Island Batik---the Magic Boxes

This is the moment you have been waiting for.  A huge moment.  A box of fabric you have been anticipating for a week arrives and your mind is blown the moment you cut the tape sealing the box.  It's like Christmas, your birthday and any other present receiving holiday all wrapped up into one.  It's the moment your first shipment of fabric from the Island Batik Ambassador program arrives.  All you can do is sit and bask in the glowing light that is all those beautiful hand dyed fabrics.  Wait, what's that noise?  Is that actual angels singing?  You are paralyzed...you can't...even...anything...

Then you slap yourself back to reality, grab the camera and start snapping pictures because fabric this beautiful...must be shared! (Warning what follows is a post full of many pictures of beautiful fabrics!)

Look at all that quilting yumminess!!!

Stashing and Crushing

I realized this weekend it has been quite some time since I've had a stash report or have been crushing on a project.  Honestly, the good ol' fabric stash hasn't been growing much.  Extra fabric is extra distractions.  But on Mother's Day, my husband decided to get me some mums.  My favorite it kind...the ones I don't have to water or care for, Dear Mum by Robin Pickens for Moda Fabric.

I must admit, I had never ran across this fabric line until I opened the bag.  Lots of fun bright prints and I fell hard for that black with gray and white speckles on it.  I have an idea in mind using a Moda Bake Shop pattern, but alas, it will have to wait a while.  Thank goodness these mums won't die!

Let Me See You Jelly Roll

Last weekend was all about the jelly roll and making something with them.  I pulled out all the jelly rolls in our stash and snapped a quick picture.  I needed to do a bit of inventory before I decided which one to cut open.  Funny enough, the two half rolls and the roll they are setting on in the far right of the picture where the lucky winners.

David decided to break into his jelly roll quilt kit using Hop, Skip and Jump by American Jane and I broke up to very old rolls that I believe came from Joann Fabrics.  The pattern I used also called for a jelly roll in solids.  Nope do not see any of those in my picture, so off to the store to quickly pick up enough of a solid fabric to cut strips.

A small confession here...I've had this Go! cutter for almost a year now (David got it for me for Christmas) and I have never used it.  Gasp!  I know.  He's actually used it several times.  I decided to break it out and take advantage of the 2 1/2" strip dye.  Holly cow, did that save time.  I think I cut enough strips for a jelly roll in maybe 15 minutes.  Might have been less time actually.

With everything gathered up and a few more cuts, I was ready to start this quilt.  

Thank goodness our daughter headed off to her homecoming dance, things got pretty hot, hot, hot at our house.  We were spicing things up in a big way.  Stripping.  Yes you read that right.  Stripping.

We decided to make use of our time alone and strip together.

Wait, what where you thinking?  Strip with each other, not for each other.  (Sorry I just had to go there)  As the weekend came to an end, I found myself with some completed strip sets and David almost had a completed quilt top.

I'm continuing to piece on the quilt this week, since having adequate quilting time seems to be a bust.  Maybe it will turn into a completed top by the weekend.  Blocks are starting to form.

I think I'm going to keep the pattern a secret until it starts coming together.  Keep you guessing.

Now on to my next quilting confession...two jelly rolls worth of strips may have started turning into quilts, but what do I do???  Buy two more of course.

While killing time between doctor appoints in Morgantown, we headed on one of our favorite quilt shops, Country Roads Quilt Shop.  Peggy, the owner, has her jelly rolls on sale all week and I just had to handle them.  Who doesn't love fondling fabric??

These lovely pinks, blues and grays with the gold print caught my eye right away.  The line is called Meow or Never by Erin Michael.  I had to have it.  I love puns and buns and this is like both!

I also kept coming back this little Christmas jelly roll.  I think it may actually become a for sale quilt once it's finished, but only time will tell.

So two rolls out two rolls in equals right back to where we started from, but I'm ready for jelly roll day 2018.

Did you strip this weekend?  Is your stash less one roll or did you celebrate by stocking up?  I'd love to hear about it.  

Today I'm linking up with Let's Bee Social and Midweek Makers.

New Fabrics For Future Gifts

So here was the scene Saturday morning, two quilters both on a mission...acquire fabric.  So out the door we went, our destination several local quilt shops.  On my list were two quilts that will end up being gifts.  The first is a baby quilt using Lorna at Sew Fresh Quilt's latest pattern, Ducks in a Row for a co-worker and his wife who are expecting their first baby.

The second quilt will be from Angela Walter and Tula Pink's book Quilt with Tula and Angela and it's called Sugar Skull Quilt.  The recipient of this quilt is a little more complicated?  Let me explain.  I'm very much into trying to listen to what the universe is telling me. Okay that may seem a bit weird.  But when I get a gut feeling about something, even though it may not make sense to me, I try my best to follow it and most usually, it never steers me wrong.  I have an Instagram friend who I find very inspiring.  They are a true artist in my eyes.  Every medium they pick up be it, pencil, paint, clay or ink, they create beautiful works of art.  I have actually met the person once, many many years ago, but I really do not know them.  They are a local talent in the area I live and for a while now, I've had the gut feeling I need to make them a quilt.  I have no idea why, but I need to do it.

When I saw the Sugar Skull quilt in the book a few weeks ago, I instantly knew it was what I am suppose to make and the color palette will be red, black and white.  So classic and sexy.

So let's get back to shopping...shall we?  Our first stop was a shop in our home town called Helen's Hen House.

I picked up 1/2 yard cuts of the above fabrics to kick off the Sugar Skull quilt, two white/black prints and two reds.  I'm not sure what the first print is, but the second floral black and white print is a Focus II print by Paint Brush Studio.  The first red print is Ivy Lane for Quilting Treasures and the second is a red print by Blank Quilting.

After David picked up a few fabrics, we hit the road again and headed to a quilt shop to the north of our town called Sew Chic.    I found myself searching for more Sugar Skull fabrics and didn't walk away disappointed.

My first find was a beautiful red batik fabric with wiggly lines that reminded me of stippling.  Next up was a red and black print, Cotton Screen Print Style by Benartex Fabrics.  And last but not least, was that cute little black and white flower print, Happy! by Me & My Sister for Moda Fabrics.

 It was while at this store and seeing a charm pack of grunge fabric it hit me...I MUST have black Grunde for the background fabric!!!!!!  Though Sew Chic has quite a few bolts of Moda Grunge, black was not one of the colors.  When we were back in the car I called yet another shop about 20 minutes away to see if they had it...they did!!

Northern bound we continued.  Our destination was Country Roads Quilt Shop, another one of our favorite shops.  I bee lined it for the bolts of Grunge to stake my claim on that beautiful bolt of black and stumbled onto a gorgeous hot pink...HELLO!  So I carried it around with me as well.  While looking through the white on whites I found a darling heart print, Whispers Muslin Mates by Studio for Moda Fabrics and decided that combined with the pink Grunge a darling little duck quilt could come to life.

Of course I got some yardage of the black Grunge as well.

While I was drooling over my fabrics, Dave was drooling over some fabrics of his own.  The internal struggle (that we all know very well) of "should I, shouldn't I?" began playing out in his head.

Our daughter set on the floor in the defeat of having two quilting parents and probably took to social media to see if anyone could save her from boredom.  I floated and fluttered among the reds and whites searching for more fabrics. 

From top left to right: 1) Frosty Forest by Cherry Cuidry for Benartex, 2) a beautiful red print that the selvage let me down, 3) another rich red batik, 4) Moda Marble Swirls in red, and 5) a red and white print with a chopped up selvage.

From the bottom left to right: 1) Hazel by Cluck Cluck Sew for Windham Fabric, 2) Moda Grunge in White, 3) a wonderful white batik, and 4) a white on white with circular patterns on it.

So here are all my fabrics for the Sugar Skull Quilt.

I can't WAIT to start whacking up fabrics and put them back together again.  More importantly, I can't wait to get them in quilt form and gift them to their new owners but for now, I hear a few small quilt tops calling my name for quilting.  Hopefully, I will be able to share them with you by the end of the week.  Until then, I'm gonna drool over my fabrics I bit longer and then start quilting.  

Make sure you hop over to Dave the Quilt Engineer to hear all about his fabric purchases and what he has been up to during his quilting absence.

Today I'm linking up with Sunday Stash.

QAL's-Haulk Mode

I'm still plugging away over here, working on QAL's and getting that pattern ready to release.  After my crazy productive week the week before, last week I kind of hit a brick wall.  I didn't really do anything-at-all.  It happens.

David has been gone since last Friday for work again, and I knew I needed to buckle down and be productive over my quiet weekend (well as quiet as it gets with a teenage daughter in the house).  On Friday it was like my batteries recharged.  I hit the coin box and found that flashy star on Super Mario Brothers that warped me into moving at super quick speeds.  I turned on quilting Haulk Mode (no I didn't turn green).

Saturday, I popped into a local quilt store, Helen's Hen House, to pick up a few FQ's to add to my Solstice challenge quilt.  That's where I picked up those yummy pieces above...I think I'm going to need more.  What was suppose to be a quick trip ended up being a 1 1/2 hour event.  The place was hopping and I ran into quilting friends and made a new quilting friend.  But the quilt store magic had to end...I had things to do!  So back home I went.

I was able to quickly finish the straight line quilting on my pattern quilt, which leaves me with one more to quilt.

I was able to get that quilt basted and cut binding strips for four quilts.

Next up, was the Freefall 1/2 blocks.  Sandra at mmm!quilts had emailed me the instructions for the next set of blocks so that I could test them before she released them on Monday.  Making that a major priority, I knocked those out pretty quickly.

Here are all the blocks playing on my design wall.

I needed a carrot chocolate bar on a stick, dangling in front of me as a reward.  I decided to do a fabric pull for the three blocks I need to make to finish section A of Pat Sloan's 182 Solstice Challenge.  I will only allow myself to work on this project once everything is completed.

Now on to the blocks I completed.  I had three blocks to catch up on;  Lorna at Sew Fresh Quilts had released the Santa block for the Jolly Christmas Quilt and he had yet to visit my design wall, April's Aurifil block needed to be completed, and Pat Sloan released The Children's Library May block two days early.  I cut the pieces for all three blocks and slowly (and carefully) worked on them all together.

Santa finished up first.  Isn't he just the jolliest? 

I even pieced one of the five rows together.

The Children's Library Block for May was Green Eggs and Ham.  I dug into my stash of green and went to work.  This block goes together log cabin style and for some reason, I always end up with a wonky block.  My 1.5" piece blocks got a little bit off, but I didn't sweat it and improvised.  As long as I ended up with a 12.5" block that looked dag gone close, I was happy.  I think Dr. Seuss would agree, whimsical is better than perfect?

And here they are all together.

Last but definitely not least, was the Aurifil BOM by Sue Marsh New Direction.  I put this block off for half of a month because the templates and triangles scared the crap out of me.  Something I've never really worked with.  I cut very carefully and took my time sewing.

I have to say the block turned out much better than I expected.  Once put together, I did lose a few points on the arrow, but hey some times in life, the arrows that point us aren't quite as sharp as they should be.  This is just one of those times. (It's not done losing points either...shhhh)

And here are the start of my rainbow blocks, ranging from blue to red purple.

So this is what my list looked like at the end of Sunday.

Not bad if I do say so myself.  I also finished making a pressing board to use for bigger pieces of fabric, but I think I'll save that for another post.  This one is about eye candy.  

So for now, my Haulk muscles have retracted and I've returned to little ol' Tish N Wonderland.  I still need to keep the forward momentum going, but for now I think I deserve a nap.

Today I'm linking up with Freefall Linky, Wednesday Wait Loss, Midweek Makers, Let's Bee Social, Main Crush Monday and Linky Tuesday.

Easter Stashing

Ah, Wonderland by Rifle Paper Co for Cotton + Steel, oh how I love thee!  I've been debating on purchasing this fabric ever since it hit my Instagram feed.  Honestly, it wasn't 100% love at first site (I think I was sick that day).  But, when Pat Sloan released April's The Children's Library block, Alice in Wonderland and I saw her block in these fabrics, I knew I had to order some, just for this block.  No picture can do these prints justice.  They are AMAZING.  After they showed up in my mail box I couldn't wait to chop them up!

Pretty sure I'm going to need more!

Another package found it's way to my house this weekend...several spools of Aurifil Thread!!

Soon these spools of thread will all be frolicking in a quilt top together and I will be sharing it with you, but alas not yet.  Ordering just the right thread online can be tricky.  Computer monitors and picture lighting can drastically skew what a thread color actually looks like and for some reason, matching turquoise is the worst.  So awhile back I broke down and purchased an Aurifil color chart and now there is no guessing at all.  I know exactly what I'm getting.

Saturday, David and I took at trip to one of our favorite LQS south of us, The Quilt Shoppe.  This store has fabric in just about every color you could think of.  It's many nooks and cranny's make it so cozy and inviting.  The shop owner has a wonderful 30's reproduction, civil war reproduction and batik sections.  The rest of the fabric is in sections by color.  After about 2 hours of walking around and petting all the pretties, this is what I walked away with.

I really am having a love affair with fabrics with text.  I have no idea what I will do with this, but I'm sure it will find a home soon enough.

Next up, is a few random FQ purchases.  I thought these greens and purples would look lovely in the Medallion Sampler QAL over at Stitchin at Home, that I am working on.  I was able to make a bit of progress on this one, but I'll save that for another post.

Sandra (mmm!quilts) and I have been kicking around the idea of working on the Sewcial Bee Sampler, later this summer when our schedules slow down a bit.  I plan to piece my blocks using a FQ bundle of Paradiso by Moda Fabrics.  I've been searching for a sashing fabric and finally fell in love with the Moda Grunge on the left.  I'm thinking the gray linen print will be my block borders and the white will go in some of the blocks and an extra fabric choice.  Note to Sandra:  we need to start this sooner than later so I stop buying fabric for it :)  This is actually the second time I've bought sashing and border fabric for it...quilting confession.

Last but not least, I decided to pick up another pair of Machingers quilting gloves.

The pair that I have now, have definitely been well loved.  The rubber tips of the fingers are quite discolored from use.  The gloves themselves have little picks in them from where the cats will snatch them up and run off to play with them.  Sigh, I can't have anything nice.  It was just time for a new pair.  It's a quilting item I cannot do without.  

The temptation to purchase more fabric was strong, but I held back.  Being a two quilter household, I have to leave room in the budget so that Dave can pick a few things out too :)

Today I'm linking up with Sunday Stash and Main Crush Monday.

Celebrating National Quilting Day

Saturday was National Quilting Day and I decided to turn it into an all weekend event.  It started by David and myself stopping by one of our favorite local quilt shops, Helen's Hen House.  I fell head over heels for that black floral print and couldn't help myself.  I just had to take some if it and it's friends home with me.  So National Quilting Day support local quilt shop...check.

Next on the list was to work on a few of my QAL blocks.  First up was block 13 of Pat Sloans's 182 Solstice Challenge, Studio Time

I followed up with the next block in the Aurifil designer of the month QAL.  This month's designer was Melissa Corry of Happy Quilting.  Her color was purple and she gave us the Straptastic Star Block.  Lots of 2" pieces, but worth every cut.

Here you can see it with the first two blocks.  Each block is a color in the color wheel.  So far we've had blue, and blue purple.  I accidentally went red purples with this block, so I will do next month's block in purples.

The last block for the weekend was the latest block in Lorna at Sew Fresh Quilt's Have a Jolly Christmas Quilt, a candle block.  National Quilting Day piece something...check.

The last of my weekend fun, was working on quilting my Meadow Mystery Quilt.  I had hoped to finish it, but I'm still a little ways away.  So I thought I would leave you with a few sneak peaks before I sign off for the night.

That's all I can give you for now.  Hopefully, I will have a finish by the end of the week, but for now I'm loving adding lots of free motion and ruler work fun to this quilt.  National Quilting Day quilt something...check.

Even David got into the fun of National Quilting Day.

Who knows, maybe even he will have a finish to share with us really soon.

How did you spend National Quilting Day?  I hope you were able to do something fun and quilty.

Today I'm linking up with Main Crush Monday.