100 Quilts For Kids Sew Along

Today is the link up for the 100 Quilts for Kids Sew Along. I made one for a girl and one for a boy.

Here's the girl's.

And the boy's. (not finished)

The girl's quilt is made from different scraps and I love all the different colors. The boy's I made from Lollipop by Sandy Gervais. That is some fun fabric. For both of the quilts I added a couple of extra rows to make them just a bit longer. This pattern for the sew along was wonderfully quick and easy, with great results. Thanks to Rae Hoekstra of Made By Rae for allowing us to use the pattern.

Thanks for stopping by,

Dana

Foto Finish Look Up

Today's Foto Finish is "Look Up". How easy is that? I walked out my front door and took these pictures.

This is growing in a tree in my front garden, looks like something out of a horror movie doesn't it?

The flowers are huge and only bloom at night and are gone by morning, this one is already closing.  Sometimes that entire canopy is full of them, it is incredibly beautiful especially if the moon is bright and they glow.  The problem is we sometimes miss the entire show because we don't look up.

Thanks for stopping by,

Dana

Foto Finish Yellow

Two posts in one day? Yes, because I can't miss Foto Finish if I have something to share. Today's theme is yellow so here's my beautiful yellow orchid. Enjoy.

Cats Day

My friend George has a post today about Mo Cat's Day, so in honor of him and the day I want to share this. 

A couple of months ago these were in my front garden and there more under the front steps.

No mama cat showed up and I ended up buying kitten formula and bottle feeding them.

Big problem though, the beautiful Maya, has a problem with other animals. She thinks Brady is hers, so he's allowed. When I called the humane society, they told me to bring them in, they would put them down for me. Wait??? What??? Did you see how cute they are?

A wonderful woman at the pet store, told me about Caring For Cats. They are two islands down from me and when I showed up with my carrier full of kittens, they were amazing. Beautiful and clean facilities full of healthy cats and kittens.  They took the kittens, assured me they will find them homes, laughed at my worries and have permanent places in my heart. I know they have a big fund raiser coming, Casting for Cats, (almost every fund raiser here has to do with fishing), but they also have a silent auction at the award dinner. So I made them this. 

That was a Kaufman panel that I cut up, framed in the aquas and mint green, then added white. If it all works out I hope to make them many more quilts. 

Thanks for stopping by,

Dana

The Road To Heck

I always have good intentions at least when it comes to my quilting.

I thought I might share with you how I usually make a quilt. I pulled this fabric from my stash to make a child's quilt. It's a border fabric, so I need to plan just the center.

I like the purple elephant, so I thought I'd make an appliqued elephant.

Cute, I added the leaves and grass and now I need to do some basic borders/frames. I'm thinking of half square triangles in the bright colors from the border fabric.

Tip: I can draw, but if it gets too big it starts to lose it's dimensions. So I take a picture, use Picassa and crop it into four pieces and print it. If you crop it a little big than quarters you can overlap and join the lines when you have your 4 pieces.

I made the triangles and it makes me dizzy it's so bright and there is too much going on, so I added this lavender polka dot fabric and at this point the half triangles I had made are in the "some day I'll use these" bag. So now I'm making a wall hanging. I felt like it needed something else, but nothing was working. It's still cute and I give up. I cut the backing fabric and go to the machine to piece two left over pieces of batting. When I get back this is what I see.

The backing fabric is just what he needed! So now I need to find other backing (I didn't have enough of this), more batting and here he is finished.

My quilt turned into a wall hanging, I used none of the original fabric, I cut backing and batting twice and I have a bunch of bright blocks to be used elsewhere. I call my style "one step forward, three steps back". He is cute and after washing, he wrinkled up in a perfect elephant skin way. I'm happy with him. I wish I had planned him this way.

Thanks for stopping by,

Dana

100 Quilts for Kids

I am quilting every spare minute and I donate a lot of my quilts. After all, what can you do with them all? I've gifted to everyone I know who would love one, notice I said love one, and I don't think a pile of quilts stashed in the closet are very useful. I've sent boxes off to Quilts for Kids, donated to individual children who I've heard need a hug and every year I pick at least one child from the birthday list over at Margaret's Hope Chest. That one is actually a favorite of mine since Carin and Carol tell you a little about the child. It's so much easier to make a quilt if you know what the child's favorite colors are and what they enjoy.

This year I'm joining the second annual 100 Quilts for Kids charity event. Last year it took place in December and I wasn't able to join. This year it runs from September 15 - October 15, so I'll be able to get something done, I'm not really thinking how many, I'll just turn this place into a sweatshop and see what I can get done.
The really nice thing about this event is they want you to pick where you're quilts go and they really promote local. I'm going to call my local woman's shelter and see if they would like them, if not I'll find somewhere or I know the ladies at Margaret's Hope Chest would love a box of quilts.

I don't like posts without pictures. So here's one of the quilts I made for Margaret's Hope Chest

Think about joining in, it makes you feel good.

Thanks for stopping by,

Dana

Foto Finish - Things on Four Legs

I always enjoy taking part in Cat Patches Foto Finish. Every Saturday Barbara posts a theme and anyone can link up with a picture that fits the theme. Sometimes I can't play, no picture to fit the theme, but this week it's "Things on Four Legs". The hard part is not filling the page with pictures of Maya and Brady. 

Although you can't see his (hers?) four legs, this is my entry. This is one of the things you really don't want to see in a canal just before you jump in. Alligators and Crocodiles are pretty common here. You don't see as many Crocs since they are the shy ones, but if you read my Python post, you know that I live close to the Crocodile preserve. One of the first places we lived here had a crocodile sunning on the boat ramp across the canal from us daily. We didn't swim in that canal. 

Go on over to Cat Patches and join in. I think everyone must have a picture of a four legged critter or even a thing that they can post.

Thanks for stopping by,

Dana

Watercolor Quilt and a Finish

This is the quilt that was laying next to my machine. I guess confession is good, since I finished it right after showing my laziness. I just stippled it, but I like the texture from stippling, so I'm happy with the finish.

I also found the perfect blog for my state of mind that day.

Stitchin' Therapy

Debbie makes beautiful, colorful and amazing quilts and that day she was doing a tutorial on watercolor quilts.

I've always wanted to learn how, I love the flow of colors, the way they blend and the softness.

For the second time in my quilting life, I followed the directions to a T. I did need to run to Joann's, there are no quilting stores within an hour of me, sadly the last one just closed. I don't have any tans, blacks, browns or basically dark colors in my stash, at least not with flowers or anything dense on them. Joann's didn't really have much to offer, but I made do. I'm already planning my next watercolor and I will be better prepared.

Debbie talks about color values and of course in a quilt like this it's important. She had a little trick to take a picture, turn it black and white, and you'll see the values so much better. It worked great.

Then there's the grid. Debbie says to make the grid, it's important. Now I'm the "I don't need no stinkin grid" type, but I'm going to follow the directions. I made the grid, it took no time at all, and it saved me three times. So it your going to try this, make the grid!

The fun part was playing with the layout.

OR

OR

As soon as I saw the heart, I knew that was the one I would make. In my mind, that is the classic, and as a fairly new quilter, I will go for the classic everytime. I needed to make 10 more blocks, which I made all in lights and mediums.

That's my finish. I learned a lot and will do this again on a bigger scale with better colors. I'm not sure about a black heart. I think I liked both of the other layouts better, but now that the heart is done I can move on. I think I'm going to get some greens and make a wall hanging of the wreath for Christmas. With the right fabrics  it should be beautiful. I really want to thank Debbie for her help and encouragement. Go check out her blog and look at all of the beautiful quilts she has made. 

Thanks for stopping in,

Dana