Last Project of the year

This year is coming to an end and I'm finishing the last project of the year which is my first t-shirt quilt.  I just got it back from the long armer and here it is.

It looks great.  I think she did a great job quilting it.  I'll finish it in a few days and send it to the new owner.  If you're interested in a tutorial to make this t-shirt quilt, I have made tutorials for it here, here and here.

In the past week, I had a lot of fun making fabric baskets for holidays gifts for friends and family members.  Here are some of them.  

They are reversable and very roomy.  They will be filled with quilted pot holders/hot pads, crochet scrub pads, a big can of hot cocoa mix, hand creams and chocolate candies.

I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happiest New Year.  May God bless you all with the richest blessings.  This year has been a challenging one for us but we survived with the grace of God.  I'm so thankful for all of you for being here for me, supporting and encouraging me all the way.  I love you!!

Margo

John3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Project in Progress in December 2024

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.  Now that the t-shirt quilt top is at the long armer, it's time to get back to a project that I was working on before.  It's my third denim quilt.  You can read about its beginning here.  Many more pieces have been added to the piece as seen in the picture below.

"Adventure In Time"

My DH gave it 'Adventure In Time' name.  He said it reminded him of a time travel.  My original thought was 'Worm Holes' but 'Adventure in Time' is a big improvement, I think.

Again, there are combinations of denim materials and painter's drop cloth.  There were several raw edges that I intentionally left exposed but in the end, I only have one shown in the middle of the picture above.  I'll finish piecing all the pieces and finalize everything this week.  Next will be quilting it.  Can't wait!!

I have a bit of good news to share, my quilt 'Off Kilter' was accepted to QuiltCon 2025 in Phoenix, Arizona.  I'm super excited.  I started making this quilt after much tribulation in the first half of this year.  Without realizing it, my feelings showed through the quilt.  I would like to share the artist statement or label information, as QuiltCon calls it, for this quilt with you.

"Distractions in life happen, They can throw your world into chaos. That's when you hold on to things that anchor you, be it faith in God, family and friends. These distractions will be but a short while and then life goes on and everything will be okay at the end. This quilt is made of old denim, garment top and painter's drop cloth as background. It reminds me that life is not perfect but beautiful."

Even though painter's drop cloth is rough and has a lot of defects and flaw, it looks beautiful with denim.  Maybe that's why I love using it so much.  I'm learning to embrace imperfections!  Here's a picture of  'Off Kilter'.

Off Kilter

Thanks for visiting and hope you all have a wonderful week.

Margo

Psalm 136: Give thanks unto God for all things, for His mercy endures forever.

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

T-Shirt Quilt Tutorial: Part 3 - The Finish

Here we are at the final step of our t-shirt quilt: the big finish.  From the last tutorial, we made t-shirt blocks as shown in the picture below.  

There are 12 t-shirt blocks for this quilt.  In this tutorial, we're putting the rows together with sashing and finishing the quilt top with borders.

Cutting:

Kona purple      (8) 2.5" x 14" strips for sashing between blocks

                            (3) 2.5" x 45" strips for sashing between rows

                            (2) 3" x 60.5" strips for right and left borders

                            (2) 3" x 50"   strips for top and bottom borders

Putting it all together:

1. Sew the top row as follow: 

block + 2.5"x14" strip + block + 2.5"x14" strip + block 

Row 1   

2. Repeat step 1 for row 2,3 and 4.

Row 2     

Row 3   

Row 4   

3. Sew a 2.5" x 45" strip between row 1 and row 2.

4. Sew a 2.5" x 45" strip between row 2 and row 3.

5. Sew a 2.5" x 45" strip between row 3 and row 4. 

Pay attention to the blocks lineup between the rows.   I lined up the blocks first, then match and pin the beginning and the end of the row to the sashing.  If you pay attention to the 1/4" seam allowance and sew carefully, things should match up with on major misshape.  

See picture below.

Now we're ready to put the borders on.  

6. Sew 3" x 60.5" strips to the right and left sides of the quilt top.

7. Then sew 3" x 50" strips to the top and bottom of the quilt top.

See picture below.

Now the quilt top is done and ready for quilting.  I use 2 yards of fleece fabric for the back.  I'm sending this out to a professional longarmer for the quilting.  I hope the little ripple on the right border will disappear after quilting.  I'm going to finish it with mixed dark purple fabric for binding.  I'll show you the finished quilt when it's done.  I'm hoping that it will be done in time for Christmas.  :-))

Notes:  I didn't use pattern for this quilt.  My niece likes shadow box design and I came up with the dimensions of the blocks, the sashings and the borders.  I used every precaution to make sure that the math is correct.  I apologize in advance if there are any mistakes in the numbers and please do let me know if you find any mistake.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday with your loved ones and thanks for visiting.

Margo

Psalm 136: Give thanks unto God for all things, for His mercy endures forever.

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

T-Shirt Quilt Tutorial: Part 2

Quilt top construction:

In this tutorial, I assumed that you all know the basics of quilting so I didn't go in the details of each step.  I don't have any affiliation to any of the products used here.  I am merely telling you what I and used and how I made my quilt.  

Now that all t-shirts have been cut, it’s time to construct the quilt top. Our niece likes the shadow box design and she loves purple. 

Materials:

1 yard Kona shadow (grey)

1 yard Kona purple

Cutting instruction:

Kona Shadow        Cut (12) 2” x 12.5”

                               Cut (12) 2” x 14”

Kona Purple           Cut (24) 2” squares

Instructions:

    1. Sew a 2" square at the end of 12.5" and 14" gray strips as in the picture below.

    2. Sew 12.5" gray strips to the right side of the block first.  Sew 14" gray strips to the bottom side of the block next, as shown in the picture below.

Now repeat steps 1 and 2 to all the blocks and set them on the design wall for the final layout.  Next, we'll work on the sashing and finish the quilt top.

Thanks for stopping by.

Margo

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

T-shirt Quilt Tutorial Part 1

How to block the t-shirt design and cut

The t-shirt quilt making has begun.   It took me a few days to figure out how to block the design on a t-shirt and to fuse an interfacing to the back before cutting without a lot of waste.  It's a little tricky to do that, and I think I've got it down.  I'll show the process with the help of pictures.  In this tutorial, I want the block size to be 12 1/2" but it will work with any size you want.

Material needed:

• T-shirt Transformation ruler (optional)
• 12 1/2" square ruler
• 13 1/2" interfacing piece.  I used Pellon P44F Fusible Interfacing
• Straight pins
• Heat erase marker pens or any erasable markers you like
• Pressing sheet.  I used Fon&Porter's pressing sheet
• Dry hot iron

Note:  I'm not affiliated to any of these products.  I only tell you what I used.

Directions:

For each t-shirt, cut the sides, sleeves and along the shoulders to separate the front and back.  Try to cut off as little as possible of usable area as shown in the picture below.

I usually don't buy a ruler just for one thing/project but in this case this t-shirt block ruler is very helpful.  It's worth it because I'm sure I can use it to block any fabric for fussy cutting and I'll be making more t-shirt quilts in the future.  I center the ruler on top of the design and decide what size I want, in this case I want 12 1/2" square.  I then marked the square with a heat erase marker.  

(If you don't want to  use the t-shirt transformation ruler, you can put the 12 1/2" square ruler directly on top the design on the t-shirt and mark the square with a heat erase marker.)

I put pins directly on the marked lines to transfer the square perimeter to the back.

On the back, with the pins marks, I know exactly where the square on the front is.  I put the interfacing, adhesive side down, on top and position it 1/2" beyond the pin marks all around.  Smooth out all the wrinkles, then I pin the interfacing sheet at four corners to secure it as in the picture above and take out all the pins at the front of the t-shirt.  Now you're ready to fuse the interfacing onto the back of the design.

I use the pressing sheet over the interfacing.  I started in the middle, press the hot iron on just enough to tac the interfacing onto the t-shirt.  Do not drag the iron across the pressing sheet at this point.  Lift up the pressing sheet, take out the pins on the right side, smooth out any wrinkles.  Put the pressing sheet back on the right side and press down with the hot dry iron.  Repeat the same process on the left side, as shown in the picture above.  Now all the pins has been removed and with the pressing sheet on top, run the hot iron from the middle to the edges and around the square a few more times to make sure that the interfacing adhere to the t-shirt real well, especially around the edges and at the corners.

Turn the t-shirt over and position 12 1/2" square ruler on top, align with the marks that you made with erasable pen earlier.  They should still be visible enough for you.  Make sure the design is center one more time, then cut with confidence.  Now you get a perfect square block that is smooth and nicely pressed for your t-shirt quilt.

Now I have 11 more t-shirts to go.   I will be taking pictures and making tutorial as I go.  

Thanks for stopping by and have a wonderful week.

Margo

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Work(?) in Progress In October

Can't believe it's October already.  Time sure flies fast when you're having fun.  Not much going on right now except I am working playing with fabric and sewing machines.  Again I can't stay away from curve piecing.  What can I say, I just love it.  Here are some of the pieces that I'm playing with.  I placed them on the design wall without much thought at this point.  Just to see how they're reacting to one another and where I'm going.  I removed the one that didn't play well with the others.  LOL

 

At the same time, I'm planning how I will make the T-shirt quilt.  I've decided on the block size, background color, and all that before I do any cutting.  Thank you everyone for many great ideas and inspirations on the topic.   You all are so awesome and wonderful.  I feel I can move along with confidence now, but I'm going at a slower pace.  I'm being extra careful because it's a memory quilt for my niece.  I'm going to mix flying geese blocks with the T-shirt blocks.  Do you know that I've never made a flying geese block?  It's been something that I wanted to try and now is the time.  

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you all have a great day!

Margo

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

What's Happening in My Studio

 The baby quilt is done and ready to be gifted.  Here is the picture.

 

I spent one day making a fabric basket as a gift for my friend's sister whom we visited in Idaho.  We had so much fun staying at her cabin near a lake, so sorry I forgot the name.   She and her husband took us on a boat ride around the lake.  We spotted so many bald eagles there.  Here are the basket pictures.

 

I used a 'Colorful Patchwork Bags and Baskets' pattern from SewCanShe.com by Caroline Fairbanks-Critchfield that I saw on Craftsy.

 

Before I end this post, I want to show you some of the pictures from our trip.

 

A sunset view on a lake

 

Thanks for visiting and have a blessed week.

Margo

 

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

A New Project: A T-Shirt Quilt

This will be my first T-shirt quilt ever and I'm excited to have a new discovery and fun experiment.  

These t-shirts belong to my late brother in-law.  My niece gave some to me to make them into a quilt.

I've done some research online on the topic of T-shirt quilts.  There are some unique and striking quilts out there.  I'm not quite sure which direction I will go.  We'll see.

I need to get more supplies, such as fusible interfacing material, etc.  I did get some fleece material that I think would be good for backing. For the batting, I'm not sure which one to use or I may go in a totally different direction.  I might use flannel in the middle layer.  I imagine with flannel, it will be more fluid and softer than a batting material.  Decisions, decisions..... 

Do any of you have any input?  Have you made a T-shirt quilt before?  I would appreciate any suggestions and comments you have.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great week!!

Margo

 

 

 

 

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Work in Progress in September

It's time to get back to quilting.  We had a two-week vacation in the beautiful Idaho Falls.  The weather was perfect and we heard we missed the heat wave of 118 degrees in the So. Cal.  We drove a little over 2,000 miles for the whole trip!  It's so nice and wonderful that we didn't have to worry about time and schedule.  We stopped when we wanted to, ate at new places along the way; some were good but some we wouldn't go back again. lol

On the way back we drove through Utah and Las Vegas, visited some friends along the way and had a marvelous time at every stop.   It was warmer in Utah than Idaho but it was as lovely.   My DH said that in this trip, we probably did more talking than we used to.  Some friends we have not seen them for a few years so we had so much to catch up. 

 Now it's time to quilt this baby quilt.  

 

 

I am also in the planning for the third denim quilt.  While I was on the trip, the idea came to me that I really like and can't wait to make it reality.  This one will have multiple colors of denim, including black.  Ooh, I'm excited.

 

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by.

Margo

 

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

 

 

New Alphabet Quilt

Monika Fritschi Henry at Penny Spool Quilts has a new alphabet quilt pattern called Elemeno Quilt which you can read about it here (not an affiliate link).   In this pattern, you'll get all the English alphabets and four symbols that you can use to design any quilts with words.

I decided to make a wall hanging with a word LOVE on it.  Before I ended up with this design, I tried line up the letters straight down, stacked up into a cube shape but they look kinda boring.  Here's the finished quilt.

 

Love Quilt  24"x47"

The instructions for the blocks are pretty straight forward and they're easy to make.  Each block finishes at 10".

To achieve this look, I laid the blocks on a background fabric and used 1/4 " bias tape to cover the raw edged.  I'm sure there are many different ways to accomplish this but I jumped in with the first idea that came to mind.  I realized that I could have made things easier for myself had I sewn the fusible web onto the back of each block and fuse them to the background.  But I like the look of the bias tape better.

If you're interested, head over to  Monika's website and check it out.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day.

Margo

In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Work in Progress in August

In June, SAQA had a call for submission to the 2024 Philadelphia Museum of Art Contemporary Craft Show.  I submitted two pieces and one of them got juried in.  The one that was selected is called 'My Way'.  You can read about it in detail in this blog here.  This is my first submission to the museum show.  I'm excited to see how it goes.

 

I've been working on a new quilt, named 'Off Kilter' and now it is done.  Here are some pictures of the quilt.

 

Here's a detail picture.

 

 

Oh, how I struggled with this one.  The beige background fabric is a painter drop cloth.  I picked it because of the color and the texture.  It goes so well with the denim fabric.  Although the drop cloth is 100% cotton, it is very coarse and rough.  When I sewed on it the sewing lines don't appear smooth unlike those on Kona or other 100 cotton quilting fabric.  I decided to add some hand quilting in there too.  That's because when I sewed with a regular blue thread, it didn't show well at all.  I hand quilted it in blue pearl cotton thread and it shows much better just the way I like it.

The next project is the alphabet quilt as I mentioned in this post.  I want to make a wall hanging quilt.  I pulled out some fabric and will start today.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day.

Margo

 In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Work in Progress in July

It sure feels like summer here in Southern California.  The heat is so intense that I only want to go into my garden in the early morning hours.  I get to spend a few hours in the morning to do what I need to do to take care of the vegetables and flowers so that they can survive the heat during the day.  

The top and pieced back for the second denim quilt are done.  I will baste it and start quilting this week.   Here what they look like.

 

 

When I showed the top to my DH, he said the word Off Kilter.  After checking the meaning, I said I liked it.  So it's the name of this quilt.  I also pieced the back to continue the idea of out of balance.  Now quilting it is the next challenge, I love it.

The tulip quilt for a baby girl is also basted and ready to be quilted.  I'll take my time on this one because I already knew how I'm going to quilt it.   Everything is going according to schedule, it seems.  

I already have a project line up for next month and it has to be done before our road trip to Idaho Falls at the end of the month.  A few months ago a quilt designer named Monika Henry of Penny Spool Quilts asked if anyone wanted to use her Modern Quilter's Alphabet pattern to make a project and posted on our social media channels.  I said yes to her and here I am.  I've never made an alphabet quilt and I think it'll be fun.

Stay cool and stay hydrated my dear quilty friends. 

Thank you for visiting.  Happy sewing and creating!!

Margo

 In addition to the linky parties on the sidebar, I also link up to:

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Brag About Your Beauties at From Bolt to Beauty

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)

Work In Progress in June

I can't believe it has been a month since my last post.  I have been busy and not busy at the same time.  I wanted to continue working on my second denim quilt.  I first talked about it in this post.  Many thoughts/ideas went through my head but I didn't touch it until two weeks ago.  I finally made some cuttings and picked some seams off, and this is what I have on my design wall right now.

It looks like a crooked magnifying glass, doesn't it.  I will stare at it for a few more days.  There might be some more changes or not, I don't know.  Now I have to think how I'm going to piece it.  

I also made some progress on baby quilts that I have to make.  This is a baby boy quilt.

 

The idea came from A Bright Corner by Andy Knowlton.  I added the Faux Rag quilting technique for a little more pizzazz.  

And this is the top for the baby girl quilt.  

 

For this one, I will finish/quilt it when I get all the info for the label.

According to the baby's father, the baby is expected to come

in middle of July.

Thank you for visiting and have a marvelous time creating. 

Margo

To Do Tuesday  hosted by Carol at Quilt Schmilt 

Put Your Foot Down at For the Love of Geese  (Thursday)

Peacock Party at Wendy’s Quilts and More  (Friday)