February Finish

My Tree of Life quilt top is a flimsy for my February goal and a Lovely Year of Finishes!

(Goal post 24 and finish post 104)

 I used up every single HST cut from the corners of another project and made another two dozen to finish the sawtooth inner border...

 added to the center field with corner and center stones.

With 8 inches of red fabric left for borders cut into four strips at 2 inches each. Not quite long enough for the second set of borders, I added the dark brown tree truck fabric for cornerstones to make it work for a finished quilt top!

Earlier this month I finished The Big EZ

and MidWinter's Blues 

Very happy with three flimsy finishes this month!

MidWinters Blues QAL

I took a break from setting up my studio today to finish my top for Lori's QAL MidWinters Blues.

and watch the season's end of Downton Abbey :0) A nice end to this season.

Only a flimsy tho. Not my best piecing but I had fun with this one. Lori has the best quilt alongs. Mine is a different only because I decided to reproduce Lori's inspiration quilt, pictured below... I did change the color of the corner setting triangles and used the same fabric for all of the dark squares. The rest is scrappy.

It was a busy week getting my longarm studio back in order. Not quite finished but I did make space to set up a new sewing area in the studio and used it today to sew my blocks together.

I am linking up to Lori's blog ~ Humble Quilts for this flimsy finish to Lori's QAL.

Thank you Lori! You are the best

Easter Baskets QAL

Easter Baskets

This is the sample quilt made and designed by Cheryl Miller.

So Many Quilts, So Little Time and The Olde World Quilt Shoppe

are collaborating on a QAL of this quilt and a givaway!

 Cheryl will post the instructions every Friday, starting the 28th, on the Shoppe's new blog.

I learned allot following Cheryl with a quilt along making a reproduction of an 1880s sampler quilt made by Barbara Bucher Synder

To get in gear for Spring, I will be making this sweet little 26" x 26" quilt. Join us! 

Kits are available as well

Groetjes, Jo

Starbursts

I won this quilt pattern! This quilt is called Starbursts from Honey, Bunny and Dolls and Craftsy. Also posted on Little Bunny Quilts, as a BOM in 2013. My name was drawn by Shanna and Melissa for A Lovely Year of Finishes for my quilt finish in January. The quilt pattern is a design by Amanda at Honey, Bunny and Dolls. Thank you Amanda, Shanna and Melissa. I am looking forward to making this quilt. I love paper piecing and this will be a fun project!

Hope you had a sweet Valentine's Day. My sweetie surprised me with flowers from the garden, 2 bars of my favorite chocolate from Trader Joe's and a Delft kissing couple.
Michael is a keeper!

Also a sweet Valentine's card from Pam with a card of really good hand needles.

 Thank you Pam!

If you follow my longarm quilting blog Moonbear Designs you already know that I spent the week clearing out my longarm studio in anticipation of a new Innova longarm. 

Today Michael and I broke down my worktable to move it to the other side of the studio. The new longarm will go here, where the table used to be

We cut almost a foot off of the table so that I will be able to fit in my industrial straight stitch. 

My table before and after in pieces

My table will stay in pieces until the Innova is set up. It will give Jim and Nicky of the Sew So Shop plenty of room to set up the longarm frame. 

I did have some fun this week, after getting teased by my customers for having a plastic table cloth for a window treatment, I cut out and pieced a quilt top, pattern is called the Big EZ which it was! It will be made into a Roman Shade for one of the windows. It will be the first quilt on my new longarm, once it gets here...

Soon!!!
Now to get back to making more blocks for MidWinter Blues QAL with Lori of Humble Quilts.

Groetjes, Jo

Happy Valentine's Day

Yes, I am spending too much time on pinterest! It is a nice way to wind down at the end of the day. Had some fun decorating my boards for Valentine's Day :0) Some of the eye candy...

A few more images and quilt related pix...

Lots more on my Pinterest boards

Feel free to pillage and plunder

Hawaii

Zen Quilting

Zentangle

Had to find some Delft :0)

 Enjoy your Valentine's Day

Wouldn't this be the best box of Chocolate!

MidWinters Blue progress

Playing with different options with the triangle pieces of the blocks. I also added another color, a sort of dark coral/orange/red. It picks up that color in the blue fabrics.

I love putting Civil War fabrics together and mixing in a few other fabrics for fun. MidWinters Blue is a QAL Lori @ Humble Quilts started two weeks ago. Part 3 is now posted with sashing. I have some catching up to do with extra blocks to make in order to reproduce the original inspiration quilt.

Inspiration quilt for Lori's QAL

These are the first 5 blocks that I made for part 1

Then decided to make more and add the alternate blocks to reproduce the inspiration quilt. 

First bowl has HSTs for the dark square blocks, middle for the light and blue bowl HSTs are for the 1/2 blocks. Toying with the idea of adding the sashing. 

We finally have rain! Three days of it!!! Not great timing for moving the longarm this weekend. Hoping to move it tomorrow. But we need the rain. This storm is just a drop in the bucket considering the drought we are facing here on the West coast.

Enjoy your Sunday and have good weather for quilting

Leaving you with a funny DH found on the web this week

Yea right!!!!!

February Goals

First February goal is to finish my Tree of Life quilt top for A Lovely Year of Finishes. I've been working on this for a long time! I love designing my own tops but it takes more time to make with lots of decisions! Falls under 'The Pleasure is in the Process'. With most of them made now, it's on to finishing the top...

Second is to work on Lori @ Humble Quilts QAL ~ MidWinter Blues. Got a start on my cutting...

This is Lori's finished top

 and the antique inspiration quilt that she is working from...

I love this antique quilt and am toying with the idea of reproducing it for my project. Love how the alternating blocks form another pattern and how, altho set on point, looks like a straight set.

Third is to continue on with the Amaretto Cottage BOM with Janie. She and I got started on the next block last Wednesday, there are four of these, this is one of mine...

Fourth is to make the first block in Barbara Brackman's new BOM Threads of Memory...

 

Kathy, a quilter participating in A Lovely Year of Finishes posted her finish (#66) for January and it's her Civil War Sampler top from Barbara Brackman's 2011 Civil War BOW!  It really got me thinking about my sampler and getting that back on to my list of goals for this year. My January finish is #87 the NYD Mystery quilt top. Last night I finished quilting it so it is also quilted for a finish!

Lofty goals considering all I have going on this month switching out longarms and reorganizing my studio. It will be a fun month, once I shake this cold off!

Have a great Super Bowl Weekend!