The quilt's out of the bag

My older nephew got married last Saturday in Dallas, where the high on Friday had been 73º. The ceremony was held outside, during which snow flurries began. Fortunately, the reception was held inside and it was a lovely affair.

I made this quilt as a wedding present, and while I'm fairly sure neither he nor his bride even know this blog exists, I didn't want to risk spoiling the surprise by showing a work in progress. I used the same Just a Piece of Cake pattern that I made my sister's 50th birthday quilt from last year, this time using a Moda Basic Grey Blush layer cake. Due to time constraints (aka my own procrastination), I machine quilted it myself. One of these years I am going to learn to do something besides stitch in the ditch!

Machine embroidery on the border...

And a cute Susan Branch label...

The newlyweds are off to Maui for their honeymoon...hope they have a fabulous time!

Wedding photos...at last

We finally got the photographers' images from the wedding. Well, at least Kate has the images...I sent the check and they mailed the disc to her...go figure. She did upload some for me because I want to get busy on our Christmas cards. This is the one I am using:

You can see all the pictures online here.

The party's over :-(

Well, the wedding was a huge success. I went up on Sunday the 14th and stayed at our favorite bed & breakfast for the first part of the week. Mike came up on Wednesday and then we stayed at the Depot with the rest of our out of town guests. Kate was a beautiful bride. We don't have the professional photos yet, but we did get some shots on our little digital.


The wedding was on Friday night and we had a gift opening on Saturday morning. They loved the quilt, although they were a bit overwhelmed by everything and didn't really take much time to look at it. They left Saturday afternoon for their honeymoon in Sonoma.
The whole thing just went by so fast, as I knew it would. Now I am trying to just sit back and relax with the memories.

Invites are in the mail...

So...these are what we have been working on for the past month or so. I think they turned out very nicely. The sealing wax was put on using a glue gun and stamped with a overlay of silver ink.

Finally!

The quilt top is done! Putting on the borders took longer than I expected, and I also had to piece the backing (it is the striped fabric peeking out from behind). We are off to the quilter today...yippee!

It's (almost) done!

Hurray! I finished piecing the quilt top today! I still need to put on the borders, but I hope to get that done on Thursday, and get it to the quilter's on Friday. I just couldn't wait to share, though, so here is a picture of it. I decided that hanging on the line was the best way to photograph it.

Decisions, decisions

Mike is at a meeting in Philadelphia this weekend, so I have had some time to work on my quilt. I have 21 of the 81 blocks pieced and hope to get some more done tonight during A Prairie Home Companion. Now I have to decide on the layout I want. My original inclination was to go with the diagonal, but they all look so pretty! Let me know what you think...


Number 1:
Number 2:Number 3:
Number 4:
Purrkins and Graycie kept me company by the sewing machine.

My latest project

What you say? A new project? I thought your wedding quilt was the ONLY thing you were going to work on, and get it done and to the quilter. Well, yes, that was true, but when I went to MSP to visit Katie for Mother's Day, we bought the paper and stuff for her save the date cards (apparently a "must" for weddings these days). It quickly became apparent to me that this was going to be a major undertaking. So, being the good mom I said, "Gee, sweetie, you are working 50 hours a week and training for a triathalon...I have plenty of free time...I will make them for you." Anyhow, they turned out to be a much bigger project that I anticipated...printing, cutting, pasting, stamping, addressing, and who knew it was so hard get photos printed in a square format? I remember when that was how photos came! Well, they are in the mail, phew! And I have discovered that with trying to work more to PAY for this wedding, I really DON'T have that much free time. I need to discipline myself and get back to the quilt!

Wedding quilt...work in progress

So...here is what I have done so far. These are 162 of the 243 strips (3 squares per strip) that will ultimately get sewn together into 81 blocks. I am trying to keep them as random as possible for the most color diversity. The dark brown triangles are the unifying theme. Once I get the blocks pieced, I will then have the challenge of arranging them. Right now I am leaning toward this type of layout, which gives you those visuals diagonals.Of course, I did need some immediate gratification and sewed this block together just to get an idea of what one would look like.

And while my Bernina was smoking, Miss Graycie found a new spot to nap, on another work in progress...perhaps to remind me that this sweater is almost finished!

Wedding quilt

I am making a quilt as a wedding gift for my daughter, Katie, and her fiance, Kyle, who are getting married October 19. These are the fabrics I am using. She chose some of them from the Hancock's of Paducah catalog when she was here at Christmas, and I added some to have enough variety. This is the pattern I am using:

Even though fabrics are for the most part contemporary, I wanted to use a fairly traditional pattern. Some of the fabrics are Amy Butler, some Moda and I even snuck in an April Cornell. I will post a photo of work in progress when I finish piecing the 486 half triangles together (did I mention I'm making a king-size? :-)