Look at this scrumpdillyicious quilt!



The colours! The quilting! The binding! (And you should see the back!)

Would you like to win this quilt? Of course you would!

If so, please go and see my friend Crystal at Sonnet of the Moon (click that link, you know you wanna!) and enter her giveaway.

I almost didn't want to tell you about it, because I sure hope I win! But you should go and have a look. And say hi! She's a lovely person with a lovely blog. You'll be glad to "meet" her.

on the boy's blankie. :)

I'm using fabrics that are purportedly "African cottons". I'm not sure whether they actually are or not, or what makes them "African"; however, they're masculine looking and in the colour pallette I'm looking for.



Black of course, along with black and gold and cream and gold. Some of the centre panels are pieced out of scraps of the cream/black fabric, but it's such a busy fabric, you can't tell.




I'm quite pleased with is so far. I'm going to continue working on it after I get home from my day job as I can for the rest of the week (knowing already that I won't be working on it tommorrow); and hope I can make some good progress on it. (Click to enlarge)



Beginning Monday though, I have to start working on another quilt that has to be completed by the 11th of August. I have the fabrics and my pattern idea already though, so that should help.

I'm doing Crazy Mom's nine patch quilt along (round two).

I really just wanted an excuse to use up some funny fabrics I've had hanging around for years. We're on day seven - and I originally thought I wanted to do 140 blocks instead of the 70 her pattern requires (so my quilt would be a "usable" size instead of a lap); but now I'm thinking I want to break up the blocks with one big nine patch block in the solids (that would be the size of the nine of the small nine patch blocks) or with single fabric squares that are the same size as the nine patch blocks.

Or maybe just sashing...

*hmmmm*

I've also got some blocks on the design wall. I'm making a quilt for my oldest son's birthday this September - it will live with him as he goes off to residence. There are two ideas I have,



I'm leaning more towards the first one, but I don't want it to look too "old fashioned" y'know? I want it to be a modern interpretation, fit for a stylin' young man. :)



My design wall is at the back of my sewing room where no light gets at night - so the pictures are kind of dark and don't accurately reflect the colours. However, this one, with the border layout, will give you a better idea of the true colours:



Whichever layout I go with, the first border will be those triangles. I find it really tough to make something for someone I love so dearly. You want it to be a perfect reflection of how much you love them, don't you? *le sigh* It's much different than when you're making something for a friend, a customer, or some "unknown" person.

Do any of you feel that pressure when making something for loved ones too?,

I work at a Ministry of the Government, and today we had a charity Fashion Show Fundraiser. Each division within the Ministry had to produce an item of clothing for the fashion show, made from recyclable office supplies.



My office knowing that I quilt and sew clothing, immediately came running to me for ideas, and because I had seen Sunny Fong on Project Runway Canada make a dress out of Post-it notes, I knew that I could make one too.

I first cut out the pattern pieces in fabric, and then sewed "feathered" post-it notes to the pieces, then I sewed the pieces of the dress together. Here it is on my 4'11" dynamo of a model. Surprisingly, it wasn't hard, just time consuming. The only part that was fidgety, was putting the zipper in. It kept wanting to get caught in the paper!

The end result was what I had imagined - a kind of go-go dress. I was very pleased with it!



The judges picked this dress as the winner:
And it is very well done, but I thought it was cheating - after all, since when are magazines office supplies?

Instead, we won "Fan Favourite". Which I think is really winning. As BSP says "Who cares what the judges think, anyway?" (BSP always unfailingly supports me. :) )


Stephanie (my model) added her own touches in the paper chain bracelet and post-it noted shoes (if you look closely, you can see that she even made a hair ornament out of more recyclable goods).




In the end though, I think what really counts is that I was pleased with it. I called it "Sunny Daze" as an homage to Sunny Fong's amazing dress - which was my inspiration.




(and, as always, pics are clickable to "embiggen").

This week I've been busy with non-quilting projects, one of which I'll post about later this week because I think it's so cool. But I was kind of scratching my head wondering what to post about in the interim, and I remembered that I made a quilt last year that I haven't blogged about yet. It was around October of last year and I had decided to kill two birds with one stone: get rid of some of my flannel stash and practice my very first curved piecing.  I decided that the best way to do this was to try my hand at a Drunkard's Path.

I used a flannel printed with lions and tiger and monkeys (oh my!) as well as a plain soft yellow flannel for the blocks. For the sashing and front ruffled edge, I used a tone on tone yellow polka dot. And for the back side, I used more of the animal print.



Once I was done the finished product, I wasn't very pleased with it. I was sorry that I hadn't chosen solids for a more modern look, and I also didn't know what to do with a baby-sized quilt when I was done. I ended up donating the quilt to a charity auction, from which it was stolen!

(As always, pics are clickable to "embiggen").

Staying true to my challenge to myself to work only with my stash through June and July (and this just in - I'm extending it to August!) I've been working on a crumb quilt this past week.

The red crumbs are from the scraps leftover from Saucy Divo (in my header), but when I begn the quilt, I had no idea how much fabric the white strips would use up, and so I quickly blew through my stash of white scraps, and then added a further 4 metres (!) of white poly-cotton yardage I had on hand. I didn't like using up all my white like that (because after all, I can't buy anymore until fall!) but the top went together easily and reasonably quickly and I was quite pleased with the result. Here it is batted up and ready to go:



For the back, I used a length of red and white polka dotted fabric I scored at the Textile Museum's fabric sale (for a $1.00, I might add!) and added some red kitschy kitchen gingham. The back turned out well too:



As I made the top, I envisioned it as a big fluffy quilt, nearly a comfortor's thickness; so I uncharacteristically bought high-loft polyester batting *le gasp!*, and used two layers of it to get the thickness that I wanted. It turned out to be as fat and soft looking as I had hoped once I got it batted up and pinned, but the problems began when I started quilting it. I had envisioned quilting it with outlined hearts, so they too would be big, soft and puffy looking, but as I quilted them, I was watching "The Duchess" (a movie I highly recommend, by the way) and was not paying 100% attention. Because of that, I didn't realize that I was quilting the hearts so densely. By the time I was done the first 30 or so hearts, I stood back and looked at it, and realized - I didn't like it. *cries*

I decided to put off making a decision about un-picking the hearts until I'd quilted more hearts in the pattern I had first envisioned - a loose diagonal - with lots of air between the hearts, and came up with this: which was more what I had intended. (Incidentally, this shot is also a really great pic of the borders, an unbelievably soft fabric called "minky" - its delightful to touch - feels like a soft warm furry baby creature of some sort.)

I'm going to finish up the quilt with a binding of red taffetta and I think I'm going to love it - if I get the quilting right.

*sigh*

So I need to decide whether to continue with the "densely hearted" quilt, or unpick and go with a looser, more freely spaced heart.

To un-pick or not un-pick?

Stay tuned to this bat channel...