Time for Winners!

It's always fun to get to this part of a giveaway!  When I woke up this morning I had rafflecopter randomly draw my winners - Donna won the fabric giveaway and Lee won the patterns.  Congrats, Ladies!  Check your e-mail for more information!

This is one of my projects from yesterday.  I believe it is going to be a raffle quilt for a local group.  It's pretty awesome, but it isn't your typical quilt!  The motorcycles are all that rubbery t-shirt transfer fabric, and the black is pleather (imitation leather).  It has a layer of poly batting and is backed with black fleece.  Quite an interesting combination to work with!

You can see the gorgeous texture in the pleather.  That's the way it came, not from quilting!  The only quilting I did was to outline each of the motorcycle squares.  With all the thickness of the fabrics there was a small amount of puckering on the back, but it's not that bad.  The backing was turned to the front for the binding.  A bit of a challenge, but it came out pretty well!

The binding clips were perfect for the job!  You can really see the texture in the pleather with this shot - so pretty!

I also started working on the Vintage Embroidery quilt.  I got it basted - this is my first quilt using two layers of batting.  The top batting is Dream wool and the bottom layer is pellon cotton.

I got the stitch in the ditch done to stabilize it and have started to quilt the blocks!  It's going to be stunning, I think!

 I was so nervous to stitch on the blocks, but I love the results!  It takes about 5 minutes to do a block and there are 42 in the quilt, so I have a few hours of quilting ahead of me.  Each block is 4 1/2 inches plus 1 inch borders framing it.

Today is grocery shopping day, so I suppose I'd better get off the computer and get my day going.  Congrats to Donna and Lee!  Thanks to everyone for your comments and participation - it was really fun hearing about your favorite blocks.  It made me want to sew them all up!

Quilter's Recipe Box - Square in a Square Unit, Rolling Stone Block

Ready for a new unit?  This month I'll be using the Square in a Square unit.  This is one of the units I usually like to use a shortcut method even though it does waste a bit of fabric.  I think the accuracy of doing them this way makes the waste worthwhile.

This block requires quite a bit of cutting!  You will need sixteen 2 inch squares of your background fabric, plus four 2 x 3 1/2 inch rectangles.  Cut four 3 1/2 squares and four 2 x 3 1/2 rectangles from your dominant fabric, and one 3 1/2 inch square for the center of your block.

Start by marking a diagonal line on the back of all the 2 inch squares.  You can mark them with a pencil or other marking tool, or finger press them in half diagonally.  Place a 2 inch background corner on one corner of each 3 1/2 inch square of your dominant fabric.  I like to chain piece them, line them up on my cutting mat and cut off the extra fabric.

Press the corner triangles out.  Then sew the opposite corner in the same way and trim.

Then press:

Continue in the same manner until you have all four corners sewn.

Then use the two sets of rectangles to make four split square units:

Lay out all your units like this:

And sew together.  I usually take a peek to make sure the corners of my square in a square units line up with the seam in the split square.

Then, when I sew them together I make sure to sew a hair to the inside of the intersection on the square in a square point.

This ensures that your point doesn't disappear in the seam line:

Once your block is complete it will look like this:

You can purchase the entire set of 12 Quilter's Recipe Box unit patterns in my Etsy shop!

Today is the last day to enter my giveaway - if you haven't already completed your entries, be sure to do so before midnight - tomorrow I'll be announcing the lucky winner of thirteen 10 inch square and a roll of 5 inch strips!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

A Look Back - My First PDF Pattern

I was updating some listings today in my Etsy Shop and as I looked at my Floral Irish Chain Pattern started wondering when I first listed it.  I was very surprised when I did a search for the pattern on my blog that it was exactly 9 years ago today! I enjoyed looking back at that post, can't believe it's been that long!  I've made quite a few different samples of this pattern over the years, so I thought it would be fun to share them.  Here is the first one:

The second version is my favorite and ended up being the cover for my pattern:

I've made it in greens:

Pinks and purples:

Lovely fall colors:

Bright Pinks and Greens!

As you can see, the quilt looks great in a variety of colors.  This is a great shop sample to sell fabric, it doesn't take a lot of time or fabric to make it, and it really shows a medium scale print to good advantage!  I haven't made one for a while, so I think it might be time to take a look at what I can find and make another one!  

Have you ever made an irish chain quilt?  They are fun and a great beginner quilt.  Someday I'd like to try my hand at a triple Irish Chain.  

Just a reminder - I am giving away some Island Batik fabric!  You have through Monday to enter right here!