Summertime Quilting

I love this quilt!  It's one of those easy jelly roll quilts where you sew all the strips together end to end, cut off the first 18", then put the two ends together and sew the length until you come to the end and do it all over again.  Make sense?  Anyway, I made this one in April at our Quilt retreat (I love it!  I was previewing this when I realized I typed guilt retreat instead of quilt retreat!  Freudian slip?) but this week I finally got it quilted.  I did a very simple wavy line in every strip, then an extra wavy line between every other line.  I just wanted it to have a little  movement and I think that did the trick.  It isn't the oldest top I have that needed quilting, but it just screams Summertime to me so I loved working on it.  The binding is strippy, made from a few strips I saved back for it.

Edit:  if you are interested in making this quilt look at this link:  http://blog.heirloomcreations.net/?p=1897 

Hmmm, a little out of focus?  Or are my eyes playing tricks on me?  With the aging process I never know.  :)  This wholecloth pillow is the one I finished on the mission trip this summer.  I washed it, put the backing on it, bled on it, washed it again, and finally stuffed it and stitched it closed.  It's very plain but if you could see it the stitching isn't bad!

I made this Autumn table runner this week too.  I did a machine blanket stitch around each letter and each leaf, then to quilt it I did an outline stitch around each leaf.  I thought it didn't need much quilting so I put the binding on and called it good.  But I didn't like it and it kept fussing at me.  I'm not sure how that works but it's like things yell at me when they aren't finished.  You understand that, right?  So I went back and stippled the whole thing...well not the leaves, but the whole background.

Now it's happy.  Or at least I think it is because it's silent.

I've done a couple of other little things this week too...appliqued my initial on my quilt wrap, traced off the ingredients for a table topper for Thanksgiving (cornucopia) and chosen the fabrics for it, found backs for two quilts, one table topper, and two baby blankets and stacked them neatly on my sewing table so they can wait for me, and worked on my embroidered Twas The Night Before Christmas.  Whew!

And this morning I'm leaving....not on a jet plane (do you remember that song - can't get it out of my head) but in my trusty vehicle, to meet my sister at a friend's house in northwest Arkansas.  I plan to hit at least four quilt shops.  Can you say, "hold on to your wallet!"  Honestly, I only need one or two small things.  I have a list.  I will stick to my list.  I will stick to my list.  I will try to stick to my list.

I'm leaving hubby at home.  I will try to stick to my list.