Happy New Year's Eve!

From my crazy family to yours!

2014 Planning

As the year is coming to a close, I've been thinking about the projects I'd like to work on next year. I'm starting graduate school and I know that my sewing time will be whittled down quite a bit as a result. I still have a few WIPs that I'd like to finish off, but I've decided that (at this moment in time) there are two projects that I'm really excited to work on. And they're new...which means I should probably stitch up some of those projects for which I've already cut the fabric. Hmmm.

Ever since finishing my nephew's Chicopee Scrappy Trip quilt, I've wanted one for myself. And I decided a couple months ago that I wanted to make it out of Nordika by Jeni Baker. She even put together an amazing color-matching guide that I used to order some coordinating oval elements and pure elements fabrics since the scrappy trip pattern takes a ton of yardage.

Photo courtesy Westwood Acres Fabric

Photo courtesy Jeni Baker via incolororder.com

Photo courtesy Jeni Baker via incolororder.com

A photo by Pitter Putter Stitch

The other project that I'm really excited about is a half-square triangle quilt using Anna Maria Horner's new True Colors line. I haven't been a die-hard AMH fan in the past (I know, blasphemous - there are lots of prints from her that I've loved though), but the colors in this True Colors line are so saturated and absolutely glorious!

Photo courtesy Westwood Acres Fabric 

My quilt won't look like this one from Anna's booth at Fall Quilt Market, but I definitely will be using HSTs in my value study layout. I. Seriously. Cannot. Wait!

Photo courtesy Lee Heinrich via freshlypieced.com

There is one more project swirling in my head today that I think I want to tackle next year as well. I just don't have the fabrics figured out yet. I really love Angela's Arkansas Crossroads quilt that she posted on IG today (and has shown snippets of in the past). I absolutely LOVE it!

Photo courtesy Fussycut via Instagram

So there you have it. A few projects I'm excited to work on in 2014. I've got one more quilt to finish up for Christmas and I'll be back to share my other finishes for the end of the year. Merry Christmas next week to those of you celebrating!

Finally! Some finished projects!

Can you believe that I actually finished some projects this week?! I can hardly believe it myself! Here's to [hopefully] many more finishes in the coming weeks.

An old friend asked if I'd make some stockings for her family for Christmas this year. Her decorations are lime, turquoise, pink, and purple. Since she needed one more color so there'd be enough stockings for each member of her family, we chose gray to go with the rest of the colors. I raided my stash and pulled together several prints for my friend to choose from and this is what she picked.



I used the same pattern here as I did with my own Christmas stockings last year, which you can find on Fabricworm's blog here.



For the hanging loops, I pulled out some grosgrain ribbon that I had on hand. I also used Kona white for the lining and the cuffs.

My friend was in town for Thanksgiving so I was able to give these to her last week. I'm excited for her to share pictures of the stockings hanging up with the rest of her decorations.

The second project I managed to finish this week is a quilt for the Festival of Trees, the proceeds from which benefit a local children's hospital here in Utah. Primary Children's has played an important role in my life as my son's club foot was treated there as well as his recent surgery. My sweet nephew, who passed away several years ago, was also treated there for his medulloblastoma. The festival is a really great cause and I was happy to help in some way.

The fabric for this queen-size quilt was donated. Since there wasn't much variety, I opted to enlarge the Surfside pattern from Thimble Blossoms, which I think works well with only two fabrics. I used a dark brown king flat sheet for the backing. This quilt was a beast to quilt on my domestic machine, so I was really glad when I finally finished it on Saturday.

While I was happy to finish these two projects this week, I still have more to finish before Christmas, including five quilts (why do I do this to myself?). I have a few other things I'd like to make for my kids for Christmas, like these cloth doll diapers, fabric crowns, and monster rice bags, so I hope I can be as productive as possible.

Linking up to:

WIP Wednesday 11/13/13: Quilty ADD makes me feel like I can't get anything DONE!

I don't know what my problem is, but lately, I keep wanting to start new projects without following through on others. Here's a peek at what's in progress at my house this week:

Navy, teal, and peach Flower Box quilt (pattern from V and Co.). All fabric cut; one block pieced.

EPP project using jewels and hexis; blue, green, orange prints pulled from my scrap bins.

Accuquilt diamond quilt. I'll have a tutorial for this one when I finally get around to piecing the top.

Pixelated camera quilt. I've pieced 1/4 of the blocks into rows. I need to come back to this one asap, but I also need to have no one in the house to mess up the layout so I don't get confused on where the blocks should go.

Labyrinth quilt. This one should have been done by now. All I need to do still is add an outer border and then it's ready for basting. Sometimes, though, the thought of cutting and adding a border is SO NOT what I want to work on.

Oranges and bacon pillow (thanks, Marci for the nickname). This one is a result of me not knowing what football laces look like when I was making my nephew's pixelated football quilt. There are a bazillion layouts that I came up with, but haven't been able to settle on one. Plus, I have to make one more X block and I've been putting that part off.

And finally, plusses in blue. This one is all pieced and awaiting basting. I've been putting it off because I hate basting and if I'm going to move my kitchen table and clean the spray residue from the floor afterward, I'm going to baste more than one quilt at a time. As soon as I add the border to the labyrinth quilt and finish the camera quilt, all three of these will get basted.

I don't like this feeling of not being able to finish a project all the way through before starting a new one. I know I've said this before, but it feels almost paralyzing. Maybe I'm just in a finishing funk or something. I hope to complete at least one project before next week though so I can feel like I'm accomplishing something. Especially with Christmas coming so soon.

My Pillow for the X Factor Pillow Swap

Quite a while ago, I joined the X Factor Pillow Swap on Flickr. With my goal to finish existing projects before starting anything new, I didn't join in on any of the rounds. But then I had surgery last month and I really wanted to sew something. Since I couldn't use my hand very well for my rotary cutter, I thought English paper piecing would be a good type of therapy. I also have been wanting to try a low volume project for a while now, something that is definitely out of my comfort zone, so round 7 of the X Factor swap was the perfect opportunity!

I looked through my stash and gathered a variety of low volume prints in rainbow colors. Then I pulled some whites, creams, and grays. I bought some diamond paper pieces from paperpieces.com a long time ago, but hadn't busted them out yet. I tried out several layouts, but ultimately settled on this one.



I tried to find a background fabric that was a little more low volume, but everything I auditioned just felt muddy. So, I used this yarn-dyed linen in black and while it's not quite "low" volume, I think it works as a fairly neutral background that allows the diamonds to stand out.

I quilted wavy lines vertically across the pillow with a white cotton thread.

I thought it'd be fun to place a dark print in with all the light fabrics. This text print from Madrona Road by Violet Craft is one of my favorite text prints of all time, so I just had to use it here. I also think it goes nicely with the background fabric.

For the back, I used this Heather Bailey light blue hop dot print and paired it with a light yellow (I can't recall the name of it now). I also used a strip of the yarn-dyed linen to cover the zipper and tie the back with the front.

The way this swap works is that you make a pillow and send a photo to the group admin. When all the pillows are posted, you vote on your favorites. If your pillow scores the most points, you get your first choice pillow. If not, then your second, third, fourth, etc. choice on down the line. I think it's a great swap idea because you can make a pillow any way you want (within the guidelines for that round of the swap) rather than making a pillow specifically for someone else in mind (although I love those types of swaps too).

This pillow is headed to its new home and I hope the recipient likes it. I really enjoyed doing something outside the norm for me.

Pillow stats:
Fits 20" x 20" pillow form
Diamond paper piecing
Low volume rainbow prints
Wavy line quilting
Hidden zipper closure

Blogger's Quilt Festival Fall 2013

Have you heard about the Blogger's Quilt Festival that Amy hosts over at Amy's Creative Side? I love looking through all the entries each spring and fall, and I almost never remember to enter any of my quilts in time. For this festival though, I knew exactly which quilt I wanted to enter: my Gradated Mod Mosaic quilt.



You regular visitors here at Pitter Putter Stitch know how much blood, sweat, and tears went into this quilt. It started back in March of 2012. I had received a ton of color wheel charms and didn't have a clue as to what I should do with them. My month in the Sew Beautiful Bee was in April and inspiration struck as I looked through the colorful charms.

I started planning a ROYGBIV quilt. My goal was to create a quilt that would lead your eye through the color wheel in a gradated manner. I used Paint (yeah, I'm fancy that way) to draw a mock up of my idea to share with the girls in the Sew Beautiful Bee.



I sent out my fabrics,



made several blocks of my own, and then started piecing the quilt together. The top came together exactly as I envisioned.



Fast forward to the end of 2012 and I still hadn't finished the quilt. I wanted it to turn out amazing so I sent it off for quilting in January 2013. Unfortunately, the back was attached to the top sideways. I nearly started crying when I noticed that it wasn't on right. So I began the arduous task of unpicking all the quilting that had been done. My sweet husband even spent a night or two helping me.

Once all the quilting was unpicked and I was recovered from all the mojo-draining that happened, I re-basted the quilt and set out to quilt it myself. I quilted organic straight lines about 1/4-1/2 inch apart horizontally across the quilt. The quilting gave the quilt such amazing texture, which is exactly what I was hoping for!



For the backing, I used large squares of rainbow colors as a simplified/color-blocked version of the front. I also included the Sew Beautiful Bee label each of us received.



Thanks to all the ladies in my bee! I couldn't be happier with how this quilt turned out.

Finished Chicopee Scrappy Trip Quilt

Back in August, I started this quilt for one of my nephews going away to college. Here is the finished product! I really love how it turned out!



I didn't have a specific plan for color placement - it would have looked nice with a dark fabric running through the center of each block or something - but I really like the variations in the randomness.

I used a light colored binding on this quilt, and I think it may have been a first for me. 

The backing features another flat sheet from Target. I'm nothing if not predictable.

I quilted meandering loops in gray all over the quilt. It's my M.O. for quilting.



I had a hard time letting go of this one, but I'm glad that it was well-received by my nephew. I have a few leftover patchwork blocks that I'll be able to use in another quilt...if I manage to not give it away.



I loved making this quilt. It was so quick and I even enjoyed the unpicking the tubes part. I plan to make another one in this pattern for myself using Nordika and some coordinating solids and oval elements that Jeni recommended on her blog.

Since I'm still recovering from surgery and unable to do any sewing, I hope to get some photos of the Geranium tunic and dress that I made for my daughter's birthday this year. I've been spending a ton of time perusing Instagram, Flickr, and various blogs and I'm so itching to get back in the swing of sewing. A couple more weeks and hopefully my arm and hand will be in working order.

I just called to say, "I love you."

I was planning to schedule this post while I'm recovering from surgery in the next couple weeks, but the mister's aunt passed away unexpectedly this week - she was only 51 - so I think it's important to take time to say the important things in life. We miss you, Nancy.

Earlier this month was my dad's birthday. My dad is pretty much the greatest guy ever. He's calm and level-headed and always tries to keep things peaceful. With five sisters and only one brother in the house that made for a lot of estrogen and all-around hormone overload growing up.

Now that all of us are grown and most of us are away from home with our own families, my dad has tried to make a point to keep in contact on a regular basis. He calls to check in on each of us, which I really love and appreciate.

I don't remember when it started, but every time he calls and I answer the phone, he starts to sing Lionel Richie's song, "I just called to say, 'I love you.'"

A few months after my youngest was born my dad got really sick and spent a week in the hospital. Things weren't the same after that. He's bed-ridden now and we've had a few scares that he was drifting away. For his birthday this year, I wanted to make him something to represent what his phone calls mean to me.

I fussy cut this telephone from Melody Miller's Ruby Star Sparkle and appliqued it onto some of Joel Dewberry's Herringbone in Grass from his Modern Meadow line.

Then I fused interfacing to some of Denyse Schmidt's Chicopee Cross Square in Green and cut out the letters for the lyrics. Then I appliqued them to the background fabric as well.

I initially planned to make a pillow cover, but figured it would be better as a wall-hanging instead.

I plan to make myself a pillow cover like it eventually too. It'll serve as a good reminder of love and family and making sure you take the time to tell those you love how you feel.

Finished Pixelated American Football Quilt

I finally got my computer back so now I can share this quilt finish with you.

One of my nephews is a huge football fan. He played all growing up and in high school and now he's in college. In trying to personalize a quilt for him, I used his favorite colors (orange, green, and purple) to put together this pixelated football quilt.



I used the orange for the football, of course, and probably should have only used green in the background so it'd look like grass, but I didn't think of that until I had already pieced the top.

















I used an orange sheet for the backing that I picked up at Target or Walmart.



To frame the quilt, I chose an orange binding from the Chicopee collection by Denyse Schmidt.



I quilted a meandering stipple on the entire quilt. I've been trying to practice, but I think perhaps I should practice on small quilt sandwiches until I get a better handle on it. It's not terrible, but I don't think it looks great yet.



Quilt Stats:
Approximately 67x67 inches
4.5 inch finished squares
Variety of orange, green, and purple prints and solids
Orange Chicopee, machine-sewn binding
Meandering stipple quilting