Enter to win 12 Fat Quaters (YES you read it right 12!) from Lotta Jansdotter’s latest collection MorMorand Sylvia. I know right *LOVE*!
Here’s the Skinny: All the members of the Sewing Society were given bundles of Lotta Jansdotter’s new fabric collection to make something with. As you can see from the schedule below we have to keep what we made under wraps until our scheduled day. Mine is Sunday the 27th! But that gives you a week of inspiration of what you could do with all that yummy fabric!
To enter this Giveaway please follow the Rafflecopter instructions and leave a comment on each participating blogger’s Lotta Jansdotter Challenge post as they happen. That’s 7 chances to win! I like those odds!
Today kicks off with Esmari’s project, the owner of Warp and Weft and the founder of the Warp and Weft Sewing Society. I’m so in love the quilt she made!
It feels like it was a dream but it did happen, a week ago in fact. I was left feeling “happy” and a bit like a “zombie” this past week but it happened.
Monica Solorio-Snow of the blog Happy Zombie came to visit our guild. We ate, we shopped, we laughed, we acted silly,
we sewed. Then we nicknamed everything in between! Here I’ll show you what I mean, follow me… er Carol!
Thursday night Monica got into town and we whisked her off to one of our FVMQG meetings as a surprise guest. Monica met Carol Brown (our fantastic guild photographer) in person for the first time. Carol and Monica have been blog buddies from way back! We were all in a good mood and some photo bombing happened-Cynthia!
Friday was a shop hop. We rented a bus (Check out Carol Browne’ post about it!) and after a little hiccup of where the bus was supposed to pick us up we were off to our first stop now affectionately called “Fabric and Cheese”, otherwise known as Hamel’s Fabrics and Quilting. You see Hamel’s is right next to this amazing Cheese place, mmm, yummy cheese!
Next up was Diaso, always fun stuff to buy there and we also had lunch near by. Carol had some kind of tentaclly thing. She said it was yummy. Hey wait, is this turning out to be an inadvertently Carol Browne post bombing!
Then we blasted over to Spool of Thread where they were all hands on deck ready for us!
Next we booked it over to Little Quilt Shop in the Woods, which is very close to my house and I’ve never been… but now I know, watch out! Muahahaha!
We ended the day with dinner at the Cactus Club, where Carol Browne told the funniest story about sugar free gummies I have ever heard. Do yourself a favour. Don’t ever, EVER eat them. Just trust me. Don’t. You’ll regret it. Promise! Exhausted, we all went home only to return to the UVF bright eyed and bushy tailed for Saturday’s Sew in Day!
I have to admit I was stunned. I decided I was going to sew Monica’s Sprinkle pattern but I knew going in I was under prepared. I didn’t have my fabric cut out before the morning of the sew in. Originally I was only going to sew a baby quilt because I didn’t think I’d have time but as the day went on I thought, you know what, I think I’m going to go for it! And I’m so glad I did! Even when Monica gave a GREAT trunk show in the middle of the day I still got it done!
I love this photo of Darlene during the trunk talk.She was in heaven being able to touch all of Monicia’s quilts and feeling VERY validated!
Like I said, even with a fabulous talk in the middle of the day, I finished a whole quilt top! It was such a fun pattern, fast and easy! As a self proclaimed improv quilter, I was a little nervous about the instructions but they were clear, easy and I when I went off script, it still turned out! I never get quilt tops done in a day, ever! Look at me I’m with the cool kids that sew fast! I highly recommend the pattern! You too can hang with the cool kids! See even one more reason to get the pattern!
So our weekend with Happy Zombie came to a close. After a ceremonial passing of the clipboard (good-bye Clippy I’ll miss you but I know you’re in good hands.) Monica, on bent knee, took the ceremony very seriously… as it should be!
We said our goodbyes, gave hugs and thanks for a wonderful weekend!
It happened! Finally, after years and years of waiting… my son had his first sewing class in school! Somehow he talked his teacher into letting him do his sewing projects with me instead of doing the standard projects. They were supposed to chose between making an owl or a donkey. Yup, a donkey. He had other ideas. That’s my boy… challenge the norm!
I remember my first Home Ec project. Do you remember yours? I made a heart shaped pencil case. Being who I am I modified it to look like a pair of lips. It was kind of a hideous project, especially the left over fabric they gave us to use. It reeked with, “you’re going to botch it so why would we bother buying you the nice stuff.” Fast forward to present time and my son, being who he is, decided he wanted to make a Tribble (any Trekkies out there?) and a creature called a Crawling Horror from one of his favourite games, Don’t Starve.
Do you remember the Star Trek episode “The trouble with Tribbles”? This might jog your memory:
So Tribbles are these puffy, furry creatures and I discovered what the trouble with Tribbles are… Nope, not that these furry creatures are invading the starship Enterprise. They are made out of freaking fun fur!!!
Okay, I’ll admit, maybe I shouldn’t have held up the fun fur as a moustache while we were making the Tribble. I was going more for a smile from my son (or at least an eye roll) than an itchy up my nose thing. I played with fun fur making Christmas stockings this year but this particular fun fur glued itself to my cutting mat! In the end it was cool – it did clean up but I was a little worried there for a while. You gotta love how forgiving fun fur is… oh look I can see the seam, scruff, scruff… gone. Perfect!
With this project he also had to sew on a button. He decided to sew on a little pink button. Can you guess why? Nope, it’s not an eye. Being the 13 year olds we are (well at heart for me) we took quite a bit of delight in people asking what the button was for as they tapped it with their finger. It’s the Tribble’s anus! Snort!
Now, what the heck is “Don’t Starve” and what the heck is” Crawling Horror”? Don’t Starve is a video game my son started playing this summer. Basically you’re a little character and you have to try and survive. You have to manage feeding yourself, building a shelter and fending off creatures, some real some not so real. And this all happens through day and night, spring, summer, fall and winter cycles.
A Crawling Horror goes under the category of one of the not so real of creatures that appears during the darkness of the night. In making him we started out by buying two sheets of black felt. Felt was perfect because we didn’t have to finish seams or turn anything out. We made up a pattern using a grid method to make it large enough. My son, pinned the pattern, and cut it out.
Then he sewed around all the edges, in and out, around, start, stop, go, stop, turn. Stop and repeat. We had to make sure we got all the edges because we didn’t want any stuffing getting out, right! I wasn’t allowed to take any pictures of this part though… Fair enough as that could be a bit unnerving.
We left the eyes open so we could use them as a way to stuff the creature.
Stuff,
stuff,
stuff!
Finally I helped by sewing the eyes closed for him, which was a bit tricky.
Ta-Da!
So there you go, two Home Ec projects that my son made! We are very proud of him for all his hard work and thinking outside the box! What did he sign up for as electives for next year?… Foods and Drama. Well, it was nice while it lasted. Good thing I have two sons!
Yup, April already! What a fun month April is, I mean c’mon it starts with a joke day, how fun it that! Remind me some time to tell you the practical joke my husband played on me in 1997. It was awful, funny but awful! As most practical jokes are. Don’t worry I waited it out until 2008 when he wasn’t suspecting and I got him back! SO GOOD! Ha!
You guessed it… this month’s calendar was inspired by the saying “April showers bring May flowers”. You can download it here . What you do with it is completely up to you… because it’s completely for you!
The Warp and Weft goodies I used this month for the calendar were from Merchant Mills Five Pins Set. I just LOVE this pin pack! Okay, full admission, I go ga-ga over this pin pack! It includes:
the prettiest ever Dressmaking pins (practical!)
Entomology pins- which are the pins they use for pinning bugs (nope, not gross) and they are the most beautiful pins ever! They slide through fabric like nobody’s business!
Black bulb pins- the little rain drops are the black light bulb pins, again so pretty! I use them to group my collection of selvages by different designers.
Glass Headed Pins- not your plastic crap pins here.
When we got home from Alberta, a few weeks back, I made this mini quilt for our FVMQG show at the Creative Stitches show. Are you going? Make sure you stop by and say hi if you are!
I did some straight-line quilting on it.
The grey is a beautiful shot cotton that I picked up in Edmonton at Earthly Goods. So soft!
And the back… you can’t even tell but I put a sleeve on it.
This quilt I started in January but I wasn’t to sure about it. I’m glad I saw it through, though. It’s quiet, just like the prairies.
The back.
I’m super pleased with the quilting. I just did a little bit everyday while listening to the audiobook of World War Z.
I just have a few finishing touches on another tree quilt that is quite HUGE. It’s my FAB BEE quilt and it will be displayed at the Creative Stitches show too. I’ll post pics as soon as it’s done! Or if you’re at the Creative Stitches show next week you’ll be able to see all three quilts in person. Our guild has a booth again this year and, oh hey, I’m giving a talk for our guild called Modern Quilting Made Simple. Four talks actually, two on the main stage, one in the Gardenia room and one in the Rose room. If you get a chance remember to stop by and say hi!
