Lil' Twister

As I'm not entirely certain when my sewing time will come to a halt, I've been working on finishing up some projects and starting only smallish projects. Or at least I've been trying to motivate to do so.  I did drop two quilts off at the shop yesterday to have them quilted - the State of Grace quilt I finished last week and the Just Before Dawn top that I finished a year ago May and have just had sitting around! 

I'd picked up a pattern and template called Lil' Twister (by Country Schoolhouse Designs of Superior, WI) at the IQF show in Chicago in April and thought it looked simple enough to give a start.  You begin by sewing together charm squares in a pleasing arrangement with a narrow border, like so:

And then you use the template to cut squares out from the sewn piece to give the illusion of pinwheels, like so:

Not terribly difficult to do, but I'm wondering if it wouldn't have looked better with fabrics with more contrast.  I do love the Martinique line by 3 Sisters that I used, but the pinwheels aren't necessarily all that apparent. Once I sew the blocks together, I'm thinking of adding on a narrow cream border and a slightly wider red border to finish it off and brighten it up a bit.

State of Grace

I've squeezed in a bit of sewing here and there for the past several weeks, working at a project that I''d had sitting around and cut out for some time. It's the State of Grace pattern (a Moda to Go jelly roll project) using the Shangri La fabric line by 3 Sisters.  I'm thinking that part of the reason I'd set the project aside (because I love the colors and design!) was that I had come up way short when I originally cut it out from the jelly roll. The good news is that I had significant portions of a jelly roll of a more recent line by the same designers - the Glace line - that mixed and matched well enough to allow me to finish the top.


Here's the full quilt (poor Ben did his best to hold it up, but it's on the larger side):


And a close-up.

I love the colors and can't wait to get this one quilted.  Ordered some backing fabric and might be able to drop it off this weekend.  Time will tell, though.

Bathtime Hoodie

At our guild's show in March, I purchased a really cute pattern for a baby bathtime hoodie, designed by RoseHip Lane (two guild members joined forces as this creative duo), along with the yard of toweling required to make it.  On Sunday, I finally made time to sit down to make it up, using 2.5" squares left over from baby's Pearls 'n Pinwheels quilt (isn't it fabulous when you can directly incorporate pieces from one project into the next?). 

I love how quickly and easily it came together and plan to stock up on toweling so that I can make more as gifts in the future.  The most time-consuming part is sewing down the binding and trying to keep the thread from being visible on the opposite side through the toweling (I wasn't always successful at that).

Sailboat Panel Quilt

When Mom and Dad were out a couple of weeks back, Mom pieced a quilt for the nursery to go with the sailboat theme.  We found the pattern and panel at the Fat Quarter Shop. It's the Nautical and Nice line by Sandy Gervais, which matches the Anchors Away hanging I made a few months back. Unfortuantely, due to all of the activity of the weekend, we ran out of time for layering, basting, and quilting the quilt before Mom headed back to Ohio, but I was able to finish it up this weekend so it's all set for the baby's arrival.

Here are a couple of photos.

The full quilt, hanging on the wall:

 Just the center portion of the quilt:

Thanks so much, Mom! He's going to love it!