April + May= Busy

It's been non-stop since mid-April. First, a graduation dress, in white for my soon to be graduate.

Many modifications later, this is the dress she said she loves………..

Then, off to get the Always Bee Learning April block for Maddie,

Carpenter's Wheel

The Modern She Made Swap, pillow for my secret partner

Jacqueline, modification of Jacob's Coat block

and the Fab Little Pin Cushion swap done-

This is for my friend Whitney. She was my partner in this swap.

before we went here.

Washington, DC

Then, home, did some laundry, slept in my bed for 2 nights and went here,

St. Louis, MO

met a quilting friend, so much fun, spend some time together at a field hockey tournament, went to dinner, received these fabulous pillows, (among other things- like chocolate, which we ate because our plane was 4 hours late - hence no picture and jelly, buttons, and a wonderful pincushion/candy jar with my all time favorite candy- fireballs).

I mean, these are fabulous pillows  from Whitney and go SOOOOOO perfectly with my Tangerine Tango Quilt

gave some pillows to Whitney 

and came home again.  Then, back to quilting to finish my Hands to Help Charity Quilt,

This is for NOLA, post Hurricane Katrina, and for a change, I went with darker colors, used up some stash batiks and a kona charm pack and thought perhaps it might find it's way into a guys hands. Guys need quilts too.

 and finally, finished my May Always Bee Learning block- the single girl for Michonne,

 such great colors and Meesh, you are the queen of starch. Made pressing all those curves a breeze. 

I received in the Fab Little Pin cushion swap, these 2 pin cushions from Leanne (shecanquilt) all the way from Canada. It seems the sewing goddesses were with me, as I have a friend to send to and I received one from a friend as well. It's never happened to me before and I must say, that I love it and it made the whole swap much more special. 

The pin cushion pyramid has 4 different "faces" depending on my sewing "mood"

I also have a 50th birthday quilt done with an unexpected outcome. I linked it up to Amy's Creative side, Blogger's Quilt festival. Voting for quilts in going on right now! I'm entry number 434 incase you're wondering. I guess this would be lap/throw quilt size, not quite a twin…….

 One other quilt on the blocks waiting for divine inspiration. 

I need a nap!

May Destash Giveaway Winners!!!

May was a busy month and I appreciate all your fun and funny responses to what your favorite green things are. I'm running a few days later than normal because I have a LOT on my plate right now. Thank you for being patient. I will announce the winners and then in a short few days have the June De-Stash Giveaway open. Where has the time gone???

As promised, there are 2 winners:
The May green box of goodies goes to: doodlebugmom who said "My favorite green thing is a boiled wool coat I got a couple winters ago. I get so many compliments when I wear it, the best part? I got found it on a clearance rack for $11!"
The $15.00 Hawthrone Threads Gift Certificate (International entries) goes to:Sew Happy Geek who said "Can I say money? Except it's not green in the UK, it's more multi coloured. Lol probably my FAVE green thing is spring as a whole.
I'm international!"And because some of these responses were very clever, I decided to pick one more "winner" (a bag of scraps) to: Sarah who said "My favorite green thing is my cat Aleister's collar. It's ratty and torn up, but without it he looks naked."

Could all of you lovely people send me your addresses and for the gift certificate winner, your preferred email. Especially Sarah- I don't have a way to get in touch with you!!!
I will try and contact each of you as well and as soon as I have addresses in hand will go about mailing your goodies. Thanks for cutting me some slack being a few days late.

Has this ever happened to you??

It's done, but it was quite a shock.

Front: the 2 grays are rather obvious

Backstory: I rarely use a purchased pattern when I make a quilt. I also rarely sketch out my "ideas" on paper. They exist in a fluid state in my head, which if you've read any of my blog posts, know, this often gets me into trouble. So, sometimes (OK often), I run out of material when I'm making a quilt. Especially if it's used in greater quantities.
Case in point: a birthday quilt for my sister-in-law.  She picked the colors and I was happily piecing away, when I realized that I would not have enough of the solid "background" color, Kona coal. So I ordered some more. (From the same vendor I ALWAYS buy my Kona solids). I finished the quilt and to my initial surprise (horror, shock), the grays are not the same.

2 grays side by side
wavy quilting

Resolution: I brought the quilt to my FRMQG meeting this month and asked if this had ever happened to anyone. People had heard of it happening, just not to any of them.
Acceptance: I'm thinking the more I look at it, the more I'm OK with the 2 different grays. I'm counting it as one of those "happy" accidents.
Sharing: I'm linking up with the Blogger's Quilt Festival at Amy's Creative Side. Who knows, perhaps this is more common that I thought.

Stats:
Robin's Birthday Quilt

Font

Back

68 x 60"
various quilting cottons in hues of purple and blue, improvisational pieced, front and back
background: Kona coal, 2 tone
thread: variegated 100% long staple cotton (top and bobbin)
quilting; wavy, random lines
original design, pieced, quilted

Dang, I feel sneaky.

So, I'm lucky to have met some wonderful people in Internet-land (kind of like Disney Land, but for grown-ups and better). One of the people I met lives in Missouri and I happened to find myself there recently, like a few days ago. Whitney and I finally got to meet in person! Both Whitney and Aidan, her daughter met with us (me and my daughter Remi) and we had a couple days to visit and be tourists. I brought a few pillows I made for Whitney with me so that I could deliver them in person (and I thought save some money on postage). You can see the story about them here. In the meantime I joined the Fab little pin cushion swap and guess who was my (secret) partner???? Uh huh…. Whitney. Since I usually send a few other goodies when we swap things and since I was also her {secret}partner for this pin cushion swap, I thought I'd casually mention that instead of bringing additional goodies with me to Missouri, I'd mail them when I got back, carry on luggage, limited space you know the routine. I'd give her her pillows but the other stuff would come via snail mail. When she gets back, she'll think that the package that comes in the mail is really the goodies I promised,   BUT  in addition it will ALSO be a pin cushion from the swap along with some more goodies just because. I hope the package has it's intended effect- we'll see- or she'll wonder why I'm, sending her a pincushion…..

Whitney-I know you said you liked it in the Flickr discussion thread, guess what? It's all yours.

 Whitney, I loved having you as a swap partner and meeting you and Aidan in person! Thanks again for being such a wonderful friend.

Pillows swap

One of my quilting friends just moved to a new house and we are exchanging pillows. I have made her 2, one more "personal", and if you know anything about this lovely person you will know she likes birds.

Detail of the folded "rainbow" points secured with matching buttons. 

 Her blog is called from the Peacock Tree and Whitney is a funny, kind and generous person.

Pillow 2 is for her new family/living room and she said she liked Kate Spain's Fandango line of fabric. I don't have any fabric from that line in my stash, but looked at pictures on-line and tried to pull the colors from that line in her 2nd pillow. I box pleated the corners to go with the overall "plus" squares in the design. I also hand quilted the entire top- Whitney typical adds this detail into things she makes for others so I thought I'd give it a go as well.

 I sure hope she likes what I came up with.

The May De-stash Give away is here!!!!!

For May we will have 2 winners!

So we've done Pink, Red, Orange, Yellow and now we're up to Green!! The month of May de-stash giveaway is now here!!!

For May, in order to be eligible to win, please leave me one comment telling me your favorite Green thing. You can interpret "thing" liberally.

This month, I will also select an International winner and they will receive a $15.00 gift certificate to Hawthorne Threads. (You MUST indicate that you are "International" in your comment). It makes it so much easier when sorting the winners with Mr. Random Number generator!

 Have fun and good luck!!!

Details for the 2012 Monthly Giveaway:

I will post a photo of the give-away each month during the first week of the month- so check back often, so you don't miss out.

You will have until the 21st of each month to leave a comment.

Leave only one comment per person.

I will pick a winner and get your package in the mail by the 25th of each month (postal holidays and weekends excepted). (Make sure you don't fall in to the no-reply blogger category- if I can't get you I'll pick someone else).

I know some of my followers are outside the USA. Because international postal rates abroad are much more expensive I will be doing international mailings only a few times during the year (these are big packages and costly to send). Please know- I haven't forgotten you and appreciate your following me- I really do. So, I will specifically post whether the monthly destash-give-away is open to international entries on any given month.

Thanks for all your support and good luck in 2012! Remember 8 chances remain to win this year- Go for it!!!