Monday, August 18, 2008

Summer Stash

Well, a few months ago I joined the Summer Stash Challenge. I honestly didn't think I would finish it. In fact, I did a quilt from my stash, and it is still waiting to be quilting. It is hanging patiently on its hanger in the shop by the machine waiting for me to get to it eventually.

It wasn't until tonight, when I pulled the two quilts I quilted today out of my bag, that I realized that I have now completed two quilts for the challenge.

The first one, I already had all the fabrics for, but I wasn't really sure if I wanted to cut into them and destroy the purity of the beautiful bundle of fabric I had. But, I decided that I needed to deplete my stash and get rid of some of the projects I had stacking up in my sewing/storage room. So, I cut into the beautiful bundle and created this quilt top.

Today I quilted it, and it turned out so dang cute! I'm going to sell it on Etsy, in my Etsy shop once I get it bound. Here are some picutres of the quilting. Also, the light was a little better today, so you can see the beautiful colors better than in my last post I did about this quilt.

In the big pink/brown striped squares I did daisies with small centers and long petals.
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In the blocks with the nine patch and border, I did daisies with big centers and short, fat petals.
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Every where else in the quilt I did a tight loop meander. It makes the daisies stand out a little better. And it looks really cool on the back.
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This is my backing fabric. Is it not the cutest fabric ever?! I totally love it. I used a pink thread, and I totally guessed when I picked it, because the quilt was already on the machine and pinned and I couldn't really tell if it matched or not, but it ended up being almost the exact same pink as the pink in the fabric.

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The second stash quilt that I did was for my niece, Lynsey, who is having a baby sometime this week. She is getting induced on Saturday, we hope, but she might have baby Jax before then. Who knows what will happen. Anyway, I made her this cute blanket for baby Jax, and it is completely out of my stash.

Funny story, actually: the pattern called for 42 blocks, but I only had enough fabric for 32. So, I ripped the seams out of my leftover fabrics from my strip pieces, ironed them out, pieced them together to matching fabrics, and miraculously managed to squeeze out 42 blocks. It actually turned out really cute, and it's hard to tell which blocks were pieced together because of the busy prints I chose.

Anyway, I also happened to have some random yellow fabric laying around (I can't remember why I have it, I just do) so I used that for the backing because it matched perfectly. I quilted it in a loop meander all over in a light yellow thread. It turned out really cute. Tonight, when I got it home, I realized I didn't have any fabric to bind it with. However, I happen to have some yellow binding fabric left over from the last baby quilt I bound, and I will have some yellow left over from the back of this (hopefully enough to bind the whole quilt with). So that means that this quilt will be entirely made from my stash! I didn't have to buy any fabric for this! YAY!
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This is a picture of the backing fabric. Sorry for the super close-up, but the detail in the fabric is so small. It turned out really cute.
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So, now that I have two finished before the end of August, I am hoping to finish my third one. Maybe I will get to it this week. That would be nice. But, at the same time, I have a lot of other stuff to quilt as well, so we'll see.

4 comments:

Eileen said...

I do love seeing the backs of quilts. These are really pretty.. wonderful job!
If you could email me, I have something to send you for completing the Summer Stash Challenge :-) And I'll make sure to add you to the next update, which I am composing today actually. Thanks so much for being a part of this with us!

Dionne said...

You were very ingenious squeaking out those 10 extra blocks! I love pictures that show the details!
Cheers,
Dionne

Lala said...

I LOVE your quilt fabrics! I wish I had more time for quilting... *sigh* perhaps one day! *wink

Supercool Hotmama said...

Oh my goodness, I'm jealous of your fabulous quilting skills! I picked up about 5 Quilting magazines last week at the library book sale - and cut out all the darling patterns. Now I'm just itching to quilt, but I've already got so many projects in the works that I'd better not start another hobby until at least after Christmas! LOL!

(Came by from Bonnie's)