Hand Piecing – Page 4 – Kelly's Kwilts

Hexi Wreath Ornament

I follow a blog for hexi’s and they posted this last month. In my spare time – ha ha ha ha – I pulled some green 2.5″ squares and whipped up a wreath. I couldn’t decide which way I wanted to put the front and back together, I ended up putting together the front pieces, then the back pieces and stitching them together with the ribbon in between. It didn’t take too long and I ended up with a cute ornament for the tree. I might work on putting these together throughout the year so I have them next year for presents. Oh who am I kidding? I’ll end up waiting until the last minute and do them all the week before I need them!

I’m still here!

I haven’t been working on much quilting lately, no time at the sewing machine and the hexagon diamonds have taken a back seat for awhile. I spent most of August and September working on a cross stitch present for my parents 40th anniversary, now that it’s been given to them I can talk about it. Unfortunately I was dumb and didn’t take a picture before I gave it to them! I should be going to their house this week and will see if I can get a picture.

I’ve also been working on some Christmas presents, which I can’t talk about until after the holidays. I have 1 stitched up and I am working on the 2nd, still have 1 to go after that. We just made some decisions yesterday about presents that I am making, boy do I have a lot of work in the next 2 months!

Still looking for a hand quilting class to take. I’m debating seeing if there is someone in the guild that would teach me. I seem to be taking more of an active role in the guild. I am now doing our guild blog. I need to go back and put the newsletters going back to January 2012, but I don’t think there is any hurry. 🙂

Alex is now 2 and I can’t believe how quickly the time goes by! He’s not talking yet, but some words are starting to come out. He’s so smart (I know, every mother says that!) and understands so much! Since I don’t have any cross stitch or quilting pictures, you’ll have to settle for one of Alex’s 2 year pictures.

Shopping!

I went to Joann’s today because I needed floss for some upcoming projects. I should know better than to walk around that store! Besides the 22 skeins of floss I got a few other things that I probably didn’t need. 7 fat quarters (on sale!), 2 packages of precut hexagons (clearance!), a sock loom (on sale!) and 4 skeins of yarn (clearance!). With all the coupons and discounts I saved a lot of money on it all. Hubby still might kill me though! 🙂 I’ve always wanted to knit socks, but I don’t know how to knit. When I saw this loom a few months ago I almost bought it, but today it was 25% off. I just finished cutting up all the hexagons with my 2.5″ square die for my Go, they are just big enough to cut a 2.5″ square and have the corners nipped off. I have all the fat quarters to cut up still, plus the ones I got in Amish on Monday. I’m getting ready to “kit” up more diamonds even though I’ll be starting a new cross stitch project soon.

I’m back!

I know, I’ve been gone for awhile. I wasn’t posting because I didn’t have any updates. I do today! I finished Month by Month last night. It’s stitched on 28 count Zweigart in Pearl Linen. Now I just need to find the right frame and figure out where to hang it. Now on to the next cross stitch project!

Yesterday we went to Amish country. Took my father-in-law to lunch and stopped at Lehman’s. They have an outlet on the other side of hte parking lot and I ran in to see if there was anything interesting. I found a couple of fat quarters for 1.25 and a BUNCH of thread really cheap! I got 2 YLI spools (the big ones) for 2.99 each and 6 spools of Gutermann for 2.95 each. I couldn’t pass up that deal!

I also finished another hexagon diamond and started the next one. Almost time to kit up some more! Still trying to find a hand quilting class so I can start quilting the hexagon quilt, but I’m in no hurry. I have a lot of projects to get done in the next few months, some are Christmas presents I have planned, we’ll see if I get any of them done!

Hope to be back soon with some updates!

Working hard

I’ve been working hard on a very old quilt the last few days and I’m happy to say I’ve made a lot of progress! This is the 2010 Quilt Show BOM. When I started this I had just found out I was pregnant with Alex and somehow through the year I managed to get my blocks done on time until he was born in October. Took me awhile to finish the November and December blocks, and I worked on it a little the last time I went to the guild sew-in. I’ve put on 4 borders and I have 4 borders left to do. I need to sort out the half square triangles that make up the next border and work on putting them together, but today I’m planning on getting the scrappy car quilt on the frame and quilted. Since it’s only 36″ x 36″ I doubt it’ll take long to quilt with a pantograph, but I’d like to take something to guild for show and tell this month. It’s been so long since I’ve shown anything! I’m also thinking about taking my hexagon quilt, even though it’s not quilted just so I can show it off, I’m really proud of it! I think I am going to use some already made binding I found in the cupboard for the car quilt, I think it might be enough, and it’s a scrappy binding so it’ll fit with the scrappy squares.

Big Update!

I’ve been busy! I finished another hexagon diamond last night, and I have the next 3 ready to be basted. This one is using just Equinox fabric, I have a couple like this – I have lots of scraps!

Yesterday I took one of my new stencils and made my own pantagraph. I took some of Alex’s drawing paper, cut it in half and taped enough together to get the width I need for the scrappy car quilt. I’m hoping to get it quilted in the next day or so, I’d like to take it to guild this week.

I’ve also been working on Month by Month from Sunflower Seed. I’m now halfway done, and still have no clue where it’s going to go! I’m debating taking down a collage frame in the hallway and putting cross stitch up. But I also have a spot upstairs in the hallway I could put stuff. I just don’t know what to do! I finally put up Dream, Hope, Believe, and Imagine in my office along with the Blessed are the Piece Makers one.

Yesterday I also decided to work on my Quilt Show 2010 BOM. I got the next row of borders put together and I’m planning on working on it today. Hoping to make some progress today, then I’m thinking tomorrow I can work on quilting the scrappy car quilt. I doubt it’ll take long to quilt it, it’s only 36″ x 36″!

Please don’t forget to vote for my quilt Patriotic Lone Star over at Quilting Gallery!

Vote and Hexi Update

I submitted one of my quilts into this week’s contest at Quilting Gallery. Please go over and vote for me, it’s the red, white and blue Lone Star Quilt!

I made a purse for my sister this week (forgot to get a picture) and I will not make another one of these ever again. The instructions SUCKED! I had to get hubby to help me figure out what I was supposed to be doing, I just could not understand what they wanted me to do. At least it’s done and she said she liked it.

I’ve managed to complete 2 diamonds for my new hexagon quilt, slow going because there are more pieces in each diamond, but I think it’ll look really cool when it’s all done. I’ve already started working on the 3rd one.

I got my stencils yesterday, now I’m going to see if I can figure out a way to make them into pantographs so I can use them on my frame upstairs. I have a few quilts to get quilted, my sister is getting antsy for hers!

Off to take a nap, Alex was up at 4:15 this morning and I didn’t get enough sleep!

New Quilt/Learnings

Well, I’ve been busy this week! I posted on Monday that I started a new quilt, it’s now done! Here’s my question though, does it need another border? It’s about 36″ x 36″ and I’m only planning on using it as a quilt in the car, for Alex or if we go on a picnic or something. I won’t be quilting it until I get my new stencils – and I don’t know when that will be since my order says Pending on the site! It went together very quickly and I love that I used fabrics from the stash, NOTHING new was bought!

I’ve been thinking about my next hexagon quilt this week and I think I’ve got it designed the way I want it. The example I found on PaperPieces.com has the diamonds vertically, but I think I like them on their sides. None of the colors in the EQ version match what I’m actually going to use, since I’ll be pulling from the 2.5″ square bin to make all the diamonds. I think I’ll do all the diamonds and then put them together with the white, or at least I’ll see how far I get with the hexi papers I already have printed out! I’ve figured I need 59 full diamonds and 12 half diamonds and this one will finish at 79″ x 85″. Huge for me! I just checked sizes and it looks like that might be large enough to fit our king size bed! I’d have to put big enough borders to hang down the sides, although I might put it on the bed in the guest room. It’ll be awhile before it’s finished, so I guess it doesn’t matter right now!

I was playing with EQ today while Alex played and hubby was busy on his laptop and learned some new things. I didn’t realize that you could create a quilt layout from a block! Here’s the caveat though, the block can only have horizontal and vertical lines – no diagonals or it won’t work. I also figured out how to break blocks apart in Word so that you can show how to make a block, that’s cool! I did find something I’m disappointed in though, I created the new hexagon quilt in EQ on my mac (using software called VirtualBox to run windows) and created it in a new project. I can move blocks, layouts (uncolored), photos, fabrics into another project but not colored quilts! I wanted to move the new quilt into my hexagon project, that sucker took a long time to color in! Oh well, maybe in the next version?

Well, I’m off to start working on the new hexagon quilt, I think I’ll print out some more papers, I think I’ll need them!

Top is finished!

I did it! I finished my hexagon quilt last night! There are 1,033 1″ hexagons in this quilt. Now I just need to learn how to hand quilt it! I’m waiting to see if the quilt shop closest to the house is going to offer the hand quilting class any time soon. The owner was the speaker at guild last week and I asked about it, she said possibly, so I’ll have to wait and see what she decides. I started this on February 7th, so it only took 5 months to complete, while also working on cross stitch projects. Tonight I get to start working on galaga again, hopefully it won’t take too long before I can finish it and work on something new.

Hit the Motherlode!!!

I haven’t been buying much fabric lately, mainly because I don’t have as much time to work on stuff. But I happened to be on ebay Friday and ran one of my saved queries for Blank Textiles Equinox fabric. Usually it only comes up with someone selling FQ’s, but this time I found someone that was selling her stash! I picked up 10 different colors of the fabric totaling approximately 48 yards for about 3.50 a yard! You cannot beat that deal! I can’t wait to make something with them! I couldn’t tell in the pictures on ebay, but one of the greens is my favorite one that I thought I’d never find again. I have like 3 yards stashed away for a project for a 2 color quilt. I need to figure out a way to spend more time quilting!

I finally got Dream, Hope, Believe and Imagine framed. The picture just doesn’t do them justice. Now I just need to figure out where to hang them!

I spent a little bit of time yesterday and made a diaper clutch that I found on pinterest. I’ve given up the diaper bag and gone back to a purse. The diaper bag is just too big and I just don’t need to carry as much anymore. I can fit 3 diapers and a package of wipes in it and it fits nicely in my purse. Of course I made it out of Equinox fabric since I knew I had more on it’s way!

Headed off to work on a project, hopefully I can get the hexagon quilt finished tonight, still working on attaching the last border!