Sister's Choice Quilts

Hallo Harvest Runner on the Table

Here she is, on the dining room table. "Night Flight" by Basic Grey. If any of you were lucky enough to get some of the Hallo Harvest fabric by Basic Grey when it was available, you should pat yourselves on the back. What a fun collection. I bought a kit for an entire quilt, and plan to divide up the leftovers and use it in smaller projects.

I don't have a lot of content for you this week, as I am planning a little getaway with my husband and granddaughter. Since we are homeschooling, we are just going to spirit Eva away with us so she won't miss a lesson. We are going up to our condominium at Lake Tahoe for a week, which we are calling a field trip. Luckily her parents have endorsed this excursion, so we won't have to resort to kidnapping!

I have a funny Eva story to share. She has grown like a weed over the past few months and every single item in her wardrobe is too small. She is nine years old and her clothes are all size 7-8. A major wardrobe overhaul with clothing in size 10 is definitely in order. When Eva arrived at our house yesterday for "school", she had on a pair of jeans that were skin tight and did not quite cover the entirety of her bottom.  She looked a bit like a 9-year-old plumber. Grandpa Denny asked her, "Honey, don't you think those pants are too small"? Eva replied, "No, Denny, I think my pants are ok.  It's just that my shirt's too short".

We are still laughing. You can be sure Target is getting a big order from me for some girl's clothes in size 10.

Cupcake Papers Quilt

Oh my, I am in love with this!  These blocks are made with Miss Rosie's Quilt Co. Cupcake Mix Foundation Papers #1. What you see above is 16 blocks made with the papers and a charm pack of "Late Bloomers" by Sandy Gervais for Moda.

I have loved the experience of paper piecing, and working with this vintage fabric collection has been a blast.  Sure wish I had some extra for a border. I have played around with block placement and have not decided if I want a small square table topper as shown above, or a longer runner.

I dunno, what do you think? Square or rectangle?  I could use either shape for a table topper.

There are a lot of new projects in the works over here at Sister's Choice. A good amount of fabric starching has been going on, and you know what that means....

I currently have more projects than I can shake a stick at, so I should probably take on another sew-along, right?  Yes!

Shine Bright Runner

It's almost September, so a Christmas project is in order, don't you think? This is Shine Bright, a pattern by Kansas Troubles. Lynn Hagemeir has been the designer behind Kansas Trouble Quilts for over 25 years, and I think I have admired her that entire time. I love her pure color palette, her crisp designs, and her style in general. I gather that she is a lovely person and hope she keeps designing for at least another 25 years. I always admire it so when a person discovers their style and sticks with it unwaveringly.

Shine Bright is a jelly roll friendly pattern, although I had yardage and cut my own strips.  Her pattern is for a 64" x 70" quilt, but I scaled down and made a table runner.  I am really pleased with how it turned out and think it will look amazing on my dining table with a Christmas floral arrangement in the middle of it. You must check out Lynn's website, as she is offering the pattern, plus an entire kit, and a variation kit featuring Americana colored prints. How cute would that be?

Did you have a good weekend?  I am feeling a bit confused as to what day it even is. My days are either days when I am teaching Eva or days when I am not.  I know it was the weekend because she wasn't here.

It feels good to wrap up the month of August.  It is typically my least favorite month, with the heat and dryness we have where I live. And those terrible fires we had this month will not be soon forgotten. Cooler days are ahead, but I am sad because if things were not impacted by COVID-19, we would be leaving for Ireland to visit our son Ahren this coming week. How I miss him.

I am working on my August book review post.  I finished eight books this month, one of which was exceptional, and some of which were surprisingly good. You might really enjoy them too.

Talk to you tomorrow.  Hope all is well with you.

Lots of Sewing Going On

I am so excited about how well this table runner turned out!  It is called Sunflower Duet, and is from the book The Big Book of Table Toppers.  The design is by Lynn Hagmeier of Kansas Troubles Quilts. I highly recommend the book, which is chock full of great patterns for small table quilts.

The applique could not have been easier.  Nice simple shapes that went together with no issues.  The interfacing I like to use is Heat 'n' Bond Lite, which is actually available at Walmart, Joann, Amazon and other places.  It is double-sided and inexpensive and I never have any issues with it.  A reader recently asked me what I used, and I am sorry to say I neglected to reply directly.  I try to answer questions right away in an email, but this time it involved going upstairs to check and I put it off and then forgot!

It was a blessedly quiet weekend, so I got in lots of sewing and some reading.  Nothing much on the agenda for the week either.  Eva's birthday is the highlight of the week.  My girl turns nine years old, can you believe it?  My goodness, how time does fly.

Here we are nine years ago.  Sara had a long difficult labor, with little Eva being born "sunny side up" (posterior position).  Can you tell it was one of the happiest days of my life? Clearly I had eyes for nothing else. That child has been a ray of sunshine from July 27, 2011 to this minute.

I am not above blackmailing her in the future, however.  I took this on Friday afternoon when she had made the odd request of asking if we could fill her baby pool with water so she could cool off.  What a little goonie bird.

Have an Ohana 4th of July

Our national day of independence, the 4th of July is this Saturday.  If you celebrate, I hope you do so safely and with those you love.  We are having a small family barbeque at Eva's daddy's house.  He is a fantastic cook, so whatever we have will be amazing. 

Eva is with her mommy this weekend, so it will just be our "ohana" family, consisting of my (ex) son-in-law, his new wife, his new mother-in-law, my husband and me (his former in-laws).  This may seem to be an odd coming together of people unless you are familiar with the Hawaiian term "ohana".  Ohana means family, but not necessarily the family you were born into.  Ohana is a very embracing and extensive use of the term "family", it can mean those you are related to, those you adopt, or those who you intentionally include in your family group.

With Ohana, nobody gets left behind, and all are welcome and loved.  Many blessings upon you and whomever you consider your family.

Well, That's Better

I had a much better sewing day yesterday.  I had my husband snap a photo to show that I really can do it.  Excuse the no makeup and funny expression.  This was about the eighth photo he took, as he kept chopping off my head and I was getting impatient with the poor man.

I went back to my Hallo Harvest kit by BasicGrey.  I had bought the kit, which features a quilt with four rows of five blocks each.  I knew I didn't want to make an entire quilt from it, but rather three table runners.  One for me, one for my daughter Sara and one for my (ex) son in-law Ryan (he's the biggest fan of my work).

One row makes a great table runner size.  I didn't measure but if I had to guess I'd say it is about 18 x 48".  I had made three blocks some time back, so it was pretty easy to make two more blocks and get something accomplished that I was happy with.  How about that white bat?  Don't you love it?

Oh my goodness, thank you all so much for all the encouraging words yesterday.  You guys are so great.  What encouragement you gave me!  It made me turn my thinking around about the Hocus Pocus table runner with no contrast.  My daughter Sara says she loves it as it is, so I will have it quilted (with green thread) and hope that once the batting and backing are on it, the look of it will be improved.  Sara works in marketing and says she thinks the photo on the pattern cover was filtered to make the colors look more saturated.  It is commonly done.  Since I used the exact same fabrics as shown on the pattern cover my result should have looked identical to it.  Lesson learned.

Time to get these all sent off to the quilter so I get them back by fall.

Not Everything Turns Out As You Hoped

This was my weekend project.  And I am so disappointed in the way it turned out.  I swear I used the same fabrics as the pattern designer, and my effort is so not what I was expecting.

There just is not enough contrast between the background and the focal units.  It is supposed to be white pumpkins against a green background, but they just don't stand out.  What a waste of time and fabric.  Really nice fabric.  And a lot of time I will never get back. Arrrgh. Those units above the middle pumpkin?  They are supposed to be pinwheels.  Really?  They look like a big blur.

What a mess.

I used Pattern Basket's pattern Hocus Pocus and purchased the extra add on instructions to make the table runner with white pumpkins.  This is the picture on the pattern cover:

This is what it was supposed to look like.  I swear, I used the exact same background fabric, and my results are so disappointing.  To say my runner is subtle is an understatement.  What a disaster.  I think the pattern is great, but if any of you attempt this project, I sure hope you chose a background fabric that has more contrast than the one I chose. 

I guess you don't get a winner every time you make something...

Waaaaa. So bummed.  You must admit I keep it real here.

Little Stars Topper & Some Organizing

Just in time for the 4th of July!  This little stars table topper was such fun to make.  I don't do paper piecing very often, so a small project like this is what it takes to keep my skill set sharp.  When I first got started I could barely remember which end was supposed to be up, but by the seventh or eighth star, I was up to speed again.

The pattern is by Laurie Simpson and is in the Moda All Stars Mini Marvels book.  I printed the paper pattern right from the book and had no issues with it not being accurate.  The finished blocks came out 3 1/2", every single one of them.

My weekend was quite productive.  I recovered a new pressing board for my ironing station, as the previous one had warped very badly over the two or three years I have been using it. You should have seen my husband and I scrabbling around on the floor with the staple gun trying to cover the new board with batting and a fabric covering.  Neither one of us does so well on the floor anymore.  My husband found out that after his double knee surgeries, he can no longer kneel.

I just put the new board on top of the old one.  Hopefully the new one won't warp.  I will use my thick wool pressing mat as often as possible and maybe that will help.

Can you see how badly the bottom board warped?  It was like ironing in a valley.

I also reorganized my book shelves and pattern storage system.  My patterns are in the five white bins on the top shelf.  I need to go through them and toss the ones I know I will never use.  I also went through my books and discovered a duplicate of a good one, so I will do a give away at some point this week.  I eliminated a couple piles of books which made room for six project boxes on one of the shelves.  

What a good feeling to get a ton of crap stuff off the floor and stored away in the closet and on the shelves.  It is a pleasure to go in my sewing room and just sit in my chair and look around the room at my accomplishment.

Hope you all had a lovely weekend.

Cabin Skein

This little mini quilt is called Cabin Skein.  Designed by Carrie Nelson, her explanation for the name is that a group of flying geese is called a "skein".  Since the quilt involves both Log Cabin Blocks and Flying Geese, she thought the name was appropriate.  The pattern is in a book called Moda All Stars Mini Marvels.  

Making the quilt is a cinch, particularly if you have certain sewing tools to make trimming your blocks to the correct size.  I used the BlocLoc Flying Geese trim tool in the 1" x 2" (1 1/2 x 2 1/2" unfinished) size, and the Creative Grids 4 inch Log Cabin Trim Tool.  My little block units came out just the right size with these sewing aids.  

As for the fabrics, they were honestly all from my stash.  There is a mix of Jo Morton, Renee Nanneman and Pam Buda for sure, others as well.  My taste in orange tends to run towards the rusty side of orange, so I was drawn to those shades.  Renee Nanneman comes out with a black and orange collection every couple of years and I always buy it.  This one was called Harvest Moon I think.  She designs for Andover Fabrics. If you Google "Harvest Moon fabric by Renee Nanneman", you might just find it.

This little quilt is about 20" square and was so much fun to make.  I got it done in no time, mainly because I couldn't stay away from making those blocks once my Log Cabin trim tool arrived in the mail.

I will send this off to my quilter, along with a full-size Halloween themed quilt I made a couple of years ago.  That was "Lucy" another Carrie Nelson pattern.  I decided to add a black containment border and an orange print border to make it big enough to hang over the sides of my queen-sized bed.  I am just waiting on getting the border fabric and I will be good to go.

I'll share a picture when I get the borders on!

Have a great weekend everyone.

What Was I Thinking?

Well, this is a UFO in all sense of the word.  I discovered this little project box in my sewing room closet and just stared at it open-mouthed.  What had I been planning?  There were the makings for flying geese units, some strips in various sizes, a whole lot of black and orange fabrics.  No pattern, no notes.  What in the world had I been thinking I was going to make with all this?

I started searching through my books and found a super cute pattern that I think will work great for this mystery assortment.

Are you familiar with the Moda All Stars book "Mini Marvels"?  It has patterns for 15 little quilts that are full of wonderful design elements.  Right there on the cover is a great little quilt that involves flying geese and log cabin blocks.  Here is a better picture of the quilt:

The pattern is called Cabin Skein and is by Carrie Nelson.  I will have to cut my flying geese and strips down to a smaller size for this project, but that is easily done.  This will be such a cute October table topper in those black and orange fabrics!  It will finish at about 20" as I recall, just right for a candle or little vignette of some kind.  

I have to confess, I got the sixty four 1 1/2 x 2 1/2" flying geese all made and thought "I'll just get cracking on those 4 1/2" log cabin blocks".  Wrong.  I made two of them and they were so wonky and misshapen I was ashamed.  I am so used to using trim tools and special rulers to ensure the accurate size of my blocks that I guess I can't live without them.  I have the Creative Grids Log Cabin Trim Tool in both the 8" and the 6" sizes and my blocks always come out perfectly.  So, I got on the computer and ordered the 4" size.  It should come by Wednesday and I will be back in business. 

Sometimes you just need the right tool for the job!