Year of Love Wreath

I figured out a "different" way to display my Year of Love scrappy hearts (shown in the last post). I used Ellen's block from Carol Doak's 40 Bright and Bold Paper Pieced Blocks book in 3" and 5" sizes. I added a black and white paisley border and stuck to solids and plain fabric blocks so that I could put my individual hearts in the center and show them off. I'll use velcro to hold them in the center of the wreath, but first I need to finish all the hearts. I'm gonna use my fancy stitches (that I never use) and try some embellishments to finish each one. But, right now I'm pretty happy that I found a way to display them - my genius idea. I didn't want to just stick them all together in a wall hanging. This way they each have their time and can stay up for a whole month. I might use some of my novelty stash to create some more. Tons of fun.

Snowing = Sewing aka A Year of Love

We have had the worst winter in Maryland since 1884. Over the last week I think we've gotten almost four feet of snow. I went to work on Monday (roads were not good), but stayed home on Tuesday and then they closed the post on Wednesday and Thursday. I took advantage of the unexpected 3 days of free time and sewed 12 blocks. Carol Doak designed a paper-pieced scrappy heart block for a swap I was planning on her Yahoo group site. The swap is called I Love the Holidays so I dug out all my holiday fabrics and started making swap blocks. I made duplicates because they were coming out so cute. Somewhere in the making of the holiday scrappy heart blocks I decided to make one for each month. I have finished and am calling them a Year of Love. I'm not sure what I 'm going to do with them, but they sure are cute and hopefully I can find the perfect project to put them in and really show them off.

Round 2 of the YTRR

We got our instructions for Round 2 of the Yours Truly Round Robin. I couldn't wait to do it and got it done right away. It's not exactly what I'd hoped, but I still like it. Our criteria for this round was to use only two colors, so I used blue and gold. You could use as many shades of those fabrics as you wanted and I ended up using 5 fabrics. The blocks were from Carol Doak's Designer Edition CD Block G66. It was originally in her Easy Stash Quilt Block book. It'll be a while til we get criteria for another round, sound I guess I'll try to work on those Christmas gifts I keep procrastinating on.

Another Round Robin

My favorite online quilting group is holding a no-mail round robin, called the Yours Truly Round Robin. We start with a center block and then each month we'll get instructions for what to do next and we will add a round according to specifications provided by our leader, Carol Doak. I'm still working on Christmas projects but decided to take a break. Here's my center. Blue/Gold, Blue/Yellow, and Blue/Orange are my favorite color combinations. I should love this quilt when done. I'm planning to make it 60" square but it could grow.

Getting Finished Part 2

Managed to get three more quilted. Only have one more table runner and six placemats left for me to quilt. The other tablerunner and wall hanging will have to be done at the long arm quilter.

Getting Finished Part 1

I made Christmas quilt projects for all my coworkers, but I got started late so I am just now getting around to finishing them up. The tops were done, but the quilting wasn't. So here are the first two finished projects. Very similar table toppers in the colors the recipients like. I like them both, but I think the fall colored one is my favorite.

Fat Quarter Birthday Swap Quilts

I hosted and joined a swap in the summer that had a due date of end of Novemeber. I figured it would be no problem and actually put my name in twice. I got my swapmates fabric in August and procrastinated until this weekend before I started working on the quilts. I brought the fabric and foundations (they are both paper pieced) with me to Korea (where I'm visiting my hubby) and was able to complete them both in 2 days. Luckily both of my swapmates chose to be easy on me. One wanted a 16" octagon table topper (that looked like a fall topper I had made previously) and the other wanted a 16" x 28" table topper. The fabric from the octagon one was a beautiful gold print from the Hearth and Home collection at connecting friends. As soon as I got it I went out a bought a bunch of that fabric line myself. I love it. The topper is pretty, I just wish she would have let me make it bigger. There were so many other beautiful fabrics in that line. The other table topper was for a bedside table and my swapmate gave me all the colors in the quilt on the bed and told me what she wanted as the focus fabric. She gave me my choice of blocks, but since her hame is Virginia, I decided to use the block called Ginny. I think both quilts came out pretty good. I used Korean batting and quilted them on the small Janome Jem sewing machine I brought with me. Even though I procrastinated, I worked hard over the last 2 days and was able to finish them both and will get them in the mail today -- which was the deadline for mailing. Life is Good!

When I get home I'll post pictures of what my swapmates made for me. I definitely made out in this swap. They were both very generous. And I got one gift in September and the other just before I left for Korea (so I had it for my birthday). I'm a horrible swapmate, I feel so guilt, but so lucky at the same time.