This week's finish ...

I love the effectiveness that a little "nudge" can give when I'm at that "almost done" stage of a project. This week, that motivation comes from Jo's UFO Challenge and CrazyMomQuilts' Finish It Up Friday link party.

A couple weeks ago, I mentioned this project in my list of Un-Finished (quilt-y) Objects.

It's a baby quilt ... Flannel (with elephants!) And soft T-Shirt fabric squares. Fleece on the back. 

 

This week, in addition to some other UFO progress, as well as the beginning of a new project, I got this one quilted up and finished.

The quilting was simple ... straight diagonals on the squares, meandering curves on the flannel.

I'm linking this post to this week's Finish It Up Friday at CrazyMomQuilts.

Starting a Scrappy Irish Chain

This is a new start on a little quilt ... Baby-size, for a gift.

It's a small version of "Happily Scrappily Irish" from Bonnie Hunter's Adventures with Leaders & Enders.

I've got all the pieces cut out ... scrappy red, white, and blue ... on a light blue background.

It's always fun to make things from fabric I have, and it's especially great to make beautiful things out of scraps!

UFO Challenge bits & pieces

Thanks to Jo's Challenge to work on UFOs, I've decided to do what I can to make progress on my Un-Finished (quilt-y) Objects ...

My list of nearly-done UFOs was in this post; last week I finished up the Hello Kitty T-Shirt Quilt, and evaluated progress on Hopscotch Butterscotch (see the end of this post).

This week, my bit of UFO progress has been on Hopscotch Butterscotch, from Bonnie Hunter's book  Adventures with Leaders and Enders.

As of last week, all the 4-patch pieces were still just twosies; I'm in the middle of assembling 4-patches now. I've also started putting blocks together, since all the rail units are already done.

I love the "organized scrappy" look that the matching rail units give each block. It's a good thing, since I've got so much random scrappiness going on.

I'm enjoying the chance to use up a ton of fun, colorful scraps in this quilt, as well as in the Happily Scrappily Irish quilt that I started earlier this week - I'll be posting about that one in a day or two.

I'm linking this post to today's UFO Challenge update at Jo's Country Junction ... It's fun to see what others are stitching up and blogging about this week!

Finish It Up Friday

This week, I've posted about a few recent Quilt finishes.

It's exciting to get some things accomplished, and fun to blog about them, too!

This Hello Kitty Quilt was a fun one to work on. The raw-edge applique (with added details) was time consuming, but so worth it! I blogged about it in more detail in this past Wednesday's post.

 

On Tuesday, I blogged about the recent QR Code quilt I finished for my brother -- Black & white squares on the front, cozy fleece on the back.

Super-cute baby quilts for my newest (twin!) niece and nephew were the subject of this past Monday's post.

 

Incidentally, all of these quilts were made in one of my recent favorite styles: Cotton Jersey-Knit T-Shirt fabric on the front, fleece on the back. This combo makes an irresistibly cozy quilt. From time to time, I sell T-Shirt Quilts on eBay & on Etsy, so check the links at the top or in the sidebar for details.

I'm linking this post to one of my favorite quilt blogs -- Here's the link for this week's Finish It Up Friday at CrazyMomQuilts ... a fun place to see what other quilters have been finishing up this week!

UFO Challenge Update

Last week, I posted about the UFO Challenge that's sponsored by Jo's Country Junction, one of my favorite quilt-y blogs.

Thanks to the motivation of doing SOMEthing about some of my Un-Finished Objects, I got something done!!! During the past week, I decided to finish the one that was closest-to-done: The Hello Kitty Quilt. It was sitting in the closet, nearly-done, just needing its edges bound.

 

I got the binding done, and again admired the fun details. This quilt was supposed to be done this past Christmas, as a gift. I had it almost done, and then time got away from me. So, now, it's done, and ready to pop in the mail!

It's made of T-Shirt fabric squares, with Hello Kitty heads (also cut from T-Shirt fabric) stitched on top. Fleece backing, simple straight-line quilting. Super-cozy, and about twin-sized.

Also, since Jo's UFO Challenge is her own personal challenge to make progress on her several in-progress quilts that are designed by Bonnie Hunter, before Bonnie's new book comes out ... I thought I'd pull out the ONE Bonnie Hunter quilt that I'm working on. 

Last year, my family got me Bonnie Hunter's awesome book Adventures with Leaders and Enders as a gift. I started "Hopscotch Butterscotch", one of the quilts from the book, soon after receiving the book, but then I didn't have time to work on it.

Since I had some pieces already cut from scraps, I altered the pattern a little, to use sizes I had already cut ... I'm using 2½" squares and bricks, instead of 2". But this works out well, because my quilt will be bigger. 

Earlier this week, I got out what I'd started on (months ago!), to see how far I'd gotten. All the rail units are stitched and trimmed (20 sets of 4). All the (232) little squares are sewn into "twosies" and need to be sewn into four-patches.

I haven't cut any sashings or cornerstones. I love the piano-key border, but I haven't cut that yet, either.

Looking forward to working on this a bit at a time, among my other UFOs. (See my post from last week for a pictorial list of the other UFOs that are up for finishing!)

I'll be linking this post to this Wednesday's UFO Challenge at Jo's Country Junction. 

QR Code Quilt

Why? Because I can. Because I've been fascinated with quilts like this for years. Because stuff-made-from-squares is perfect for patchwork. Because I find quilt inspiration everywhere. Because there are websites to generate QR Codes for just about anything!

Like many of my recent quilts, this one was made from T-Shirt squares ... Small ones, this time (they finish at about 2"). The QR Code is square, and I stitched it to a plush fleece blanket.

I'm just now blogging about it, but this was my brother's Christmas gift. I surprised even myself with the fact that I actually mailed it in time for Christmas.

And, of course, the cat thinks she has to inspect EVERY quilt!

Process was pretty easy ... use a free online QR Code Generator, print the resulting code as your patchwork pattern, and assemble squares ... 

Little twin quilts ...

My kids have lots of cousins, but they got a special treat this year: TWIN cousins!

 

For the baby shower for my new niece AND nephew, I made a couple of cozy T-Shirt-Quilt baby quilts.

One of my girls helped me with the straight-line quilting, and I added some custom quilting around the edges.

Finished Gray T-Shirt Patchwork Quilt

The other day, I finished up a project that I meant to get done months ago. I blogged briefly about it last week.
Hooray for Anti-Procrastination Work!

This is a quilt for my daughter ... T-Shirt fabric and fleece - always a winning combination for coziness!

She requested the colors & style. It's a fun, easy semi-random patchwork ... reminiscent of Minecraft's gravel and stone blocks, but not so Minecraft-y as to be too faddish.

I'll be linking this post to this week's Finish It Up Friday at CrazyMomQuilts ... one of my favorite quilt-y blogs, and a fun place to see things others have finished recently ...

UFO Challenge ...

Jo at Jo's Country Junction has a fun quilt-y blog that's among my favorites! Jo is hosting a UFO Challenge - with updates/link parties once a week ... A chance to remind ourselves to put some extra work into "Un-Finished Objects" ... When it comes to quilts, I've got lots of those!

Jo is concentrating on her unfinished projects from a specific designer (Bonnie Hunter!), but I've got some random projects to challenge myself with. I think that counts for the challenge.

Here's a quick rundown ...

This one is up soon ... One Thousand Eight little squares ... The top is done, and I've got a plan in mind for this, so I'd like to finish it soon. It needs borders, quilting & binding. Looks like the last time I blogged about it was almost exactly a year ago - see this post. 

This little one should finish up quickly ...  It's getting backed with fleece.

This is one wins the prize for the oldest UFO in this list: This amazing Dresden Plate quilt top it was hand-pieced by my great-great grandmother, and I'm quilting it for my mom. The quilting is started. Just need to finish quilting, and bind.

Lego heads quilt was supposed to be done this past Christmas - It'll be backed with fleece; still needs quilting & binding.

Hello Kitty is another late Christmas quilt - It's already quilted onto cozy fleece; just needs binding.

A couple more things I should work on but haven't gotten to lately: projects for me, so I tend to save them for later, since they have no deadlines ...

The Modern Double Wedding Ring ... the middle of the quilt top is almost done, and the borders will be plain.

And the Carpenter's Wheel quilt top that's been done and waiting and waiting to be quilted.

This is by no means an exhaustive list of my UFOs (*cue hysterical laughter*), but it's the list of the ones I'd like to finish pretty soon.

I'm linking this post to Jo's UFO Challenge link party ... hoping that maybe a once-a-week check-in will help motivate me to make a little bit of extra progress, in my little bits of sewing time.

Quilting tonight ...

Working on this gray fleece-and-T-Shirt quilt tonight ...