ombre weave baby quilt - 26 in 21 quilt 2

a quilt! a quilt!
finally a quilt!
yes, i know it has been long overdue, but between deciding to vlog, a baby shower and now moving at the end of the month... sitting at my computer to blog clearly fell by the wayside.

but never fear... 26 in 21 is still going strong!

so let's backtrack to january, when i made this cute little number from start to finish... to go with a quilt that i STILL haven't finished...  insert facepalm emoji here.

lisa's caboose baby was born in october, so of COURSE she needed a quilt.  i was ready to get back in to some girly fun quilts after a wave of baby boys.  i had purchased 2 half jelly rolls from cali quilt co to make this ombre weave quilt, but it turns out... the "new colors" of the v and co ombre confetti fabrics just weren't all the fun colors i needed.  so i purchased a few more colors to punch up the variety, and well... this beauty was born.

punching it up with a few more colors really helped bring out the fun in this quilt... and it was SO EASY to make!  the trickiest part is making sure the different color chunks cut stayed in their zone to make sure each "circle" had one part of each section to get the matching effect.as far as the layout goes, i shuffled the colors around randomly, making sure the purples were spread out from each other, as well as the pinks, grays and such.  a few colors only had one or two blocks, so they were pretty easy to spread out throughout the remainder of the quilt without getting too much of a harsh diagonal of color... which is always something that drives me crazy when it isn't intentional.i used one of my favorite pantographs on this quilt, and it added the perfect amount of movement and texture to the quilt.  i actually used a goldish thread to coordinate with all the metallic dots (glide sand, if you're curious) and as usual... i was nervous when it first started quilting... but i LOVE it so much.

so much so, that i really need to hurry up and finish the second quilt, which is technically the first quilt... yikes!

but seriously...

just look at the minky backing too.

i'm glad i went with just the pink to bind it (which will also happen on the other quilt so they match that way) but it just quilted so fabulously on both the front and the backing!

this quilt is still just sitting at my parents, waiting to be shipped...
but word just came in that i *might* not actually have to ship it.  providing i can get the other one done in just 2 weeks.  here's to hoping!

and as always (since i'm saying it for the 2nd time now... so therefore, always) here's the current 26 in 21 playlist, which includes the videos from making this quilt!

pattern information: ombre weave by v and co

quilt count: 149

emily loves dinosaurs - teal dinosaur baby quilt

last quilt of 2020, first quilt post of 2021!

the moment this quilt pattern was announced, i think i was tagged at least three different times per post.  and so i instantly bought it the day it was released.  the pattern sat for awhile, waiting to become reality.  then, tayva asked me if i would make a sample for the shop, and of course i gave it a big fat YES.
picking the colors was the HARDEST part.

every sample i had seen was in rainbow, which was super cute and all... but i wanted to be different! i played with so many different grunge color ways, and ended up setting on this delightful teal/aqua combo.  gah.  so cute.
instead of having my plants different colors as well, i kept them to be just two shades of green grunge so they'd stand free of the dinosaurs as well.  the plants were the first things i pieced at a sew day way back when... and they went together so quickly!having the balance of regular grunge mixed in with printed grunges made the dinosaurs a lot more fun too.  i tried to keep one of each per dino, but you'll see in one of the stegosaurus blocks, one of them is SUPER printy.  he's still so cute though!  the blue t rex cracks me up a lot, because how his print ended up, it looks like he's got polka dot socks on.i ended up not using the solid turquoise grunge in the dinosaurs themselves, so i couldn't help but bring it in as the perfect bright binding.  and can we talk about this pantograph??
since i now have access to a computerized long arm machine at work, i HAD to make this pantograph happen on this quilt.  from far away, it looks like a stipple, but when you look closer, there are tiny little dinosaurs in there.  gah.  i love it so much.
i had a real good time piecing the back, and have no regrets at all.

the grunge stars are the same color as one of the plant colors, and i used a chunk of scraps to piece in some turquoise as well to get the right size.it was so much fun to do this little version of the quilt, that i cannot WAIT to do a larger version for myself.  yep, you heard it here.  i absolutely plan to do the lap size quilt in this same color scheme so i can have one all to my very own.

all the small pieces went together well, it was just super helpful to keep them labeled and in order (garage sale stickers are the best tip i've ever heard for that with elizabeth hartman patterns)

plus, i've got to get another use (or ten) out of that pantograph! 

pattern information: dinosaurs by elizabeth hartman
quilt count: 147

boxed up beauty and the beast quilt

i'm in LOVE with this quilt!
for being a (huge) baby quilt, it couldn't have turned out any better.
and the best part?  it went to live at my best friend's house for her sweet baby girl.when erika was pregnant with jackson, figuring out the fabric for that quilt was a breeze.  (see it here!)  but when it came to this little one, i was at a complete loss of what to do.  do i do another winnie the pooh one?  do i do something simple and basic?  do i make it match her nursery?  WHAT DO I DO???
so the plan just sat.
and sat and sat and sat.  until one day, someone posted a thread in a quilting group i'm in asking what fabric lines everyone is drooling over.  then, someone in the comments shared the riley blake beauty and the beast fabric line, and as soon as i saw it, i was putting a fat quarter bundle in my cart and calling it a day. i don't think i quite had an exact plan right off the bat, except that this fabric needed to happen.

i knew cluck cluck sew had easy, awesome, fat quarter friendly patterns, so i cruised through their selection and decided on the boxed up quilt.  this pattern featured the fun prints in a great way, without chopping them up and eliminating everything that was cute about them.  once the fabric arrived, it was then time to decide on a background color.

i could have easily done white, but that would have been asking for danger with a baby quilt.  my first instinct was green, then i started to second guess it... i tried some pinks, i looked at dear stella moonscape dots, but my eyes and my heart came back to the konas.  i landed on kona asparagus, which was the perfect shade of green to go with the leaves in the rose prints.  i also decided that more fabrics needed to be featured in this quilt.  the crib size only needed 7 fat quarters, and well... i just bought a full set of 18...
so what did i do?i went ahead and made the lap size version of the quilt!
sure, she's just a tiny baby right now, but now she can use it for years and years!  i also went ahead and used 15 of the fat quarters and changed up the ratio used in the quilt (3 sets of each when it was 10, down to 2 sets of each at 15).  i took out the three brown fat quarters, since they stood out SO MUCH.  i used my design wall to figure out the layout of the large blocks, but that part was actually the hardest.

the blue/yellow/pink ratios were a little mismatched, so it was harder to create a balance of everything when creating the final layout.  i had to fussy cut some of the smaller pieces for the sashing type strips, because i knew it would drive me CRAZY to have sideways prints.

i used a day at my parents to get the little strips thrown together and then sew together the complete quilt top.  once those little bits were all laid out, things went together pretty quickly.  minus the occasional cat laying in the middle of the project, but such is life.

i quilted it using a rose garden pantograph that i used on a previous quilt, because when you're doing beauty and the beast, it OBVIOUSLY has to be roses!  the backing and binding are out of the same rose print from the line, because as soon as i saw it, i couldn't imagine anything else to frame up the quilt.  the colors were perfect.

i mean cmon, just look at how cute that little beast guy is! erika was originally due on october 6th, but after little baby gemma decided to turn herself in the wrong way, she was induced at the end of september.  

that sure kicked finishing this quilt in to high gear, and i was sewing the binding on the day that she was born.  it took a little bit longer to get mailed out to her, due to finding a package the right size to fit it in... because poly mailers are MIA right now, like no other.  but i did receive word when it arrived, and that it is already well loved!this quilt turned out better than i could have imagined!
well, given that it started off with nothing imagined, i couldn't be more thankful to have stumbled across that riley blake line by way of the facebook group.

there is a secondary pattern that was also included in this, and i cannot wait to take a look at that and give it a go.  truth be told, i have SO many patterns i have purchased, i don't even know where to begin on some things!  i really just need to pull out all the ones i've done and work my way through them, even if it is just as a charity quilt to work through my stash (which i'm sure i've mentioned is way excessive and a bit overwhelming most of the time)

so here's to winding down the rest of 2020 with wrapping up current projects before blowing the roof of with the plans i have for 2021.  but first...
i'm really just itching to meet the little one that got this quilt and snuggle her.
texas is so far away though... :(

pattern information: boxed up by cluck cluck sew

quilt count: 143

moda grunge kapow! quilt

i think i've tested a few patterns in my day prior to this one... but i honestly cannot think of any others besides boba fett... but this one was a real delight to put together!
in the past month or so i joined a young and millennials quilter group on facebook, and have zero regrets about the group.  like... i made lisa join it too, and she's had great results from it.  one of the first posts i responded to was from joanna with kustom kwilts looking for people to test her pattern.  i thought it looked AWESOME, so i jumped on board and responded, despite the other things i still had planned to do.

i'm sure you're sensing a pattern here with my project behaviors.  can't be productive if 10,000 things aren't happening at once!  originally, i signed up for the lap sized quilt, but when she needed testers for the baby size, i gladly obliged.  let's be real... i should have only taken on the baby sized quilt for testing... but you'll see where this same situation happens again VERY soon.
before this quilt, i had never made one that was 100% out of grunge.  and if you've seen my posts before, you know very well how much i love, love, love it.  like, we just got all the moda grunges in at the shop, and i'm like a walking heart eye emoji whenever i'm near them.  i took advantage of this size and pulled a rainbow assortment of fat quarters that helped complete the rainbow plus a few extras to make it pop (i needed 9 for the baby size).  with that, i starched, ironed, and then got to cutting! i tried to space the colors out the best i could, since i didn't want the same three colors to rotate through the blocks, leaving me with only 3 different colorway sets.  i have to say, i think i did a pretty darn good job with it!  this quilt, much like the mini meadowland i posted last week, had 16" blocks, which was perfect.  the size of the center star was just the right side, and with the grunge there was no worry about anything being directional.the great thing about this crayola-esque color way, is it isn't really gender specific.  the fabric i picked for the back was this perfectly matched rainbow brick print i got at thistledew's retirement sale.  once i quilted this quilt, i assumed it was just going to sit and wait for a home before i decided how to bind it.  then, i remembered a dear friend of mine from high school was expecting her first baby, and she would be the perfect person to receive this fun quilt.  i bound it in raspberry pink grunge, since i had a ton left over from the meadowland backing, and sent it on it's way.beyond the grunge, i loved a lot of things about this pattern.  everything is made from traditional quilt block piecing - half square triangles and flying geese in particular.  there is plenty of room to trim down, and most of the points aren't even near the final seam allowance to get lost.  i'm one that often loses points on my block edges, but this one i had GREAT experience with, and i think i only lost a few points, and that was due to binding.  i call that a win.

i loved looking and seeing other pattern testers versions of this block.  some fussy cut things for the middle and others used only two color ways instead of 9 to get a totally different effect.  i hope someday i'm a little more bold when it comes to pattern testing instead of following the instructions EXACTLY as written.
but you know what.
i love my grungey kapow so much.  i think that top left pink/yellow/aqua one might be my favorite block though.

pattern information: kapow! quilt by kustom kwilts
quilt count: 142

mini meadowland kitty quilt

oh my goodness... this poor quilt has been done FOREVER and just got mailed off last week.
it is WAY over due for it's time in the spotlight!

when i found out my dear friend jessica was having baby girl number three, i was thrilled to come up with a way to incorporate our childhood love of kitties in to this quilt.  but apparently that is the theme for her getting baby quilts... they come eventually!  (half hexi smokey cat quilt was baby girl #2).

being in the midst of quarantine while making this, and possibly even during my unemployment phase, i needed a pattern that was quick, easy and i could use my stash for.  the meadowland quilt was one i had my eye on for quite some time, and it was the perfect size for a wee one to grow with.  i had a lot of pinks, aquas and grays from previous projects, so it was the perfect mix for a baby girl.

the collections of pinks i had surprised me, since i don't often use them in my quilt!
granted, a bunch of them came from my rad 100 days 100 blocks quilt that was all over the rainbow.  the aqua kitty heads were just too cute to pass up when i did some shop hopping awhile ago, and they became the perfect tie in for this quilt!
these blocks were much larger than i expected them to be, which was great to feature these fabrics even more so.  bigger blocks = more kitty cuteness, am i right?  i used to think 12"blocks were gigantic and good, but something just feels good about these 16ish ones.  maybe that's because i spent a good three months making 6 and a half inch blocks a few years ago!i picked up the gray binding and raspberry grunge backing from caliquiltco.com to help tie it all together.  i felt like the gray was enough to frame it up without being too "in your face" while the pink on the back was perfect.  i did a simple crazy puzzle pantograph all over it to keep the focus on the blocks and not necessarily overwhelm it with quilting. i would absolutely do this quilt again, using a wider variety of colors and in a larger size.  could i use a new quilt for my bed?  hmmm...  6 quilts layered during the wintertime could be exactly what i need!  
i should also add that i found a blog post that helped figure out how to keep the directional fabric going the same way on all of the flying geese pieces (helpful for those kitty heads especially)
if you plan to do a meadowland and want to know how to keep it directional, the link is here: four at a time geese with directional fabric

pattern information: meadowland by then came june
quilt count: 141

neverland themed take heart baby quilt

 okay, so clearly 2020 quarantine has gotten to me, since this is the SECOND curves quilt i've done ever, and it was just a few months after i finished the winnie the pooh parallel path quilt.  i see you curves, i don't fear you anymore.  well, at least in small doses.

angela pingel, the designer of this quilt (you may remember the hidden agenda quilt i made my mom.  same awesome designer), posted early on in june that she was selling her "take heart" pattern for $10, with all proceeds going towards black artists+designers guild.  i fell in love with the pattern, so while feeling like a small fish in a huge pond during the black lives matter movement, i purchased the pattern in hopes that my contribution would help in some way.  after purchasing the pattern, it sat for awhile waiting to be created. that is, until i saw this great neverland line of fabric at caliquiltco.

my dear friend and fellow benny and the jets member andrea was expecting her first little one.  when she first announced she was pregnant, i was going to take a hard left in to a muppets themed quilt for her, but as her pregnancy progressed and the decor for the nursery started being shared by her and her husband... well, i knew i had to save that muppet idea for another day.  they are going to be having a sweet baby girl next month, and the colors in this line of michael miller fabric was just perfect.

i selected 4 prints in each color (i tried to vary the pink from the green, but the boats were just too cute) and then selected 4 various blenders to go with it - 2 dear stella, bedrock and ombre confetti dots.  The hardest part was spreading out the prints and colors to be away from each other... but as you can tell, that got a little harder as things went on.   yet again, these curves were SO much easier than i expected!

i anticipated them to be difficult, but i only used the paper template provided with the pattern and had no issues at all piecing them together.  plus, i had my super awesome design wall hung up, which really helped keep these blocks organized and ready to go when it became time to sew them all together.

i'm a little obsessed... there are lots of photos of this quilt... i chose the blue print to use as the front, since i feel like it didn't get to showcase all of the cuteness in the small squares.  it features mermaids, wendy, tiger lily and fairies surrounded by other neverland inspired items.  this particular print in the line is called "girls are much to clever" which i felt like was the perfect for this clever girl that was coming in to their family.  (fact: andrea's husband is a MAJOR jurassic park fan... i totally meant to make them a "clever girl" onesie as well).  since i don't like to piece things together and look at them not lining up, i used some of the blue dear stella fabric to create a space between them in my usual offset pieced back style.and get this... this quilt was the first one with my...new quilt tags!

i'd been wanting new ones for awhile, and my supply of what i've been using had finally dwindled down to there it was reasonable to buy new ones.  so i did just that!

i hired a family friend (shout out to holly ellis) as a graphic designer (who is also a cat lover) to come up with something new, and she knocked it out of the park.  so much so, that there were two versions that she did...i loved them both... so you'll have to wait and see what the other one looks like.  i promise, it should pop up soon in one of my projects that still need quilted (or actually... all 3 of them!)

quilt tags ordered from border city quilts

i'm so happy that despite quarantine and everything, i did get to see andrea and drop this quilt off to her curbside for her drive by baby shower.  i hadn't seen her since march, which was oh so long ago.  i long for the day we have our next french toast friday... but i am so excited there will be a new little one to join us at the party!

pattern info: take heart by angela pingel

quilt count: 140