New Laptop Sleeve, a Finish

One more off my to list.....laptop sleeve , check!

I used my Joel Dewberry fabrics from Intrepid Thread and cut up some random strips. Pieced them together with some leftovers from my mini Scrappy Trip Along and quilted with straight lines.

  I cut it to size, added a flap, then lined it with  flannel.

The back with straight line quilting.

Boxing the corners, I used sharpie to mark it...

I had 1 strip at the bottom that I wanted to ensure it landed at the fold, so I marked it with my new Bohin, ceramic chalk pencil.

 Ta Da!!!!

 The finished sleeve!!!   I love how it looks with it's boxed corners, snug fit (on the verge of too snug, but it's gonna stretch, I keep telling myself!) and a very cheery look to brighten my day at work!!

 Here is a picture of Tyson my daughters cat cozying up to the improv rug I made for Christmas. I love his fuzzy belly!!  Yes same fabric....that fat quarter bundle goes a long way and I'm STILL in love with it.

Off to sew a bit, took a vacation day! Yeah, happy sewing, K

Road to California Quilt Show

This weekend I was able to go to the quilt show and do a bit of shopping. I try to go every year at least to shop and see the quilts on display. There is every category of quilts on display, I have a couple shown here. I was amazed at he number of 3/4 inch hexagons it took to make this quilt. The horses were hand painted and then stitched, it was one of the winners. The sea tunnel was spectacular in person and looked just like a painting, it has over 250 different fabrics in it.

I tried to behave myself with the shopping and only got a couple zen tangle books, a charm pack of 50 lights and 50 darks all one of a kind with some extra light for sashing, a new 1/4 edge stitching foot (I am in LOVE) and a few other gadgets. I did get to see Eleanor Burns in person which was cool. I don't really go for that kind if quilting but she has really good tips and techniques. She was very nice and quite funny!

I wrote this on my iPad so my pictures are going to be out of line.....sorry.

I did get some sewing done today and finished my laptop sleeve, it's drying now so no picture and some piecing with my new foot. How did I ever live without it I don't know?!

Now I gotta get some laundry done, starting a new job assignment tomorrow! Need clean clothes!
Happy Sewing, K

Linking up with Plum and June

Design wall & Free HST Paper

      This is the cutest idea. Lori Holt's mini design boards.  I made a couple this week with leftover school  project foam board.  I used some of my sweetest thing fabric for the binding and the zig zag detail is pretty cute. (You can not see it here but on Lori's you can.)
   
       I'm calling this project a UFO since I bought the pattern a year ago and am just now starting it.  Underground Railroad by Lisa Bongean@Primitive Gatherings click here to see the pattern.


  I picked up a charm pack of 1930's fabric on etsy that is vintage looking but not quite the traditional 1930's look.  At this point I am a little uncertain on the contrast of the lights and darks, I will keep going and see what happens.  I may give up and turn it into a pillow or table topper and get the real 30's fabrics.  The original is in more of a civil war fabric line.

My first block not quite all together, it's 3.5 inches unfinished.  I do like the tiny piecing but it is so hard to get the 4 patches perfectly square.  I have the center seams matched pretty good if I do say so.  That is always a challenge for me....

    

. You can go here to my post on free HST paper to print from home.

Free HST Paper

Check out this site for free HALF SQUARE TRIANGE pattern paper.   I have been buying these for my projects and during a late night sewing fest I realized I didn't have the right size for my project.  Ahhhh what am I going to do???!   Search the intranet and this is what I found.

...
You can print out any size you need and it even has a key to measure so you know your triangles are going to come out the right size!!  Thanks so much quilting and whatnot for making my sewing fest a success!

Amazing Class-Donna Downey

       I wanted to share my amazing class I took last week with Donna Downey mixed media artist and international teacher.

       This is what we made...it's pan pastel on canvas board.  I took the class with my youngest
 daughter.  My oldest daughter is the studio manager for Donna and set me up for the class. 
 I have to say Donna and her husband Bill are the most fun and friendly people!!

Me, Donna and M, who is really that tall.....6 foot!!  

My canvas looks more like the original and M did her own artistic thing....I like hers better of course!!!  

Here is Donna's  bio....and her blog is great too.  She does Inspiration Wednesday video every week and 
they are amazing...you have to check it out.  

Donna Downey is a bestselling author, instructor and all-around creative force as a mixed-media artist. In 2000, she got into scrapbooking as an extension of her paper product and photography addiction. This was only the beginning. From working as a popular columnist for Simple Scrapbooks magazine, to traveling the world inspiring women to push the boundaries of their own creativity, to developing her first mixed-media scrapbooking line with Prima in the Spring of ‘09, Donna is consistently on the leading edge of taking creative risks the push the creative envelope and empowering others to do the same with their art.

As a mixed-media artist, Donna is a born experimenter, blending and transforming both traditional and unexpected items into meaningful pieces of self expression. A former elementary school teacher, she has synthesized her first love of teaching with her passion for craft and brings this to women via workshops at scrapbook stores and events, writing books, and through her popular blog and website.

Donna lives in North Carolina with her husband, and is a mother of three exceptionally blonde children, a chihuahua and one blonde dog.

"All things material can be creatively transformed into a personal piece of artistic interpretation. That creativity is not a measure of skill, but a passion. That art comes from within and is a visual extension of ones self. That everyone is perfect just the way they create. That art cannot be defined, but rather is defining."

Now back to my long weekend and sewing projects....Happy Weekend, K

A Little Organization Needed-found more UFO's

     So I decided I needed to organize my craft room after seeing some posts on sewing rooms and some Pinterest browsing.    The one thing I love about my craft room is I put all my favorite things in there to display that most people put away and only bring the out at the specific holiday time.

       I keep. my snowman collection on a shelving section along with their Santa friends.  I pin up my sewing maching stitch sampler so I can look at it when I need a fancy stitch.  I post up drawings from my kids when they were little.  My Halloween quilts....you get the idea.  So it looks a bit cluttered, but I worked so hard on some of theses and to box them up all year is not appealing to me.




      Now I really spend most of my time sewing downstairs at the kitchen table so I don't spend a ton of time in there so I don't get tired of seeing my snowmen.  The other space hog is my inspiration quilting frame and Viking machine.  I will have to admit that I did not use it at all this last year.  (I was assigned an extra assignment to cover for a coworker that was going to be on leave for 6 weeks that turned into over a year and just never had enough time/energy to start a project).

      I also have a twin bed for when my daughter comes to stay.  She only comes once or twice a year and I can not figure out a way to hide that bed anywhere else in the house.    I would love some ideas on this one.  I might move the quilting cram forward so I can stand the bed behind it sideways.  Then I can add some table space.

     That was rather long winded to get to my UFO  list.....so in my cleaning I found my snowman quilt that needs to be quilted and have all the buttons sewn on.  I think over 100 buttons.

The makings of a valentine wall hanging that is a very cute panel with a pieced border.

A felt pillow to be hand sewn, along with a felt table topper.

A painted plate that just needs the vines and final details painted and varnished.  Didn't find the pattern that goes with it yet.

2 lap quilts that need batting and backings.

Many punch needle projects that need framing.  Need some ideas...Pinterest??

     I intend to get these going in the year 2013 and will start with loading one on the quilt frame this week after inventory.   I have to go take a nap now to prep myself for 3 overnighters of inventory bliss.  I make it sound like hell but I do love the process but getting 100 plus people to get it counted right is sometimes quite a chore, times that by 2 and you know what my next 3 nights will be like.  Did I mention I do like inventory?  

Happy counting, I mean sewing, K




 

WIP Wednesday

        Linking up with WIP Wednesday over at Freshly Pieced.. Here is my progress on my scrappy hexie's.....a bit slow this week due to Inventory at work.   Prepping the stores to get ready for 3 overnighters.  Then a day of sleep followed by a 4 day weekend and some sewing time.

freshly pieced

Free Motion Friday

 Update, FMQ pictures of my mini 1x1 scrappy trip along.  I used my Joel Dewberry scraps for this project.  It came out about 12 inches square with the 4 blocks.  It is FMQ'd in pipe maze by Leah Day.   Fun pattern, easy to do and you never need to break thread, which I can appreciate because I often do applique and like to change colors all over the place= lots of thread tails to hide.

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    It's Sunday and I have spent the last 90 minutes browsing all my favorite blogs and discovering a few new ones to add to my weekly reading.

       I am a bit off this week......I got my post all ready to link up on Wednesday with WIP @
Freshly Pieced  and it was Thursday....so I missed the link up.

     Then Friday rolls around and oh my its Free Motion Friday and I was not ready for that one either......

       So now it's Sunday and I'm sure I have a UFO to drag out and work on this week.   So I am off to go find it......Well I did see Pat's post about a USO  ( Unstarted Object)  and that is an intriguing possibility also..   I got a new work laptop and want to make a sleeve for it and I might be coming down with the new sickness of scrappy trip along.....   Oh no what's a girl to do?  Get off the computer and make something!!   I will post my pictures later today.....

Happy Sewing, K

       So here is my scrappy trip, the strips were 1 1/2 inch wide and the 4 blocks I made came out to 5 1/4" by 5 3/4".  Not sure why they were not square??   I like they way it came out.  I am going to quilt it with pipe maze by Leah Day.   This isn't going to work for my laptop bag but I still have more fabric!!!!

WIP

Checking in with my work in progress.....I have been cutting my scraps from

 this quilt to make some scrappy hexagons with EPP. I have cut some up into triangles and diamonds to get a more pieces look to the quilt.  It may only end up a pillow or zip bag but I love the fabrics so much I needed to use up the scraps.  It really brightens my day during my long train trip tp work....

Not much time for sewing after work this week due to inventory coming up....but I will have some much needed vacation time at the end of the month right in time for the Road To California Quilt Show.  Anyone else going or taking classes?   I usually go for the shopping and to look at all the quilts on display.  


Almost to work, gotta go, happy sewing, K

Happy New Year

I am so ready for a new year!  I have all kinds of things I want to do, like..... 

• Make a modern scrappy quilt from the new book I just bought, Sunday Morning Quilts.
• Clean out and organize my fabric.
• Make backs and quilt the finished tops my sister made.
• Finish the hand appliqué scallops on my Fantasy Flowers quilt top.
• Then quilt it, the back is ready to go.
• Go on a vacation
• Exercise every week. Ugh gotta do it.
• Make a biscornu.  It's a little embroidered pillow or pincushion.  I saw it on a blog and now I have to have one.
• Start my spring garden, oh wait it's too cold right this minute....wait till March.
• Make more hexies, and make them into a scrappy bright lap quilt.
• Figure out how to design a cute blog.....

I have lots more to add but I need to go clean the garage and make my last donation to the good will today for the year.

Here is my mosaic for this year's project, not all of them because I didn't take pictures or have a blog at the time.

 I do love blogging, it keeps me focused on what I love to do and maybe I will start my second career here, the possibilities are endless.....it's a NEW YEAR!!!!!

What are your plans for the NEW YEAR????  

Link up below to share your 2012 projects.