Geekery" by Sue Marsh for RJR fabric!  I am a mechanical engineer and I am always on the lookout for math and science related fabric and this totally meets that goal.








I just love the rainbow colors and these fabrics are so fun!  I could see these being used for pouches and for notebook covers for school.

These fabrics are available here from Fabric Shack, along with several other coordinates.  These fabrics come with a black background too.

Fabric Shack does not sponsor me, I just really like their selection, their fast and cheap shipping, and the fact that they let you purchase 1/4 yds!

Friday, July 22, 2016

Giant Storm at Sea

Last fall, my sister and I decided to make a lap sized quilt for our grandfather.  For some reason, I had been looking at "Storm at Sea" quilts and I convinced my sister that we should make a Storm at Sea but greatly enlarged.

"storm at sea" design from here

First of all, after making my quilt, I can't imagine making more of the intricate Storm at Sea quilts with so many blocks!  We did 4 blocks and that was all I could deal with.  This would have to be a paper pieced quilt to get all the points to line up!

We went to the fabric store with the idea of getting some "manly" fabrics, like greens, browns, etc, but definitively wanted to do prints.  Well, we came home with blue solids hahaha.  We tried so hard to find some prints but in the end decided it was more "us" with the blues and the solids.

We used some quilt calculators online to find the dimensions for the "square in a square" blocks.  The hardest part was the "diamond in a rectangle" block.  We couldn't find dimensions and then we messed up so many times before figuring out how to get the corner pieces on the rectangle to be the correct size.  Never again!  This picture was taken to celebrate the first correct diamond piece!


The completed quilt top:

Before I started the quilting, I googled Storm at Sea quilts just to try and see how they did the quilting because I didn't just want to do a simple stipple or loops on this quilt.  I found one quilt that was quilted with straight lines following the shapes in the quilt and I really loved the way it looked, so I copied it for this quilt.  I quilted with a variegated blue thread.  Can you see the quilting lines in the picture below?


 We bound the quilt with a navy binding and it brought the whole quilt together.  The backing is a beautiful light blue/dark blue print but unfortunately I don't have any pictures of it.

Here is the finished quilt, I just love the way it looks!

Wednesday, July 20, 2016

Wednesday Fabric Love #3



This week I want to talk about a new kid fabric that I found, the Northcott Connector Playmats Panels.






From top to bottom, they are "Around Town", "At the Train Station", "At the Airport", and "At the Harbor".  Each panel is 2/3 yd and you can see that the roads can connect both vertically and horizontally.  So you could buy one for a small playmat (40" x 24"), connect two for a medium mat (40" x 48"), or buy all 4 for a giant mat (80" x 48").  

I don't have anyone to make this for right now but am considering buying some of them just because they are so cute haha.  But which ones to buy?  How could I pick one over the others?  If you want some for yourself, they are available at Fabric Shack, one of my favorite online fabric sellers.

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

Wednesday Fabric Love #2


Continuing with my travel theme from last week, I really love this fabric from Hoffman Fabrics, called "National Park Centennial".  It is available in blue, gray, and khaki.







Did you know that the National Park Service turns 100 years old on August 26, 2016?  I went to the Grand Canyon with my family about 7 years ago and ever since it has re-ignited my love of the National Parks.  I have a "National Park Passport" that you can get stamped at all the National Parks and my husband and I plan trips based on how many National Parks we can visit!  Every Park is different and they are all awesome.  I just asked my husband which park is his favorite (that we have visited) and he said Grand Canyon- and I think I would agree with that!


This fabric would make a fun journal cover, or maybe a pillow cover to use in the car for your road trips?  Or maybe a road-trip bag?  So many options.


This fabric is available online from Fabric Shack.  They are not paying me to say this, but they are one of my favorite online shops!  Quick cutting, quick and cheap shipping, and they allow 1/4 yd cuts!