A Study in Appliqué

I finally made it to a quilt guild meeting. More on that later. The guild has a library of books, and I grabbed two. One on the basics of quilting, and another with some awesome (AWESOME) appliqué flowers. A machine appliqué quilt block is actually pretty easy to put together (left). Just trace patterns on bonding paper, cut and iron on your fabric. Then place the pieces where you want on the square and iron again. I had some fabric scraps from a couple failed quilts and found some that looked cute together. The stitching is fairly sloppy in places, but overall I was really impressed with the outcome. I just wish I could finish projects faster than I find more fun things to try. I need sleep.

Project #7.5: Footstool Covers: Complete!

Always looking to practice my sewing machine skills, I thought I'd make my mother a pair of footstool covers. I was buying some fall fabric for myself, so I just bought a little extra. The nine-patch square should just fit the top of the foot stool. I added borders and matched it up with some muslin, sewed the edges and turned it back right-side-out. Added some nice (ok, it's sloppy) topstitching to the edge. I suppose it's really a giant unstuffed pillow.

I'll Never Learn

Sigh. Three months ago, to this day, I blogged that I'd never machine quilt. So who was up until 2AM shopping for quilting feet for her sewing machine? This girl. I feel like a snowball flying down a mountain; collecting all these ideas but steadily losing control. Until I reach the bottom of the mountain and smash into a car. Driven by me.

Project #8: ??

This one is going to take me a while ;)

Project #7: Welcome Banner

I bought some fall fabric to make a little welcome banner for my foyer. I think I have something cute planned out; something to give me a little practice with machine appliqué and buttonholes. My little monster didn't cooperate (surprise!) so I had to grab some quick and run.

This is a quick layout of a footstool cover I'm making. From my welcome banner fabric. Yeah, I don't get it either.

Wall Quilt #1

I finally finished something for my house! I've been trying so hard to finish up projects that I've started. But for each one I pull out to work on, I start two or three new ones. That doesn't count all the ideas I come up with. And now that I've found I can actually use a sewing machine, it's only gotten worse.

I came across some fabric remnants a few weeks ago, planned this out, and sewed it together one Sunday afternoon. I was up until about 3:30 AM quilting it one night this week, and then finished it around 1 or 2 AM the next. Sleep, who needs you anyway?