Adam's Dino Quilt

My cousin Jodi and her husband Ryan are adopting a baby boy! So I made them a quilt, of course. My favorite quilt shop had recently received a new line of fabric featuring dinosaurs which would be perfect. (I didn't know their theme was Noah's Ark/safari at the time, but I'm sure there were dinosaurs on Noah's Ark....right?).

Front of the Quilt:

 

Back of the Quilt:

I chose to quilt it with an overall stipple meander. I'm quite pleased with how it turned out, especially as this meander has always seemed a bit daunting to me. Here are a few close ups of the quilting:

One of the neatest things about this dinosaur fabric is that it glows in the dark! If you turn out all the lights and angle your screen just right, you may be able to see it glowing in this next picture, although it was difficult to capture.

Baby Quilt for Brynlee

My friend Lydia is had her first baby at the end of July - it was a girl! This seemed like the perfect opportunity to make my first "real" quilt on my longarm, although in truth it was still a "practice" quilt as I learned several new quilting designs and it helped to advance my skills. Most exciting, is that I was able to use my first feather quilting design. It is one I learned from Angela Huffman while at a Kentuckiana Longarm Guild meeting. She calls it the Garden Gate feather. I used this motif in the outer border. The inner border was also a new motif for me, but one that everybody knows, called ribbon candy. I made a double leaf motif in the corners to help transition from horizontal to vertical direction. And in the center of the quilt, I've done what has become one of my go-to designs: loops and posies. I'm really happy with how it turned out. Hopefully it will get a lot of use!

Here's a picture of the whole quilt:

Here's a close up of the two borders:

Here's a close up of the loops and posies quilting:

Quilt Specifics: Hobbs 80/20 batting. Glide Cotton Candy (light pink) thread, 40 weight. Needle size 4.0. 

Made for a Star

My second Ronald McDonald House quilt is a blue disappearing nine patch. Here it is prior to quilting:

Here it is on my machine - I'm doing a loops and stars motif this time:

And here it is finished - I'm calling it 'Made for a Star' since there are stars in the fabric and in the quilting.

Close up of the front - hopefully you can see the quilting!

Close up of the back of the quilt - no trouble seeing the quilting here!

This is the first time I've done a machine binding. It worked well, but I could use some more practice. To do this, I trimmed my quilt backing and batting to ~1/8" past the quilt top. Then I attached binding (2.5 inch strips, folded in half) to the back of the quilt ~3/8" from edge. Then I folded the backing over to the front and stitched it down with a straight top stitch. You'll want to use a thread color that matches the quilt. 

Charity Quilt Patterns

For the last couple of months, I've been working on putting together some charity quilts that I can use to start developing my free motion longarm quilting skills. I chose the Ronald McDonald House as a place to donate to as they request quilts that are approximately 40" x 40" - which seems like a very good practice size.

Disappearing Nine Patch

When I found a picture of this quilt on pinterest, I didn't realize it was a Disappearing Nine Patch, so I cut all the pieces for the blocks their final size, instead of making a nine patch and cutting it in quarters. I designed the quilt to have 12 inch blocks (finished size) with 1 inch sashings/borders. There were three rows of blocks, with three blocks per row. Final size is 40" x 40". I'm going to make two of these quilts; one to practice the loops and hearts quilting motif and one to practice the loops and stars quilting motif.

Rail Quilt

coming soon...

Flying Geese

coming soon...

Hourglass Quilt

coming soon...

I bought a longarm!

My longarm quilting class went well last July, so I decided to buy one! I've been shopping and researching the last several months, and finally decided on the right machine for me. I chose the Millie from APQS. It has electronic vertical and horizontal channel locks as well as motorized advance - two of my favorite features. My friend Ricklie helped me to set it up - and in another month I'll be taking my beginners longarm quilting classes with Angela Huffman to learn how to use it! I can't wait to see what I'll be able to do with it!

Lemoyne Stars

My Lemoyne Stars Basics quilt class was today. We learned how to use Deb Tucker's Rapid Fire Lemoyne ruler.The pattern I wanted to make (Pop Stars...watch for a future post!) didn't arrive on time, so I designed my own quilt for the class. I decided to use the Brushstrokes fabric line by Kim Schaefer for Andover Fabrics with black as the background and various blues, greens, and purples for the stars. I will make forty-two 8 inch Lemoyne stars, then will pop the corners of the blocks to add small diamonds to the background. There will be two borders: the first will be two inch squares of all the different star colors and the second will be the black background fabric. My tentative name for the pattern is "Night Sky." Here is my drawing of a mini version of the quilt:

During class I finished the first four blocks; only 38 more to go! I think this will be a good quilt to practice long arm quilting on - my introductory class on long arm quilting is July 27th!

Kari's Chicken Coop Quilt

My cousin Kari has graciously hosted me for two years in a row for a winter vacation in San Diego. After the first year, I promised her a quilt for her house as a token of my appreciation. Her favorite colors are chocolate brown and turquoise. I have found a pattern for what I hope will be a wonderful quilt in these colors, and have even bought and washed the fabrics, but unfortunately have not yet had time to start this quilt. In order to keep my promise, I chose a smaller quilt to complete for this year. As she loves all things chicken, I chose the spotty chicken quilt kit. It was a combination of machine stitching the background and hand sewing applique pieces. She loved it, and I'm looking forward to seeing it hung on her wall next year when I visit again (hopefully with her chocolate brown and turquoise quilt in tow!).