Graduation T-Shirt Quilt

 A co-worker asked me to make this T-shirt quilt for her son who is graduating from high school this May.  I enjoyed working with her on a design using many of her son's favorite shirts. It measures 64" by 91". My helper had to stand on the coffee table so I could take this picture!

She chose the music note fabric as an accent, and it looks fabulous for the binding! The back is solid royal blue dots from JoAnn.

My last two quilts have been gifts, so next up is a project for me!

A Pinwheel Quilt for Kade

I made this Pinwheel Quilt for two friends of mine who just had their first baby.

The nursery colors are green and brown, so I tried to stay with that theme without making it scream "BABY".  The jungle animal backing is fun :)  I chose straight-line quilting in a diagonal pattern which was quick and easy on this small quilt!

My favorite part of the quilt is the binding. This was my first time to use a striped binding. I'm in love. It's so cute! 

I rarely make quilts to give away, so I hope baby Kade will enjoy it for many years!

Dad's 5k T-Shirt Quilt

I just finished this awesome quilt for my dad.  It's made from his 5k race t-shirts that he's collected over the past few years. We decided on a "road" design for the background.  I love it! 

Here's a great tutorial for t-shirt quilts.  They are very simple to make. 

Hexagon Placemats!

I bought this gorgeous fabric at Joann's and planned to make fun summer placemats.  After browsing the Internet, I decided on the hexagon design.

I made an equilateral triangle template with Word and the rest was pretty easy!

To make it super quick, I sewed it together inside out and turned it to skip the binding step.

Next, I might make a matching pot holder.

Check out what other people are making at the Blogger's Dinner Party!

Hard Rock Cafe T-Shirt Quilt

Over the weekend, I finished my Hard Rock Cafe T-Shirt Quilt!  In high school, I collected these shirts and enjoyed wearing them.  After a while, I retired them, but saved them for a quilt one day. 

I designed this quilt using Excel.  Surprisingly, it came together exactly as I planned.  All the fabric came from Joann's.  I had no idea what color would match these bright shirts, but the batiks seems to go perfectly.

For the back, I used zebra print to balance the bright colors but still keep it wild.

I still need to make a label for it.  I'll post it soon.

Poppy Pillow

Here is my new pillow!  I used a pattern by Oh, Fransson! and fabric by Laura Gunn. 

My parents gave me this book by Miss Oh, Fransson! herself.  I cannot wait to make something from it.

I picked up the fabric from Klazzy Katz and Joann.

Here you can see my first zipper!  I thought it would be difficult, but it really wasn't!

Fall Table Topper

I've been in the mood to make small projects to spruce up the house for fall.

I found this cute fall tree fabric at Joann's and couldn't resist buying it.  For weeks, I could not come up with a project for it and then one night, I thought of this design.  All the other fabric is from my stash.

My new-ish walking foot made quilting SUPER easy.  This is my first attempt at making a grid.  It turned out pretty well.

Mug Rugs

Since "mug rugs" are all the rage in Blogland, I decided to make a few of my own.  

I've always been interested in flying geese, so I decided to try them out on this small project.  

Conclusion: Flying geese are complicated and only cute when they are perfect!

The fabric is a reproduction print left over from this quilt.

My dad requested this mug rug inspired by LandShark Lager.  lol

It was a good opportunity to test my free motion quilting skills.  As you can see, they are lacking, but I'm improving.  Maybe in 2 years, I'll be ready for a quilt. 

Free Projects = Fun Projects 

I used left over fabric and batting for these mug rugs!

Blogger's Quilt Festival!

It's that time of year again!  The Blogger's Quilt Festival is so much fun! There are so many fun and beautiful quilts to admire.  I can spend hours looking through all the links.

I wanted to share my New Wave Love quilt that I made this summer. 

This pattern came from one of my favorite blogs Oh, Fransson!

And the fabric came from a sweet lady on Etsy plus some Kona Khaki from Joann.

I used 12 fat quarters, but the dimensions didn't quite work out the way the pattern explained.  I like to prewash my fabric, so once i did that, I couldn't get the full 9" shape.  8.5" works just fine and left me enough extra for 2 more rows!
 

I pieced the back with leftovers and an extra half yard of my favorite Amy Butler pattern.  Then, machine quilted in the ditch to make a beautiful wave design on the back!  This was the first quilt I've made using my walking foot.  What a difference!!!

Here's the label that I made.  This is the first time I've ever used a selvage!  I think it looks great!

I can't get enough of this quilt!!

New Wave Quilt with Amy Butler Love

It's Finished and I LOVE it!!!

This pattern came from one of my favorite blogs Oh, Fransson!

And the fabric came from a sweet lady on Etsy plus some Kona Khaki from Joann.

I used 12 fat quarters, but the dimensions didn't quite work out the way the pattern explained.  I like to prewash my fabric, so once i did that, I couldn't get the full 9" shape.  8.5" works just fine and left me enough extra for 2 more rows!
 

I pieced the back with leftovers and an extra half yard of my favorite Amy Butler pattern.  Then, machine quilted in the ditch to make a beautiful wave design on the back!  This was the first quilt I've made using my walking foot.  What a difference!!!

I can't get enough of this quilt!!

Blogger's Quilt Festival 2010 -- Figgy Pudding

Last year, I discovered the world of quilt blogs.  I was and still am amazed at the things you guys create.  When I found the Blogger's Quilt Festival, I knew I had to start a blog.

I knew I might have a problem when I saw Moda's Figgy Pudding fabric.  I couldn't stop thinking about it.  I wanted this fabric. After calling all my LQS, I resorted to ordering this fabric online (a first for me).  When I saw this pattern, I knew immediately that I wanted to make it.  I thought it would be challenge because of the trees and the size, but once I got started, it came together pretty quickly.  I worked on it for about 3 months and finished just before Christmas.

After a suggestion from a reader, I decided to hand quilt snowflakes in the blocks. That was taking FOREVER, so  I machine quilted around the trees which was a challenge, but I think it motivated me to try machine quilting for my next project. It's so much faster!

For the back, I used ideas from the blogs I read and found an inexpensive brown sheet that was almost the perfect size.  The scrappy stripes turned out great too.

Happy Quilt Festival-ing!

HST Table-Topper

This was my first attempt at Half Square Triangles. I've seen so many cute quilts made from them, so I decided to give it a try.  Construction was simple, but squaring the edges wasn't much fun.  Also, I tried to machine quilt this more than usual.  I'm still learning how to keep the bubbles and puckers away!

Circle Quilt!

I first saw this circle quilt on one of the blogs I read.  It was adorable and looked pretty easy to make, so I decided to give it a try.  I bought a Tula Pink Nest charm pack and cut all of the squares into circles using a sundae dish.  The brown fabric is a bed sheet left over from my Figgy Pudding Quilt, and I bought a couple yards of my favorite Nest patterns for the borders and backing.  This quilt came together very quickly, but still presented challenges.  For the first time in a while, I wanted to machine quilt the entire quilt. I stopped machine quilting because I was never happy with the results; puckers, shifting etc.  I had to rip out a few seams and redo parts of this quilt, but I think I know what I need to do next time to improve.

I will post pictures of the back as soon as my photography helper gets home!