What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

Spring is finally upon us and it is time to enjoy bright colors and warm weather again… eventually… we hope. We can at least enjoy a little March Renter Quilting Madness with some bright colors in our quilts. So I have a lovely selection on some of the quilts that have come to us this last month. We’ve got some very bright creations and some very creative creations. I am always so inspired by what I see here in the shop. There are a couple of these that are now in my quilting bucket list.

Shelley made a Solid ...

The first month of the year is over and I’m wondering where it went. Sometimes it feels like it will never end and then you turn around and it’s gone. Here is our long arm renter January review. We saw a lot of very pretty quilts this month! We’ve been posting them on our Instagram and Facebook pages, so for those who follow us on those apps, these may seem familiar. But they were so pretty, I thought those who haven’t seen them would enjoy them, and those that have would like seeing them again!

We love our renters. They bring in such lovely quilts. The one downfall for me is after seeing all these lovely quilts I now have a long list of quilts that I have to make now. I don’t know if it’s the colors or the piecing that draws my eyes more. You can tell me exactly what makes them so pretty. This is a renter roundup of some of my favorites over the last couple of months.

First up in the renter roundup: A Bright 16 Patch

This is a fun quilt by Leann. The bold gray lines ...

Earlier this week, since I was all caught up with customer quilts and right on-track with the kaleidoscope blocks I'm making for Anders' high school graduation quilt, I finally -- FINALLY -- got my UFO Bear Paw quilt out of the Purgatory closet and loaded it on my frame for quilting.  I am so excited to finally be finishing this quilt for myself!  I stewed over how to quilt this one for three years, but when I discovered this digital edge-to-edge quilting design, Graffiti E2E #7, by Karlee Porter,  I knew it would be perfect for this top.  

I'm Loving ...

Good morning, Lovelies, and Happy Tuesday!  

I often see quilters -- even seasoned professional longarm quilters with years of experience -- crowd-sourcing ideas for quilting designs on social media and in online forums.  You know, "how should I quilt this," "which thread would you choose," and "which panto design would look good on this quilt?"  If the quilter has a computerized machine, there are additional questions about what size to scale a particular design for quilting as well.  My interior design background kicks in whenever I'm faced with these kinds of choices, so I thought I'd take a moment today ...

Fresh off my frame, and full of fabulously scrumptious feathery texture:

Peacock Flourish Opulence Fabric, Mottled White Multi

So here's how the "Firemen Heroes" charity quilt turned out the other day:

"Firemen Heroes" Pediatric Hospital Outreach Quilt

Top Prior to Quilting

 Ah, if only the Squirrel of Distraction didn't bring along so many friends...

So the last time I checked in here, I was telling you how I got this "squirrel" of an idea to drop all ongoing projects to make a festive Christmasy tumbler quilt.  But then I bought a bit more Christmas fabric than was absolutely necessary...  So I cut out all of the tumblers I'd need:

6 inch Tumblers Cut Out and Ready to Sew

 Good morning, lovelies!  After my little R.B.G. block detour, I returned to the cheater cloth panel that I'd loaded on my long arm frame for IntelliQuilter practice.  Feeling comfortable with resizing and distorting block designs to fit less-than-perfectly-square quilt blocks, I decided to practice laying out and sequencing some E2E (Edge-to-Edge) designs.  Oh my gosh, you guys -- I LOVE how my APQS machine stitches these designs out with R2D2 (yes, that's what I've named my IQ) doing the driving instead of me!  Smooth feather curves, crisp points, and perfect circle bubbles with beautiful stitches on ...

I played with my new IntelliQuilter (IQ) computer robotics yesterday, and I am GIDDY!!!!!!!!  Is that enough exclamation points for you?  If not, here are a few more!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

C is for Charlie, 42 x 42 prior to washing

First Big News: A Quilt Finish!

My AQS Letter Home QAL (resized, recolored, and with EPP monogram block added) is finished!  I wrapped it up last night, carefully packed it in a box along with big sister Margot's butterfly/clam shell quilt, and Bernie just entrusted the package to the safekeeping of UPS for its journey to New Mexico.  Godspeed, little quilts!  May you arrive safely and be literally loved to pieces!

Letter Home Monogram Baby, Quilting Completed

I ended up really liking how the the custom quilting came ...

Good morning!  It's Election Day in the United States, but we've already voted early so there's nothing to do about that except wait and see what happens...  With civic duties already completed and no further power to affect the election outcome, I may as well shift my focus to what I CAN control: Quilting goals for the week and for the fresh, crisp month of November!

This Week's Goals:

Letter Home Monogram Baby Quilt Nearly Quilted

1. I'm still working on finishing up the last of my October goals, my Letter Home Monogram baby quilt ...