I LOVE reading blogs ...

... especially when they continue to deliver such great & inspirational content.

My Google Reader had gotten out of control lately -- not only have I had little time to write blog posts, but I've been limited in my ability to keep up with reading them, too -- and I had over 500 unread posts at some point last week. Finally, over the past few days and this morning, I got it down to zero. And I came across some awesome things that I felt compelled to share:

• Lizzy House revealed the prints from her latest line, Castle Peeps, which is sure to become a quick favorite of mine.

image courtesy of Lizzy House

• I came across a great little tutorial for making an adorable ruffly hedgehog -- my mind is racing with all of the holiday gift possibilities, but the hand sewing is a bit outside of my comfort zone. A problem, or a new challenge? Hmmm ...

image courtesy of Matsutake blog

• Saw this awesome Craftzine tutorial for a twist on the old t-shirt quilt: the T-Shirt Memory Scarf. Seems like a more manageable project than a whole quilt, while achieving the same effect. I'm already envisioning a version with some of my favorite quilting fabrics in the mix.
  

image courtesy of Craftzine blog

• Found a new favorite Etsy shop: Orange Studio by Helen Dardik (via Jenny @ Blempgorf). Again, I can't help but have Christmas gifts on the brain ...

image courtesy of Orange Studio by Helen Dardik

• Jessica Jones over at How About Orange always posts the coolest things. A recent find: the NaniBird. I'd love to have some of these guys both in my cubicle and in my sewing space.
  

image courtesy of NaniBird

Pretty neat, no? I feel it's important to take a step back and say a big THANK YOU to all of the bloggers out there for continuing to share your crafts, your inspiration, and your encouragement for creative souls like me.

Have you found anything cool or inspirational lately? Please share!

September Quilting Bee Blocks

You know it's bad when I'm just now posting my September parade of quilting bee blocks ... on NOVEMBER 9th. I wish I could post my October blocks too, but ... *cough cough ahem ahem* I haven't finished them all yet *cough cough*. Yes, it's true -- for the first time in my swapping career (and yes, sometimes it is akin to a career) I have fallen slightly behind in my monthly commitments. I'm scrambling a little bit right now to catch up, and I'm looking forward to December (which is an "off" month for many of the bees.)

So let's jump right in, shall we?

In the SewConnected 3 group, Ashley sent out the always fabulous Mendocino fabrics with a pale blue solid and asked for wonky star blocks in a variety of sizes. I was able to make three blocks from Ashley's fabrics.

This first one is 12.5" square:


I had fun with this next one, which finished out at 6.5" wide by 12.5" tall. Every time I look at it, I think that my photo is stretched ... but it's not!


I was experimenting a bit and added some "shards" into the points. See them on the top right and bottom left points in the star above?

And finally, a wee li'l guy that's 6.5" square (with some more yellow "shards"):



Adrienne helped me and all the other Buzz Cuts kids get into the Halloween spirit early this year by sending out some really fun holiday prints for her quilt. I made three blocks, starting with this simple 6.5" pattern:

For some reason, I just love making those little "X" blocks. I think they're a great addition to any quilt design.

For my next block, I decided to play a bit with curved piecing. I wanted to go with a more wonky look, rather than precise ... so my disclaimer for the next photo is that the pieces were never intended to match up!!

And I went for another basic but fun block for my third one:


Next up are Karla's blocks for the bee inspired group. She sent a selection of fabrics from the Botanical Pop line and requested disappearing 9-patch blocks.


A simple pattern, but always fun to make. I was able to eke out two blocks from Karla's fabric.


September was a two-member month in bee inspired, and Ann from Denmark was our other assigned member. Like Ashley, she wanted wonky star blocks made from a variety of Christmas fabrics. Here are the two blocks I made for Ann (love those Christmas chickens!):


Over in the Cottage Quilting Bee, Rachel (of p.s. i quilt fame ... I know she loves when I say that : ) requested the always popular string blocks for her fabrics. I really loved the autumnal color palette of Rachel's fabrics:


And finally, September was Amanda Jean's month in the original SewConnected group (which *sniff* is nearing its final month). She requested 15.5" blocks featuring tiny houses sitting in a field of creamy white, inspired by this awesome, amazing, super cool Ingrid Press quilt.

Here's the close-up of the first house I made:

And even though I didn't have enough white to border it, I also made this little house (church? barn?) to send along to Amanda Jean:

So there it is, folks -- another month in the books for virtual quilting bees. And if you've been itching to get involved in a virtual quilting bee like the ones shown here, I encourage you to visit the Quilting Bee Blocks group on Flickr. Erin does a fantastic job of corraling the news from the many bees happening on Flickr, including new bees that are always opening up and recruiting new members.

Happy Monday, all!

A Year of Schnibbles | September

Consider this an apology to my poor, neglected blog for being MIA the past few weeks. Work's been crazy, home's been crazy, Halloween, yada yada yada ... you've heard it all before, so I'll spare you the details. But the good news is that I have 3 blog posts already in draft mode and a few more in my head, so as long as I can eke out a few minutes each day to finish them up, then you'll be negelected no more, dear blog.

First thing to catch up on is my September (yes, I know it's already November 5th) Year of Schnibbles quilt. I'm sure you've heard of the Year of Schnibbles by now. The brainchild of Sinta and Sherry, A Year of Schnibbles is a challenge (maybe more of an invitation) to complete one of Carrie Nelson's Schnibbles patterns each month for the next 12 months. I've always admired those patterns but never made one, so I was excited to jump in.


The first pattern for the month of September was called Winter White. It seemed like a great pattern, and I immediately knew that I was going to dip into my stash of Tula Pink's Nest line to make mine.

I scrambled to get it done in time (nothing like a deadline to keep you motivated) so that it could be included in Sinta & Sherri's monthly Parade of Schnibbles for September. As you can see, I didn't get it quilted and bound in time -- and it still isn't -- but I'm going to try to tackle it soon because I really like how this one came out!


Unfortunately, I didn't get to play along in October (when Cindy Lou Who was the selected pattern), and it's not looking good for November (Picnic) either. That's OK, though -- I don't need to make every one. I think I'll dip in and out based on the selected pattern and how the month's shaping up. There are quite a few Schnibbles patterns that I'm excited to make and hope will be in the rotation.

Oh, and did I mention there are prizes and giveaways involved? If you're not already participating in the Year of Schnibbles project, I encourage you to check it out. It's great fun.

Finally, to my dear readers: I miss you guys! How are you doing? What's new? What'cha working on? Anyone else (besides me) both looking forward to -- and stressing out -- about the holidays already?

Quilt-Along | 7. Finishing your quilt!

I know it's been a while since my last wonky block tutorial -- thanks for sticking with me. I hope you've all been having fun wonking away on your quilt blocks. Based on all of the great pictures in the Flickr pool, it looks like you've all really embraced the technique! I am blown away by both the awesomeness and the sheer quantity of quilts you guys are pulling together. Great job!

I wanted to be sure to wrap up the quilt-along with some resources on finishing your quilt. I was going to prepare a post with basting, quilting, and binding tips, but then realized this has already been done ... and done much better than I could ever hope to do it myself.

So, when you're finished making your wonky quilt blocks and are ready to begin assembling, be sure to refer to Dana's very thorough and easy-to-follow tutorials below:

How to assemble your quilt top
Free motion quilting tutorial
How to bind a quilt

Thanks again to all of you for your continued support and feedback throughout this quilt-along. It was tons of fun and, who knows?, I might be able to be convinced to do another one in the (maybe not so near) future!

Back again soon with some stuff I've been working on ... ... ...

AllModern.com Giveaway Winner!

Thank you all for your many entries to the AllModern.com giveaway. I had to laugh at how many of you said you'd give those finger puppets to your children or grandchildren when I KNOW you'd probably keep them for yourselves!! : )

With the help of the trusty random integer generator over at Random.org, we have a winner. (Sorry, I can't show a screen shot because I'm on my janky Windows machine : ( Oh, and my IE has already crashed twice while trying to write this post. Grrrr ... I think I'll stick to my Linux and Mac machines, thankyouverymuch.)

The winner is lucky #13, Liz, who blogs at Teeny Tiny Quilts and wrote:

Goddess in Progress said...
Oh my goodness, how cute are those?! My two-year-olds would get such a kick out of those finger puppets.

The coolest part? Like me, Liz is the parent of twins! I am SO excited that a fellow sleep-deprived, stressed out parent of mutiples won this prize. We deserve some extra special treament sometimes, don't we Liz? : )

Congrats, Liz. Shoot me an email with your mailing address and I'll have your prizes sent to you ASAP.

Thanks again to Jamie at AllModern.com for sponsoring such a fun giveaway.

I'll be back tomorrow (I hope!) to wrap up the wonky log cabin quilt-along. And I'm also behind on sharing my September quilting bee blocks. I've been crazy busy with work lately, so all else seems to be falling behind ... ... ...

Pillow + Puppet Giveaway

Blogging has been such a great thing for me for so many reasons, but I think the best thing is that it has given me a vehicle to meet so many great people that I never would have met otherwise. Recently, I connected with Jamie from AllModern.com, a really cool site for contemporary furniture and housewares. (I've even been checking out their modern and contemporary bedding sections for some inspiration for my Pillow Talk Swap project ... more on that soon ... )

And speaking of pillows ...

Jamie is such a big fan of Quilt Dad and my readers that he offered to let me host a giveaway! There will be two prizes this time (edited to add: both will go to one lucky winner!). The first is this adorable DwellStudio sparrow pillow -- an item that I knew all of you quilters and crafters (and lovers of anything bird-related!) would love.


With all of the pillow buzz happening around Flickr-land lately, I knew this would be a perfect prize.

The second is this awesome set of five DwellStudio finger puppets:





I think I need to snag a set of these myself for a nephew that we're expecting in December!

What do you think? Pretty nice prizes, huh? By the way, I also love AllModern's selection of Alessi houseware items -- I wish I had known about those kitchen tools when Mrs. Quilt Dad and I made our wedding registry! Look at this salt & pepper set! Super cool stuff. Great for bridal shower (or Christmas) gifts, I think ...

Some fine print ...

Unfortunately, due to shipping costs, this giveaway is only open to my U.S. readers. Sorry about that!

You know the drill: simply leave a comment on this post, and I'll select one random number as the winner of both prizes.

I'll leave the giveaway open until next Wednesday, October 21st.

Good luck!

Blogger's Quilt Festival 2009

OK, so I am a little late to the party, but I couldn't miss Amy's 2nd annual Blogger's Quilt Festival, hosted on her ParkCityGirl blog! Truth is, I've been traveling like a madman for work lately, and haven't had much time for sewing, stitching, blogging, Flickr-ing, and the like. However, I am very excited to share a quilt that I recently finished and would like to highlight for the festival!

Now, for the story:

A few weeks back, Mrs. Quilt Dad and I were enjoying a late breakfast on a Sunday morning and catching up on both the week past and the week to come (which we often don't get to do during the hectic weeks themselves!) My wife was scheduled to attend a cousin's baby shower the following Sunday, and she began to express how nice it would be to give her cousin something homemade as a gift ...

You can see where this is going, can't you?

I had 6 days to make a baby quilt, from start to finish, amidst the many other life demands over the course of the week. But of course, I was up for the challenge. Especially because a baby quilt gave me the perfect opportunity to play with "Hushabye" by Tula Pink!

The pattern itself is nothing too advanced -- I had two charm packs and just had to supplement them with some border, binding, and backing fabrics.

As many of you have so astutely noted, I tend to avoid working on -- and especially finishing -- large-sized quilts. I free-motion quilted this one -- with only one pucker! -- and bound it in one evening. Even I couldn't believe how much the speed at which I'm able to bind has improved!

So the reason why this quilt is so special to me and why I've decided to highlight it for the festival is that I feel that it truly represents just how far I've come in my skills and abilities over the last year. True, I spend a lot of my time working on blocks and smaller projects, but this quilt has proven to me that I can make a quilt, soup to nuts, when I want to.

Oh, and the mom-to-be loved it ... what more can I ask for?

Be sure to check out all of the other wonderful quilts and bloggers highlighted on Amy's blog -- there are over 500 links and counting! WOW!! And be sure to thank Amy for all of her hard work while you're there.