Blogger's Quilt Festival

It's that time again...

I have been looking at all the quilts and enjoying the stories, so I thought I'd enter something of my own.
I give you...the Birdie stacked coins quilt with texture!

Because this quilt is so linear, I wanted to do something different with the actual quilting. A friend suggested soft waves to calm the feeling and I heartily agreed. I went a step further and thought about adding texture. I love the way a quilt puckers after the wash, but I wanted this one to really stand out. So, I bumped up the tension/pressure foot and started quilting . . .check out that texture!

Here's the back:

Is that calming or what?! The waves worked perfectly to offset the lines and bright color. This one went to a sweet little girl named Quinn Therese♥

What I've been doing...not really but OMG

Are these girls amazing or what? I don't think I could ever do that! This takes some time to load, but trust me, it's worth it!

Okay, you win...

This is what I've really been doing...some commissioned work & a gift:

(click for a closer view)

and the winner is...

Thank you for all your kind comments! Mr. Aidan picked a winner using random.org (sorry, I couldn't figure out how to post that image). From a pool of 14, our lucky winner is...
#5. Lisa of One-Hip-Mom.

Terri's in for a surprise!

I really wanted to make a quilt for Terri because she's such a special gal pal. Jennie and I paid attention while Terri perused the quilt magazines and "ooh" or "I love this" slipped from her lips; she likes earth-tone batiks in geometric patterns. Jennie said she'd donate the fabric if I made the quilt and the final product is a gift from both of us. What a deal! I had a hard time going through her stash and not drooling all over it. I picked a geometric pattern (Piece of Cake 2 by Thimble Blossoms) and showed Jennie my fabric choices. She added to it and wha-la, today the quilt top is finished. I'm not big on earth-tone batiks, so if you are, what do you think?

The whole quilt (this pic needs to be rotated):

Here it is in natural, indirect light (the contrast is more apparent)

A close-up of the squares:

And this is even closer--see the beautiful gold leaves against the blue? They shimmer in the light!

What the...and a giveaway

It's been crazy around here so I've been remiss about posting. Well, it was a really good crazy so that's just fabulous!
As some of you may know, Jennie (Sunflower quilts) is officially divorced. She asked me top help her move, store her things at my house, and live here until the divorce was final. A whopping 21 days after she walked into a lawyer's office and wha-la, she left this morning for New York. We thought it would take a couple months and  Jennie kindly offered up her grand quilter in exchange for the above-mentioned list. In actuality, she was only here for 2 weeks, long enough for us to become better friends and wine-drinking, hot-tub goddesses.  And she cooked--homemade bread, pasta primavera with shrimp, meat pie...you get the idea...all yummy stuff that doesn't come from a box. She's an awesome cook. And she cleaned, too. Dream roommate. She's got (lifetime) free room and board here. And then some. And she still threw in the grand quilter. How lucky can one gal be? Now you know.  

Yesterday Jennie gave me my first lesson on the GQ, so I thought I'd share some of the photos. I'm absolutely giddy with this thing. Like a first kiss, it's heavenly and I never want the love affair to end! Yesterday I tried 2 lines following a pantograph and then today I went for it again:

2 lines of flowers (following a pantograph) 

Some free-hand swirls

Next, a few stone/pebbles

Not too shabby for my second day, huh?

Thanks again, Jennie, you're the shiznit!

Seeing as I'm such a lucky gal, I thought I'd spread the love with some Christmas fabric.

Leave a comment before next Friday (10/15) if you'd like to win this scrap bag of Adoring by Sandy Gervais. Essentially, it's a jelly roll with various widths of the line--2 to 3 1/2 inches wide.