Bird House Project Quilting Challenge #1

 I would like to participate in some of the Project Quilting challenges at Persimon Dreams. I managed to complete this potholder in time for Challenge #1.

The back of the potholder shows the bird outside of his cage.

But the birds do not stay in their cage. They make a nest in Miss Ghastly's hair.

Project #1 - all about Bird houses is complete. I will be looking forward to Project Quilting #2. It is fun to try something different. I now have a fun and useable potholder.

Cookies and Quilts - what could get any better?

 The Virtual Cookie Exchange is here. I will start off with the cookies, Yum! I love the Sugar Cookies recipe that a friend from work gave to me. I made one batch. They are a soft cookie with cream cheese icing. 

Christmas Cookie Cutter Sugar Cookies

1 1/2 cups confection sugar                                2 1/ C flour

1 C butter, softened                                            1 tsp baking soda

1 egg                                                                    1 tsp cream of tartar

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 tsp almond flavoring

Cream sugar and butter. Mix in egg and flavorings. Blend in dry ingredients. Refrigerate 2-3 hours. Divide dough in half and roll out on floured surface to desired thickness. Use cookie cutters to cut into shapes and place on lightly-greased baking sheet. Bake until delicately golden - baking time depends on thickness of cookie. Approximately 8 minutes. Can sprinkle sugar on before baking. Or let cool and ice with cream cheese icing. 

I have had this tea towel with a Sugar Cookie recipe on it for quite a while. It has not been used and needed some prettying up. The tea towel started out like this. Just rather large and not so fun or delicious-looking. 

I trimmed it down to a smaller size and added some 2 1/2" squares - well, just because... It now looks like this.  I probably won't use this too often to dry the dishes because once it gets used, it will quickly become not-so-pretty. This should brighten up my kitchen a little just by hanging it over my oven handle.

On to my quilt project. I received the fabric and pattern from The Sweetwater Company for this table topper. I really just loved how the pattern had all of these Christmas trees on it. The rectangles are from a charm pack, plus some are cut from yardage. I made a plastic template from the tree pattern and cut them all out.

Christmas tree table topper

The Christmas trees are appliqued onto the rectangles. I used the blanket stitch on my sewing machine. The white fabric has little dots of snow on it, which I liked. It's hard to see in the photos, but some of the fabric in the charm packs, like this black-colored one, have snow, also.

The back is some Christmas fabric that I had purchased as a bolt end. It was good to be able to just cut a piece off and use it. It's a little time-saving when you don't have to piece a quilt back. This quilt is approximately 35" x 35" so it worked out good using the width of fabric.

In addition to my quilt, I made some Lined drawstring bags to use for wrapping gifts. I wanted to use these panels for the bags so they are a larger-sized bag. I had framed the panels and then followed the directions.  

Thanks for joining along on my Virtual Cookie Exchange. Please visit all of the bloggers shown below. I'm sure there are many wonderful cookie recipes and Christmas quilts!

Thanks to Carol at Just Let Me Quilt for hosting this great Blog Hop.   

DECEMBER 4

Just Let Me Quilt

Inflorescence

Songbird Designs

Words & Stitches

DesertSky Quilting

Quilting Gail

Days Filled With Joy

A Quiltery-For the Love of Geese

 DECEMBER 5

Selina Quilts

Just Because Quilts

Karrin’s Crazy World

Quilt Schmilt

Domestic Felicity

Happy Cottage Quilter

Nettie Sews and Lucky Quilts

DECEMBER 6

Hill Valley Quilter

Beaquilter

Crazy'boutquilts

Bumbleberry Stitches

That Fabric Feeling

Homespun Hannah's Blog

 DECEMBER 7

MooseStashQuilting

Ms P Designs USA

Quilt Doodle Designs

Quilted Snail

Sew Many Yarns

Just Sew Quilter

The Life of Grammy

A Fall Pillow is now complete for The Turkey Trot.

I have been following many of the Blog Hops that Joan and Carol have throughout the year. They are always so much fun. They indicated that there were spots available for the Turkey Trot and Virtual Cookie Exchange so I asked that I be added to the list. 

I seem to have accumulated an endless amount of projects and I'm sure some of them may fit with each topic. I have had this pillow kit from Sew Lux Fabric lingering in my dresser drawer for quite a while. 

I have always had issues with sewing this Economy Block the traditional way. I end up not having a 1/4" seam on all sides. Probably because my accuracy is not too swift when sewing the triangles to the side. So I nabbed this 6 1/2" Paper-piecing block . I guess paper-piecing does use a little more fabric than the traditional method. But that's fine, I have plenty of stash sitting around. I added another block or two. It worked out fine. 

Once the blocks were completed, Lucky helped to lay out the blocks in a pleasing manner. 

Both the front and back are pieced with the Economy blocks. I quilted the front and back with orange thread. It has an orange zipper on the bottom. This pillow will be a nice addition to my couch for the Fall season. 

Pillow front

Pillow back

I do have a turkey (er chicken) to use as a doorstop, also. I sewed this crazy birdbrain quite a few years ago. She is filled with scraps and has a cardboard bottom so she sits pretty good.

I hope you have enjoyed my little Turkey Trot. Please check out all of the other wonderful bloggers in this Fun Fall Blog Hop.

  

 

Monday November 13

 

MooseStashQuilting

Words & Stitches

The Morning Latte

Quilting Gail

The Life Of Grammy

 

Tuesday November 14

Karrin’s Crazy World

Just Because Quilts

Elizabeth Coughlin Designs

Domestic Felicity

Nettie Sews and Lucky Quilts

 

Wednesday November 15

Selina Quilts

Quilt Doodle Designs

Inflorescence

MS P Designs USA

 

Thursday November 16

Just Let Me Quilt

BeaQuilter

Quilted Snail

Songbird Designs

Scrapdash

 

 

Gifts for my sister's 60th Birthday.

 When considering gifts for my sister's birthday this year, I looked through the quilt tops that I had completed. Most of them were seasonal or whatever, not really a nice throw-size quilt top. So I did decide on a top that I had sewn from Rollin' Along. I had sewn the cover quilt sometime through this past year. I was pleased with how it came out and it did need to be quilted and finished up.

Sometime while finishing this quilt, I decided to sew a gift bag to hold the quilt. I have made quite a few of these Lined drawstring bags. The laundry bag size fits a throw-size quilt very well. It probably can fit a queen-sized quilt. I wouldn't necessarily do this much piecing on a bag for myself, because it did become a little bit tedious. For a gift, though, it is fun. Plus I used up quite a bit more jelly roll strips. My sister can store the quilt in this bag and put it in the closet when not using it.

In addition, the thought came to me to make a mini quilt with a cupcake for her birthday. I like how the cupcake came out, too. I think I managed to hurry up and zap this out in a day. This cupcake quilt block was in one of my magazines from when Quiltmaker put out the 100 Quilt Blocks magazine. 

I do enjoy these labels that I purchase from Sweetwater . I receive monthly labels with my name to label my quilts. This Happy Birthday one was purchased separately.  I thought it added a nice touch.