Home at last

We rolled in yesterday afternoon around 3:30.  Home never felt so good.  The in-laws are great but nothings like your own bed.  Come to think of it I kinda like everything here better.  The roads are flat and straight, in Pennsylvania everything is on a hill, in a hill, down a hill, up a hill, over a hill.  Its like the never ending roller coaster....ewww...tummy troubles!

I couldn't wait to get home and get back to quilting. 

I've had this quilt on and off the frame soooo many times.  Maybe I'll get it finished this week.  2 more rows of blocks to go!

The little scrappy quilt came together nicely...and I stole a doll from momma.  She wouldn't let me have one of her good dolls so I settled for a hand me down from my aunt. 

They both seemed to bright ....a coffee dye bath  

......Painted her little shoes

TADA!  I think she needs a bed or a chair.  OH Honey!! .....LOL

Until next time "Quilt out of your Comfort Zone!"

Lea

Lilys quilts is having a giveaway

Once again I've been cruising the web and stumbled across a wonderful blog with tons of tutorials.   Admitting that I'm not a modern quilter, but my kids love the modern style and are always asking me to make more modern patterns, why?  So they can take my quilts!  BRATS!  LOL...Gotta love them.   Check out this great give away of these new fabrics  over at Lily's quilts.  These would look great in my sons home!

Happy Thanksgiving!

A box of chocolate?

....That's what I'm going to name this one.  Of course I'm open to suggestions if you've an idea for a name.   Do you remember all those little extra pieces?

 There was no room for squaring up these little pieces(to much out of my comfort zone) at least not in my mind.  Sure Jo Morton could have but I'm not the queen of Mini.  They came together kinda wonky so blur your eyes and look past the imperfections.  When I realized that they were going to be cattywompus(that's a podunk word for wonky) the reading glasses came off and the assembly line sewing began!  The seam allowance on these is 3 ticks less than a quarter inch, a scant quarter inch is 1 tick.  It was the only way to keep from clipping off my points.

A few hours later and TADA!  My first mini doll quilt!(19 1/2 x 26 1/2)  Now I need a doll.  I'll be raiding my moms doll collection on Thanksgiving.  She only has about 300 to 500(seriously) they're everywhere, every room, she can't seem to stop buying them.  I can relate...FABRIC!  Once its quilted I'll show you how its displayed with my antique baby cloths, it's gonna be too cute!

Until next time "Quilt out of your Comfort Zone!"

Lea



Christmas Cardinals

200 miles to my daughters plus 200 miles of running our rear ends off plus 200 miles back home makes momma happy to be home.  Yes 600 miles in 3 days, helping her to get her dad in a nursing home rehab was not on my list of fun things to do this week.  Not to mention I took a wrong turn on the interstate and had to figure out how to get back on track.  A traveler I'm not, no sense of direction!  Anyway all is well and we got her back to work and things taken care of.  It was too much for a 24 yr old girl to handle on her own, so I put on my Magic Mommy Cape and swooped in, worked my magic, and swooped back home as quickly as possible.

The inspiration for my applique was right outside my window while surfing the net for ideas.

Still need to make the rest of the applique and sew them down. 

Awww it's nice to be back home the view here is amazing most evenings, this picture hasn't been photo shopped or cleaned up in anyway what-so-ever, it came directly from my camera.

Standing on my front porch....



Until next time "Quilt out of your Comfort Zone"

Lea

Design wall Monday, if your afraid of snakes dont look!

Not much to share design related, other than I decided my New Lonestar needed some applique.  Only 122 more of these petals to go!

Yesterday was a momma's day out.  Spent the day with my middle son and his lovely girly.  They are so cute!  And they have a petting zoo at their place, inside and out.

They also have a black cat, called Stanley, I forgot to snap a pic of him. 

This snake was loose in my house for an afternoon a few years ago.  Was glad to see the snake move out!

The view from the back porch

Until next time "Quilt out of your comfort zone!"

Lea



Fired Myself today!

It had to be done, many times I've told Myself to be careful when cutting fabrics. Especially when working with scraps and from the stash. The stash is a collection of fabric that date from current to 40 yrs old. Most current fabric is used as it comes through the door, the rest is near impossible to get more. Measure twice cut once, pay attention to details, plan ahead to know exactly what you'll need. These are rules of the Podunk Studio. The rules are clear for all who work here, Me, Myself, and I. Well let me show you what happened. I am assembly line sewing and look at this! Salvages! Who in the world cut this fabric? Luckily I had enough scraps to recut.

It reads 64

This isn't the first screw up this week. Earlier in the week I caught Myself sewing Lonestar strips together upside down and had to rip seams on two different star points. Then while cutting the Log cabin blocks I caught Myself cutting to the wrong length so I had to change what colors went where and pray that I had enough fabric to make the 28 log cabins. So you see it had to be done, I fired Myself. Now it's left up to Me to take up the slack.


I thought about asking " Her" to come in for awhile and help out but I'm not ready to take on another ego in the Studio. So I decided to ask you all what you think about the border in between the Star and the Log Cabins. It'll be a 6 inch space. Red? Green? Pieced? Any suggestions?

Until next time "Quilt out of your comfort zone!"

Lea

Todays progess

The borders are in the works.  Its been hard to find just the right fabric in my stash with just the right yardage. 

The background was the hardest to find enough, so I decided to use this..not sure if its 100% cotton but I thought what the heck.  Made a test piece to make sure that it could be quilted.  Those little dots are fuzzy!  This is one of those vintage finds at an estate auction, it came in a lot of fabric.

Until next time "Quilt out of your Comfort Zone!"

Lea

Lovin the colors

While preparing to put away the fabric from my last quilt another idea hit me.  I seem to get stuck on a certain color way once it's out of the cabinets.  So I did a little longarming yesterday evening and then started on this. 

This is the book I used for the basic construction.  And then EQ to help me with the rest.  It'll be my  3rd lonestar.  Quiltsmart is another great way to make these but I'm working out of my COMFORT ZONE with the inset seams and bias edges....YUK..so far so good no puckers or waves. 

Until next time "Quilt out of your Comfort Zone!"

Lea

No scraps left behind

 The  last quilt (Nostalgic Christmas)  had oodles of double flying geese units.  Realizing after the first block that the scraps from these could be used to make an AAQI quilt.  So I started using the "wings" that were cut off as leaders when sewing the blocks, and then  an EPIPHANY!   Draw another line and sew it before cutting!  NO need to make them leaders!  Hoping that my pictures make sense.   So here's what the pattern called for, one straight line down the middle and sew on that line then cut it off leaving a 1/4 inch seam.

                                                         Adding another sewing line

 Sew on both lines

 Cut in between

Press open

Clip that birdies wings

The picture larger so you could see the ruler...now can I get these sewn together without pulling out my hair!



Until next time "Quilt out of your Comfort Zone!"

Lea

Nostalgic Quilt top finish

Well here she is!  This has to be one of my favorite quilts this year.  Can't wait to get it on the frame and start quilting.  The pattern called for the final border to be red but I didn't have one red piece in my stash that matched that was big enough.  So its green and very hard to see in this picture that I took the picture at 8am outside and frost still on the ground...BRRRR!  It was too darn cold to worry about how wavy and wonky it looks so just imagine it not.  Giving Lynn a BIG ole country huggins for the pattern!

Close ups of all the blocks

 This one below is my favorite block, it seems to just jump off the quilt.

Until next time, Quilt out of your comfort zone!

Lea