American Beauty Quilt

I am in charge of a Spring Conference for my American Legion Auxiliary District and I wanted to donate a quilt to use as a raffle prize at the meeting.

I've been collecting fat quarters of a nice line of fabric by Riley Blake called American Beauty that is both patriotic and pretty. The florals are so sweet and the blenders that go with the line compliment the florals so very nicely.  All I needed to do was find a pattern that would show off the fabrics.

I decided to look for something with simple, large blocks so I don't have to cut up all these beauties. I wanted the focus to be on the fabrics, not on the blocks. 

I started going through all my Villa Rosa pattern cards, I have tons of them. The patterns have easy to follow instructions that make many of their projects a breeze. And since this was to be donated it's nice if I don't have to put tons of time into them. This may be a labor of love, but sometimes I just don't want the time spent on a project to take up too much time. 

So I chose the Villa Rosa pattern called Staccato. It will really make the fabrics stand out on their own. 

I cut my pieces in just a few hours then spent an entire afternoon lining them up in the order I wanted them to appear in the quilt. Color placement is so important and I struggled with making sure that different colors were next to each other and large prints were mixed up with small blender prints. 

I shouldn't really call it a struggle because I do find it to be a lot of fun...a little like putting puzzle pieces together. I did enjoy laying it all out. 

I longarmed the quilt with a pretty flourish pattern that really complimented the fabrics.

The flowing swirls in the pattern was a nice contrast to the sharp rectangles that make the blocks.

The quilt turned out beautifully and I'm so happy to get it done in time for my conference.

I hope we can sell enough raffle tickets to make some extra money for our veterans and I hope the winner enjoys using it. 

Town Square Quilt and the last Sock Monkey Quilt

From the book Easy Peasy 3-Yard Quilts, I used the pattern Town Square for this charity quilt. I've used this pattern a few times before. It goes together quickly only this time I did a few modifications.

As the book claims, you need 1 yard of 3 different fabrics to make them. I didn't have enough of a coordinating green fabric so I used two different half-yard green prints. It took a little extra planning but it all worked out in the end.

I've had the cute pea pod fabric for a very long time so I was happy to finally used it up.

I longarm quilted this with a really nice pantograph design that I didn't know I had. It was an easy pattern to follow. I'm certain I will use this one more now that I know I have it - haha!

I also completed another Sock Monkey quilt using a Villa Rosa pattern called Fire and Rain. I couldn't wait to finish this quilt. Finishing it means I've used up and entire fat quarter bundle of Sock Monkey fabrics. This is the fourth quilt I've made from that bundle and the last. I only had a few fat quarters left when this top was done so I made sure to incorporate them into the back even if they did't really match. I was bound and determined to use it all up no matter what. It's amazing what you can do with one bundle of fabric. It was quite a challenge and I now I'm ok if I never see sock monkey prints ever again - haha! This quilt will be off to Quilts for Kids the next time we meet.

Quilting for a Friend

I was really hoping to finish this quilt before we left for Orlando but I just couldn't make it happen. It belongs to my friend Cindy who will auction it off at a charity event that she supports. The charity raises funds for PKD, a kidney disease that her step-daughter has. It's a terrible disease that has put her step-daughter on the kidney transplant list. 

Each year she makes a quilt for the event and it continually makes lots of money. I'm happy to support her efforts, I'm sure it must be difficult to watch someone you care about suffer. Hopefully the transplant will happen in time to save her step daughter.

I used a feather pattern for the pantograph and I just happened to have a spool of variegated thread in blues and teals that match the fabrics perfectly. I love how it turned out.

My little helper was happy to watch me take the quilt off the longarmer. He just loves to hang out in the sewing room with me. 

And here's a photo of my granddaughter Avery at Disney World. We were there for her birthday where she had breakfast with the princesses in Cinderella's castle. It was supposed to happen for her 8th birthday but the pandemic pushed it off for a few years. It finally happened this year and we are glad we got to make it happen for her as promised so long ago. 

Daybreak Sock Monkey Christmas Quilt

I've been hanging on to a Sock Monkey charm pack for many years. Then one day I went to a Quilts for Kids sew day, started digging through donated fabric to find coordinating fabric that matches the charm pack prints. It was a nice. surprise.

All I had to do is find a proper pattern to use that would incorporate the amount of fabric I found. As I sorted through my many Villa Rosa pattern cards I came across the Daybreak pattern. It was a perfect fit!

I had just enough fabric to make this cute little quilt. I took the finished top to the quilt shop and matched it up with some nice, soft brown flannel. It was a great compliment to the Christmas themed prints. 

I free-motion quilted the quilt and added flannel binding. It's a nice addition to my growing stack of Sock Monkey themed quilts that I have going.

Dancing Bears Quilt

I had 2 kits that were designed to make throw pillows along with some matching yardage. I decided I didn't want to make the pillows so I took the kits apart and sorted through the fabrics. In the end, I had a little more than 1 yard of each of 3 different prints. So I got out my 3-yard quilt books and found a pattern that I thought would be great to use with the fabrics. The pattern is called Dancing Bear. Since there are trees and bears on the prints it felt appropriate to do a bear paw type quilt block. Like the bear is in the woods - haha!

The 3-yard quilt books have a different technique for binding than I usually use. Their version uses less fabric so I didn't have enough fabric left over to do it my way. So I found some green fabric in my stash that matched very well to use as binding and there was enough to use for backing as well.

I longarmed the quilt using a leaf pattern that complemented the tree prints. I like how it looks on the green background.

I will add the quilt to my stash for craft fairs. I can usually sell a few quilts when I vend at a lower price point so this one will work for that purpose.

Villa Rosa Red Rose Quilt

I made my mother a quilt from some pretty fabrics and last week I came across the scraps left over from it. There were some really pretty pieces left. After I sorted the pieces I chose a pattern that would accommodate the sizes of the scraps. The Villa Rosa pattern, Red Rose was a perfect fit. 

I put the quilt top together on one of my basement quilters days. We meet the second Saturday of every month in the basement of a church. My quilt group may not have a very original name, but it certainly is a fitting one - haha!  The leader of the group is a member of the church and so are a few of the quilters but most of us are not. The group is considered a community service offered by the church and they ask for nothing in return. 

I finished the quilt top in just a few hours while at our sew day. Once I got it home and put it on the longarmer and I immediately got a little extra help. I think my kitties like using the longarmer as a hammock.

Some of the ladies in the quilt group who belong to the church donate their finished quilts to the church. They give a quilt to all the babies baptized there and they also give them to their shut-ins. I thought this might be a good one for a shut-in so I donated it to the church. It feels good to give a little back to them since they allow us to get together at their facility.

I used as much of the leftover scraps to make the backing in the hopes there would be no more left. I'm doing my best to use up the good stuff I have in my stash. And it was nice to use this up in a good way.

Gumbo Sock Monkey Quilt

From a large bundle of Sock Monkey fabrics, I made a few quilts.  The bundle contained so many fabrics that I started by sorting through the many colors. I separated out the teals, pinks, and purples to make this one.  I used the Villa Rosa pattern Gumbo. It was fast and easy and didn't use many of the fat quarters in the bundle. I'm going to have some fun trying different patterns to use up the bundle. 

I found a bolt of polka dot fabric at my Quilts for Kids meeting. It makes great backing and the colors match the sock monkeys. It was a great fabric find. 

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Mystery Quilt Class

Sew N Save is celebrating their 40th anniversary this year so to commemorate the year there's a mystery quilt project box filled with lots of goodies. Included in the box is a 40% off coupon for every month of the year. It was worth the purchase just for the coupons. 

I really didn't like the fabrics in the kit but I wanted to be a team player so I went to the class to make the quilt. It went together very quickly. By the end of the 4-hour class I had all the blocks made. I could have taken the time to put the quilt together while I was there but I really wanted to use my design board and make sure I arranged them in a pleasing way. 

Once I had the blocks sewn together. I added the border. Unfortunately, I picked out the border fabric before the quilt was put together.  I sewed the border on and I hated them. So on my next trip to the quilt shop I took the sewn blocks and picked out something that was a better match. It's funny how even though the original border matched the fabrics in the kit, when the blocks were done, it was a very different story.

I longarmed the quilt with a nice swirl to complement the straight strips. It went together quickly and I'm glad I finished it but it's just not my style. I plan on listing it for sale on Etsy. It really is a cool looking quilt with all the little gold specks in the fabrics.

Gingersnap Quilt

A line of fabric called My Red Wagon by Henry Glass hit the clearance section at the quilt shop last year and I picked some up. It had some pretty prints and some I just didn't understand. The colors didn't really seem to go together, I wonder if that's why most of it was in clearance. In an effort to use up what I have, I found that this fabric line would be good with the Gingersnap quilt pattern by Villa Rosa. It seems I can't get enough of those Villa Rosa pattern cards lately.

The Gingersnap pattern uses large chunks of fabric so I thought I could easily place the border print where a large print would go. I also had so much of one of the prints that it would easily make the backing and enough was left over for the center block. The patchwork used up some fat quarters and another larger piece made the borders. As you can see from the finished quilt, none of it coordinates. 

This was a good experiment in putting colors together that I normally wouldn't. I don't care for the results but I'm glad I followed through and finished it. 

I will send this quilt off to Quilts for Kids. The little wagons are very cute and some of the fabrics are quite charming. I do love the backing fabric.

I pieced the backing in order to use up all the leftover fabrics. It felt good to use up more of my stash. 

Villa Rosa Pattern Cards

Last year I purchased a large bundle of Villa Rosa pattern cards at a quilt show.  I spent a little time recently going through the patterns and found some I had forgotten about. I matched a few up with some fabrics from my stash.

The directions are well written and easy to follow. Within a week I had finished two quilts!

I used the Grand Prize pattern to make this spaceship themed quilt. It was a great way to frame the panel. The backing fabric glows in the dark. 

I had a small bundle of some nice modern prints I wanted to use with the Asagail pattern.  It turned out there wasn't enough fabric as required on the pattern card but I did get enough blocks to make a smaller version. Then wouldn't you know it! I was digging through more of my stash and discovered a large chunk of the same fabric line. Of course I found it after I put the borders on. So I did the next best thing, I used it for the back. I chose variegated thread in the quilting which really looks great in the white background. It still turned out to be a decent size for a kid's quilt.