Q3 - Ikea ZOO finished

Time to tick something from my list! Yipee! Not only this Ikea ZOO quilt is on my Q3 list but I made it my July's goal as well. Nothing gets me motivated like a deadline.

It wasn't smooth ride though. I wanted to do some loose FMQ square on it but I only managed very small scale and I was not happy with it. So I needed something else. I draw quick sketch in paint to discuss with my quilting friend. She liked it and encouraged me to do it with white thread just like the drawing. I call it frames. There is less on the quilt but you get the idea.

I used masking tape to mark the frames. It has just the right width.

I added some bright green for the binding. As I wrote in previous post I leave the polar fleece on and trim off once the binding is on. That means you have to sew the binding on front. As I used machine binding for this one, it left line all around the quilt which I'm pretty fine with.

My regular quilt holder was not available so I asked my girl to take the pics. We took the quilt to near field of sunflowers. You can see they are almost gone. We had to go where the field begins. There were still some pretty ones. I must admit I'm not the best quilt holder as my girl was not giving me any instructions. It was rather me yelling "hurry up, do one more the wind is not blowing" :-)

I'm glad it is done. It is just small size 59x52". I do not have that feeling that this is the best quilt I have ever made but it will no longer bother me. The backing is pretty snuggly though. I don't even have a song name for this one. Or maybe: Animals by Martin Garrix. I assume you don't check the lyrics, LOL.

Linking up with TGIFF and Crazy mom quilts

  

Making progress

Are you taking part in Orange Peel QAL? If yes, it is time to link up your progress at midway linky party.
I settled on peels placement and picked my pearl cotton for hand quilting. I'm not making a quilt. This is cushion to become.

While waiting in line for my ID renew I made great progress on crochet project you all probably forgot I'm making. I have a thing or two for house theme. This one is from local crafty magazine.

What I really needed to work on was my July's goal. I felt like I'm running out of time and I was also running out of thread. I got new one and I actually finished the whole thing. Yay! Well I tell you all about it once I take some pictures during daylight.

While sewing with polar fleece I recommend sewing the binding on and trim afterwards. It doesn't stretch and does not create any puckers or messy corners.

Linking up with      

Square mode

It seems I'm a bit in square mode. Isn't that funny when I said I'm not really a square person. I proudly present 330 squares. Finished size is 60x40cm and I started with 4cm squares. It is the most artsy thing I have ever done. There is a meaning behind and it is not just a B&W project to me.

I plan on doing some more squares so I have pretty new ironing board 55cm square which I used for the layout setting.

I haven't used any grid and my fusible interfacing is in one piece. Oh you want to know meaning behind. There are two versions actually. As I added a bit of color it is about life not being just B&W. Plus I like to listen to music when I create and the lyrics of Demons by Imagine Dragons kind of stuck in my head. The black hole is representing where all my demons are. We all have those, right. Those bright bits are the happy moments of our life.

Half way through I had pretty rectangles and I'm feeling I want to do rectangles one day.

This technique is really faster than you think but the worst part for me is to iron those seams open.

I have also finished quilt top this week. I'm having hard time to name this one. Let's just call it Ikea print.
Now I have plenty of projects ready for quilting so I better switch into quilting mode.

Linking up with Crazy mom quilts.

July goal and a BIG thing

Once upon a time I was inspired by this quilt and I started my own version. I lost interest and it was in my drawer for over a year or so. I didn't even remember how many blocks there were waiting for my attention. I only took this picture to include it in my FAL Q1 list.

Well there were 8 and last night I used up all the light blue and I quite like it. To keep me motivated I'm making this my goal for July. That's right. I'm linking up with ALYoF and so can you.

And what's the BIG thing you ask? Wooo hooo, I won 1st place in Jaybird Quilts Sew Along! Yes, my Mini Disco quilt top made it! There were 32 entries in total and I'm so flattered being picked by Julie Herman herself. Thank you!