Swap Time!

I'd like to invite you all to participate in my Dotty For Dots Swap!

This is a swap I'm doing in conjunction with my local quilt store, and I'm very excited about it.

Here's the details:

You will mail in to me:

20 5” squares from each of 4 polka-dot fabrics (for a total of 80 charm squares)

          So that means you buy ½ yard of 4 polka-dot fabrics and cut 20 5” squares of each of them.

And then you will receive in the mail:

80 5” charm squares of 80 different polka dot fabrics.

The details:

·       Comment on this post to claim your place in the swap.  Make sure I have a way to contact you.  If I reply to the comment and your e-mail comes up as "no-reply" then I'll have to remove you from the list.

·        Purchase ½ yard of 4 different polka dot fabrics.  All fabrics should be 100% cotton and quilt-store quality.

·        Use a rotary cutter to carefully cut 20 5” charm squares from each fabric.  

·        Mail in your charm squares to arrive to me no later than June 6.  Please put your squares into a gallon-size Ziploc bag with your name, phone number and address written on the bag.   

In the bag, include $5 for return postage via Priority Mail flat-rate envelope.

Because this is a swap with a very quick turnaround, I'm limiting the participants to people in the continental United States.  But next time I'll be sure to include International participants.

progress this week

This weekend I have "Meet the Teacher" for the classes I'm teaching in the next few months.  

I'm very excited about it.

One of the classes is a Modern Machine Quilting class, and I've been working on my sample for it.

Here's a closeup of the quilting.

and this was the last week of school, so I've been busy working on teacher gifts.

These too for my younger daughter's teachers.

It's been a busy week!  

My new table runner (and someone let me loose with a longarm machine!)

Last week my friend Angie let me play around on her longarm.

What fun!!

And she had made this cute table runner..... 

That totally matches my kitchen... and she let me quilt it. 

Isn't that the best?  

So I played around with spirals.  This one wasn't my best, but isn't the fabric beautiful?

This one was probably better.  I bound it in yellow, and I love the way it looks on my table. 

Such fun.  

Thanks Angie!

Sew Mama Sew Giveaway!

Hi friends,

I love the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day!

This year I'm giving away a fun little water-resistant zippered pouch filled with 2.5 inch strips of fabric from my stash.

Yes, well right now it's empty... but it will not be when it arrives to you.....

Later on, I'm planning a tutorial on the quilted but still water-resistantness of this zippered bag, which involves one of my new favorite things, iron on vinyl!

So I have a few things coming up soon:  a quilt pattern and a children's clothing pattern.  So check back in the next few days!

To enter my giveaway:
1.  Go comment on any previous post.  I just want you to look around a bit while you're here!
2.  Come back and leave a comment on this post telling me you did.  That's all.

I'll randomly choose a winner on the 26th, and the prize will ship out by May 30th.
Thanks for stopping by!
Wendy

Look what's posting today!

Today I have a recipe up at Moda Bake Shop.  It's my second one, and I am so excited!  

Please click over and see.  

And would you leave a comment over there so that Moda knows you stopped by?  

I would so appreciate it.

I enjoyed this project so very much.  And once the quilt was finished up, it needed an accessory.

So I made this cute pillow from the scraps!

Read on for directions......

Draw a basic butterfly shape, approximately the size of your desired pillow size.

Piece together enough scraps to cover your shape.  Then cut your shape out of Heat N Bond and affix to your pieced fabric.

Cut it out and 

Iron onto your pillow front.  Mine measured 16" x 16".

Satin stitch around the edge of the butterfly.

Layer up your pillow front, then two layers of batting, then backing. 

 The backing will not show, so it's a good way to use up scraps.

I used two layers of batting so that the quilting would really show up well.

Quilt as desired.  This was a lot of fun for me because my 4-year old daughter helped me with it!

She put her hands on top of mine and we traced the echo around the butterfly together.

After I washed the front, the butterfly was a bit saggy.  So I cut into the backing and stuffed the butterfly part with fiberfill so that it's puffy.  The proper name for this is trapunto, I have since learned.

I used an envelope closure on the back of the pillow and some leftover binding from my quilt to finish it up.

Muted Nauticals finished up

Finished up a quilt this week that I was first working on here....

It's for a little boy named Maksim who's due to be born in July.

I quilted it in free-form waves with his name in there a few times for fun.  I enjoyed the quilting. 

The name didn't photograph great, but it looks neat in person.  

I did a quilt for Maksim's big sister a couple of years ago, and here's that post.

Giveaway Day is coming to town....

The May Sew, Mama, Sew! Giveaway Day is coming up soon.  

If you haven't participated before, it's lots of fun.  I want to encourage everyone to enter to do a giveaway of their own.  All the details of how to enter are posted here, and the deadline to sign up is Friday, May 20.

my creations from the last few days..

So the last few days have been pillow crazy.  I had some gifts to complete and decided to get them all done at one time.

This one was one I did for my niece to give her coach.  It's pieced into the zebra design.

And this is for her other coach.  She drew the picture of the bulldog and the softball and I made her drawing into the pillow.

Cute, eh? I used my open-toe applique foot, and I was impressed at how much easier it made the applique.  Perhaps I like applique after all?

I decided to play around with zippered bags.  

I have seen so many pretty ones in blogland, and I had to give it a try. 

I fear zippers, you see... and so this was a big step.

I used this tutorial, more or less.

And you know what?  It was EASY!

Love me some lime green lining.

The wonderful thing about creating things for other people is that it  allows me to think differently... somehow it opens up my mind to new ideas!  And so after the first zebra one, I made this for my mom.

She loves red and white, and she also loves zebra.  I hope she loves this as well.

I played around with the quilting more to give it a texture.

And then I used the off-cuts to make this.

And I had to make the lining fun.

On this one, I gusseted the corners so that it sits up on its own.

If you are related to me and recently had a birthday, don't scroll down....

Finally, I finished up this project.  I love how it turned out!

Pillows in progress....

This week I'm working on pillows.  Pillows, pillows, and more pillows.  They're coming out my ears over here.

This one has been fun.

How was it pieced?  By hook or by crook.  When it didn't want to lie flat, I sliced through it with my rotary cutter.  But I like it a lot!  This was a request for my niece's coach who likes zebra.  

It's going to get a pink binding.

If you had a birthday this past week and think I might be making something for you, don't look at the next picture, ok?

I'm playing with ruffles.

I'm pretty sure I like it.

Hoping to find a 12x16 pillow form in the morning for this one.

I have 2 more in progress that aren't ready for photographs yet... hoping to get them done by this weekend.

linking up to