Christmas Postage Stamp Quilt

I rushed to get the quilt top done today, I still had the last 4 boarders to finish. It was bright and sunny outside after a few days of fog, so good day to take photos outside. As I write this it is clouding over already. 

I started this quilt in early December when I won a cute fat quarter with Penguins on it. Also I was quilting a cute Christmas quilt for a customer. I realized I do not have a good Christmas quilt and I need one. 

Edit: I was asked how big this quilt was and how big are my postage stamps. The quilt top measure 76" square and I used all 2" square to make the quilt. I then stayed with 2" cut sizes for the white sashing and boarders too. 

I had a little breeze to to fluff out my quilt in the wind. This fence is our outside riding ring. 

I am glad I got to take photos out in the snow today.

I have added this post to Crazy Mom Quilt's Finish up Friday

I have also added this post to Confessions of a fabric addict and Can I get Whoop Whoop

Can you spot the many Penguins I used? Also there is nutcrackers, snowmen, a chickadee, mittens, chocolates and Christmas lights. I am not able to quilt this right away, some customers are wanting their quilts first. I hope to have the quilt done in time to enter in a few quilt shows with the local quilt guilds. Then it will be ready for Christmas later this year. 

Quilt Goals for 2017

Fancy Forest, I have about half the blocks done but I would love to finish it this year. 

 I have a large list of UFO's, about 56 projects. I have been keeping track of them for a few years now and review them every couple of months. Sometimes I am adding in new project and sometimes I get to mark a project as done. The finished projects get moved to a list of completed projects for the year. Then I know when I finished it too. 

Grand Illusion Mystery quilt, top is now done and waiting to be quilted. Not sure I have a photo of the finished top. 

Needs Quilting

1. Bad to the Bone – quilting and binding
2. Grand Illusions – Bonnie Hunter mystery from 2014 – Need to piece a backing and machine quilt ( started Nov 2014, top complete April 2015)
3. Christmas Tree Shirt – mom did the piecing and I need to Quilt
4. I am sure I have a charity quilt in a bin that needs quilting

Christmas Postage Stamp Quilt, I hope to have this quilt completed in time for a Quilt show this year. 

My Goal to finish this year, in light of there being 2 local quilt shows. I need to enter some finished work. One quilt show is in June, Edmonton Guild then in October is the Leduc Quilt show. 

What goals I have to finish for 2017

1.      Truffet for me but I should start it
2.      Christmas tree skirt needs quilting
3.      Christmas Postal Stamp quilt 76” sq, finish top, make backing, quilt it
4.      Bad to the Bone quilt it
5.       Fancy Forest  more blocks to complete 
6.      Grand Illusions make a backing then quilt it
7.      Hawaii quilt finish quilt top and quilt it
8.      Misty Day (small) quilt it 
9.      Get a rainbow quilt top done and quilt it too
10.      Eye project - baby quilt, start it
11.      Slab blocks with Canadian fabric in it. 

Alletaire Mystery quilt is in this state now. I would like to get the top complete soon but I may not finish the quilting too quickly as other are on the list first.

Piecing UFO - not planning to finish in time for quilt shows but needs work

1. KFC log cabin started in a swap, all blocks done, needs design wall work.
2. Red brown log cabin more then 1/2 blocks done, many more still to do
3. Pineapple log cabin with white, more blocks need piecing 
4. Adam's plaid quilt, lots of piecing needed
5. Celtic Solstice mystery blocks done needs work
6. Garden Party
7. Dear Jane in KFC many more blocks needs work, some applique
8. Pizza box exchange still going around
9. Scrappy Trips Around the world in KFC Reds blocks done needs to be put together.
10. Nov 2016 Bonnie Hunter mystery En Provence 
11. Gemma improve piecing in purple

KFC Hexagons 1" with bubble gum Kona

Hand stitching to work on

1. Baltimore applique
2. KFC Hexagons with bubble gum pink Kona
3. The New Hexagons or Glorious Hexagons
4. 3/4" hexagons started in the RSC what to do next?
5. Leaves and daises stitched in latter stitch  

My list of UFOs still has another 35 quilts listed but not listed here today.  Some will get worked on and a few I may not go back to. I am not ready to give up on them yet. Someday I might give away or sell some of the partly done quilts.

Glorious Hexagons

I am behind in showing off my Glorious Hexagons, Yes I keep working on them.  This has been a sew a long on the internet, but I just did the blocks I wanted to do when I wanted to do them. I by no means kept up and maybe I have done 1/4 of the number of blocks. 

#13 Judy,  love doing this block as it stats out just like the grandmother's flower garden and then to get it back to 6 sides you add the little diamonds on the out edge. 

#11 Susan, great block to show of the 6 repeats. 

#35 Sharon, Love this star block.

#9 Doris, love how it is growing from the center. 

Tuffet Gift

I thought I had lost these photos. Look I found them. Here is the third and last tuffet I made for Christmas. 

I used all black and white fabric and made sure they have mostly black. Two of the fabrics are batik. I got this one done just in time. It would not have be possible if not for the help of my dear Dad.  

I have added this post to Crazy Mom Quilts and the Finish up Friday link. 

I lost a few photos over the holidays. So sorry they are so old but I just have to show you. Here is part of the yard. We had heavy frost and then clean sunny weather, the world was covered in sparkles and glitter. 

Next is the Christmas tree. It was extra special this year. We cut one of the trees we grew. Back in 2002 we planted a few hundred blue spruce trees in our lower field. This year has been the first time we cut our own tree. I loved this tree. I hope we can take a few more over the years. 

Christmas Quilt part 2

I did some more work on my Christmas quilt. I am getting ready to put all the blocks together with the sashing. I am planning to make it 4 blocks square. I think it makes the quilt 76" square.

I have added this post to Judy's Design Wall Monday. It has been a few months since I showed a quilt on design wall Monday, so glad to get my act together. 

I have another quilt taking up a 3rd of my wall. I had kind of pushed it off to one side. How ever my quilt needs 4 blocks wide so I just pinned the blocks in place. Kind of a mess. I hope to get an hour tonight to work on it some more. there are some small white squares missing. Then start on the sashing. 

Gemma and I did the Pace agility trial this past weekend. We had so much fun. We had 5 runs and did not pass any of our runs but there was some very good things. Gemma was very good. Most of the time it was my fault, being late or not fast enough for her. We are off for a training time later today. 

Block Exchange

I forgot to post the Christmas Blocks from the Leduc guild meeting back in December. Here is the cute 12" block I did for the monthly Lotto blocks. I used some scraps left over from my tree shirt. I still need to quilt my tree shirt, oops maybe in time for next year. 

The grouping of blocks the members did. I forgot who won the blocks. I know I would have liked to win the blocks. I was thinking I do not have a Christmas quilt. While when I did not win the blocks, it did get me thinking about doing a Christmas quilt. So Yes I started one, and posted Christmas quilt started yesterday. 

Also I am back doing the pizza box exchange. I got this cute little fox 8" square. 

One of my larger Orchids is flowing. So nice to have flowers in the middle of winter.  

Christmas Quilt Started

1) Nutcracker Ballet fabric, 2) black labs on blue 3) three colours of labs with Christmas on pink

I found a sale on Spoonflower fabric just before Christmas. They had 2 for the price of one Fat Quarters. Spoonflower has so many pretty fabrics and I liked so many of the dog themed fabrics. I had to order some of the fabric. I ordered 10 FQ and here are 3 of the Christmas prints. They were not in my hands till after Christmas but that is OK. I just started my Christmas quilt in early December and have many more blocks to make. 

The Christmas quilt was started when I won the blue penguin fabric from the Leduc guild Christmas party. I just loved it. I also bought more turquoise and the red print, just a sample of what I bought.  

9 patches, this is 3 rows of 3 nine patches. 

So for my Christmas I am making postage stamps blocks. Yes small 2 inch cut squares. I love some squares. I raider all my Christmas fabric and cut a few hundred 2" squares. I also went looking in my stash of 2" water colour square. I found lots in the water colour squares. I used many reds that are not real Christmas but I wanted lots of red so I am using them. 

My first block. It is 9 squares by 9 squares. So the size is 13 1/2".

This one was a little better to sew. I got bit of a system going now. I make rows of 3 squares. Some light dark light L/D/L and some that are D/L/D. Then I make nine patches. Half the nine patches start with light in the top corner and half are dark in the top corner. Then I make three rows of 3 nine patches. 

Planning the sashing too. I really hope I can have this quilt done for this fall. The Leduc Guild is having a quilt show this fall and I would like this to be in the show. 

I bought the backing fabric this past weekend. It was 40% off plus I finished the bolt so got another 5% off. The little foxes are so cute. I will also put a few little foxes on the front in the squares. 

After Christmas my family often does an order from Amazon. We order the stuff we did not get for Christmas. One year we all got cards so the trend started. The order arrived yesterday, I got the New Hexagon Calendar and the colouring book. I am still working on my Glorious Hexagons. Also more power cords and plugs for my phone.  

Christmas Gifts

I can show you the tuffets I made. The Red one was made for my mom, Betty. When I was starting I asked my dad to make some feet for me. He has his wood shop in my yard these days. I think turning is a favorite for him to do. So yes these feet are made by him. Mom has a carpet with the dark red but very little red in her house. so now a big splash of red on her tuffet.  

Mom was pleased with her gift. 

The Blue one I made for my mother in law. She has blue and brown in her house. I thought dark blue would wear better then light blue. I pulled her name for Christmas this year. I think she was surprised to get it.  All the fabrics are Kaffe Fassett. 

The feet on this tuffet are the store bought ones I got for myself. I now have a set dad made for me. 

I made one more for a gift. The photos are on my phone. It will have to wait and be another blog post another day. I also want to make one for myself. Maybe later in the week. 

I also must say a big thank you to dad! He helped me for days and days. We worked on getting the batting and the fabric all stapled in place. I gave him a button to help me with , opps, he took the pliers and a screw driver to it. I had to buy another button to cover. He was a big help and just a few days before Christmas. 

En Provence Mystery Quilt

For the past 6 weeks or so I have been slowly working on the Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt. You can find the pattern Here.  She has named it En Provence, as last year she did a tour in France. I spent today playing with all my units. She had yellow blocks around the green. I just did not like the yellow. 

I thought maybe this pink I have around the green. Yuck no life.

I gave hot pink a try on the left, I tried a pink and yellow green print, yuck.

I must try yellow. ok I guess it just needs that yellow to give it life. I also tried a different center unit. too fuzzy. But I may still try something out. the pattern called for the neutral or light 4 patches. 

At this point I have also changed out some hourglass block for more Tri Rec units. I also moved the pink and purple around. 

This is kind of the same just two more of the yellow prints I will use. I have at least 6 different yellows I can use. 

So I am sewing more Tri Rec units, starting with 32 purple ones. I am not sure how many more I will need. I was planning the full size quilt. 

I also have last years quilt to finish. I have the rows in to rows. So close to being ready to quilt. 

Christmas Gifts

I can only show a little bit of what I have done for gifts. First was the Leduc guild Christmas party and gift exchange. We were to exchange some kind of bag. I wanted to use some fabric I had dyed this fabric,

And I want to use it. It was a little bigger then a fat quarter so my bag can not be too big. I made these square bags or totes. 

I had enough to make a mini square one too. I was happy how they turned out. I think the lady that got them liked them. 

Oh I forgot to take a photo of the great little bag I got in return. 

This pretty blue fabric is part of a Christmas gift. Not telling any more then that. I have taken photos of what I made so maybe next week I can show you. I have all my gifts finished but not wrapped yet. 

I did not get my tree skirt done. Maybe next year, or maybe aim for the guild quilt show in October then it will be done for next Christmas.