CHRISTMAS STOCKING ORNAMENT

Yes, it's Halloween, but I spent this afternoon making a Christmas stocking ornament. It is my first Moda Bakeshop Honeybun project. You get three stockings from one honeybun, and the bakeshop box includes two honeybuns. So, one down, five to go. My kids will be getting homemade ornaments this year!

Now, off to get ready for those scary Trick-or-Treaters, four of whom shall be my grands!

FLIMSY COMPLETE

Today I put the last stitches in my Disappearing Nine Patch, Heart to Heart quilt. All of the hearts (except 2) were swap blocks from women all over the world. So I think I will indeed call this quilt, Heart to Heart.

It is 60 x 83, in the end. Now to find or piece backing fabric. I have left-overs from the top for binding.

HALF-SQUARE TRIANGLE PAPER ON-LINE

There is a great site on the net to print out HST paper in many sizes. It was such a great find, I wanted to share it with you in a post, and have added a link to it on my left gadget bar.

HSTs are used in so many patterns, and this is a super way to create accurate ones.

SPOOLS SWAPPED AND ON DESIGN WALL

These are the lovely spool blocks I received in the swap. The left column, top three are vintage fabrics that I swapped one-on-one. The rest of the column are hostess gifts.

Starting with the second column over, the top row are the ones I made an extra of from each of my sets, so I'd have one to keep.

The 50 blocks below that are from the swap.

I'm planning to make 4 more so I'll have 70 and can set them 7 x 10. I'll likely do an applique border for this quilt.

Another UFO in the pipeline, LOL.

SWAPPING SPOOLS

Today I'm busy swapping out our spool swap. This is only some of the blocks. There were others scattered here and there.

There were 15 participants in the swap, from 3 countries, sending in a total of 96 sets, each with 5 blocks, so that's 480 blocks to swap out.

This was very fun, but I have new found appreciation for gals who hostess the really big swaps! Good for you hostesses!

GIVE AWAY

Pumpkin Patch Primitives is having a Halloween Give Away. Be sure to check it out. It's very generous. You will LOVE the fabrics!

H2H, D9P, CORNER BLOCKS AND BORDERS

Since my quilt is a 'slice-n-dice' type pattern, I decided to use a slice-n-dice heart pattern for the four corners. Here's my corner blocks with the double border fabrics. It's all coming together. Yeah!

HEART-TO-HEART FLIMSY

Today I finished my H2H flimsy, sans borders. Right now it measures 54 1/2" x 72 1/2"

Here's a close up of my intended border fabric. I may make hearts to go in the four corners. Or small heart D9Ps. Or, or...............

HEART TO HEART QUILT

I've decided on this layout for the blocks. This is about half of them.

The more blocks I put on the wall, the more this reminds me of my granddaughters. I won't be giving the quilt to any of them, as these blocks hold precious memories of the makers of the hearts, but perhaps they can sleep under it when they visit.

LAND OF GIANTS

Today I feel like I'm in the Land of the Giants! I'm always making tiny blocks with a million pieces, like DJ and SBS. But today I started my Disappearing Nine Patch Hearts quilt using heart blocks from two swaps I was in last winter. Both the swap on DJ Alternate, called Heart to Heart, or H2H, and the heart swap on my Friendship Swap group had the same guidelines, so the blocks all go together.

You start by making a nine-patch. Since the swaps were 6" squares, the 9-patch was a whopping 18". Huge! The blocks you place in the corners will not be cut, so that's where the hearts go. The center block will end up smallest, so usually you use something darker there.

Here's my first giant 9-patch.

Then you slice it down the center, both vertically and horizontally.

Then you play with the 4 resulting blocks to find an arrangement you like. Here are some of my possibilities, on my design wall.



If your uncut blocks don't have a definite right way up, the possibilities are doubled, or you can start out with two of them (generally diagonally - but there's no rules here) going the opposite direction.
This is really a fun pattern.

ANY WITCH WAY

I just put the last stitches in the binding of my "Any Witch Way" quilt. The pattern calls it a wall quilt, but I'm using it as a table topper.



This is one quilt that I worked on straight from start (Sat. a.m.) to finish, (Mon. p.m.) without it becoming a UFO! Yeah!

SBS, A-10, BACHELOR'S PUZZLE

This week I finished the Sylvia's Bridal Sampler BOW on the first day. I put it off last week and never got to it:-(

FOUR-PATCH POSIE

Have you seen the gorgeous 4-Patch Possie quilts made using only three fabrics! It is like Stack 'n Whack but easier because you are using squares. You can find a complete tutorial to make this quilt on webshots.

Here's a link to a video display of this technique.

I think I definitely need to add this to my to-do list.

CRACKER QUILT

Yesterday I finished this quilt. The blocks are from my Friendship Block Swap group. Each year we have a signed block swap. We made and signed Cracker blocks this year, in scrappy fabrics, so that no one would be left out in hard economic times, for not having the right color or style of fabric.

In lieu of a label I made one additional block and in the signature area, put the label information.

This is the fastest time from receiving blocks to completed quilt in my swap history. I only got them last Sat. -- mine took the long route from St. Pete to Winter Garden, LOL!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

No, it's not my birthday. That's in July. In fact it's Columbus Day here in the USA, and Thanksgiving in Canada.

However, yesterday I did finish a table runner made from my birthday blocks from a 08-09 birthday block swap, blocks I received in July '08, and posted two photos.

This is my Friendship Block Swap group which is an offshoot from the SBS group. We each chose a SBS block to make for all the others in the swap, and send it to them for their birthday. That way you could choose a block you were confident you could do a good job on. They are 6" blocks. The receiver selected the colors she wanted. I chose jewel tones of purple, blue, green, etc., and asked that the makers sign the blocks with birthday messages.

When making this runner, I arranged the blocks with the writing going from the center out, so no matter where you are sitting you can read the birthday messages.

It brings back warm memories of current and past members of our group. I plan to use this table runner for my birthday for many years!

SYLVIA'S BRIDAL SAMPLER

G-8, Crown of Thorns has sides that are the same as Odd Fellow's Chain (thanks Mary Anne for pointing that out!), so while I was at it I made that one too.

ODD FELLOW'S CHAIN

Today I tackled the SBS BOW, H-7, Odd Fellow's Chain. This is a 6" block and contains 73 pieces! Yes, 73! Certainly one of the tougher ones I've done.

SBS CHRISTMAS STAR SWAP

In the end, I did indeed make two sets of SBS Christmas Stars to swap. That will give me 10 blocks, that I think will be plenty for a new Christmas table runner.


These two different versions of the same fabric, are part of one set. The difference is just in how the fabrics of the flying geese are placed.

SYLVIA'S BRIDAL SAMPLER

Now that I'm in FL, I'm back to my fabric collection for my SBS quilt. Yesterday, just in the nick of time, I finished the BOW, L-3, 54-40 or Fight. I think my colors are too pretty for the political agenda of that block name, LOL!

This week, Debbie pick a real doozie for us, with 3/4" half-square-triangles, etc. I think I'll start it today. It's definitely not a 'Sunday evening, in the nick of time' kind of block. I'm also working on a couple sets of SBS Christmas Stars (yes, Mary Ann!), and need to get back to a couple other things. So many quilts, so little time!

6" AUTUMN LEAVES SWAP

I'm hostessing a 6" Autumn Leaves in Batiks swap, on my Friendship Swap group. We are using batiks for both the background and the leaves. I'm hoping to gets lots of variety back, as I really want to make this quilt with them.

FINISHES

What happened to my goal of "One Project A Month?" Well, ok, the broken shoulder and recover, and PT, didn't help, but still............

Sad, sad.

I think I really need to select a UFO and FINISH it this month!

Where is Dorothy with her boots when you need them?