latest finishes

This past weekend, my husband and I drove around looking for a place to photograph two of my recent finishes. We wound up at this pink brick wall in downtown Raleigh, and were actually soon joined by a photographer and a family, who were looking to use the wall as a backdrop as well (they awkwardly stood behind me as I snapped my last few pictures). First up was a low-volume Scrappy Trip Around the World quilt I made from solid and almost-solid cottons and linens. I stuck with a low-volume theme, throwing in strips of color here and there.

I backed it with one of my favorite Anna Maria Horner prints and quilted it with a light peach thread. I've listed it here in my Etsy shop, if you'd like to take a closer look.

My second recent finish is this Tatami Mat quilt, using a pattern designed by my friend Melissa, of Lunden Designs. Melissa and I met at Quilt Market in Houston last year, and have kept in touch since. I've had the chance to test out a few of her amazing quilt patterns, including this one, and have loved how they've turned out.

For this quilt, I pulled a stack of peach, pink, orange and brown prints by Anna Maria Horner, Amy Butler, and Art Gallery Fabrics. I enlarged the quilt's borders a bit, and backed it with larger cuts of floral prints by Art Gallery Fabrics and a vintage daisy pillowcase I'd been hoarding. It will be heading off to its new home soon, joining a matching pillow.

do. Good Stitches: June Block

Have you sewn a lot of curves? I've done only a few, but I got some good practice in last week while making the block for this month's quilt for the Wish Circle of do. Good Stitches. We used a restricted palette and Alyssa's pattern, and I think the finished quilt is going to be stunning!

Each month, I make quilt blocks for the Wish Circle of do. Good Stitches, which our group then turns into quilts that we donate to Project Linus. You can see all of my past blocks here.

the mermaid quilt

Is three years too long to wait to blog about a quilt? I hope not.

I came across these photos of one of my first and favorite quilts this weekend, and thought now would be as good a time as any to share them. The top is made up of 10" squares of fabrics from Heather Ross's Mendocino line (lots of mermaids and octopi), which I picked up from a quilt shop in NH years ago, and the back is an Anna Maria Horner fabric I found in the clearance tub at Nido.

I finished the quilt in 2010, while we were still living in Maryland, and it has been a constant on our couch ever since.

Fellow bloggers, what's the longest you've waited to blog about a project? Do you have project photos languishing unshared in your computer folders, too?

star blossoms mini quilt

When my husband and I went to London last year, I brought along an English paper-piecing project to work on during the plane ride and down time in the city (you can see the start of it here).

In the months that followed, I continued to work on it, and this past fall, I finally finished it.

I used Rachel's Star Blossoms tutorial as my starting point, and decided to make each star monochromatic, pulling scraps exclusively from my stash. For the diamonds in between each star, I used scraps of a gray tablecloth from our wedding (I've used it in other projects as well, including this one and this one).

I backed my mini quilt with two vintage floral prints, and hand quilted it with embroidery floss.

I bound it with an Anna Maria Horner print, which was leftover from this quilt.

I love, love, love this quilt. It was so much fun to work on, especially since it utilized so many little scraps and was perfect for traveling. As soon as it was finished though, I found myself missing having a go-to hand-sewing project---which I quickly remedied with a new English paper-piecing project. Pictures to come soon!

purple color wheel mini quilt

Not long after posting about the mini color wheel quilt top I started for September's LMP+QG challenge (which I opted to create using only shades of purple), I managed to quilt it, bind it and mail it to one of my good friends (who loves the color purple) for her October birthday.

I opted to hand quilt the piece, using purple floss in the wedges and white floss in the inner and outer borders.

For the backing, I chose a Japanese print I've had in my stash for years.

And for the binding, I used an Anna Maria Horner print, which was leftover from this quilt that I made in 2011.

I was smitten with the finished wall hanging (I love the look of monochromatic scraps!), and so happy to gift it to a good friend.

quilt: innocent crush brick quilt

As a Christmas gift for my in-laws this past holiday, I made them a quilt:

{Made mostly from Anna Maria Horner's Innocent Crush fabrics, using Amy Smart's Easy Strawberry Fields Brick Quilt featured over on Moda Bake Shop. It was the very first quilt I've ever sent off to a long-arm quilter, and I was quite pleased with the results.}