What I'm working on now

I just pledged the 2012 Free-Motion Quilting Challenge (the badge for the challenge is further down the page in the blogroll). We'll see how that goes.

In the meantime, I'm working on the Harvest Quilters' guild challenge quilt for the March show. The challenge is to make a bi-color quilt, with white and another fabric that "reads" as a solid color. I'm using a white-on-white print and a black hand-dye that has just a bit of texture in it. I'm not going to spoil the surprise but I will post a bit of a teaser:

Something Useful

It wasn't terribly easy to part with my mug rug at the swap last Monday, but I was consoled by the fact that I had to cut through a stack of 5 squares of fabric to make the one block. This meant that I had enough fabric to make 4 additional blocks that are nearly identical (but with the fabrics swapped in each piece).

I also needed something to carry my Wacom Intuous 4 drawing tablet back and forth to the office, so I decided to design and make a carry bag for it.  I used some of the Pellon fusible fleece that I see used for a lot of purse projects (that I procured at the last quilt show I attended). It's a whole lot floppier than the ultra stiff heavy duty Pellon that I've been using for various things, but it seems to make a nice bag.

The bag is still missing some Velcro closures,  because the Velcro is hiding in my sewing room, somewhere.
The "front," sporting 2 of the leftover blocks from the mug rug.

The back, with accordion pocket for  tablet accessories: USB cable, pen, pen stand.

 Pocket, opened.

The bag, open, so you can see the great batik lining fabric, and a the tablet peeking out.

Well I went and did it

I sent in my information to be considered as a contestant on the Ultimate Craft Throwdown.  Having watched Cupcake Wars and Halloween Wars more than a few times, I sort of know what to expect if I get picked to be on the show. I am sort of hoping they do pick me. Then I'd have to think about who to take as my assistant...

Mug Rug Swap

Tomorrow is the Mug Rug Swap at Garden State Quilters' Guild. So I did some curved piecing and spme spiral quilting.

The fabric is from Connecting Threads; a "layer cake" pack. I stacked 5 fabrics on top of each other and went to town with my rotary cutter. So I actually have enough cut out for 5 different "blocks" in the same design (but the fabrics will alternate in the patches). I'm not sure what to do with the other 4 yet, aside from piecing them.

I also used another piece from the layer cake for the backing.

Happy 2012!

I haven't posted here since the last workshop... Because of personal stuff, I haven't really been in the sewing room too much since October. That will change with the new year. There are a lot of projects on the back burner that need to get done and I'll be posting about it here.