let’s get acquainted blog hop

Baby K’s Quilt: Finished!

Last … July? I started a quilt for my neighbors, who were having a baby in late August. I chose Baby K’s Quilt, by Audrey of HotPinkQuilts, which she featured during the her spot on the Lets Get Aquainted blog hop organized by Beth of Plum and June. I had high hopes of finishing it and giving it to them as a baby shower present. Then the semester began, and all my best intentions, well, we know what happens to good intentions.

Well, I finished it just before Christmas. Finally! This is what it looks like:

I used scraps for nearly all of the postage stamp squares, though I fussy-cut some 1001 Peeps and the little blue pigs. The green is Kona Clover, the stripe is Hello Pilgrim.

I’m really pleased with how the postage stamp squares turned out:

I free-motion quilted the squares using Elizabeth Hartman’s orange peel pattern. My peels aren’t quite as plump and pretty as hers, but I’m not unhappy with them.

I quilted the borders on each side of the seam, which was, well, not quite as much fun as the orange peels, but I’m happier with how it turned out — though I need to learn how to adjust my stitch length better next time.

I waffled on the backing for a little while, and finally settled on fleece: I talked to friends this summer who had a little one, and their favorite part of the quilt their mother had made was the soft fuzzy backing. As a bonus, it shows the quilting well:

So that’s one of the things I started last summer and finished in December!

Linking up with Thank Goodness It’s FINISHED Friday. Because, really? I’m so glad this one is done.

Signal boosting

Do you like modern, designer quilting fabric? Consider this:

When you sign up for the swap you vote for designers you’d like to see included. Participants will be split into 8 groups of 7 people, and each group will be assigned a designer. You get two yards of different fabrics by that designer, and cut each into 56 charm squares. Collate them AB, AB, AB, etc. and send them in! Get back charm squares representing 14 fabrics each by 8 different designers. This sounds like a win-win scenario to me.

I’ve got my fingers crossed for Lizzy House, Riley Blake or Denyse Schmidt, though I’m also looking forward to discovering new designers!

As of right now, there are 16 open spots. Come join us, and help get this thing going! I can’t wait to get cutting. :)

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And, just in case it’s fallen off your radar:

This past week, we had posts on July 31st from Audrey, of Hot Pink Quilts and M-R from Quilt Matters. On August 2nd, there were posts by Jennifer, of GH Quilting and Danny, of MommyFor Reals.

This week, we can look forward to posts on August 7 from Liz of What I Did On My Summer Vacation and Susan, of Canadian Abroad. On August 9, we get posts from Kirsten of Gemini Stitches and Stephanie of Sewing By Stephanie.

This blog hop is a ton of fun, and a great way to meet new people, find awesome projects and get a ton of inspiration. Drop by their blogs and see what they’re up to! Even better, leave a comment — if they’re anything like me, it’ll make them happy.

I’m not up to bat until the very end of the blog hop, but I’m already thinking about what my project / mini-tutorial is going to be. :)

A thoroughly relaxing weekend.

Last weekend was great: I went to see Avengers on Friday with a friend who hadn’t seen it yet, went to the Brooklyn Flea with the same friend on Saturday, and spent the rest of the weekend hiding in air conditioning and quilting. My family was out of town, so I had the house more or less to myself.

I’m almost done with the Circa 1934 Filmstrip quilt: all I have to do is sew down the binding. This may take me a while, though, because I’ve decided I want to do it by hand, and I’m terribly slow at sewing by hand.

I made it a scrappy binding, alternating black fabric with strips of the various prints used in the front of the quilt: I had just enough to make it work, with hardly anything left over at the end.

The backing is a simple red and white stripe — I’ve actually had the fabric for years, trying to figure out what to do with it. I suppose this will only encourage me to be a packrat in the future. (Ooops.)

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I also cut fabric for my next project — a Kitchen Window quilt. Because I don’t have enough half-done projects already, right? But I know myself well enough by now to know that I’ll pretty much always have more than one WiP at a time: I do it with knitting, with spinning, even with reading books: I like to have a variety to flip back and forth between.

I’m torn right now between using a black fabric for the frame and using a navy one — I’ll have to lay them both out for a little bit and look at them in different light, I think. The sashing between windows will be a deep green to pick up some of the teals and greens in the panes.

How were your weekends? Anything out of the ordinary, or interesting projects?

If you have time, check out the Monday Link-Up at Plum and June:

And keep an eye out for the Let’s Get Aquainted blog hop posts this week: there are three on Tuesday this week!

Blog link-ups

I didn’t really know what blog link-ups were until maybe a month ago. This week, I’m posting to two:

And, over at Plum and June, the Let’s Get Acquainted Monday Link-Up.

Head over to either of them to get a really convenient list of interesting quilting blogs: small blogs, for the one at Lily’s Quilts, and anyone participating in the Let’s Get Acquainted at Plum and June.

The Let’s Get Acquainted Blog Hop is going strong.

The Let’s Get Acquainted Blog Hop continues! For links to all the participants, click here, or click the button on my sidebar. If you don’t know what it is, definitely check it out: it’s a great opportunity to find other quilting blogs, and to meet other people in the community, not to mention learn something new and come away with great ideas and inspiration.

The Advice for New Bloggers Series continues today, with great advice from Angela of Cut to Pieces.

For this week’s lineup of bloggers, who will be posting on the 26th and 28th, a link party and a giveaway, click the button below.

And, hey, if you get a chance? Thank Beth for organizing this whole shebang!