Skill Builder Sampler Finish

After about a year and a half of being a work in progress I finally finished my Skill Builder Sampler! I'm in love and it is just perfect on my bed! After I finished the blocks last June they were put in a box and left for quite some time. Last week I bought some fabric for the sashing and the border then put it all together. My fabulous friend Leila did an awesome job quilting it. The local quilt guild had an all-day sewing day and there I had it bound and finished up.

Here's some fun pictures for your viewing enjoyment.

Here's the top all finished and quilted. I just love how it turned out! I put the blocks in the order that I created them so theoretically they go from easy in the top left to crazy hard in the bottom right. For all the posts on this quilt click here.

Now here are some closeups of my favorite blocks either because of the piecing or the quilting.

This is the hardest block in the series. It was crazy hard and I ended up cutting up the tips of the wings while piecing but I think it looks so great! I love the quilting in the wings too! This is Block #36 - Alice Brooks Butterfly.

This one is paper pieced and was so fun to make! It was a little tricky getting all the fabric in the right spot to make the pattern but luckily I didn't have to unpick anything. I found the pattern here for 99 cents.

This was the first time I attempted EPP with hexagons. I loved it so much I now have a plan to make a whole quilt of solid hexies. I hope to start it soon but I have all the pieces and fabric in my stash ready to go. I love how Leila did the quilting on this one, it makes it even more cute!

I really love geometric blocks and these triangles are so fun. The glaring sun make the quilting hard to pick up but she did wavy lines in the white and it just makes the triangles pop more and I love it! The colors are pretty fabulous too.

Who doesn't love a circle of geese block? I saw this one and thought it would be impossible and never turn out right but it was paper pieced and so much easier than expected. I love how it turned out!

This one was fun and totally a learning process. She had us try four different ways of applique and there were some that were much harder than others. The quilting was so fun too!

Here's one last picture to show off the backing and my little name tag in the corner. The backing fabric is 108" wide and was so nice not to have to piece. I got it at fabric.com and I highly recommend for backing.

Thanks for stopping by and taking a look! I'm linking up with Finish it Up Friday over at Crazy Mom Quilts.

WiP Wednesday: UFO No More!

I accomplished so much this week! I took out a collection of blocks that I finished June of 2012 and put them together into a finished top! I'm so excited! I also finished up one of my 2010 scrapbooks and several crochet projects. It's been a crazy week and I'm linking it all up with Freshly Pieced for WiP Wednesday.

 I'll post in order that I worked on them. I kind of jumped around a bit...

This is part of the Skill Builder Sampler series I worked on last year. These blocks sat in a box since the end of June and I finally bit the bullet and put them into a quilt top.  I put them in the order that they were made so theoretically it goes from easiest to hardest top left to bottom right.

Then I finished up the scrapbook of my eldest daughter. I have pictures printed through the end of November that I've had sitting around for two years! I'm glad to have marked that off too.

Here's my favorite layout from that batch.

I love her cute scrapbook. It looks so thick!

Since I do five scrapbooks every year I needed some easy way to tell them apart.  Each one is color coded and they get a tag with their first initial and the year stamped on it. I can remember which one is which but this sure makes it easier for everyone else.

I crocheted this adorable sweater for my baby due the end of July. I was so excited to make it to match the sock monkey set I did last week. I found this adorable and FREE pattern here. Sadly I didn't look at the yarn requirements for the pattern and it came out HUGE. It needed baby sport weight and I used worsted weight. Thus a 3-6 month sweater turned out to be more like a 2T. It's still super cute and should fit her during the right season, just not this year. I think it might be easier to make a new sock monkey hat to match than another sweater to match the sock monkey hat.

This white blanket has been in the works for what seems like forever! I kept working on it but never seemed to get anywhere.  On Sunday I just sat on the couch and finished the whole thing. I'm so happy with it! I found the pattern here for free and it was so easy to follow.

Here's a bit of a closeup with the fun edge. I was so close to running out of yarn but I made it all with a one pound skein.

An artsy picture just because it is so cute.

I went to my LQS and they were so helpful! I just sat there while the woman helping me brought me all kinds of bolts to compare to my quilt.  It was so fun and easy! I went in thinking one color combination would be fabulous but with all her help I went a different way and I'm loving it. This is the green I picked for the binding and it's all ready to go!

Here's the sampler quilt all pieced together.  I just love the yellow border. I was thinking red or gray at first but the yellow is fabulous! My friend Leila who also came up with the sampler series is going to quilt it this week and I hope to have it finished and bound by my next post.

I have just entered my third trimester with this pregnancy and things are starting to get exciting. When I move around too much or try to work too hard I get crazy painful contractions. I had two premature babies and lots of preterm labor with other children. To keep this baby baking I have to spend a lot of time resting. I got this nice pile of yarn to keep me entertained while I sit around. I am so excited about what I have planned and am loving that creating cute things for my baby is helping her stay in longer.

My mom has this fun little tree that she decorates for every month/holiday. For Mother's Day she asked for some crochet flowers for her tree. I whipped these up pretty quickly and think they'll be just perfect for her.

I tend to hoard yarn a little bit so I got all of these fun spring flowers from my stash.

I made this adorable dress for my little baby and finished it in two days. I just love everything about it! The pattern was $3 and I found it here. It was more or less easy to follow. Creating the flap for the button the wording was a little weird but I figured it out and love the end result!

That was my crazy week. I've been thinking about posting more so my WiP Wednesday posts aren't so overloaded but then I get all excited to work on the next thing and it never happens. Maybe this week. Thanks for stopping by!

WiP Wednesday: FMQing Extravaganza!

I got my free-motion quilting foot in the mail last week and couldn't wait to try it out!  I've never even attempted something like this before (I only once machine quilted but it was straight lines with a regular foot) so I was super excited.  I tried a few different techniques with varying degrees of success.  I know I need A LOT more work on shapes (like flowers).  I'm pretty great at meandering, my favorite, and I need a walking foot for straight line quilting.  I had four extra blocks from the Skill Builder Sampler and made a bunch of 12" minis for my kids toys.

Since this is certainly a work in progress I'm linking up with Freshly Pieced where Kati, who blogs at From the Blue Chair, is the guest blogger this week.  I'm loving all her projects and she gave a great advice post on Monday for the Let's Get Acquainted Blog Hop at Plum and June.

 Here's my fun attempts at free-motion quilting...

Sadly this didn't come out like I pictured in my head.   In my head the flowers were all cute and even mirroring the petals in the block.  In reality they were all kind of lopsided and odd shaped but it was fun anyway.  I learned that I can't go from shape to shape without cutting my thread.  I have an open front foot and the thread kept getting caught.  Many of my flowers are crooked because the thread got caught on the foot and yanked it over.

Here's the back side of that same one.  You can see the flowers better here how they aren't the same.  You can also see a few times where my thread got caught and bunched.  Many of those were a result of getting caught up in the foot.  The straight lines are straight-ish which makes me happy but I think a walking foot would be better for this.

I did this really nifty loopy lines for this one and I loved it!  After two passes I really had it down and loved how easy it was and how fun they came out.  I will be doing this one again!  I used the middle print for the back and you can't see the quilting at all, even in person, so I didn't post a picture of that one.

I adore this block!  It's the green mountain star block and it's one of my favorites from the sampler.  I didn't want the quilting to distract from the block so I stitched in the ditch around every blue shape.  You can see it better on the back side...

Here's the back of the Green Mountain Star.  LOVE!  I don't think the free motion foot was the right choice for this block but I love it anyway.  It looks so fun even if the lines are a bit shaky.

This is the Beacon Light block from the sampler.  I had a really hard time making this one because this style was new to me and it didn't come out square at all!  Anyway, I decided to try meandering with this one and had so much fun with it!  You can see it in the middle a bit but it's much better on the back side...

Look at that fancy meander!  I'm so happy with it!  I love how fast, easy, and stress-free this style was!  I will be doing this again.

I tired out this nifty trick I saw on Pinterest and LOVED it!  My template didn't print with seam allowances.  They were too light to see, so I taped two pencils together to add seam allowances to the templates.  See the full post of instructions and demo here.

My last WiP project pictured is my mom's Papillon quilt.  I've done half the blocks which are pinwheels and I have half remaining which are a star block.  I'm so happy to be done with these as I had to make then trim down each HST block.

Also this week I got a 1/4" foot which I'm excited to get piecing with and a walking foot, which I can't wait to use.  I'm really getting into quilting my own things!

I have a lot of other things I made progress on this week but my hubby accidentally took the camera to work with him and thus I don't have pictures.  Here's the run down...

- Crochet Fusion Blanket - I have half the charms sewn together and I hope get the rest of them sewn together this week and then the top stitching done as well.
- Preemie Crochet Hats - I made five more this week.  I've been slowing down on these because I've been crazily working on quilting.

That's about it for this week.  Thanks for stopping by!

Free-Motion Quilting - Pass/Fail

 After completing the Skill Builder Sampler I was feeling brave and wanted to try my hand at free-motion quilting.  I was quite determined as you will discover in this post it was a real pass/fail kind of experience.  I had a few blocks left over from the sampler and an bit of extra batting lying around so I figured what better way to use my skill builder sampler blocks then to build a new skill doing free-motion quilting.  I'd heard a few things about it but didn't really know much.  I knew that you needed to lower the feed dogs and that you guide the quilt around with your hands to make shapes/designs.  I'd vaguely remember that you needed a special foot for this but I thought, "how much could that really matter?"  HAHAHA!  Read on for my adventure!

Here I'm all ready to go with my Improv House (Block #12) a bit of cotton batting and some backing that perfectly matches the body for my house.  This fabric is all from a quilt I made about 10ish years ago so I'm pretty happy I had enough to finish the mini.

Now we get to the really laughable part!  With my regular pressure foot and my feed dogs down my quilt would not move!  It was pinned by the foot in place.  With the foot up the needle would pick up the fabric and would make sloppy horrible stitches.  It was a mess.  Did that stop me?  No, but it probably should have.  I'm pretty stubborn so I used one hand to lift the foot up just a little so the fabric wasn't pinned but not wobbly either.  Then I used the other hand to move around the fabric (see the above picture).  It was pathetic.  At times I really needed my right hand so I'd wrap my left arm around the machine like a hug and lift the lever from the back.

I persevered and finished my 12" by 12" mini.  It's not perfect.  The grass is not consistent and there are parts in the meander that the thread caught but hey, look what I was working with!  I also learned that slower is not better for me.  I often would move my hands faster than the needle and ended up with some pretty large stitches.  When I sped up I noticed a lot more even stitches and it looked nicer.

Here's the front!  LOVE!  It's already been claimed by my cute kids to wrap up babies and stuffed animals.  They don't care that it's not perfect and it was fun practice.

Here's What I Learned:
- I am involved with the Let's Get Acquainted Blog Hop (my day is September 13) from Plum and June.  There are many many fabulous bloggers a part of this and they have put together an email list for any questions we have we just shoot everyone on the hop an email and they help us out.  I got 11 responses to my quest for finding the perfect Free Motion Quilting foot.  Many of them were new to the skill too and wanted to know more.  Here's the skinny...

- You need a special foot, often called a darning foot!  It's spring loaded, that's the important part. That's the bit I was missing on my attempt.
- There are different kinds!  It's important to get one that fits your specific machine.  While it doesn't HAVE to be made by your same company it's probably a good idea.
- I have a Singer Confidence 7470 and it's a low shank vertical needle.  When looking for a foot I had to make sure it specified that it fit my model and was a fit for the type of machine it was.
- Metal is better than plastic!  - Nearly everyone I've ever read anything on has agreed with this.
- Open foot is nice so you can see where you're going and a great selling point but if they don't make one for your specific machine it's not the end of the world.
- Ebay is KING!  I got my foot for half of what Singer said it should sell for and that included shipping.  The seller is a Singer authorized retailer and listed my machine specifically (with only four others) that this foot fits.  Hurray!

One last thing...
SewCalGal is doing a Free Motion Quilting Challenge.  It started back in January and goes through December.  The idea is that you learn new skills and practice each month.  They have experts on the blog to teach you new things.  There are prizes and giveaways if you play along.  It seems like just the motivation I need to keep up.  Thanks Ginny from Fish Creek Studio for the heads up!

Skill Builder Sampler Blocks - FINISHED!

 Hurray!  I can't believe I've finished the Skill Builder Sampler series.  It's been going for so long!  Well, not as long for me as everyone else.  I originally found the sampler and started quilting along in November (see my first post here) but everyone else started in June.  Then I really couldn't get into it in spite of my best efforts.  I decided it was my fabric frustration and restarted in March (see post here).  The restart was fabulous and in about three months I cranked out all 36 blocks, some of them for a second time.  For all the posts involving sampler blocks go here.  Otherwise read on for the last installment...

Block #35 - Feathered Star.  I did the paper pieced version (found here) and I loved it.  Then again I am a huge fan of all things paper pieced.  I think it turned out great!  I have only one or two points that will be cut off when sewn to another block.  I think that's pretty good all things considering.  This block finishes up to 12" so those little HST are REALLY TINY!  I don't think I've worked with something that small before.

Block #36 - Alice Brooks Butterfly.   Being the last blog in the sampler means this one was hard.  Although for me it was more time consuming that really crazy difficult.  I only had to unpick twice, which is pretty good with all those crazy curves.  I did make it a bit too big and thus the points of the wings will be cut off but either way, hurray!

I decided not to make some of the blocks the second time around and thus I was short a block for my 36 block layout.  I decided to go back and do the Bonus Block #2 the Green Mountain Star Block.  I loved it!  Especially after doing the last blocks of the sampler going back to this one was a piece of cake.  It went so quickly and looks pretty sharp.

Here are all my sampler blocks together.  I don't know how I'm going to assemble them yet.  I may need to think on this one or just see what Leila suggests.  Either way this is quite the accomplishment.

Here's a close-up of the bottom left from the group shot.

Here's the bottom right of the group shot.

Top Right of the group shot.

Finally the top left of the group shot.

These are my blocks from my first attempt at the sampler. (See original posts here from top left... one, two, three, four, and five).  I was using my scraps which are in a very large tote and it was so hard to find what I needed big enough and that matched the others.  Thus, I restarted with new fabric.  The top three I remade but the bottom two didn't make the cut the second time around.  I replaced them with both bonus blocks.  I made them so I could learn the skills but they won't be in the final quilt.  The kids love these blocks and have asked me to make pillows out of them.  We'll see what happens.

A big thank you to Leila for putting this together.  I learned a lot while putting this together and had so much fun!

WiP Wednesdayand TNT Thursday: Minor Mishaps

 I find that sewing, especially when I'm doing it, is filled with minor mishaps.  Nothing too life shattering but just enough to frustrate and then excite when they are overcome.  I had a week FULL of those.  I know I'm not alone as I've read about these on several other blogs recently.  I'm linking up with WiP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced and with TNT Thursday at Happy Quilting where I know I'll find people who know what I mean.

Here's the story...

It all started with the Tetris Charm Swap.  It is my first ever fabric swap and I'm so excited!  I got my fabric from The Intrepid Thread last week and excitedly started cutting the 112 5" squares in each color.  Sadly I cut six of the red one 4" x 5".  I was so upset!  I only had enough fabric if I did it exactly right.  I was stressing out and went to Melissa from Happy Quilting to tell her my problem and that I may be a little late getting her the fabric.  I went back to The Intrepid Thread to get some more red to be shipped to me and they were sold out.  I shot them a quick email to see if they really were sold out or if Julie had enough for six charm squares she could send me.  Julie saved the day!  Not only did she have enough she sent it to me, including shipping, for FREE!  Yup, she's my hero and just earned herself a VERY loyal and happy customer!  In the end I got just what I needed and the crisis was averted.

Then we had our next crisis.  I have never seen such a huge spider in real life before.  I've seen ones that cover a larger area with long legs but this one was beefy.  My hubby was out mowing the lawn and spied this spider on our wagon.  He grabbed a jar and put it in there.  Seriously I wouldn't have been able to get that close to it.  The very thought makes me shudder.  You see all the tiny baby spiders all over the jar?  It wasn't like that when he first put her in.  She was huge and had a furry back.  A while later my daughter was looking at it and said she thought they might be baby spiders, sure enough they were.  At the point when I took this picture they had moved off the mom and were all over the jar.  We didn't know what to do with it now.  If we opened the lid they'd be everywhere and we couldn't squish them all.  The thought of this nasty anywhere near my house was not appealing so in the end we just threw it in the trash, jar and all, for the trash man to pick up today.  I was happy to see it go and wish them a happy life in the dump.

I'm on the last three blocks of the Skill Builder Sampler by Leila over at Sewn.  This is Block #34 - Newport Compass.  I found the pattern here for 99 cents.  They have a lot to choose from but I loved this one.  It's paper pieced so it looks pretty good but it wasn't without it's mishaps either.  When I paper piece I love to cut my pieces much larger than necessary so I don't have to worry about lining them up perfectly.  Well, seeing how these were the last blocks in the series I was running low so I had to cut them smaller than I'd like.  This led to several unpicking sessions after I didn't align them properly.  It all worked out in the end and I just LOVE this block!

Last week I started making hats for preemies in the NICU.  I had a lot of fun and made nine (post here).  This week I decided to make some for newborn sized babies too.  I had two babies in the NICU after their births and they would have been too big for the little hats.  I didn't have a pattern for the larger size so I had to make one up myself.  This led to a few unravels but in the end I got it just the right size.  Also I adore watching TV while I crochet and my lack of attention led me to a couple of missed stitches that I had to unravel back to and fix.  Just minor things, especially with a hat this small everything is minor, but a bit frustrating in the end.

Through this week I learned that stuff happens and there is usually an easy solution.  Either grab the seam ripper, email you new favorite fabric store, or unravel that yarn.  The world keeps on spinning so don't let it ruin your day and just try to make the best of those minor mishaps.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great week!

WiP Wednesday: Caught Up and More!

 I FINALLY caught up with the Skill Builder Sampler.  I'm so excited!  Most of them look just perfect only a few were off but mostly it was minor and I'm happy to say my skills have improved.  I'm equally happy that it's WiP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced and I can use the link up as a means for sharing my achievement with a larger audience!

This week I finished my last five blocks to catch up on the sampler.  There are only three left in the series and the tutorials for those have yet to be written.  I love them all!  Also this week I started and nearly finished my disappearing nine-patch quilt done in A Walk in the Woods fabric line.  LOVE!  It's so crazy fast!  I started it on Friday and by Sunday I was sewing the rows together and only three hours away from a finished quilt top (that has sadly yet to be finished).  I also started another crochet gown.  This one is for a nine month-old baby girl that is going to use it later this month.  I've been a busy bee again!

Now for the fun part...

Block #33 - Mini Lone Star - Okay, I have NO idea what happened to the middle of this guy.  No clue at all.  Notice the little 3D lump?  Hopefully Leila can help me fix it because I really don't want to start over.

Block #14 - Crazy Quilt Block - I was saving this one until near the end because I knew I'd have a bunch of otherwise useless scraps and this block is perfect for those!  I'm not typically a crazy fabric kind of person but this was fun to make.  I just went crazy!

Block #23 - Drunkard's Path.  I saw this idea here and loved it!  So when it was time to make the drunkard's path block I decided to make the blocks 3" finished and create the scales pattern.  I love how it turned out and I may have to make a bigger one someday.

Block #24 - Curved 9-Patch - I love this block!  It was so easy and fun and it turned out perfectly!  I will be making this one again!  I love the sampler because it introduces me to blocks that I don't know that I would have tried and some that I wanted to badly.  I learned what ones are great for a whole quilt and others that are so not worth the effort.

A Walk in the Woods Disappearing 9-Patch (first found the idea here).  LOVE!  Seriously, for so many reasons.  It's fast, super duper easy, and it looks awesome!  This is only after three days of my slave-driving daughter insisting I'd work on it at every moment.  Once I was relaxing on the couch and she said, "You shouldn't just sit there, you should relax while working on my quilt!"  She was so sweet while she was saying it, it didn't sound as harsh as you might think and I couldn't resist.  I was hoping to get it done but I've had so many other things to do.

Block #22 - Flowering Snowball - This is seriously the block that did not want to get made!  The template was horrible to print.  I literally tried 12 times to no avail.  In the end Leila printed it up and I got it from her.  My block did turn out perfectly square, which I love, but it's square at 11.75" instead of 12.5", bummer!  I guess I'll just have to trim it down and add a border.  It's so fun either way!

What?  This again?  I know I just finished one here but I couldn't resist making another one for another friend.  One of my good friends from church and her family are going to the temple this month to be sealed together.  As a Mormon I believe that families can be together in heaven.  Going to the temple to be sealed one of the most important steps to ensure this. Want to know more?  Click here.  I am super excited for them!  While in the temple they are all supposed to wear white.  I thought it would be fun to make their 9 month a crochet dress so she could keep it forever.  When I suggested this to my friend she was so excited.  I only have a week and a half to finish it so I'd better get moving!  The last one took me 14 days but it was smaller.  I have the top half done here and I'm about ready to start on the flower skirt.  It's much faster the second time around.

Hop on over to the WiP Wednesday post to see what other crafty people have been up to this week and thanks for stopping by!