Yellow Pinwheel Quilt

I sewed the binding on this quilt last night, and then washed and dried it in the dryer.  It got that nice crinkly look that I love.

The back is a solid pale yellow.  It was one of the many pieces of fabric I got last winter at the Joann's 75% off sale.  They were moving to a new store, and Julie (Joe Tulips) and I just happened to get in on the good deals.  I last talked about this quilt here.  I first showed these blocks last July here. 

It's going to be a college graduation gift for a friend's daughter.  She also has a daughter graduating from high school, and I made the t-shirt quilt for her. 

This might be a long trip...

Ok, I don't know what possessed me to start a new block.  I saw a few of the "Arkansas Crossroads" blocks out in blogland and on Flickr.  I found a free pattern online, but it called for 3 1/2" strips and squares.  Well, I have a lot of 1 1/2" and 2 1/2" strips, so I looked for a pattern that offered the block in different sizes.  I found what I was looking for here. 

Here's my first one

I must be crazy.... I'm using the inch and a half strips and squares...I messed one up last night - got a little too crazy trimming.  This block measures 8 1/2" square.  I spent my whole morning working on this - It's my 11 to 7 day at work, and I had ambitious plans to get some cleaning, etc done, both at home and at my dad's house.  Yeah, right.  This was much more fun.....



Sneak Peek

Here's a peek at what I've been working on over the weekend...

And I just realized I am making way more blocks than I will need.  These blocks right now are 12 1/2 inches square.  I was planning to make the quilt 7 x 8.  I was making 59 blocks so I'd have a few extra.  There are always some that don't turn out the best, and this gave me some wiggle room.  Well, that would make the quilt 84"x96".  That's just too darned big to manage!  Even though I won't quilt it myself, it's still too big.  So, I'm scaling it back to 6 x 7, 42 blocks in all.  I guess the extra blocks will be seed for another quilt.  :)  Oh, and the Whoopie Pies....... I swear they're as addictive as crack cocaine.....I can't leave them alone!

Whoopie Pies

Ok, so I started looking up recipes for Whoopie Pies today.  They sounded easy enough.  Most of the recipes I found were very similar.  I decided on this recipe.  Since only Mr. Small Town and I are home (we are empty-nesters, you know), I made half a batch. 

  I only made one change - I used a Red Velvet Cake Mix instead of Devil's Food. 

We haven't tried them yet, but I'll be sure to let you know how we like them!  :)

It seemed like a rather blah week around here.  I have been sewing log cabin blocks.  16 are finished.  I only have the last 2 logs to put on the other 40....

On a side note, I got a cortisone shot in my knee on Tuesday.  It feels a lot better - still not perfect, but definitely much better than it was!

Finished projects

The top photo is a table runner I made this past week.  My son and daughter-in-law gave me some pretty fabric squares for Christmas.  This set of them included 50 4" squares.  I thought they would make a cute spring table runner.  I say "son and daughter-in-law" but I'm really quite certain that my son had nothing to do with picking them out....:) I love receiving quilt fabric, and it was a great gift!

The bottom photo is an apron, hot pad and oven mitt I made for a bridal shower gift. The shower is this afternoon - I better get the gift wrapped up and get my clothes changed and out the door soon! I just love the fabric with the blenders. I thought about adding a couple of Marguarita glasses and some Marguarita mix to the gift, but the shower is at a church, and I'm not sure it would be appreciated! :)

The picture below was taken this morning, as a fire burned down the bank in our little town.  So devastating.  We are lucky that no one was hurt, but it is a huge loss for our community.  Fire departments from 3 other towns came to assist our local fire department. 

Another Finish......

The pattern is Yellow Brick Road by Atkinson Designs.  This is the full size version, a "late" wedding gift for a couple that was married last September.  I'm linking this up to Bonnie Hunter (Quiltville's) "What's on Your Bed?"  Even though this won't be on my bed for long, I wanted to show it off.....

It's kind of funny - I tool pictures with it on my bed (please ignore the mess in the background) and pictures of it outside.  The ones I took inside without a flash actually turned out better than the outdoor ones.

 Here's a close-up of the quilting.  It was sent out to a long-arm quilter - I'm not sure of her name, but it's one I normally don't use.  The quilting is really cute - she did a great job.  I just drop my quilts off at my local quilt shop, and the owner sends them out to be quilted.  She has 2 ladies that she normally uses, and then a couple that she uses as "overflow".  This went out to one of the "overflow" quilters!  :)

The lovely quilting carries over into the border as well. 

The binding is Grunge, by Basic Grey.  I love that fabric! 

Reunion T-Shirt Quilt

 Ok, so the colors didn't really photograph the greatest, but here is the finished Reunion quilt.  I posted the finished top here awhile ago.  I've had it back from the quilters for awhile, but had to finish up all the craft show stuff before finishing this.

I decided on a solid black binding, and it is the first one I totally machine stitched.  It's not perfect by any means, but it beats hand-sewing any day! 

I pieced the back, and was pretty happy with the way it looks, too.

It's been washed and dried, and delivered to it's new owner - in plenty of time for graduation!

Craft Show

So, you may have noticed that I've been absent from the blog lately. I was busy sewing every night, getting ready for a craft show.  Julie and I had a table there.  This is something we have talked about doing for a long time, and finally decided to go for it.  If you click on the link to her blog, you'll see her picture of our table.  I took my camera along, but I didn't take even one picture.  Not a single one.

 I made bags....... lots and lots of bags.  Tote bags of all sizes, and little zippered bags.  Also a couple of cute little-girl purses.  A sampling of the bags is shown above... Julie made some awesome postcards, hot pads and table runners.  We each sold about 1/3 of the items we brought.  Not bad for our first craft show.  Am I in a hurry to do it again?  No, not really.  Maybe around Christmas time, when out little town hosts another craft show, as part of our annual Christmas celebration.  Getting ready for a craft show is a lot of work, and now I'm not sure what to do with the leftovers!

I was pleasantly surprised at how well my "raggly" scarves went over.  I was scrambling to get them done at the last minute, and was not sure how well they would be received.  I sold 6 out of 9 of them.  Here's what the leftovers look like.  They are super easy to make..... I might have to post a tutorial one of these days.

And imagine my surprise when I noticed the lector in church this morning was wearing one of my creations........ :)