Last Chance! Only a few hours . . .

To enter my Grow Your Blog giveaway. You may win all 12 of Sassafras Lane's patterns!

Go to this post to comment before noon Mountain Standard Time today to comment!



From the desk of your

WIP Wednesday: Cast Your Vote

Only one more day to comment for a chance to win all 12 of Sassafras Lane's patterns in the Grow Your Blog giveaway. Go here to comment.

I shared a photo of this quilt on Monday's design wall. I was short a few blocks, so had to run by Ruth's Stitchery and buy three more fat quarters to finish it up.

I'm still not sure which layout I like best. Would you like to vote?

Should I sew Yummy 1:

Yummy 2?

or Yummy 3?

Linking up to Let's Bee Social at Sew Fresh Quilts.

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As well as WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced.

Tell me what you think!

From the desk of your

Design Wall Monday

Only four more days to comment for a chance to win all 12 of Sassafras Lane's patterns in the Grow Your Blog giveaway. Go here to comment.

Something new on the design wall today! It's the March Jelly Roll Party sample. The pattern is "Yummy" from Jaybird Quilts, the fabric is "daydream" from Moda.

Um. yeah. When the pattern calls for 42 strips, sometimes you really need 42 strips. Lucky for me, Ruth's Stitchery has yardage of this fabric line, so I can supplement my jelly roll!

I can't decide if I like the color-progression layout best, or if I should go random. Here is what the pattern cover looks like, with random arrangement of the fabrics:

So happy to find a new Monday link-up! It's Anything Goes Mondays at Stitch by Stitch.

Since I have to run over to Ruth's to buy a bit more fabric, that gives me time to mull over the layout. What do you think?

From the desk of your

Simple Sunday Scraps

Only five more days to comment for a chance to win all 12 of Sassafras Lane's patterns in the Grow Your Blog giveaway. Go here to comment.

When my mother moved into the nursing home, I was lucky enough to receive her Singer 401 slant needle sewing machine. It's the machine on which she sewed my clothes from birth through my wedding dress, so it's precious to me.

Unfortunately, she had placed houseplants on the cabinet top and water had leaked onto it, marring the finish. I should refinish it, and I will, eventually. But in the meanwhile, I wanted to make a quilted table topper to cover it.

I saw a design for placemats that used 2.5" squares. And boy howdy, I have lots of 2.5" squares! So today I started sewing them together with white 2.5" by 1.5" rectangles. I sewed the rows together with 1.5" by 26" white strips and here is the result:

If I add one more row of scrappy squares, it won't need a border. This design is so much fun, I may decide to make it my next "leaders and enders" project and make an entire quilt!

Linking up to Scrap Basket Sunday at Kim's Big Quilting Adventure.

I (finally!) have something new on the design wall for tomorrow. Hope you'll come back to see!

From the desk of your

Grow Your Blog Giveaway

Only a few more days to enter the giveaway to win all 12 patterns from Sassafras Lane!

Go to this blog post to comment and enter.




The giveaway ends Friday, February 14 at noon Mountain Standard Time (USA)


From the desk of your

WIP Wednesday Shhh it's a Secret!

I can't show you all of what is on my design wall today because it's a pattern test. But I can show you my colors!

Here is my "inspiration" photo It's from Design Seeds, ages ago. It was buried in my "solids" bin, and when I went searching for fabric for this new test quilt, it leapt out and shouted, "Choose me!"

Without a light box, it's really hard to get a photo of the true colors of the fabrics, but this is close:

The block needs to be 16" finished, and I didn't have enough of the cacti fabric. So I pieced together some cacti and some sagebrush, with the khaki background. The prints are from an old Northcott collection of state flowers fabrics. Sagebrush is the state flower of Nevada, and the Saguaro Cactus is the state flower of Arizona.

I don't know why Northcott didn't use the sagebrush in bloom, but here is a close up:

This is going to be a fun quilt, I can't wait to show you the finish!

Linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced.

Arizona is sounding pretty good today, it was -10 degrees when I woke up this morning!

Keep warm and come back on Friday to see the newest Jelly Roll Party finish.

From the desk of your

Tuesday Tip and Tool

First of all, if you're looking for the Grow Your blog giveaway, it's here!

I did finish the first blog of my newest BOM project yesterday -- but it was after dark, so no photo until this morning.  Here it is:

It's the first block in Marti Michell's newest BOM quilt, Bordered Rows. Here's a photo of the quilt from Marti's website:

I'm making mine with the folks at Stitcher's Garden, down the road in Pueblo. They are all such fun, and the best place for Mexican food is right next door!

This quilt uses Marti Michell's  Set "L" templates:

If you've never used Marti's templates -- try them! The clever little corner notches make your pieces go together perfectly!

I do recommend using Omnigrid's "InvisiGrip" on the back of each template. InvisiGrip is a clear plastic that clings to the reverse of the acrylic templates and helps keep them from shifting while you're cutting the fabric.

I "rough cut" out the shape while it is still attached to the paper backing:

Then peel the plastic away from the backing and smooth it onto the template:

I keep one rotary cutter just to cut paper or plastic, and trim away the excess InvisiGrip:

Some of the templates are quite small, so using InvisiGrip really makes cutting with them easier.

Everyone at Stitcher's Garden is so excited about this quilt, we're going to do two blocks per month so we have time to do the setting strips together before the end of the year. 

Come back next Monday to see the second block!

From the desk of your