Baby Boy Bento Box: A Finish

Oh look, I have emerged out from under my pile of house renovation madness, motherly duties, 9-5 obligations, and agility craziness to write a blog post. I thought it might never happen!

So what's new with me? For one, as you know, I have a cute little, ever demanding, growing, always doing something new, baby. He's awesome. Until it's 3 am and he won't go back to sleep, then, not so awesome. But really it isn't the baby that has kept me from sewing. It's my lack of sewing machine.

A Water-Logged Saga

A few days after we brought the Tater Tot home, a fitting on our new fridge failed and caused a flood in our kitchen and dining room. Buddy got everything fixed up, but a few hours later, it happened again. After consulting the insurance company, etc., we learned that our dining room floor was going to need to be replaced and the hardwoods needed to be refinished, wait for it, IN THE WHOLE HOUSE!

The nursery was the only place left I could lay the blocks out.
My fuzzy phone photo was necessary to make sure I sewed it together as intended!

Before any of that could commence, they needed to get the floor as dry as possible, which meant moving everything out of the dining room, aka my sewing room. So after being downsized from the extra bedroom (now Tate's nursery) to the dining room, I was being downsized again. All I was left with was the dining room table, stuffed in a corner of the living room. Did I let that stop me? No!



What did stop me was living in a hotel for two weeks and then basically having to move back in to our own house. With a baby, agility classes two nights a week, competing on most weekends, not to mention, my new super early bed time, the unpacking has been very slow. Plus, I promised Buddy that I would put away my clothes before I unpacked my sewing stuff. Silly me.

What's a Girl To Do?

Get out a needle and thread, of course. I had decided that I wanted to hand sew the binding on my Bento Box quilt. I thought it would be a good project to keep me busy while we lived at the hotel, but I just didn't feel like it.

It had been sitting on the back of the couch and finally, one day, I just picked up and starting sewing. It didn't take too long to get it done and I was helped along with  a quiet few hours while both Buddy and the baby napped.

Quilting and the Like

I knew that I wanted to keep the quilting somewhat simple, no plans to tackle FMQ here. However, I didn't want to just to straight lines either. I decided to do a zig-zag pattern, using the squares as my guide. Hooray! No marking. Shortly after starting, I regretted it. There was A LOT of stopping and turning the quilt. I didn't have to push it all the way through the machine, but the process was SSLLOOWW. Since there was no turning back, I forged on.

It is difficult to quilt with the table butted up against the wall, but I made it work!

I love how this quilt turned out. Especially since it was a quilt that was never really meant to be. Originally, I was going to make a small stroller sized quilt with the scraps from my nursery sewing. I realized the backing I was planning on using was too small. So I was going to use a piece of fabric originally bought for the back of the Bizzy Kid Quilt. Then I decided on the Bento Box pattern and THAT was too small AND I didn't have enough scraps. Fabric Depot always seems to benefit from my poorly laid quilting plans! I am so glad that I saw the vision through. This quilt has that scrappy but modern vibe that I love!

It is listed for sale in my Etsy shop. And now, a gratuitous number of photos. It was fun to actually have a crib to photograph a baby quilt on!

Now to unpack my sewing machine so that I can get on to my next adventure!

Craft Show Quilt Finishes

Four Quilts!

That's right, I finished four new quilts for the craft show.  Most of them you will recognize from here and here, then there is one that just sort of snuck itself in there.  They are all for sale in my Etsy shop, so if you see one that you just have to have, you can!

Elephant Quilt

I am beyond tickled with how this one turned out!  After so much hymning and hawing over how to quilt it, I ended up going with "organic" straight line quilting roughly 3/4" apart.  Despite the density, it is actually some of the easiest quilting I have done.  Not marking anything helps make it easy plus the fact that you aren't actually trying to get the lines straight!

The quilting just adds so much to this simple design!

Chevron Quilt

I think I have a thing about not being overly thrilled with blocks and quilt tops.  I have to say, for all my foot stomping, this one came out darn cute.  I ended up leaving the quilting minimal and only adding a few additional lines in some of the white zig-zags.

Granny Square Quilt

I love this quilt.  I came together just like I was hoping it would.  This was the first time that I have ever stitched binding to a quilt completely by machine and I am very pleased with the results.  I did simple diagonal quilting lines, pretty widely spaced and used a lilac colored thread.

You can almost see the zig-zag stitch that I used to attach the binding to the front.
I was hoping that if things were just a bit off, the stitches on the back would get
 lost in the pile of the fabric. Check!

Do you see my cute little tag at the top?  They came out very much to my liking.

Briar Rose Plus Quilt

I was pretty excited while I was putting this quilt together but it didn't really turn out like I was hoping.  I wish that I squared the top up a bit before sewing the backing on and I am thinking that it probably needed at least a mini border.  The minky blankets don't have binding which takes away that nice, unifying edge.  When I edge stitched the whole thing that certainly helped, but still isn't quite enough in my mind.  At any rate, I love the fabrics and the fun plus design, so I am still happy with it.

Which one is your favorite?

Unfinished Business

A Confession of Sorts

The idea of starting a super awesome and fun brand new quilt for me is very tantalizing.  However, fresh off the finish of my second Lisa Lam Diaper Bag, I have found myself wanting to continue the high of finishing things.  As a result I have been eyeballing my pile of unfinished quilts.  I have quite a large pile of unfinished quilt tops and blocks.  For hopes that public declaration will spur me to action here is a complete list with photos of the current state of progress:

Mom quilt

I started this for my mom well over a year ago.

Excuse:
I don't have the skills to finish it the way I want

I really want to learn how to do free motion quilting and am close to working up the nerve to try.  I want to work on something small first, so I may take some of my Jitterbug blocks and practice on those.  They would make cute pillows, even with sub-par quilting, they themselves are sub par afterall :)

Pinwheel quilt

My mom won a stack of fat quarters of Denyse Schmidt's Hope Valley
when we saw her at a book signing. I stared these blocks the next day!

Excuse:
I'm mad at the blocks

I definitely need some work on my flying geese construction and my poor execution is one of the reasons I got mad at the pinwheels.  The other reason is that I just could NOT decide on a layout, so I put them down and never went back.

Chevron quilt

For my shop.

Excuse:
Just plain not excited

Honestly, I have never been excited about this quilt.  I made it only because I thought it would sell and I quickly learned that is not a good reason for me to make a quilt.  I am just not as motivated by money as I thought I was when I opened my Etsy shop.

Elephant quilt

Also for my shop.

Excuse:
I don't know how I want to quilt it

Originally I thought I wanted to do something loopy to add some softness and girliness, now I'm just not sure.  Again, I really want to do FMQ but in the interest of finishing in this millenia, I may do a tight grid pattern like this.

Choices choices.

Star quilt

A gift that is now well overdue, but the intended recipient do not know this.

Excuse:
It got too darn hot to quilt!

It just so happens that my craft room is the hottest room in the house and after the brother moved out, I relocated my machine out of the dining room back to its rightful home.  I had no interest in having a quilt draped over my shoulder in a hundred degree room.  But Fall is coming . . . and the husband gave me a new fancy fan . . .

Reed quilt

There are still two rows of blocks on the ground!

Excuse:
It's so big that I am totally intimidated by the prospect of quilting this thing!

Um, its. just. so. big.  I did take a class on using a quilt frame that is available to rent by the hour, clearly the best option for this monstrosity.  I just need to get motivated and make it happen.

Hopscotch

For me.

Excuse:
I'm mad at the blocks

When I laid out Hopscotch I realized that I was missing blocks, and managed to tackle that hurdle.  However, I also realized that this quilt is going to be LOUD, which normally I love . . . but, not loving it here.  I do generally go through a phase of not liking a quilt and thinking it won't turn out, typically when I get all the blocks done, so I should probably just forge ahead so I can get over it.

Phew.

Wow, I am full of excuses.  Some more lame than others.  Now that's over with, let's get on with some finishing!  What to tackle first?