Bearing Gifts from Afar.....

No, not the 3 Kings.....the postman!

Okay, I've been a bad, bad, girl. I saw the Christmas paper wrapped squishy inside the box.

I saw that the box was from Gotham City.....my fave!

I knew who it was from.

Could I wait? After all it is only a week away. Could I?

Well, your answer is right here.

Yessirreee Bob, I snatched that paper off in about two flicks of a bobtail dog (which in Maya's case is lightening speed fast) and what to my delight did I find?

Awwww, my heart is full and Christmas arrived officially at my house anyway!

Thanks V. I love it and it is perfect for the table isn't it?

When I moved here, I chose this table because I knew it would have to do triple duty. It is my cutting table, and it is the table where I pin baste my quilts, and finally it is where I host a dinner party or two.

That I have my stash in the dining room (in that lovely red cabinet at the end of the table) seems not to faze my guests and they love looking at all the fabric there.

I'm a lucky woman.

Katie Did.......

I got an email today about an earlier posting on my blog from Katie at the Katie Did blog.
Bless her heart for writing and I'm going to try to answer her here because it requires pics.

This is the quilt she was asking about and what she asked is ~ Can you share the size of the larger squares?

Simple enough request and I probably should be able to whip out a number, but I'm not there yet. I don't have the pattern for this quilt and don't even know who to give credit to. I liked it and wanted to make it and saw the picture somewhere and while mine will not be exactly like this....it will be somewhat like this.

I decided to figure out the pattern by working backwards from the outside in.

I resolved to cut my strips 2 1/2 inches wide for the sashing and thought that I'd make the corner squares first. Those are the squares at the intersections where the big squares and sashing meet. I made them with the smaller squares (2 1/2") framed with 2 1/2" borders like you see in this picture. They measured out at about 6 1/2" as you see here.

Next I would make the rectangles that would be on each side of the larger squares.





Here they are all laid out and ready to go. I know that they will be 6 1/2" wide by approximately 10 1/2". Once I know how long the rectangle sashing blocks actually are, I will be able to cut the large squares. Then it's just a matter of assembling the quilt top.

I have no idea what kind of border I'll finish this with...I might float the whole thing in the plain off-white fabric that I used for the sashing. Not every quilt demands a frame and I'll have to see what this one calls out for when it's assembled.








These are the fabrics for the large squares. There is some yellow and some brown prints, but I think it's an awful lot of pink, don't you? I had originally thought I'd make this quilt for my bed and am making it full/queen size. But, I'm not feeling it so much. So maybe it will be gifted.

By the way, go on over to see Katie's blog, it's full of goodies.

Happy sewing.

Recognizing Generous Crafters and Other Stuff......

The Sew, Mama, Sew blog writes today about recognizing those crafters who do charitable work and asks for nominations. I've participated in a joint effort or two, and follow the work of a very talented artist who has encouraged many of us to do just that. They're going to gift 15 of the nominees, and I would love for her to be one of them, but more than that I just wanted to publicly acknowledge her generosity. This is what I wrote:

I'd like to nominate Victoria of the Bumblebeans blog. (http://bumblebeans.blogspot.com/) She has organized some "block gather" projects for quilts that she assembled, quilted, and donated. She issued the call to action on her blog, sent out fabrics to be used in the blocks, and encouraged us along every step in the process. She also set up a separate blog for one of the projects (http://sisboompow.blogspot.com/) so we could see each others blocks as they were sent in before being assembled, and for us to talk about our process. It was an incredible amount of work, done joyfully.

Since I'm writing about V, I swiped the photo of that fabric you see from her blog. I hope she doesn't mind, but it is a direct link to my first ever sewing memory. When I was about 7 or 8, after watching my mom turn out clothing, home decor, and upholstery from her skilled hands and sewing machine...I too wanted to sew. Mostly for my dolls, but the very first thing I made were pillow cases for my mom on Mother's day. My Godmother showed me how to make them on the sewing machine at her house and the fabric you see there in that picture is the fabric I remember using. Now it may not have been exactly like that, but it was yellow and it was roses and it was a border print. I can't describe how accomplished I felt and it was the start of a long relationship for me and the machine.

I'm sewing blocks today.