Secret Project

I finished piecing the top for the Secret Project yesterday.  I love it and can't wait to get it quilted.  I am going to attempt to get it into the longarm today so I can finish it this week.  I'll post pictures after it's done.

It is raining again here today so I should get lots of things accomplished.

Happy Quilting.
Shelia

I Am So Ready For Spring!

It has been raining here for two days and I am so ready for spring to get here.  Speaking of spring, look what greeted me this morning in my flower garden.  These beautiful purple tulips.  These were one of the table decorations at my 50th birthday party last year.  Roger and I planted the table decorations and the flowers that I received as gifts that day.  I see some of the other lilly's also bursting through.  I can't wait to see them.
 

 Friday night was bee night. We met at Suzanne's house this week. Below is Deb looking at some scrap quilt patterns. Deb also brought several bags of scraps that she had cleaned out of her studio for us to go through and drool over. You guessed it......me, Sue, Suzanne and Susan all on the floor going through someone else's scraps. What a bunch of girls!! We each came home with some new scraps to add to our stash. Thanks Deb for sharing.

 Below is Sue who spent the evening cutting out 2 1/2 inch strips for a new scrap quilt project she is about to start. She was able to cut out some of the new scraps and add into her strip pile.

 Here is Susan, me and Suzanne piecing away on our different projects. Susan was piecing blocks for her New Year's resolution challenge, I am piecing on my secret project and Suzanne is piecing on her Blueberry Challenge. We had a great night and laughed so much. What an awesome stress reliever bee is.

I hope to get all of the blocks finished this weekend for the secret project so I can put borders on and get it into the frame this week. Suzanne has pieced a ton of blocks for me on this project. Thanks Suzanne for all of the help. It is going to be gorgeous.


Better get back to piecing as time is limited.
Happy Quilting,

Shelia

Quilt-A-Thon

The bee girls and I decided to have a quilt-a-thon to get some projects completed including some habitat for humanity quilts that needed to be pieced and quilted.
We started on Thursday afternoon and kept going until late Saturday night.  What a blast.
We were able to get a total of six quilts quilted.  Some of which we had to complete the piecing, piece the backing and then quilt.
Below is a picture of Suzanne who is quilting her Texas Braid quilt.  This was her first panto on my machine, below you can see she even made her own panto to follow.  Such a talented lady.

 I finished quilting Jenny's quilt and hope to get it to her tomorrow.  I forgot to take a picture of the finished quilt.

Our guild president, Suzanne, issued a new year's resolution challenge in which we had to list a project that we wanted to get done before our June meeting.  We had to fill out a pledge and submit a picture of the project in it's current state.  Those who don't finish will be changed a fine.......a half-yard of fabric!!
Below is my challenge and my progress.  It is a round robin that I was part of a couple of years ago.  We took a poster, cut it up and gave pieces of the poster to the other members who had to recreate it in fabric.  I'm doing some thread painting and texture quilting.  I really think it might just turn out nice.

 This is a close up of the flower pot and the texture of pebbles that I am doing.  Kinda like it.

 Background texture.

 This is our resident designer, Deb, she was having to test a pattern for Studio E fabrics, so I was the recepient of the test project.    HEHEHE!!

Suzanne is here quilting on her second quilt which was a Carolina Chain pattern by Bonnie Hunter.  She had a blast.

 Susan was piecing on her challenge which is 25 blocks from a block of the month.  They are black/white and bright colors.  Beautiful work.

 Sue was teaching us how to make a pillowcase with totally enclosed seams.  Awesome, easy technique.  Of course, whiskers thought he should be helping.

 I quilted the next quilt for habitat which was beautiful.

 Mom was busy piecing away on two other habitat quilts.  She was able to get the tops pieced and now just needs to add borders.

Here is the project mentioned above that Deb made, I couldn't get the picture to move to the right position.........DAH!  She made a cute shoulder bag. 

Deb also finished the backing on her habitat quilt then loaded it into the longarm.  She was able to quilt it in less than an hour.  It was gorgeous.....so where did the picture go?????

Next Suzanne, Deb and I worked on a secret project.  I can't give details now, but will let you in on the project later.  Suzanne and I started and the directions were horrible.  So we enlisted Deb's help, since she writes so many pattern instructions for designers, to help us figure out what was wrong.....because of course it was not our piecing that was making it come out wappyjawed!  And of course she instantly realized that the cutting instructions were off.  Go figure.

A little adjusting and off we were to piecing and cutting.

Hope you have had a great weekend piecing....we sure have had some fun, laughing, quilting, sewing and of course eating goodies!

Happy Quilting,

Shelia

Piecing Blocks

I've been up since 3 a.m. this morning.  It's been productive time.  I completed my brother's taxes and got them filed.  I also got some blocks pieced for our block quest drawing at the guild.  Each month we have a different block in our newsletter.  You can piece one or many.  For each one you piece you put your name in a drawing for all of the blocks.  This year we are doing regular size blocks and mini blocks.  I pieced 3 of the regular this morning which are just scrap 9-patch blocks.

these finish at 6-inches.
I also pieced a mini block, these finish at 3-inches.

Now off to get ready for work.  Camera battery is dead right now so I will upload some pictures from Mom's day at Mary Jo's later.
Happy Quilting,
Shelia