Saturday, September 28, 2013

Wicked Good Quilty Fun!

 
NiteLite
Glow-in-the-dark Thread
 
I am having wicked good fun quilting my wicked project for the

 
This thread has come to me courtesy of my wicked good
favorite local quilt shop,
 
 
which is also an online shop.
Click on the link above to visit.
 
When I stopped by recently to look for glow-in-the-dark thread to add the perfect quilting touch to my project for the Wicked blog hop, they were temporarily sold out of these spools for sale.  Liz, the owner, is so nice that she let me "borrow" this used spool from her long arm supplies.  It is wonderful to have this as my local quilt shop. They have great weekly sales.  Check out their weekly newsletter Here.
 
  I will be returning what is left on Monday as I am putting the finishing stitches in my project.
I am scheduled to post on the first day of the hop!
There are so many wicked awesome quilters in this hop
that it is sure to be spooktacular!
 
The sign ups are now open for a new hop at
 
It is  "For the Boys"
 
 
The cheerleader for this hop is
Amy @ Sew Incredibly Crazy !
That is sew incredibly awesome!
 
I think this is a wonderful idea for a blog hop and wish I could participate.
I have two weeks left before my scheduled eye surgery and I may try to get a project together before then for this hop. Wish me luck!
 
If you want to join in the fun ...
Sign Up Now!
 
Happy Quilting!
 
~ <3 ~
 


Friday, September 27, 2013

Random 5 & Feline Friday

 
(1)  My Butterfly, Born to Be Wild
Butterfly says, " Leather, no lace, for me!"
 
My Matty left this on the table recently after he enjoyed a ride on one of our lovely fall days on his bike and
Butterfly just loves to cuddle in her humans' clothing and blankets ...  
 ... and any warm and quilty place!

 
Butterfly is looking quite domesticated in this picture. ;)
 

(3)  Fall Quity Love! <3
I have hung my fall quilts!
I love fall colors and fabrics and everything about the fall! 
More fall quilty piccies  Here.
 
 
(4) Quilty Kitties X 2
 
It is getting cool and breezy at night in my quilty corner
and I have had to close windows ...
 
Butterfly and Katniss say, "You closed our window!"
 
   This is the coveted window in the sewing room.  Usually the plaid blanket is on the sill for kitty comfort.  When I moved it, I cleared some stuff that had collected on the lower shelf with the intention of putting the blanket there so that my kitties would still have a place to perch in comfort and see out and I might be able to actually use my pressing board, which Butterfly is claiming as her spot. 
Katniss actually had the audacity to sneak in underneath and peer up at Butterfly from the window side and surprise her. 
Score 1 for Katniss.
 
Hissing and jostling occurred until Butterfly convinced her to move ...
 

Butterfly is The Cat #1 
Even after a year, 3 year old Katniss is still the "new cat in the house"
to 13 year old Butterfly who likes to give constant reminders
of this to Kat #2.
Score 1 for Butterfly.
 
 
Katniss consoled herself by claiming my new comfy new sewing chair.
Quilty Kitty Score tied 1/1.
 
(4) Score 0 for me ... I did not get much sewing and pressing done.
 
Here is a block I made awhile ago and I just found while I was looking for the picture of Butterfly on Matty's motorcycle jacket ...
 
 
( 5)  An Army Star Block

 
I love this block, but it was a bit tricky to make.
It is a paper pieced pattern designed by my friend Denise and it is going into a very special group Quilt of Valor being made
by my lovely quilty friends at The Quilt & Needle.
In a few months, I will post the quilt when it is finished.
Shhhhhh!  This quilt is a secret!
 
Linking up today with the interesting kitties at
 
 
 
and the interesting people at
 
 
 
Have a happy weekend!
 
:)
 

Thursday, September 26, 2013

Quilting with Freezer Paper Templates


My favorite way to quilt is free styling with my darning foot or straight line with my walking foot, but occasionally I want to try a new motif that I need to work on how to FMQ.  So I make a template using freezer paper for this purpose.  I also sometimes make a freezer paper template to fit a border or specific space. 

I did both of these for this fall quilt that I made last September.

Here is how I did this:

 
I made my own freezer paper stencils sized for my quilt.
I drew the design on the paper side and pressed the plastic coated side to my quilt with a warm iron to hold them in place for quilting.
 
 
I decided to do primitive 5 point stars for this quilt
 to compliment the fabrics and design.
Now that I have done these a few times, I think I could easily make these stars free form, but these stencils helped me learn
and to keep them uniform in size.


 
I cute the centers out of the stars carefully with a sharp craft knife.



I prepared the quilt sandwich and pinned on the outer edges only,
back and front.
 
 
I actually use as few pins as possible on quilts. 
I am very careful to smooth front and back a few times and move pins as needed before I am ready to quilt. While quilting, I turn the quilt over frequently to be sure I have no folds in my backing. This works best for a small quilt, of course, but I use the same method for a larger quilt on my home machine.  Sometimes I pin only one section as I work on it and remove and repin for the next section for a larger quilt.
Works for me!
 

 
I laid my templates on my quilt and pressed in place with a warm iron.
The templates peel off easily to be moved and reused
and leave no marks on my fabric.

 
For these templates I "quilted inside the lines,"

 
 I started in the middle and did the individual stars first.
 
 
The I did the small two star templates in the sashing.
 
 
Then I did the outside borders

 
 I planned my way and marked my template with direction arrows
and where to start, turn and finish.
 
 
Here is the turn on the other end.
 

 
I keep my iron handy for touch ups as needed.
 
 
Sometimes I need to add a little tape for the longer templates to keep it fixed and to help the edges from curling.
I then need to be careful not to touch the tape with the hot iron.
 

 
Then I placed moved the template to the opposite side.
These two sides had five stars and went corner to corner.
 
 
For the other two sides, I only needed to fit three stars in between the stars on the corners.  I used the same stencil only
I marked the turn for the shorter borders.
 

These templates are durable and can be reused
 

 ... and saved for another day.
 
 
I have used freezer paper templates and guides for other quilts, too.
 


On this table runner I wanted a uniform size and shape and
I quilted outside the edges of the template.
I just moved the template as I went along. 
 

Then I made parallel quilting lines outward to the edge of the tablerunner.
 
 
For this quilt, I used the template as a guide
 
 
to keep the curve uniform on each flower petal.
 
I hope you have found this tutorial helpful.
 
Happy Quilting!
 
~ <3> ~
 

The Pumpkin Scrapatch

 
Kitty in the Pumpkin Patch
 
My tuxedo kitty, Butterfly, looks like a black cat from the back,
so this is her quilt.
 
 
It is a wall hanging so she does not get to curl up on it much, but
 she always finds it and gets as close as she can.
 
I love everything about fall ... the colors ... the leaves ... the crisp apples on the trees ... the pumpkin patches ... the scarecrows and cornstalks ... fall mums ... corn mazes ... and, of course, Fall Quilts!
 
Sew I was very happy to find this fun fall themed blog hop today! 
 
Sunshine in the attic
 
There are some great tutorials in the links and some fun giveaways.
 It is the last day so blog hop to it so you do not miss out!
 
I am not participating in this hop, just enjoying the show
and planning future projects.
I make at least one quilt for fall every year to make my home
cozy and quilty for the cooler weather.
 
These are some of my older quilts.
 
 
This is also one of my first fall quilts.
 
 
The center is a panel.
The border was my first attempt at flying geese.
 
 
I quilted this on my old Brother machine and it was one of my early home quilting efforts.I added a little extra batting under the pumpkins to make them a rounded.
 

I made this quilt last year and blogged about it Here
 

I made freezer paper quilt stencils to quilt this one.
 Tutorial on how I made the freezer paper templates
 and quilted it may be found Here
 
 
Here is a close up of the quilting.
 
Here is a sneak peek at this years' quilt ...
 
 
 
Come back in October as I will be showing you soon for the
 
 
Wicked Blog Hop @ Sew We Quilt
There is a fun 60's Hop happening there now!
 
 
I hope you have enjoyed my fall quilts!

Happy Autumn
 
Today in my blog reading, I also found some pretty seasonal clip art for quilters. To see more, Click Here.
Thanks for this Free Fall Clipart to Sew Cal Gal 

Have a Happy Quilty Blog Hopping Day!

:-)
 

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Piece, Love, Quilt!

Starts happening @ midnight tonight!
 
I dig it!
 
Shout out to the
"paper shakers"
 and 
for putting it all together. 

Here is the Full Schedule for this fun blog hop:
 
September 25
 
 
September 26
 
September 27
 
 
September 30
 
 
October 1
 
 
October 2
 
October 3
 
 
October 4
 
 
I did not "get my act together" to be "at the happening" 
with all these "groovy" quilters, 
so I will a be a "wallflower" for this one.
's cool, baby!
Right on!
 
Piece out!
:-)
 
 

Oh My Stars!


Oh My Stars!
Pattern from the Quilt & Needle
I started this as a mystery quilt that has now been released
as a whole quilt pattern HERE.
 
I love these fabrics in this pattern and I want to make it larger by adding custom borders so that I may use it as a fall bed quilt.
 
I am going to leave this top as is on my design wall while I am waiting for my quilty muse to tell me about the borders this quilt wants.
 
I ran out of the background fabric. I do have enough of the other fabrics to make a queen size quilt.  I love the background fabric so much, though, that I did a search online and found an end of bolt on clearance in a web quilt shop.  The fabric is in the mail!
 
I have a small quilt that needs quilting for an upcoming blog hop. so I am going to set up my machine for quilting.
 
Have a happy quilty day!
 
~ <3~