I’m happy to add another 8 diamonds and 1 flower to my hexie insanity quilt. The count is now 32 of 158 diamonds completed and 18 of 64 flowers completed for a total of 4% done! LOL Last week I cut up one of the jelly rolls that I got for Mother’s Day last year, today I finished cutting up the other one. Between the 2 jelly rolls I have 1600 squares ready to be turned into hexies. I still have 3 charm packs and 4 quarter yard cuts that need to be cut up too, but I’ll do those once I get some of these other squares used up. I also bought a yard of white for the paths between the diamonds and I also decided to cut some of my white 2.5″ square smaller so there’s a variety in the white. I won’t cut any of that for a while though I want to get all the diamonds and flowers finished first. I keep trading off between this project and my knitting at night, depending on how tired I am. It’s a lot easier to fix hexies than the knitting – I hate taking stitches out of the knitting!! Hopefully be back tomorrow with a knitting update!
Category: Hexagons
Alex’s Quilt
So I FINALLY started a quilt for Alex – who is now 4 years old! I have been collecting some fabrics for awhile and at our guild quilt show I let him pick out a fat quarter pack for his quilt. Last week I cut out the 80 pieces out of the prints and now I just need to cut out all the side strips for each print. I cut out a few and sewed them together this afternoon just so I could see some progress! The pattern is one that was a class at our guild that I put into EQ in all the different sizes. I think this will go together quickly, as long as I can get everything cut out and ready to sew when I have time. Alex has now stated that he’s not going to nap in the afternoon anymore, but I’ve told him he has to play quietly in his room if he’s not going to nap. Cassie naps, but not very well, I usually have to nurse her back to sleep. But I think I can do this, I miss it!!
In the last week or so I managed to get a few more diamonds completed for my Hexie Insanity quilt. I’m now 3.2% completed! 🙂 My numbers changed a little bit because I added in more borders after seeing some finished quilts. Once this is finished it will have over 10,000 hexagons in it!
Guild meeting tonight, and a board meeting, that I now need to attend since I am the “media person” – I took over the newsletter last fall and I do the blog and FaceBook. *sigh* One of these days I’ll learn to say no! 🙂 Oh and did I mention that I’m doing a BOM this year for the guild? LOL, I have some ideas but need to spend some time working on it! First 2 blocks need to be ready for next month!
Hopefully I’ll be back soon with more blocks finished on Alex’s quilt – or a finished top! I need to put borders on my Hexagon Diamonds quilt so I can get it basted and quilted too – it needs to be on the bed in the trailer this year!
Merry Christmas!
I know, it’s a few days after Christmas, but I haven’t had time!! These kids have been keeping me busy with school for Alex and just taking care of a super mobile 9 month old! I still don’t have much time to sew, but I’ve been working on some knitting and hand work. For Christmas I asked the hubby to get me a sample kit from a site called KnitCrate.com. They have a monthly subscription where you get yarn, a pattern and some other items, and I wanted to see what it was like. While I think it’s a good idea, I don’t think it’s for me, it’s a lot of money for yarn and other silly items that I just can’t use. The one I got is here and I love the yarn color a lot, I just have no use for a big pom-pom!
Let’s see, to catch up the last few months. We had our guild quilt show in October, and I entered 5 quilts. We don’t do awards or anything in our show, maybe in future years we will. The only quilt I’ve been able to finish this year was Cassie’s wall quilt – I finished the binding 2 days before it needed to be turned in for the show! We had a great show and raised a lot of money for the guild, our next one isn’t until 2016, maybe I can get hexie diamonds finished to enter!
I didn’t make any presents this year, well except for the calendars I make every year. I just did not have as much time as I used to have and unfortunately sewing was on the bottom of the list. I did make 25 little candy cane holders for Alex’s 2 classes (daycare and preschool). They were so cute and the kids liked them (or so I’m told!). It took me quite a few days to make all of them, I had some issues with the embroidery machine that I had to work out before they started moving smoothly.
I finally finished the blanket for my sister’s friend. They loved it and I’m happy to have given something to that sweet little boy! The 18 rows of border went fast, and I don’t think there are that many errors in it. I know there are a few, but I doubt they’d ever notice it! Once I finished working on the blanket I decided to take apart the blanket I was crocheting for my sister and start all over with a knitted pattern. I found a nice pattern called Ziggy-Zaggy on Ravelry and I’ve gotten 1 repeat done already. It’s slow only because I only knit at night and lately I’ve been too tired to do any work! I’ll get a picture next time I have it out.
Back in August I started working on a new hexagon quilt. I’ve been slowly working on it and currently have 18 of 158 diamonds and 17 of 64 flowers completed. I had won a gift certificate to our local quilt shop at a guild meeting a few months ago and bought 5 quarter yards of some nice bright Moda Marbles and a yard of a white for the background. Now that the holidays are over I’m hoping to get more of this fabric cut up so I can work on prepping more hexies. Hexies are just the perfect thing to work on at night, as long as I’m not falling asleep!
I can’t remember if there was something else I wanted to mention, but I can always do another post if there is! I’m hoping to start posting at least once a week, whether I have something done or not!
A New Start
I know I have too many things going right now, but I miss doing my hexies! In the last 2 weeks I’ve been working hard on my knitting and I’ve gotten the first repeat completed. I will continue to work on it, but I need something else to work on as well. Otherwise my hands/arms are going to get too tired and sore of doing the same thing over and over again. So yesterday I cut out 2″ x 2″ squares from 2 charms packs and I now have about 336 squares ready for use. Only took me about 15 minutes to cut them out with my studio since I bought the 2″ square die awhile ago. I already have 1 diamond done and I’m working on the first flower today. I’m using Moda Marbles fabrics, I love how they look and think the whole quilt will look awesome with all the marble/tone on tone fabrics! I have another quilt that is in process using Moda Marbles, I need to finish the borders so I can cut that fabric up for this project.
Tonight is my EQ class, I did my lessons yesterday and printed them out, so I’ve been able to relax this afternoon and work on hexies! Hopefully I’ll be back soon with some finishes, I have to finish Cassie’s wall quilt for the quilt show and I’m hoping I can get the Hexie Diamonds one done for the show, but time is running out and I need to get the border on it and get it quilted. Hopefully Cassie will nap nicely tomorrow morning while Alex is at school and I can get her quilt bordered, layered and maybe even start quilting it.
Design Wall Monday
Well I finally did it. 2 years and 1 month ago I started my hexagon diamonds quilt. Today I put the last hand stitches into it. All 2,473 hexagons are sewn together and I just need to add a border to it and then sandwich and quilt it. I think I have a plan for quilting it, it’s not going to be anything fancy since this is a queen sized quilt! I’m trying to decide how thick the border needs to be, I’m thinking only about 3 inches just to have a stopping spot. I’m cutting all the sides even, but I still think it needs that little bit on all sides. I have a few hexies that were extras (counted wrong on a few diamonds) that I was thinking of appliqueing on the borders, I’ll have to see if they really need it when I get them added on.
Since I had the quilt on our bed, even though it is going to be used on the bed in the trailer, I decided my new quilt model needed a pic on it. She’s now 4 months old and such a joy in our lives! Such a happy baby!! Hope to start posting more often now that I’m getting a little more free time – not much, but I am getting to work on the sewing machine a little more lately!
Linking to Patchwork Times.
It’s Been Awhile….
I have been so busy the last few months that I really haven’t done much sewing. Why have I been busy? Because my precious little girl Cassie was born!!!! She will be 2 months old on Wednesday and I can’t believe how fast the time has gone! We cannot believe she’s here, it’s amazing how different she is from Alex in size and attitude. Alex loves his little sister, almost too much, since he always wants to kiss her when she’s sleeping and that wakes her up!
I managed to get a few things done in my office over the weekend, finally made a cover for Alex’s dresser and now it’s protected from scratches. I forgot to take a picture of it, but it’s nothing special just 2 different fabrics (construction equipment and Chuggington trains) with some batting. I didn’t even quilt it, just stitched a 1/4 inch around the edges.
I finally managed to finish the last diamond for the penultimate row of my hexagon diamonds quilt. At the same time I’ve been working on the black pieces I need for fill in at the top and right now I’m working on putting one of those in place. Everything is slow work since Cassie wants to be fed every few hours! 🙂 I really would like to finish this so I can put it in our guild quilt show this year. Plus it’s for our bed in the trailer!
I joined another group on Facebook for those that are making what is called the Insanity Quilt by Rhonda Pearce. I really don’t need another hexagon quilt to make, but I love the design!!! I bought 3/4″ and 1/2″ hexagon papers from paperpieces.com awhile ago so I could decide which size I liked better and I also bought the Studio dies that I needed to cut my fabric into the correct sizes. I got the quilt designed in EQ7 and it’s going to be almost 100″ x 100″!! I’m planning on using the 3/4″ hexis, the 1/2″ are just too small for me. So when hubby asked what I’d like for Mother’s Day, I found some Moda Marbles jelly rolls on Amazon and gave him that option. Since it’s a lot of diamonds and flowers, I can start working on them as soon as I get hexie diamonds finished. It’s really hard to NOT cut into the fabric and start working on it!! I have some Moda Marbles here that I’m using on another quilt that I will also use once I finish the other quilt (yeah I know something else to finish!). I still need to decide on the background color, but I’ll probably use a solid Kona, white or cream. I won’t need it for awhile since I’ll just work on the flowers and diamonds for awhile first.
Well, Cassie is up again, time to get her dressed and fed so we can go out for a walk – I have more baby weight to lose!!!! And since I just realized it’s Monday, I’m linking up to Patchwork Times!
Odds and Ends
Well since I finished the baby’s blanket this week I’ve been working on hexies! Don’t have any pictures of them yet, I’ll probably wait until I have all the diamonds for the row completed.
Alex spent the night at my parents last night so I pulled some pink fat quarters and set to work cutting everything out for baby girl’s signature quilt. This morning I managed to complete 22 of the 36 blocks I need for the top. I need to make a run to Joann’s so I can get more Kona white for the rest of the blocks. I thought I had more than I did! Hopefully I can buy a whole bolt and be set for awhile, I do have a 40% off coupon to use. If I do go to Joann’s (which I probably will), I’m planning on getting the yarn to start another blanket for Kimmie’s friend. I think I’ll be able to work on that while I take care of everyone else – it might just be my sanity check!
I also managed to finally iron and put together the first 2 blocks in the Good Night Irene sew along. I’m SO far behind on this SAL! It doesn’t really matter, I know I can catch up pretty quickly since I already have all the pieces cut out, I just need time (and energy) to sit at the machine to work on it. I’m hoping I’ll find some time once I can sit at the machine better – there’s no a whole lot of room between the table and my stomach right now!
We’ve now completed 3 EQ sessions with the other quilt guild in my area. I’m loving teaching again, even though I am now taking a month or so off for the baby. Everyone says they are learning a lot on how to use the software, which is wonderful! Can’t wait to see what they do with the assignment I gave them for April while I’m on “maternity leave”.
Gotta run, need to get 2 months worth of newsletters posted for our guild!
On the Needles – February 14, 2014
Happy Valentine’s Day!!! We don’t really do much to celebrate, we really just get each other cards. We are going out to dinner tonight with Alex, and I guess we are taking him to Amazone, so he can play with other kids and we can sit and enjoy him having fun.
I have been working VERY hard on the blanket for little girl and I’m happy to say I’m almost halfway done. I just finished the third repeat of the pattern and have 3 to go, plus a half repeat, plus the border. I might decide to make it a little smaller and skip a few of the repeats, I’m not sure yet. We’ll see how big it looks when I get the next repeat completed. I only have 6 weeks until she’s born, and it’s already taken me 6 weeks to get this far! I’m really liking the pattern and it has gotten LOTS easier as I go. I had a problem last week where I was missing a stitch and had done 2 rows, thank goodness I only had to take out 1 row and a little bit of the second row to pick up the dropped stitch. Unfortunately I didn’t see where the dropped stitch was until after I got that first row out. I’m still working on getting my stitches to be uniform in tightness, but it’s really difficult for me.
I still haven’t worked on any quilting in the last few weeks, I’ve just been too busy trying to get this done. I really miss my hexagons and I have a new design I want to do with either 1/2″ or 3/4″ hexies – the pattern calls for 1/2″, but that might be too small for me I need to do some testing first!
Gotta run, time for lunch and get Alex to bed for his nap, or we’ll never be able to go out tonight!
Linking up with Patchwork Times.
Hexagon Diamonds Update
I think I mentioned recently that I was going to try and work to finish my hexie diamonds quilt top so I can get it quilted to use next year camping. Well, I just finished another row and I only have 2 rows and black fill-in hexies to go! I really do love how it looks, but I might need to put a black border on it to finish the edges off before binding. I’ll have to think about this a little more.
We’ve been pretty busy lately getting ready for the holiday and having fun with the extended family. My brother-in-law and his kids came up for the holiday, so the last 3 days have been spent at the MIL’s with them. It’s been really nice seeing Alex play with his cousins again. He doesn’t want them to leave, and I wish they lived closer too!!!!
Oh well, off the computer and headed to work on my crochet. I’ve asked for a how-to knitting kit for Xmas and I’m pretty sure the hubby got it for me. I’ve always wanted to learn to knit, and now seems the right time. Besides I retaught myself how to crochet before Alex was born so I could make him a blanket. Now I can teach myself how to knit and make baby girl a blanket!
Guild Block Exchange – Xmas
Well I finally did it and finished the quilt top for the guild block exchange! I only had to put the border on, and had originally intended on putting 2 borders – a thin one using the background fabric and then the thicker one using the focus fabric. Unfortunately I didn’t have enough of the background fabric to do a border, and not enough time to order more. So I just took that border out and put the thicker one on with the focus fabric. I do like how it looks, and I have NO clue how I’ll even quilt it. Now that it’s done I’ve folded it and hung it in the closet with the other tops needing quilted. I’m trying to get people interested in next years exchange, but I don’t have a single person that has signed up yet. I’ll keep trying, if I don’t get any takers I’ll order the fabric and make myself a quilt instead!
Last year I had found a pattern online and made a hexie wreath for the tree with a jingle bell in the center. I had pulled the 2.5″ squares to make 3 more but never finished them. I found them while looking for something else and decided that I needed to finish them this year. Didn’t take me long, when I was awake enough to work on them, they are now all hanging on the tree!
I did make a few items for Christmas gifts this year, however I will not be posting any information about them until after they have been received. Right now the embroidery machine is humming along stitching out some free-standing lace gingerbread men ornaments. I found the design on Embroidery Library – my favorite site for embroidery designs. I love doing lace designs, they turn out so cute and there’s really nothing I need to do for them. Put the same color in the bobbin and on the top and let it go. This design stitches out in under 20 minutes, so I can work on lots of other things while it runs.
I spent a little time working on cleaning things up in my office, things have gotten WAY too dusty and unorganized in here. Since I’m now done with pretty much all my Xmas gifts and just have to finish decorating and get a few items ready for folks the hubby works with I can spend some time working on items for myself. I’m hoping to finish Scrappy 9-patch this week and since they announced at our guild meeting last week that the next quilt show is going to be in October 2014, I’m planning on seeing if I can get hexie diamonds finished for the show. Of course I’d really rather it be ready for the 2014 camping season, but we’ll see what happens.
We have just barely started getting the baby’s room ready, which means my mini-pinni frame needs to come down. I asked hubby to leave it in the room for now, I have a few quilts I’d like to put on it to pin before we take it apart. The basement isn’t finished yet and I don’t want it setup in the basement until it’s cleaned and looking better down there! I think I’ll be able to easily quilt some of the scrappy quilts and get them finished before the baby is born.
I think I’m going to go play with a few of my Go dies and plan a few more quilts – I think baby girl needs something made by mommy!