Oh, Fransson!

Pattern Tester Shout Out!

Violet's bags. Photo by Violet Craft.

I'm lucky to have a fabulous local sewing circle, several members of which helped me out by testing the Perfect Zip Bags pattern. I want to give a huge thank you to Gabrien Chaney, Heather Bostic (music with link), Irene Rodergerdts, Jen Carlton Bailly, Monica Solorio Snow, and Violet Craft for their invaluable help with fine-tuning the pattern. Thank you so much, ladies! 

Gabrien's Bag. Photo by Gabrien Chaney.

One of Jen's bags. Photo by Jen Carlton Bailly.

One of Heather's bags. Photo by Heather Bostic.

Monica's bags. Photo by Monica Solario Snow.

(Check out that pink and white print from Mo Bedell's Party Dress collection!)

Happy Mochi Yum Yum fabric designed by Monica Solario Snow for Lecien. Photo by Monica.

I also want to give a shout out to Monica and Violet's current fabric collections.

Monica's latest collection for Lecien is Happy Mochi Yum Yum (you can read about the name here) and she's helping me celebrate the new pattern by giving away a fat eighth bundle of the full collection to one lucky reader. 

Peacock Lane fabric designed by Violet Craft for Michael Miller. Photo by Violet.

Violet is also giving away a fat eighth bundle of her first collection for Michael Miller, Peacock Lane. Fun fact of the day: Craft is Violet's actual last name.   

Woo hoo!

I'm so thankful for my yams and appreciate their help so much. To enter the fabric giveaway, please leave a comment telling me what you're thankful for. I'll leave the comments open through Thursday night.

Perfect Zip Bags is here, winners, and a big pattern sale!

The Perfect Zip Bags pattern is now available in my shop.

Thank you so much to everyone who entered the giveaway.

Ruth, who wrote "I would love to win your pattern. Thanks for the give away" won the zip bag making kit and a copy of the pattern.

Suzanne, who wrote "Wow, this is such a generous giveaway! The details of your bag are so polished" and Yukari, who wrote "I love your pattern!!!!! It's going to be my early Christmas Present!!!" both won copies of the pattern.

I'm so thrilled with the finished product and want to give a huge thank you to my fabulous pattern testers, who I'll talk more about on Wednesday.

Picture Day Quilt

To celebrate the release of the new pattern, all of the other patterns in my shop will be on sale through Friday, November 11. Have you had your eye on one of the other patterns? Now is the time to pick it up! 

Rec Center Picnic Quilt

Zip Bag Pattern Update and Giveaway

My new zip bag pattern will go on sale Monday, November 7. Between now and then, you can enter to win one of 3 free copies of the pattern by commenting on this post.

One winner will also receive this kit, which includes beautiful Ruby Star Spring fabric, coordinating Kona Solids and everything else (zippers, hardware, interlining, etc.) you'll need to make zip bags.

To enter, comment on this post before midnight Sunday, November 6. 

Note: Because of shipping restrictions, the kit giveaway is only open to US residents. Pattern giveaway is open to sewers everywhere.

Another Planetarium Quilt and Two Giveaways

In my last post, I showed pictures of my Planetarium Quilt.  Here's another version that features some bold contrast, but is overall more subdued color-wise.

In this quilt, the difference between the warm and cool blocks is much more subtle, with the warm blocks including lots of brown and the cool blocks being primarily gray and black. 

The frames around the blocks are Robert Kaufman Quilter's Linen.

The back features large areas of Kona Khaki and Kona Ash.  The white sashing is Kona Snow.  (If you look closely at the above photo, you can totally tell that I inadvertantly used two different dye lots of Snow.  That's apparently what I get for piecing in the middle of the night!) 

I quilted this one in a blocky meander, making little boxes instead of curves.  It's hard to tell in the photos, but it gives the quilt a really fantastic texture -- almost like cross-hatching.   

But I'm sure you want to hear about the giveaway part, right?

Fabricworm is, once again, offering a fabulous fat quarter bundle to one lucky commenter.  Maybe it's just because I'm one of the weirdos looking forward to the approaching cold weather, but this group of fabrics makes me very happy about staying inside and quilting during the Fall and Winter!

I will also be giving away three signed copies of my book.

To enter, simply comment on this post prior to midnight Thursday, telling me what colors you're looking forward to working with this Fall.

This finished Planetarium Quilt is 68" x 68".  The pattern uses charm squares to make the hourglass shapes.  You can use precut squares or, as I did, cut your own.  Please refer to this post for more on cutting your own charm squares.

Mod Mosaic Floor Pillow

 
I've been playing around with this technique for a while and decided to write it up as a simple pillow project.  The fabric scraps on this pillow front are improvisationally-pieced with narrow solid sashing between each -- sort of like little bits of mosaic tile surrounded by grout.

The tutorial is for a 24" x 24" floor pillow, but the piecing technique could easily be used to make a pillow of a different size, or even a whole quilt.

Download Mod Mosaic Floor Pillow

My pillow is finished with a very simple envelope-style closure.  I finished the edges of the envelope flaps with double-fold binding for a polished look.  The pillow back is made with Quilter's Linen in Leaf.

 
For the fabrics on the front of the pillow, I put together this set of 12 fat quarters in citrus colors and gray.  (I especially love that Alexander Henry Thea!)  12 fat quarter is enough to make several pillows, or even a small quilt using the same improvisational mosaic piecing technique.

Fabricworm is offering one of these fat quarter sets to a lucky commenter.  Use it to make your very own Mos Mosaic, or possibly for a Mixtape, Picture Day, or Rec Center quilt.  To enter, simply leave a comment before noon tomorrow telling me what kind of projects you're looking forward to sewing this Fall. 

 
I can't get enough of these colors!

Birthday Cake Fabric Winner

The winner of the Birthday Cake Fat Quarter Bundle is Kate Y.  Thank you all for entering and thank you to Fabricworm for another wonderful giveaway! 

 

I also wanted to mention that there are a couple of spots left in my Freestyle Quilting Class at Modern Domestic this Saturday.  You can read more about it here.

Birthday Cake Quilt and Fabric Giveaway

 
The blocks in this quilt are inspired by slices of birthday cake. 

 
Each rectangular block is made from a brown or aqua print "cake" fabric cut into two layers and sewn together with a thin layer of chocolate or vanilla "frosting" in between. 

The 48" x 48" size is perfect for covering a small table. 

Download the free pattern here:

Download Birthday Cake Quilt

 
 
The 10 print and 2 solid fabrics that I used for this quilt top can be purchased as a fat quarter bundle from Fabricworm.  Fabricworm will be giving away one of these fat quarter bundles.  To enter, just leave a comment on this post before tomorrow evening. 

This bundle of 12 fat quarters would also be perfect for a Mixtape, New Wave, or Rec Center quilt! 

 
I used Taupe Quilter's Linen for binding and a solid aqua, similar to Kona Aqua for the backing.

 
If you make a Birthday Cake Quilt, please show it off in my Flickr Pool!

Monaluna Fabric Winners

 
The winners of a fat quarter bundle of fabric from Monaluna's new organic Monaca collection are Kari and Jana.  Congratulations to the winners, and thank you to Monaluna!

Monaluna Fabric Giveaway

It seems to be taking an inordinate amount of time to get my sewing room back in order.  In the meantime, let's look at some fun new fabric!

Did you know that Jennifer Moore of Monaluna is producing her own organic fabric collection, Monaco?  I think the big loops on chocolate brown are my favorite!

 

I have two fat quarter bundles (one of each colorway) to give away.  If you'd like to enter, please comment on this post.  Comments will be open until Saturday morning and I'll announce a winner on Sunday.

Step One (of Many)

My sewing room has been completely dismantled during the past few weeks, as I get ready to paint and make a number of improvements.  The first (which I wanted to do before painting in order to get all the fabric out of the way) was to install some new shelving in my closet. 

For the time being, all my fabric is nicely organized in bins according to color.  I have separate sets of bins for solids and prints.

 
Of course, cleaning out all of my fabric meant that I had to deal with my scraps.  I have been diligently saving small scraps during the past few months and, as you can see from the photo above, I've accumulated quite a few.  The problem is that I have no plan for them.  I just think they're really pretty!

Now, before you think that I'm crazy, I should tell you that the above scraps are the "after" piles.  I did go through and save most anything that I didn't have or couldn't get more of. 

A lot of the pieces here are extras that were cut for now-finished projects.  A lot of them are pieces that I cut for projects that didn't end up happening.  A lot of them are just regular leftovers.  There are a few weirdly-shaped pieces but almost everything here is square or rectangle with a clean rotary-cut edge. 

 

They're just so pretty aren't they?  It makes me wish that I had a project for them, but I don't.

Can you use them?  I would love to send them to someone who can.  Unfortunately, because this is a BIG box of fabric, it's going to have to go to someone in the US.   

So, if you have a use for these scraps, please tell me about it in the comments.  I'll select a winner on Saturday morning!