What a difference a year makes!

This weekend I went to the Long Beach Quilt Festival.

Do you remember when I went last year? Well, things have changed! Not at all in terms of their offerings (in fact, I saw even less fabric I wanted this time around - but it could be that with my stash growth I've become pickier) but this time, I was there with some of the LA Modern Quilt Guild!

Last year I'd mentioned that I thought modern quilters weren't well represented at festival, and in terms of the merchandise and quilts on display, I still think that's the case, but WE were there! And since we were showing our pride with our t-shirts and totes, we were stopped and chatted with quite a bit. We put the effort in to spread the word!

Jamie, me and Latifah all loving our totes!

It was my griping about festival on my blog last year that caused Latifah to comment, saying that maybe we should start our own "modern" quilt guild and look at us now! Over 70 groups across the country and world.

Impressive modern quilters, impressive! What will we do next?!?

Scrap winners!

Thanks to all of you for your comments on the scraps. First, I'm actually not very organized at all, but moving is a chance to start out strong, right? Also, I did in fact consciously chose to put the scraps in contrasting baskets. Might not make practical sense but it looked prettier to me. That's always more important, right?? Anyhow - congrats to Kerry and Georgia!  The ol' random number generator picked you!

Georgia's getting some brown and purple (with some green thrown in!) scraps...

...and some orange and aqua scraps will be headed to Kerri!

Keep an eye out for an email from me!

Scrap mania!

I'm taking my time and being very thorough with the sewing room set up.  Yesterday that meant a major scrap sort! Presort:

-

And post sort!

I'm not great about using my little scraps but maybe if they are sorted by color I will? In any case, I have more than I'll ever use and should give some to you. Comment with your two favorite colors and I'll pick a couple of winners on Monday.  A scrap pack will then be on it's way to you!  Good luck and happy weekend to you all!

Sewing?

Sewing!

A little bit!  Loving my new work space and still so busy getting settled into the new house but soon I'll be back into the usual swing of things.  See you more then!

What I've been up to.

My husband and sister painting away! (Forgive the lousy IPhone photos!)

We went for lots of bold color and we're super happy with the results.

And now - this is what I'm living in.

Time to get unpacking! Of course you know my sewing room is already partly good to go! Will do a whole post on that a later... Hope you all have wonderful weekends!

So cool!

Jane the amazing graphic designer for The Modern Quilt Guild has done it again!   She has designed a logo for our LA guild and we immediately set up a Cafepress shop. Just a tote for me for now... but soon a t-shirt, and a mug and a water bottle and a... Ok I'll stop. You get it.

See you all again later on next week! I'm up to my eyeballs in moving boxes and paint and so on through the long weekend and into next week! Happy 4th (to American readers)!

Yellow Pop

I got this quilt top finished up! So simple and quick to make baby quilts!

Happy weekend to you all!!

Options!

I now have most of my blocks from the 12 Squared Bee. I'm not sure how I'm going to put them together... With sashing?

No sashing?

"Reassembled" blocks?

Some of both?

Or I might go in a completely different direction all together! We'll see!

In other news, we just found out that we're moving. To the house directly next door to my sister.  Needless to say, that's great! The house is slightly bigger than where we are now (we're talking moving from 700 square feet to 850? Maybe?) and I'll have a dedicated sewing space so we're really excited. It's gonna make the blogging mellow for a bit but you'll all be here when I get back, right??  We've been in our place for almost seven years so there's loads of packing that has to happen that will cut into the sewing time! I can't wait for a fresh start with a new place though. It's a cute little old house (old for California - build in 1927) that we're excited to make our own!

Starting something new...

I always love when you first see the quilt in your head.

For me it then gets quickly drawn and I pull loads of fabrics.

Usually I instantly want to get started...

... and make some progress! I'm auditioning this green as the background but I'm thinking it's not right. We'll see.

Hope that you all gets loads of sewing in this weekend!

Why is everything cuter when tiny?

We all love Bonne Maman jars. But have you seen these teeny tiny ones before??  A hotel I was at recently had 'em.  Now I don't THINK you're supposed to take...oh... six or so... but I did.  I couldn't help it.

I love them. Love. But I'm at a loss as to what I can do with them. They make me wish I had a bead collection. Are you allowed to start a collection purely because you already have something to hold it in??

They are just so... little! And wonderful! Anyone have suggestions what I could use them for?

The latest Block Party block

It's finally up!

Click on over to check it out!

A finish!

It's been awhile since I've finished a quilt that wasn't on a deadline.  It was nice. Some friends who are having a baby girl are getting this one!

This quilt confirmed for me that I am not as much of a fan of the washed crinkled look when the quilt isn't stippled. Stippling leads to a nice even all over crinkle, but other quilting... not so much.

I've been trying to stretch myself and NOT stipple quilts... it's hard for me! But there's inspiration everywhere. I saw this photo shoot with Megan Fox recently.  Do you think others are obsessively looking at the quilting too??

Happy Monday!

Whip Up Mini Quilts winner!

Thanks for all your mini quilts comments.  They are a great time, right?? Getting down to business... the ol' random number generator picked...

#32: Megan!

Who said "What a great little book! I’ve been thinking about doing some mini-quilts lately for just those reasons you mention: you can try out new techniques and ideas without the major commitment of a full-size quilt. Plus, it’s a great way to use up scraps (not that I have any of those lying around)."

Congrats Megan!!  Keep any eye out for an email from me...

Whip Up Mini Quilts

Today's the day that I'm part of the Whip Up Mini Quilt book blog tour! Hurray!

It's such a great book. It starts with a very thorough run down of quilting - how to and loads of tips and tricks. All the info you need in one place. Then you get to the quilts... oh the mini quilts!

That last one there was made by Liz, a member of my guild, the LAMQG. In an aligning of the mini quilt stars, we had a mini quilt swap at our meeting last night.

Mini quilts are so wonderful because you can try something new or whimsical or out of your comfort zone, on a small scale.  You can take a risk or two that you wouldn't dare take on a huge project that takes you ages to make.

Check out some of the great quilts from last night with their happy recipients...

Quilts made by Latifah,                 Emily,                                                                  and Lori

That last one deserves a zoom in...

On the To Do list?

"Buy more fabric" - so clever!

Whip Up Mini Quilts divides the many included patterns up into different categories.

I think the one I made fits nicely into...Geometric!

Right?

Mini quilts are great because you don't have to concern yourself with the functionality of making a quilt - you're just having fun with an artistic expression.  The book  captures that so wonderfully, providing such a great mix of practical information and pure inspiration.

Do you want a copy of this fantastic book? Just comment here and tell me your favorite thing about mini quilts! I'll post a winner on Wednesday!

Here's the run down of the whole blog tour!

6/1 - Craftzine – essential quilting tools 6/2 - Crafty Pod – book review & giveaway 6/3 - Chronicle Books – Behind the making of the book 6/4 – Indie Fixx – Designing your own mini-quilts 6/7 – Craft Sanity – Piped binding tutorial 6/8 – Handmade by Alissa 6/9 – My Love for You Background on Mini Quilts 6/10 - Film in the Fridge 6/11 - The Haystack Needle Decorating with mini quilts 6/12 – West Coast Crafty

Oh and P.S. ... guess what I spotted in the book's crafty blog resources list?

I was completely surprised by this and didn't know about it until I was flipping through the book.  Truly made my day!

Catching up

On Friday my job ended and so I'm back to having much more time to sew! Needless to say, I'm happy about it. I took the weekend to catch up on some things including one of the bees I'm in, Bee Imaginative.

Some drunk love style blocks for Ashley.

And some flying geese for Amanda!

I paper pieced these... not something that I've done a lot of, and it limits creativity, but it was fun to tackle. I used this pattern.

Check back here tomorrow as I'll be part of the Whip Up Mini Quilt book blog tour. As luck would have it - we're having a mini quilt swap tonight at our LA Modern Quilt Guild meeting.  Tomorrow's post will be all mini quilts all the time!

Handmade Beginnings winner!

It's Audrey!

Congrats!!   You're going to love the book!

Handmade Beginnings

I was so pleased to be asked to be a part of the blog tour for Anna Marie Horner's new book, Handmade Beginnings.

At first I thought "hmm... I'm not pregnant and I don't have any babies (yet!)... will this book be of any use to me?" The answer?  Yes - absolutely!

First of all, we're all swamped with baby showers and sometimes there just isn't time to get a whole quilt made, but you want to bring a personal handmade gift.  There are many wonderful options in the book that are certain to be big hits at the next baby shower you head to!

How about some adorable bebe shooooes??

Or a cozy cozy sleeping sack??

And OMG I can't handle how cute this photo is.  Makes me wanna make loads of little pants for babies this instant!!

And then there are patterns in the book that can be made for anyone - not just babies. Check out both of these bags.  They would work for any number of things non-baby related!

Overall a great book with loads of modern, interesting and varied choices.  Oh and did I mention the photography?  It's so so good.  Really - it gives the book a wonderful warm and personal feeling that makes you want to sit down to your sewing machine and dive into one of the many included projects!

Maggie agrees completely.

Do you want a copy? Wiley Publishing were generous to get me an extra for you! Leave a comment here and I'll pick a winner tomorrow morning.

Also, click on over here if you want to enter to win a sewing machine!

The blog tour is coming to a close soon, but you still have a couple places to check out. Here's the details of the whole tour:

May 3 : Craft May 4: Indie Fixx May 5: Sew Mama Sew May 6: Pink Chalk Studio May 10: Wise Craft May 14: House on Hill Road May 16: The Purl Bee May 18: All Buttoned Up May 19: Alabama Chanin Journal May 20: Homemade by Jill May 21: True Up May 22: Oh, Fransson! May 23: Prudent Baby May 24: Sew Liberated May 25: Handmade by Alissa May 26: Hazelnuts May 27: Petite Purls

Quilter's Home winner

Amber!  Hurray! You won the magazine.

Thanks so much to the rest of you for your kind words about it.  You're all so nice!

Guess what's exciting?

This is!

One of my quilts on the cover of a magazine! Eeek! Needless to say, I'm thrilled.

Quilters Home contacted Latifah and me a while ago about the MQG because they were writing an article on the modern quilting movement.

The article is great - you should grab an issue if you can... and meanwhile, I bought a umm... few copies. Who wants one? Drop me a comment and I'll send one of you a copy! I'll pick a winner on Monday.

It's giveaway central over here on the ol' blog ( in June I'll be back to blogging about sewing!! My job will be over AND the book will be turned in) so check back here Tuesday as I'm part of the Handmade Beginnings - Anna Marie Horner's new book - blog tour.

Giveaway winner!

Wow! 1077 comments for the fat quarter pack!! You are all some fabric crazed blog readers! Amazing. Ok- too the Random number generator...!

The winner is Becky! Becky I've sent you an email so keep an eye out for it! Congrats!