Sewing Away in the Dining Room

 I have discovered that I can stay up until midnight if I am sewing. Normally that kind of bedtime is unheard of for me. But when I am cutting, pinning, and sewing time slows down and I just keep going! I guess we are never too old to surprise ourselves and change our set ways.

I took this little two-color quilt to Maine with me to hand quilt in the evenings. It is an older pattern from Temecula Quilt Company. It is in one of their mini pattern books of all two-color quilts. I quilted "in the ditch" and carried the lines to the edges. I love the brown cotton fabric and chose it for a little fall quilt.

Next, I machine pieced the center of this pattern called, "Sweet Autumn" from Farmhouse Cottons. It uses fabric by Tilda in their Creating Memories Autumn line. The border is hand appliqued with a vine, acorns, berries, and leaves. This is also a small quilt measuring about 28" x 31". I was doubting my ability to make and stitch those tiny leaves and berries but it worked out okay. I borrowed kay's Applipops to get those tiny berries made. (I must get a set of Applipops. They are amazing!) I dropped this quilt to the long arm quilter because I want it quilted all over ad I have not mastered the art of free motion machine quilting yet. I am not sure if I ever will, although I will get an A+ for trying. 

Last week, my two friends, Kay and Pat, and I took a three day getaway to Mount Jackson, VA to a sweet Airbnb where we all got a lot of sewing done. That is where I did the hand applique on this quilt. On the way home we stopped in a new quilt shop called, Belle and Me Sew Vintage in Staunton, VA. They carry wonderful quilting fabric and we are very excited to have found them.

I am afraid I have set my rug hooking aside for so long now that I have no desire to pick it back up again. I think I got burned out running the rug hooking group and pushing to have so much done every month. I hope that I will pick it up again one day. Perhaps when a pattern catches my eye. The little quilt below was a kit that Kay gave me. It included fabrics and pattern. I wanted to try my hand at making hexagons and this was a fun little way of starting out. The fabrics are a little more primitive in style than I usually make but it is darling and colorful. I bought a little piece of fabric for the backing last week and now I can finish this with some hand quilting.

For fun, I bought some bunny fabric and made Violet a carry bag for her little squishy animals. I also tried out the ByAnne Petit Four Baskets pattern. These are all so cute and the possibilities are endless with different fabric combinations.

 

Finally, the last thing (that I actually made first, before all the others) is a sewing machine cover and a tote bag for the acrylic extension table that goes with it. Back in August I signed up to take a class on free motion quilting. I had nothing to carry my sewing machine to and from the class. I searched for a store bought case but they were very expensive. Steve asked me why I didn't make one? So, I found another By Annie pattern called, "Under Cover". I had to tailor the pattern a little to fit my sewing machine's dimensions but it sewed up great! I bought all the batik fabrics from Sew Batik. The wonderful shop owner of Sew Batik quilted the fabrics for me in one large piece. After I received it, I cut out the pattern and built the cover. With the leftover quilted fabric, I made up a pattern to fit the extension table. There's still a little fabric left over that I can use to make some more stuff. When I was making the sewing machine cover, I thought to myself, "Now I am making stuff for my stuff. "