Non-quilt stuff

I've been busy lately, but not with a lot of quilting things. Here are some of the other things I've got going on.
A new (to me) bike! She's a 1984 (I think) Schwinn World Tourist. The fenders are a bit banged up, but it was manufactured by Giant which has a stellar reputation. It rides like a dream and has a nifty gear set that lets you shift while coasting. Love it! It takes a place among all my other vintage things. It's newer than my Viking sewing machine (circa the early 70s) and my Dodge van (1982). Sometimes older is better.
Next up: a new cat condo for the cat. We dumpster dived this from some neighbors who were just tossing it. Nothing wrong with it (no smells and just a bit of dirt), and the cat loves it. We've trained her to stand on top of it when she wants to be brushed or petted. She also sometimes sleeps on the first floor and snores very loudly.

I don't have any pictures of all the apple butter I've put up lately. I've got probably 10+ pints of Apple-Cinnamon, Apple-Peach, Apple-Cranberry and just plain Apple Butter. I think I'm done with apples for this year.

Finally! Another quilt finished!

Finally! For the first time in ages...
This was from a pattern I bought on a trip to NYC in early Oct. It's going to be a gift for our host and hostess who kindly let us stay with them on our trip.
The sunset background, water, and borders are all pieced. Then the buildings, lettering and apple are raw edge, fused applique.
It's not quite finished. I need to stitch the hanging pocket down on the back and add a label. I also need to add some very fine detail to the Chrysler Building (the tall green building) and the Statue of Liberty. Once I get it completed finished, I'll post some better pictures.
In the meantime, you can see a bit of the raw-edge applique in the picture above. I love how the Guggenheim turned out. This was such a fun quilt. The pattern is from Zebra Patterns, and she has some for other cities/states. The cutting and fusing takes a long time, but once that part is done, it goes together very quickly.

Swap blocks

These are some blocks I've been making for a swap I'm in. They're ready to mail off now, so I feel safe posting them.

There are 12 people in the swap, so I should get 12 new tulips in return sometime in Oct. I made 12 red tulips and 1 green on for the hostess of the swap.

It's a fun old-timey block. I can see them set on point with alternating squares of something. Maybe muslin with an intricate quilting pattern in them.

Mini Pantry

This is a small test quilt that I did in preparation for a much larger jar quilt.



I have tons of "food" fabrics and have been wanting to try a jar quilt for a long time. This was a small version of a much bigger project.



In particular, I like the quilts that look like an actual pantry with different sized jar and bottles. So some of mine are jam jars, quart jars, etc.



I made this with scraps I had on hand. That explains the two colors of black. I used some scraps on the jar corners and then accidentally used a different black on the background. Doh! Other people tell me it's not noticeable, but it drives me bonkers.



I ended up giving this one away to some friends. Very appropriate since they had just canned figs the week before.



I also tried outlining a lot of the fruit with my quilting. I discovered I am very bad at following the lines. The quilting on the black background is a very tight stipple, and the brown wood around the outside has simulated wood grain quilting in it. Here's a closeup of the quilting on the purple grapes.

Sneak Peak

A sneak peak of my latest obsession. It's a dark picture, but it will give you the idea.

This is such a fun block to sew. I'm using the great tutorial by Bonnie Hunter over at Quiltville. It's a good feeling to clean out the scrap bucket and use up a bunch of office paper that was also destined for the bin.

Sunny Delight

Finally! Something to show off. This is a quilt I call "Sunny Delight."

It's for a co-worker's upcoming baby. It's made from two charm packs of Sandy Gervais's Fresh Squeezed line of fabric. This line of fabric has been out for awhile so I happened upon the charm packs on the clearance rack at a local quilt store. It is very bright, very loud, and very happy. Reminds me of Florida. You can see the great citrus prints in this picture:

It's a simple disappearing 9-patch pattern. I put the charm squares together into a very large 9-patch block and then went at cutting and rearranging. The resulting quilt is about 35"x35".

The quilting is just an allover meander. Nothing fancy, but it helped it wash up into a gorgeous, crinkly quilt. You can see the backing is from the same line of fabric.

Row Robin Swap - Sudi Laura's Row

Next up this weekend was a row for Sudi Laura. She wanted an alphabet quilt. Her first row is still with the previous person in the rotation, but I went ahead and started her row. I was scheduled for the letters F-J. Here it is (pinned badly against the neighbor's fence).

Here's a closeup of some of my favorite fabric. I just love this pink fern fabric. I have a pretty big piece of yardage of it, and this was a perfect opportunity to use some of it up.

This was a fun row to work on because there wasn't a lot of preplanning (other than choosing the fabric out of my stash). I just went at it making wonky letters. It was a bit hard to adjust the size up and make bigger letters (this row is 12" tall, I think) but it came out pretty well, I think.