I managed a second finish last week. I cannot tell you how good it feels to be so productive!

This sweet baby quilt top was finished back in January and it has been sitting in the studio awaiting quilting ever since. Because it is small, I decided to spray baste it. I was not happy with the basting so it sat, waiting for me to take it apart and re-baste with pins. When I picked it up a couple of weeks ago and put it in the to-do pile, I took a second look at the basting and decided to go for it without re-basting. And it worked great!

The fabrics are mostly Shelburne Falls by Denyse Schmidt with a few other pink prints thrown in. I immediately fell in love with the soft, but not washed out pastels of these fabrics, especially since they are grounded with navy. Perfection! The solids came from Pink Chalk Fabrics. I will say it again and again: I LOVE that they take the time to match solids to prints and share that information. Thank you, Kathy and team! I cut the equilateral triangles using the GO! cutter by Accuquilt. Fast and easy, just the way I like it. The sewing took a little time - all those short seams! - but I managed it in a few spurts. Sometimes I think that I should have added more triangles - maybe next time.

I quilted it using straight lines, keeping the edge of my walking foot lined up with the seams. This made for some very simple, very fast quilting - it took me about an hour to quilt the whole thing! Truly! Hand stitching the binding took longer than that. The finished quilt measures 32" x 42" unwashed. Like the Creamsicle Quilt, this one will go to our church/school carnival and be raffled off.

Speaking of which, I wish I knew how to get raffle tickets into the hands of those of you that have expressed interest, but I just don't think it is possible. I will do some checking, though, and if there is a way, I will let you know.

Back in a day or so with another finish AND a reading list at some point this week, too. See you then!

When it comes to naming quilts, I'm often stumped. This one, though, was easy. All that orange and white? Creamsicle! Never mind that I had to explain what a creamsicle is to my children. Don't worry - a trip to the grocery is planned for later today so I can remedy the missed opportunities of their young taste buds.

As I mentioned earlier this week, I pieced this quilt top in 2008. Crazy, right? I am not sure why I didn't quilt it sooner. It's been shuffled around through many studio clean outs and has lingered in the to-do pile. I am glad that I finally got around to finishing it. It's cheerful and happy and very orange.

The top is obviously influenced by Denyse Schmidt, in particular the Hop, Skip & A Jump quilt in her first book, Denyse Schmidt Quilts. I did not follow her pattern, but rather just sliced up a bunch of white fabric into strips and pieced them with similar strips in orange prints. When I look back at the top, I am so happy to see some of my very favorite fabrics - Flea Market Fancy, Katie Jump Rope, some Heather Ross stripe, a favorite Alexander Henry floral, those Japanese elephants...I could go on. These fabrics were among the first ones in my stash - the ones I built it around and, in a way, this quilt is a bit of a time capsule back to that summer when my girls were 8 and 6. I vividly remember sitting on the carpet just outside the door to my original walk-in closet sewing room, cutting fabric while they played in the room adjacent. In so many ways, it does not seem like six years ago.

I pieced the backing from a large piece of orange and white check shirting fabric that was in my stash. I added the Amy Butler floral and the piece of Katie Jump Rope. While I did hesitate before cutting that particular Denyse print, I didn't let myself get overly sentimental. If there is one thing that I am taking away from this quilt is that I need to use the fabric that I love instead of letting it sit on the shelves.

The quilting is simple lines and in keeping with the look of the quilt, they are not at all measured out and not at all straight. This made the actual quilting fast and rather mindless which is exactly what I needed this past weekend. The binding is an orange Kona from my stash and I even pieced the batting from scraps, making this quilt entirely from what I had on hand. I love it when I can do that.

It measures 46.5" x 50" after washing - a nice lap quilt. I am donating it our church/school carnival where it will be raffled off in July.

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This post includes affliate links. And thank you, Jane, for always volunteering to hold my quilts.

Newton's First Law of Motion: Inertia. A body at rest stays at rest. A body in motion tends to stay in motion.

This weekend I got stuff done.

I quilted this triangle quilt and stitched the binding to the front.

This improv quilt came back from the long arm quilter earlier in the week, so naturally, it got a binding sewn to the front, too.

While cleaning out the studio, I decided to finally quilt this orange and white top that I made way, way back in 2008. About time, huh? I pieced the back, sandwiched it, quilted it up, and attached the binding to the front.

Needless to say, there will be a lot of hand stitching bindings in the evenings this week. I'm looking forward to it.

The remainder of my Pacific Crest blocks were pieced, too. So maybe there will be another quilt top by the end of next weekend?

I'm on a roll, people. No stopping now.

Hello!

I disappeared. I didn't mean to, but life happens. Thank you to all that checked in to make sure that I am ok - I am! It's just been a crazy few weeks...

Jane graduated from 8th grade. So. Hard. To. Believe. And still, so right, you know?

I altered my painted portrait dress and wore it out. I love this pattern. There will be more. And more. And then probably even more.

I had my annual colonoscopy (I have ulcerative colitis). TMI? Probably. But, I had a lot (understatement) of anxiety leading up to it as my last two scopes were only so-so - not really bad, but not great. This time all was better than it has been in years. I am thankful and relieved and happy and will continue to take my meds and eat healthy and all that.

We packed up and left town for Mexico on Kate's last day of school. It was a great way to start the summer.

While gone, Fatty and I both suffered from food poisoning. That put a little damper on the trip, but it was still good to get away.

I read 10 books on vacation. TEN.

And my MacBook crapped out. It couldn't be fixed. Insert sad face here.

Two days after we returned home, I took a great class with Quilt Dad, John Adams. It was fun and I am super excited about how my quilt is coming together. It's Pacific Crest, the cover quilt from John's new book, Beyond Neutral, (affiliate link) which is A-MAZ-ING.

When I came home from sewing all day, there were flowers for me for Father's Day. Fatty is the best, I tell you.

My new computer arrived earlier this week. It is shiny and fast - yay!

I didn't turn it on until I cleaned the entire studio. It took 3 days, but it is also looking shiny, so there's that.

And now I am going to pay the bills and then get back to making things.

See you around.