Snail's Trail Top Done

It's me again updating you on what little sewing I got done this week. This first photo is of a small snail's trail quilt pattern with 3 borders which makes it a lap quilt size. Colors are a bit had to see in the photo but basically it is green, yellow, dark blue, and white. I did the center section last year at a quilting retreat and found it stuck in a box in sewing room this week so made myself finish the top at least. Now I just need to get it layered, qiulted, binding on, and labeled.

This block is one of 12 that will go together to make a nice size quilt. I don't remember the pattern name for this one, but it took quite a while to get all 12 blocks done. Now I just need to find some fabrics for the sashing, borders, backing and binding to finish it. If you have any suggestions on colors, etc. please let me know.

I've been working on taxes all day today and haven't had time to do any sewing, so I think it's about time to get some of that done now. Happy quilting!

My Babies: Ginger and Cookie

Last spring we purchased 2 miniature dachshunds that have turned out to be the life of the party at our home. Now Ginger is a year old and Cookie will be a year old on March 20th. They are fully housetrained and except for occasionally robbing a trash can, they don't cause much trouble. In the course of this past year we have purchased dog bedding of all sizes for them. In this first photo you will see the smallest of the dog beds that we started out with when they were little puppys. Now they still try to sleep together in this bed and as you can see, it's a very tight fit.

This next bed was a step up in size and fit them very well most of the past year and is still "do-able" if they decide to share like they usually do.

Now they have a nice big bed that they look like they're lost in, but it has become their favorite. I keep it in my office and when I'm on the computer they curl up and snooze in this bed.

As you can see they are both doing very well and growing. Ginger is almost 10 pounds and Cookie is about 8 pounds. They are both scheduled to be spayed in the next couple of months. We've decided against breeding them as we originally thought we might. They both have their own unique personallities, so different they are from each other. Ginger is the high strung hyper "guard dog" type always looking to growl at anyone that comes near me. Cookie is so laid back that I wonder sometimes if she isn't just too lazy to even eat. When I get them up in the morning, they are both in the same crate, and when I open the door Ginger runs to the back door to be let out. Cookie just rolls over on her back and wags her tail and will stay there until I pick her up and love her a bit and carry her to the back door and make her go out. I guess she's just doing her part in making sure I get at least one stretching exercise in each morning.

My First Kaleidoscope Quilts

Here are my first tries at making kaleidoscope quilts. These two are 4 patch quilts made with some funky fabric that came from who knows where and ended up in my stash. It wasn't the kind of fabric I would normally use for a quilt but it was a large print, so I figured for the first try they would work and I wouldn't be out an expense if they didn't turn out very well. I've found out since making them that they are favorites of my grandkids.

In this first quilt I only had enough fabric to make 8 blocks so I just cut a block from the actual fabric that the other blocks were cut and pieced from and put it in the center. It seems to work okay I think and it's interesting to see the unique designs that came from the fabric along side the actual fabric.

My prize kaleidoscope is one I made using a 6 patch block and some beautiful large print flowered pattern fabric. This is not quilted yet nor bound, but you can get an idea what it is going to look like from looking at the top which is now finished.

The colors in this quilt are black, white, pink, and green. They are really quite pretty but it was hard to get a good photo of this entire quilt that shows the colors up well because I have to get back so far to get the whole quilt in the photo. This is a twin bed size quilt.

Here are a few close up shots so you can see the cubes better.

My Pattern - Flippin' Bowtie

This quilt was my own design. I called it the flippin' bowtie quilt. I made the smaller one (above) and entered it into a contest but didn't win. It was quite a learning experience to try to figure out the measurements for each piece to make it come out just right. Needless to say, in the beginning I had a few "weird" looking squares before I got it just like I wanted it. This is the small wallhanging I entered into the contest. It is currently for sale on my 2009 - For Sale post if you are interested.

This is a larger lap quilt made from the same Flippin' Bowtie pattern. It was made with only 3 fabrics, red, white, and blue and the fabrics are patriotic fabrics so it can be used around the 4th of July and other patriotic holidays. It was finished with pieced red, white and blue binding.

Grief Quilts for Another Family

The grief quilts I'm going to show you this time were all made in November and December of 2009 for a lady from St. Louis whose husband died. They were made from his t-shirts and dress shirts. She sorted out which shirts she wanted in each quilt. Two were for her daughters and one for her mother-in-law. She chose the shirts for each one according to the events and who was with him at those events. Shirts that could go in all three were put in another bag. This first quilt was made for her mother-in-law.

The last two quilts were made for her daughters. All the quilts are hand tied per her request and both the fronts and the backs were quilted from the shirts. Fortunately, there were a lot of shirts to work with.

This last quilt was made with the stack and whack technique except that I kept the templates the same for each block rather than varying it as some do. The t-shirt parts were then appliqued on top of the quilt.