Okay, here’s a question. Last Thursday was my birthday, and my in-laws gave me a new quilting book. Unfortunatly, I already own it, and it’s not returnable. Here’s what I’m thinking though: If anyone is interested in trading me either a book, fabric, or just goodies of any kind, I’d be willing to give away my book. It’s the Encyclopedia of Classic Quilt Patterns. If you’re interested, let me know and maybe we can work out a trade.
I wish I had some new, exciting work to show you all about, but recently I’ve just been out of it. Between feeling lousy from allergies, having crappy weather bum me out, and realizing today is my 2 year anniversary of graduating from college and still not doing what I had planned on doing, I’ve not gotten much of anything done. I’m hoping to have the rest of the Wedding Quilt done by the end of May (mainly so I don’t have to work on it during the summer months in a house with no air conditioning!) and I had thought that I’d have no problem with that timeline, but everytime I sit down to quilt lately, I’m just not able to get much done. It’s making me feel so lazy–I hate it!
We have started a major project in the house though. We began working on our kitchen renovation, and it already looks different. The previous owners of the house loved wood panneling, even in the kitchen. Two of the four walls were panneled, along with the cabinets. We took down all of the panneling on the walls (not on the cabinets, since those are all just going to come down in one big piece) and Ben took down the drywall on one wall. We’re replacing drywall on both of the walls that will have cabinets on them in the final project. It’s been a huge mess though–our stove is sitting in the middle of the kitchen, there’s dust everywhere, wires haning out of an unfinished wall, and scummy, dirty walls that they hung panneling over without cleaning first–yuck!

Kitchen, Minus One Wall

Isn’t that yellow awful?!? It smelled so very, very badly when the panneling revealed those walls. It’s going to be a long couple of months, while we wait and piece the kitchen together ourselves. We’re looking forward to what all of our hard work gets us, but ugh–it’s not the greatest now!
A Work In Progress

I just realized it’s Hip To Piece Square’s birthday today! I’ve somehow made it a year talking about not much more than just quilts and quilting. Are you guys still really still interested in reading about this stuff?? Anyway, here’s to another year of quilt talk! I can’t tell you how much fun it’s been for me to keep this up–I’ve loved getting to know quilters and crafters from all across the country. You all make writing this blog a lot of fun. Thanks to everyone who’s read for the past year, and I look forward to talking to all of you who haven’t posted yet–I love hearing what people think of what I’m doing and what people are doing in their own art.

A quick post otherwise: this past week I took a little break from quilting one day to make my friend, Kate, a little gift. I used wool felt (which I think is just the most fun stuff ever) and put together a little pouch.



orange pouch

It seems like everyone is making these pouches lately, and I thought I try one for myself. I have to say, that little zipper is kinda tricky! I hand stiched it in, and it seemed alright to do. Hopefully it won’t fall apart on her once she gets it though.

And if you aren’t on the receiving end of a wedding quilt by me, click on to see the quilting in progress!

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I decided to wear my quilter geek flag proudly this weekend and went to a quilt show. I have to admit, I really had a lot of fun. Most of the quilts were really traditional with the traditional quilting colors, but there were a few unique ones in the mix too. Overall, I think my favorite though was this one though:

Tiny Strips Quilt

It’s just a small part of it, but the pattern was amazing! On first look it just looks like a “t,” with angled edges, but each of the t’s were hand pieced with 36 individual strips, probably no more than 1/4 inch wide. It was really very cool. Plus it was one of the few quilts hand pieced and quilted there. The handquilters were really pretty underrepresented, which made me pretty bummed. I was hoping to see more of that.
As far as my own quilting goes, I’m hoping to start quilting the wedding quilt today. I basted the quilt together last night, so as soon as I can get the quilting pattern mapped out on part of it, I’ll get to work. As soon as there’s something to show, I’ll post a picture!