Along with the baby quilt and bag that I sent off, I also wanted to include something for big sis. After verifying with her mom that she was now a few sizes bigger, I decided to go with a Geranium Dress, pattern from Made by Rae. This is definitely one of my go-to patterns for little girls. I’ve made three before (2 here and here) and I’m sure this won’t be the last (I’ve got several friend preggers with little girls right now).

I wanted something she could wear every day, but I also wanted a little something extra so that she felt special. I opted for using this Paperie design by Amy Sinibaldi. The little shapes looked like fireworks to me so after completing the dress, I applied rhinestones to the centers of them in an artistically (in my opinion) random pattern. Overall, really happy with how it turned out — perfect for summer!

Here’s the back. I used simple white buttons. And below, some close ups of the sparkles.

      

As I mentioned in my previous post, I had some leftover triangles from the baby quilt I was making. Not one to waste already sewn fabric, The triangles were in the perfect dimension to make a bag.

I used the same solid color that I previously used for the quilt binding as at the sides. I bought some new matching patterned fabric for the inside.

After figuring out the dimensions (I don’t remember them exactly), I lined the outside with fusible thermolam fleece. Then I quilted the pieces. The sides are parallel quilting about 1 inch apart. The front and back are quilted following the triangles lines.

The inside lining I interfaced with SF101. The handles are natural color webbing. I still had some extra half triangles and I was determined to use all of them so I pieced them together and used them to make pockets on the inside. I think it adds a nice contrast to the inside.

After that it was simple putting the bag together and some top stitching around the top edge. It’s really nice and sturdy and I would have considered keeping it for myself if it didn’t match the baby quilt perfectly.

A couple more pictures so you can see how the two sides vary.

      

A recent finish for my friend’s little girl. I had these Tula Pink fat quarters for a really long time. Probably over 3 years, but just never had the right project for them. I think I may have used one of them at some point, but never got around to using the rest of them.

Well, fast forward and my good friend from college was having her second little girl and I wanted to make baby quilt. Going through my stash, I found these and knew they were just right.

I opted to go for a triangle quilt. I find triangles to be both interesting and not overwhelmingly complicated so they allow the fabrics to show through. I opted for large triangles which I cut using my Sidekick ruler. I like that ruler because it gives me guides to cut off the corners as well which makes piecing triangles so much easier.

I cut out my triangles by cutting strips and then chopping the strip into triangles. The small ones on the left in the photo above are the extras which I used in the sides.

I laid out my quilt and randomized as much as I could. Love a good random quilt. I was originally going to do 8 rows but I didn’t like the final shape. Too long and skinny. You can see in my next post what I did with the triangles for the extra 2 rows.

Here’s how the quilt top ended up looking. Really happy with how it turned out and I thought it was a great mix of colors and patterns. Feminine but not too girly.

I quilted it on the long arm with some simple shapes that followed the triangles but didn’t overpower. I wanted to keep the quilting open so the quilt was soft and cuddly rather than super-quilted and stiff.

I backed it with flannel for more cuddle factor.

And bound it with a simple coordinating solid color binding.

      

This was a “quick” mini-quilt I made using some Northcott charm squares that my mom won at Quiltcon 2017. She wasn’t going to use them so she gave them to me. I used this to try out a bunch of techniques on my sewing machine which I’ve only had a year. Some new, some I just need to work on. Here’s what they were:

• Quarter square triangles (I mostly did okay, but they’re not all perfect)
• Embroidery (the CREATE word obviously, but I did this very soon after getting my machine so when I did it, it was one of the first embroidery pieces I had done)
• Stitch in the ditch using my edgestitch foot (this is along the black lines and binding)
• Free motion stippling/wandering using my Bernina Stitch Regulator (you can see the close up of this down below. Pretty happy with how it worked out.

I guess I’ve been dragging it out over a year, but using it to try out different techniques the whole time. Although the total time spent on it was not that much so that’s why it’s a “quick” mini-quilt. Overall, very happy with how it turned out and looking forward to using more of these techniques again!

      

Yeah, yeah, I know it’s been a while since I’ve posted. Work has been crazy and although I’ve been doing stuff, it’s been hard to find the time to take pictures, post, etc. If anyone has suggestions for ways to stream line the camera->flickr->blog pipeline, I’d be happy to know.

Anyways, this was the Grace Circle quilt for October. I asked for blue and gold courthouse steps.

I did free motion longarm quilting and loaded the quilt in the wide direction so that I could go down the hourglass shapes. In the navy, I just did random cubes.

Here you can see some of the border cubes. Overall, I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. These group quilts area always cool to me because you have so many different things coming in, but they always seem to work out. Love that about quilting!

And a shot of the back. I kinda wish I’d used a contrast thread because i think it would have been cool on the back, but you can still sorta see it