A New Holiday Decoration

Hi everyone! It’s Cindy here. I wanted to show you a new Christmas decoration I made.

Christmas Dachshund Quilt

I started this in a class during the 2019 Genesee Valley QuiltFest. The class was taught by Cynthia England and it helps to demonstrate her “picture piecing” technique. This pattern is called “Santa Pooch” and you can buy the pattern and fabric pack from her.

Close up of Head

The finishing instructions call for you to embroider the eye on the dog and it has you outline the white parts of the Santa hat to help them stand out. Charlie and I thought the outlining fell a little flat so I purchased some fluffy fleece from JoAnn Fabrics and added it to the hat instead.

Detail of Head with Fleece

Adding the fleece was quite fiddly but I managed to get it attached and I love how it turned out. I also added the little bell to his scarf which was part of the kit. I did most of the quilting using my embroidery machine.

Close up of the quilting

I used two embroideries from Embroidery Online by OESD. The straight border is called “Snow Quilt Border” and the corner is “Snow Quilt Corner”. Since the corner embroidery was a triangle shape and I needed it to have square edges to match the straight border, I used my embroidery software to extract a bit from the straight border to square them up. I also extracted one of the snow flakes and used that randomly in the white background. You can click on the above image to see the details. I also stitched in the ditch around the dog and the gift boxes with invisible thread.

Christmas Dachshund hanging above the fireplace

The fabric pack that came with the pattern had a different border fabric that I wasn’t crazy for so I found this perfect purple fabric to use instead. I love how it turned out and it makes a lovely addition to our holiday decorations.

 

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Thankful Thursday – An Award Winning Quilt!

Hi everyone! It’s Cindy here. Things have been a little quiet here for the past few weeks but there is a reason for it. I’ve been working on a quilt in order to get it ready for my quilt clubs big show the Genesee Valley QuiltFest. The quilt show starts tomorrow and runs through Sunday and tonight there was a members reception where they gave out the awards.

There are two types of ribbons that are given out. One set is for professionally judged quilts and the other set is for those judged by a group of quilt club members. I only have two quilts in this show and did not submit either one for professional judging.

I arrived at the reception a little late and they had already started giving out the “club” awards. Just a few minutes after I got to the reception area I was hearing the name of my small quilt and my name read aloud for a second place ribbon!

Listening Through the Glass

This quilt is about 48 inches x 24 inches and was made to put up in our living room. There is a lot to tell about how the quilt came together but I will leave that for another day. I didn’t expect to win any awards but I’m very thankful I did.

We are joining Brian for the Thankful Thursday Blog Hop!

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Snuggles on Sunday

Hi everyone! It’s Walter here. Wow our secretary (my mom) sure has been slacking the past few weeks and I apologize for that. She does have some excuses like having two big quilt club meetings just one week apart. She is the membership secretary and has a ton of work to do to get ready for the meetings. Then she took a class, and in the middle of it all she had an order from her Etsy shop for 8 custom bandanas. We will show you those on another post. We are way behind in reading all your posts and are trying hard to catch up. In order to catch up we are reading with very few comments. So we hope you haven’t forgotten about us. Just to remind you what I look like here is a picture of me snuggling with my daddy while we were watching TV last night.

It doesn’t get much better than this!

I hope you all have a warm and cozy day and get lots of snuggles too.

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Tasty Tuesday – Crochet Candy Boxes

Hi everyone it’s Cindy here. Today I want to tell you about another Christmas project I did.

Crochet Christmas Candy Boxes

I’m the membership secretary for the Genesee Valley Quilt Club and as an officer I meet once a month just after our monthly meeting with my fellow officers. During the November meeting one of the veteran members told us newbys that it was customary during our December officer meeting to exchange Christmas gifts.

Solid Red with Red/White/Green Twist

The news of this sent my head spinning. What to get or make for these four ladies? I wanted something that could be practical and fun. I thought about the small box I crocheted for myself a while back and decided that might make a nice gift.

Solid Red with Solid White

After scouring my stash of crafting supplies I decided to use up some of the Christmas colored cotton yarn I had purchased last year. I hadn’t used any of it yet so I knew I would have enough to make these small boxes. Each box is made using two strands of cotton yarn held together and is all single crochet. I used solid red, solid white, variegated red/green/white, and red/green/white twist in different combinations to achieve the effects you see.

Solid Red with Variegated Red/White/Green

There are five separate pieces that I used single crochet to sew together. I like how the single crochet seam helps to hold them up too since I didn’t want to use any stiffener on them.  I made them what I thought would be a good size to use for candy or anything you might like.

Red/White/Green Twist with Red/White/Green Variegated

As you can see I filled them with Lindt chocolates too. The ladies all seemed to like them, but I’m not sure if they thought the boxes were nice or they just liked what was inside the boxes 😉

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Wordy Wednesday

Hi everyone! Yes, we are alive and well. So sorry for the unexplained absence the past week or so, but I’m here to tell you all about it. Last week was a very busy quilty week for me. Monday and Wednesday were the first meetings for both of the quilt clubs I belong to. I’m now the membership secretary for the Genesee Valley Quilt Club so that means extra work to get ready for the meetings each month. Then on Thursday my mom and I went on a quilting retreat and didn’t get home until late Saturday. We had lots of fun and that is what I’m going to tell you about today.

Our retreat was organized by the Perinton Quilt Guild and was held at Watson Homestead. My mom picked me up Thursday morning and we made the 1 1/2 hour trip south in perfect weather.

Our workroom is under the chapel

We unpacked all our quilting stuff and then headed to our room.

Our room viewed from the work room

Our room

A nice hotel style room, but with no TV. WiFi was available in the common areas so I was able to keep up with reading blogs, but didn’t take much time to comment.

Main dining hall – dressed up for a wedding

Our workroom was large and bright. With only twelve of us there was room for each of us to have our own table as well as some common tables in the middle for us to do our cutting or lay out our projects.

View of workroom – Claire lays out her project

Right away my mom and I, who had never been on one of these retreats before, noticed an unusual picture posted at both ends of the room.

The ladies call him Lance

The ladies said that “Lance” comes with them on every retreat. I believe he is from an Abercrombie and Fitch bag. We knew right then that this weekend was going to be fun.

Most of the ladies brought more than one project. I started out by working on the quilting for the king sized quilt I had basted way too long ago.

My work space

I can’t remember when the last time was that I did some quilting on this project, but I hit a wall when I was having problems with the fabric bunching up. The first thing I had to do was pick out some of the last bit I had stitched and start over. I’m happy to say that I was able to complete quilting the parts I wanted to and now feel better about keeping it going.

A little working and a little chatting

Everyone had a great time working on their projects and getting to know each other a little better.

Mary W. worked on many different projects

One of my favorite projects was one that Patty P. worked on.

Patty P says her brothers aren’t really devils.

In addition to lots of quilting and chatting we also had some great catered meals. We were very lucky on Friday night and were treated to a delicious salmon dinner with a side of macaroni and cheese that was incredibly creamy.

Salmon, Macaroni & Cheese and Steamed Veggies

Apparently salmon is not a common meal to have, but the caterer had an earlier event where he served the salmon and there were far fewer attendees than he was told. We were the lucky recipients of this great left over meal. To top that meal off we also had a scrumptious dessert.

Chocolate Mousse

All our meals were great if not quite as special as the salmon with mousse.

On our last day there I worked on piecing the backing for the flannel quilt top I finished a while ago. In addition to our work room there was another smaller room that had large blank walls. I came prepared with the batting, quilt top, painters tape and 505 spray baste in the hopes I would have a place to baste all the parts together.

Basted Flannel Quilt

I didn’t take pictures of the process, but first I taped the backing with wrong side facing out to the wall. Then I sprayed the backing with the adhesive. The next step is to stick the batting to the backing. Of course it isn’t that simple, but for the sake of finishing this post lets just say it went on smoothly. The last step is to spray the batting and then stick the quilt top to it. I was jumping for joy to get this done. At home I don’t have a wall tall enough to do this so the only alternative is to pin the backing to the floor and do the same process on my hands and knees. This is so much easier!

As you saw above there was a wedding held at the center Saturday evening. Claire and I decided to surprise the happy couple with a little gift and made a couple of Christmas placemats for them.

Christmas Placemat for the Newlyweds

My mom did the sewing and I did the quilting. We never found the  bride or groom, but were able to give the gift to the brides father and hope the youngsters like them.

For our first ever quilt retreat we had a great time and I have plans on going next year too. I think Claire will join me if it fits her schedule too. Thanks to Sue P-T for organizing the retreat and thanks to all the other ladies for helping my mom and I to have such a fun time.

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Raffle Reminder – With an Update

Get your Blue Moon Magic Raffle tickets now!

As blog followers may recall my mom and I coordinated the making of this years Genesee Valley Quilt Club raffle quilt. I have set up a fundraising page through youCaring.org where you can purchase tickets.

Made by the Genesee Valley Quilt Club, this pieced and quilted work is 90″ x 90″ and will be raffled off to benefit the club and the Community Quilting Bee of Sojourner House at Pathstone.

Raffle tickets are $1 each. Tickets may be purchased world wide, but international winners will be required to pay shipping. Shipping is free to any winner living in the United States.

For each $1 donation a raffle ticket will be filled out with your contact information and you will receive your raffle ticket stub in the mail as confirmation. You may check the boxes to hide your donation amount or to make your donation anonymous so your information doesn’t show up on the fundraiser site. Your contact information is available to the fundraiser administrator only.

Update: I realize that not all of my followers use Paypal or like to use a credit card on the internet so if you would like to purchase tickets with a check just leave me a message in the comments section (make sure a valid email is used with your comment) and I will send you an email with information on where to mail your payment.

The drawing will take place on June 2, 2013 at 2:00 pm (Eastern time) at the RIT Gordon Field House in Rochester, NY. You do not need to be present to win.

Feel free to grab the badge above or any images of this quilt from my site to pass the word on this raffle. You can also go to the donation page and use the “Spread the Word!” section to help promote the raffle. If you have a non-wordpress blog you can create a widget like the one pictured below to put on your site as well.

Thank you very much for your support! I hope one of my readers wins this beautiful quilt (if I don’t)!

If you are in the Rochester, New York area from May 31 – June 2, 2013 please plan on visiting the GVQC quilt show “Magical Threads — Inspired Stitches” where the Blue Moon Magic quilt will be on display along with hundreds of other quilts.

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Magic Monday!

First up I would like to report that Lily Belle is home and feeling better. She is not completely out of the woods yet though.  Thanks to all my friends for your Power of the Paw to help her get better. I know Lily Belle thanks you too.

Lily Belle says, “Put the peddle to the metal daddy and let’s get home fast!”

She and her family are all getting some much needed rest and I’m sure her mom will post an update when she can. Now on to our regularly scheduled post…

Get your Blue Moon Magic Raffle tickets now!

As blog followers may recall my mom and I coordinated the making of this years Genesee Valley Quilt Club raffle quilt. I have set up a fundraising page through youCaring.org where you can purchase tickets.

Made by the Genesee Valley Quilt Club, this pieced and quilted work is 90″ x 90″ and will be raffled off to benefit the club and the Community Quilting Bee of Sojourner House at Pathstone.

Raffle tickets are $1 each. Tickets may be purchased world wide, but international winners will be required to pay shipping. Shipping is free to any winner living in the United States.

For each $1 donation a raffle ticket will be filled out with your contact information and you will receive your raffle ticket stub in the mail as confirmation. You may check the boxes to hide your donation amount or to make your donation anonymous so your information doesn’t show up on the fundraiser site. Your contact information is available to the fundraiser administrator only.

The drawing will take place on June 2, 2013 at 2:00 pm (Eastern time) at the RIT Gordon Field House in Rochester, NY. You do not need to be present to win.

Feel free to grab the badge above or any images of this quilt from my site to pass the word on this raffle. You can also go to the donation page and use the “Spread the Word!” section to help promote the raffle. If you have a non-wordpress blog you can create a widget like the one pictured below to put on your site as well.

Thank you very much for your support! I hope one of my readers wins this beautiful quilt (if I don’t)!

If you are in the Rochester, New York area from May 31 – June 2, 2013 please plan on visiting the GVQC quilt show “Magical Threads — Inspired Stitches” where the Blue Moon Magic quilt will be on display along with hundreds of other quilts.

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Blue Moon Magic

After a year and a half the raffle quilt for the Genesee Valley Quilt Club (GVQC) is finally complete! Okay I will back up a bit to tell you why I care. So please grab a cuppa as this is a long story (I said it took 18 months). Okay I won’t blame you for not reading everything, but at least humor me by scrolling down, looking at the pictures and Oohing and Aweing and telling me how beautiful it is. 😉

A year and a half ago the president of the GVQC approached my mother and I and asked if we would be interested in creating the raffle quilt for the 2013 GVQC Quilt Show. We told her we would discuss it and get back to her. Well you know how it goes, someone asks you politely to do something and it can be hard to refuse. We thought that since we would be working on it together it wouldn’t be too bad right? So of course we agreed to do it.

Center Squares

Designing quilts from scratch was not a strong point for either my mom or I. We got together a few times and discussed the types of quilts we like to look at and searched through quilt magazines and past quilt calendars for inspiration. My mom said that she liked New York Beauty blocks and would like the quilt to have some of those in it. We found a couple of pictures of quilts that we liked the layout of to use as a starting point.

Sunrise Beauty blocks from EQ7

I was fortunate to be able to purchase Electric Quilt 7 (EQ7), a quilt design software, to help with creating the design. It was challenging to look through all the quilt blocks available in the EQ7 software to pick out the one I wanted for our quilt but I finally settled on one called “Sunrise Beauty”. I didn’t want the quilt to be just beauty blocks so I added some palm and crazy pineapple blocks.

Palm & Crazy Pineapple 6
from EQ7

The final blocks to add were the border. I wanted something that would have a similar feel as the beauty blocks without distracting from them. I added a one inch border first and then chose the “Staccato Border” and “Staccato Corner” blocks.

Staccato Border blocks

The next step was to choose the colors I wanted to use. My mom and I used some fabric catalogues to choose a pallet that we liked so I started from there. The colors that show up in the EQ7 software for each of the blocks is very different to how I colored them.

First try

I started with the beauty blocks, then the crazy pineapple (remember I wanted them to look like roses) and then the palm blocks. The final blocks I did were the borders. I just made sure that I repeated the colors from the rest of the quilt in the border and only added the white in the border.

Second try…getting closer

With the colors in place we took a trip to one of our local quilt shops to pick out samples of fabrics we wanted to use.

We liked this one

We needed a dozen different fabrics for this quilt and only purchased a fat quarter of each fabric. We still needed approval from the board of directors on our design. My mom took the fabrics and created a few samples of the blocks we wanted to use and I scanned the fabric into my computer and added those fabrics to the EQ7 design.

EQ7 design with actual fabric scanned

With printouts and sample blocks in hand the board didn’t hesitate to approve our design. After all nobody else was going to jump in with a new design any time soon.

The EQ7 software gave us estimates of the amount of fabric we would need so we hurried back to the fabric shop and picked up the yardage we needed of each one. When we took on this task we had no expectation of sewing the quilt together by ourselves. We chose paper pieced blocks for the quilt since they would allow for the most accuracy when sewn by many different people.

The next project was to create kits to hand out for our club members to assemble. This required writing instructions, creating guides so the right fabric went in the right place, printing the paper templates, cutting the fabric and bundling it all into kits. We had a fun cutting party at my house (I was so busy keeping everyone working that I didn’t get any pictures) to put the kits together and then handed them out at the next GVQC meeting in May 2012. We asked everyone to bring them back no later than the September 2012 meeting (the club doesn’t meet in July and August).

After all the blocks were returned we sorted through them, fixed a few problems and created a few blocks that we were short on. It was time for another party to assemble the quilt.

Chris, Anne and Claire
(left to right)

A couple of the ladies from the club joined my mom (Claire) and I to sew the blocks together. I pinned the rows up on a huge piece of cardboard and each one took a row. I pieced all the border blocks together.

There were a ton of seams to press!

We did the sewing in my dining room and pressing in the kitchen. I have a huge table that easily fit all of us and our machines. After a few hours the top was completed! Now to find someone to quilt it. Every time Claire and I stood up in front of the club asking for help we emphasized that we would like to find a member with a longarm quilting machine to do the quilting, but no one stepped up. Finally when we were collecting the blocks in September Karen Kiener of The Cottage Quilter finally offered to do the quilting.

Quilting detail

If you click on the pictures above you can see what a fantastic job she did to enhance our quilt. We really had no ideas regarding the quilt motifs to use and left it all up to Karen.

Back view of Center of Quilt

She did an amazing job and we couldn’t be happier with it.

Hand sewing the binding while Millie supervises

Last, but not least mom and I added the binding under Millie’s watchful eyes. All totaled there were about 70 ladies that helped to create this quilt. It really was  a group project and my mom and I want to thank all of you for your help. We certainly couldn’t have done it without you.

Very soon you will be able to purchase raffle tickets to win this quilt. If any of my readers buy a ticket just remember that if you win you have to give the quilt to me 😉 !

 

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