Can’t Have Anyone Over Syndrome!

I will have to admit my house has gotten so bad I don't even want to live in it.  All I have wanted to do lately is sew hence the dust and dirt has piled up.  Now I never wanted to be known as the lady whose obituary said she was known for the cleanest house but this is ridiculous.   So the last few days have been spent cleaning showers, floors, windows and all the other things that don't have anything to do with quilting.

Now back to what I enjoy.

I have been participating in the BOM Comfort & Joy at Sweet Home Quilt Company my local quilt shop because I really needed another applique' project.




The first two months were just piecing -  nine patch, flying geese,

churn dash, log cabin and half sq. triangle blocks ...with one little sq. in a sq. block.

Month three was this little applique house and this month we made a snowman and a flag.










I think this is going to be a sweet little Christmas quilt when finished.

Beyond the Cherry Trees Progress

I know this is not a very good picture because I just don't have enough room to stand far enough back from my design wall---but I though I would show you the progress I have made on my Cherry Tree quilt.


I also made a couple of changes to my quilt. The purple in the grapes just didn't seem to fit with all the other red and green blocks.  Some of the others made their cherries red and they fit better but I didn't want to do all those cherries over so I just put some leaves around the vine.

I never really liked the pineapple block.  To me it just looks weird and not at all like a pineapple---also there is no red in this block.  So I found another block in one of my applique books made a few changes and had it enlarged to fit.




My only dilemma now is should I change the purple basket in this block.  I will wait and see what the last six blocks are about before making that decision.

Snappy Bag and GO

This is the fourth project in my Accuquilt Die Challenge.  I am using the 2" square die and the Funky Flower Die to make my Snappy bag.

I wanted to make a black and white bag so I gathered all my black and white scraps and placed them on the die rolled them through and very quickly ended up with all these nice little 2" squares.

 I arranged them in the order I wanted and sewed them together into little rows.  Then I sewed the rows together to make my bag front and back.

I pressed the rows on one piece going up and  the rows on the other piece going down so the seams would butt together when I assembled my bag.

Next I got out my Funky Flower die and fabric.

I ironed a piece of Lite Steam-A-Seam2 to the back of my fabric and ran it through the cutter to get these cute little flower shapes.  I placed them on the front of my bag ironed them down and stitched around the edges.

The next step was to stabilize the bag so I ironed a piece of fusible interfacing to the back of both pieces.

 I wanted to have a little black trim on the front of my bag so I sewed a piece of black fabric to the top of the bag

and since this is the casing the metal tape is going through I reinforced it with some batting.  I also trimmed the batting out of the seam allowance to eliminate some thickness.Next I cut two pieces of lining fabric the same size as the bag front and back and sewed them to the black fabric

  

I  made a simple pocket and sewed it to the lining before sewing the bag together.  I also made little loops for my strap to go through but failed to take pictures.

I wanted the bottom of my bag to be curved so I used my masking tape roll to draw a curve stitching    line on both corners---- put the bag right sides together and sewed  around the edges leaving an opening in the bottom of the lining to turn the bag through.

 I cut my metal tape the width of the bag top curved the ends and covered them with clear duct tape.
Then I  folded the top of the bag down  to cover the tape and have enough to stitch down.

I cut a piece of black fabric for the strap 4 times the width of the finished strap.  Pressed it in half  opened it and pressed each side to the center and stitched down both sides. Put the strap through the loops and tied an overhand knot.

Check out the tutorial for the
Snappy Bag on my blog for a little more direction.
This is not a pattern and you should use your own sizes and materials for your bag if you make one.

Accuquilt 4x4 Diamond New Idea

I just realized you can make these great blocks from the Accuquilt 4x4 Diamond die. 

Now all I need is more time to make enough of them for a quilt.

We have A winner

Thanks so much everyone for taking the time to vote for Jenifer.  She has move on to the next step which I am happy to say does not involve voting.

The winner of this Giveaway is Catskill Quilter.

This is the first time I have tried to use this Number Generator and I don't know why the number keeps changing to 100 because I entered the number 52.
Happy Stitching,
Nancy

True Random Number GeneratorMin: Max: Result:12Powered by RANDOM.ORG

It's A Giveaway!

The owner of Lily'nWren, Jenifer, my daughter is trying to win her dream job so she can work from home and won't have to leave my Granddaughter.
So, I am having this giveaway to try and help her get votes.

She needs more votes to be in the top 20 in order to move on to the next step.


 If you Go here and click on VOTE-----Then leave a comment on my blog saying you voted
You will be entered for a chance to win These great patterns and fabric.


You can vote from each computer, phone, etc that you use and each vote will be an additional entry into this giveaway, just leave a comment every time you vote!
A winner will be randomly drawn from the comments....If you post as Anonymous, please leave your email address in case you  are the winner.

Voting will now close on Monday April 25 at 11:59:59 PST

 and the winners will be posted here Tuesday.

Happy Stitching,
Nancy

Beyond the Cherry Trees Block 12, 14 & 17

I had been putting off doing block 12 because of the little fingers not much of a seam to turn under and I am still not convinced the seams will hold.

I enjoyed stitching Block 14 it was a little easier to do.

















Block 17 was very quick to stitch....... Sometime you need something easy to relax again.

 I believe the ladies that designed this quilt all those many years ago must have been very accomplished at  appliqué.

Accuquilt Triangles in a Square and Half Square Triangles

My third quilt in the die challenge is made from the Accuquilt Triangle in a Square and Half Square Triangles dies.

First I cut all the pieces for the triangle in a square block.  I ran into some difficulty with this block not coming out to the right size but quickly found out I was not sewing it together correctly. The little nubbed corners are not stitching guide lines.   Once that was corrected everything went smoothly.

Here are all the little pieces that go into making up each block.  Each one should be 3 1/2 inches square.

These are the two blocks in the quilt.  Either block would make a lovely quilt. 

But when combined they make a spectacular one.

I wanted to make this quilt a little larger but part of the challenge is to use only fabrics from my stash so I was limited in the size. 

Happy stitching, Nancy

LollyPop Trees Center

I finally finished the center of my Lollypop Trees quilt.  The picture is not very good but this quilt is hugh and I just don''t have a space large enough to photograph it.

I am only about half way finished because there is a lot of applique' in the borders but the more I do on this quilt the more I like it.
Happy quilting,
Nancy