A real, live, real-life, quilting, blogging friend!

I love when something wonderful and unexpected happens...Like adding an old acquaintance from church onto your Facebook friends...and discovering that she quilts...AND has a blog! She and I were in the same Sunday school class at Clays Mill Road, and it looks like we both started quilting around the same time! How weird, wild, and wonderful is that? It was pretty amusing last night--at the same time I was posting on her wall "Hey! I didn't know you quilt!" she sent me a chat message "I didn't know you quilt!" and we talked for a few minutes.

So while this discovery has me missing my old church and my old friends again, I'm so excited to know someone else who quilts and blogs! She is going to a Bonnie Hunter workshop this weekend--which is just crazy to me, to actually talk to a live person who knows who Bonnie Hunter is. I know, I know, I'm sure someone at my LQS would know who Bonnie is, but I'm just too shy and intimidated to talk to them. I'm too shy and intimidated to join my local guild too, shame on me, I know.

Anyway, other than that bit of excitement to share with you, I don't have much else. I didn't get around to sewing any last night; my husband and I went out soulwinning with our church and by the time we got home and ate I just felt like piddling around online and going to bed. And with church tonight, I probably won't sew again until Thursday night. Here's my ever-growing To Wanna Do List:What's on your list today?

Double Irish Chain

I had a very productive night last night. It must have been that McCafe iced mocha I tried--blech! I am not a coffee drinker, and I discovered that no amount of ice or chocolate can change that...but I had a free coupon, so all was not lost.

Anyway, in about 2 hours I turned this stack of blocks:

Into this:

It is twin size. I have to add a border and then it will be ready to baste and quilt. Just planning to do some grid quilting on this one...still haven't had time to sit down and figure out and play with freemotion quilting. I'm making this one for someone very special as a surprise. I love surprises!

Don't...

Start a blog and then buy a house.

It will be months before you settle down enough to start blogging again.

I have some fun quilting projects on the line and will post pix soon. One is a baby quilt for my sister-in-law. I'm not using a pattern, but I'm going off a picture of a pattern cover... We'll see how it turns out... I wanted to create something that used charm packs, and specifically these Peek-a-Boo and Funny Babies charm packs by Amy Bradley for Moda:

Love it! Love it love it love it, so much that I may just have to make two quilts, one to give and one to keep!

I am also finishing the top of a double irish chain quilt that has taken on a life of its own... Why it has taken me 3 months to get this thing pieced is beyond me, especially considering that I used the quick and easy strip piecing method from my Fons & Porter magazine!

Hopefully I will post more often and be a quilting blogger. It's tough when you work full-time though. I have adored so many bloggers and it amazes me how they can quilt, raise children, AND keep up their blogs. I'll have to work on this!!

More...

Here are a few more pictures....

Toss it up and make...


Quilt Salad!

The strips coming together...

This weekend...

Well, I'm fighting with Flickr. I'm about to break up with him, but this post is managing to work out okay, so, I'll go easy on him for now.

Anyway, this is what I worked on Saturday morning. I LOVE L-U-V this pattern and I L-U-V strip piecing. I put together all of the large strip sets and cut them into 2.5" substrips. It took about 2.5 hours to sew the 7 large sets and cut them into subsets. If you can't tell, the solid yellow is my accent color. Now the fun part will be randomly picking up strips and sewing them together.

Did I mention I L-U-V strip piecing? And this fabric? And pretty much everything about this quilt that I think my head is going to pop when I get it all finished?!

And I need to take more pictures!

Strip Piecing!

Aunt Grace jelly roll

I am so excited to start my next quilt. I'm using the Cozy Quilt Strip Club pattern Stepping Stones and a sweet Aunt Grace jelly roll I got at my local quilt shop. Strip piecing is SO fast and SO easy, it's a great way to start quilting. The buttercup yellow will be the solid accent color in the middle of the strip sets.

Quilt shop excursions

Tuesday I had to take a trip to Lexington and decided to stop at some new quilt shops on my way...

The first shop I visited was The Quilt Box in Dry Ridge. What a treat! The first thing I noticed was a their selection of notions--if you can imagine a ruler for something, they had it. There was literally half a wall full of just square rulers! Patterns were hanging from every pillar and wall and they had a very nice variety. There was also a good variety of Civil War fabrics and not a half-bad assortment of 30's prints! (I have a special fondness for 1930-1940s prints.) My favorite part of the store was the large half-barrel full of "candies"--25 cents for a 9"x9" square! I picked up a couple yardages and 12 candies.

Several miles down the road and back in my favorite town, I stopped at The Quilter's Square. If you visit, I must warn you--you are immediately greeted with a Bernina 830! (For those not familiar, it's like the Rolls Royce of sewing machines. It practically sews by itself.) I registered to win one, since a free handout is the only way I'll ever own one of those puppies, so here's to hoping! This shop was great, too, and is also great for machine embroidery fanatics. I ended up with two store-made charm packs of some 30s prints (about 80-5" squares of different fabrics) and another "candy" that I couldn't pass up--it has band-aids and Rx bottles on it.

I also stopped at The Corner Quilt Shop. Now, I have to admit, this wasn't my favorite shop of the day, because it was a little small. But they did have some Moda jelly rolls and charm packs that I so desperately wanted, but alas, I had spent my fabric budget. (I shouldn't have even gone in the place because of that fact but I just had to check it out!)