A Finished Folksy Flannels Quilt!

I finished this fantastic little crib quilt which I started and blogged about here. 

I ended up trying a new basting method, spray basting. I previously only used the safety pin basting method and it was always kind of a pain. I read this tutorial from Ashley @ Film in the Fridge and was easily convinced to try spray basting out.  

 

 

To be honest, it was SOOO easy. I really thought the process was rather effortless, and I followed her to tutorial to a T, but I did use a different spray (because I couldn't find the 505 in the actual store). I may never pin baste again.

(Getting ready to quilt)

Quilting with the spray basting was a dream. I just did straight-line quilting on either side of the seams up and down the quilt. I wanted the quilt to keep its soft flannel feel with a nice flexible drape.

It took me almost 2 days to decide on the binding. I really should plan out all elements of a quilt before I get going, but I get too excited and jump right in. I didn't want to cut into anymore of the Folksy Flannels and I didn't like the feel of quilting cotton next to the flannel at all, but I did find a great deep purple colored cotton-linen blend (I think) at the bottom of my stash, so I went with it. The quilt is pretty girly (as intended) but I didn't want it to be TOO girly by adding pink as binding, so I think that the purple is perfect. I machine stitch my binding and it is an amazing time saver as well.

And finito! A finished Folksy Flannels quilt!

Quilt Stats:
- Fabric is 1/2 a fat quarter pack of Anna Maria Horner's Folksy Flannels (the girl colors, then blue)
- Batting is Warm and White 100% cotton
- Backing is some more from Anna Maria Horner's Folksy Flannels
- Binding is a plum cotton-linen blend
- Finished size is 50 in x 40 in crib quilt
 

I looooveee it. The project was stalled back in February when I couldn't decide on backing fabric (surprise surprise, I can never decide on backing).  All in all, I would definitely spray baste again and I would HIGHLY recommend using any of Anna Maria Horner's fabrics, she is amazing and I love them. 

See my finished projects in my flickr account. 

I have also marked another project off my bucket list!  Yess!

xoxoxox

Folksy Flannels Workings

I have been busy. I am crafting a flannel baby quilt using Anna Maria Horner's "Folksy Flannels" collection. Hubby gave me a fat quarter bundle of the entire collection for Christmas an I am finally putting them to use!

Let me first say that I have been groping these flannels since Christmas. I have never worked with flannel before, but let me tell you these cut like butter and iron like a dream! It has been a pleasure.

You all know that I have a love affair with hourglass and double-hourglass blocks (as seen here and here). I had an idea to make a large scale hourglass quilt to really showcase the Folksy Flannels fabric, because boy is it gorgeous. 

Here are the flannels I chose for the quilt. I tried to pick girly colors so that this could be a girly quilt:

 (Each block was cut to 10.25 inches x 10.25 inches)

(Each block was paired up with an off-white solid flannel)

Now I tried cutting these blocks up without messing them up too much:

 (Cut #1)

 (Cut #2)

 (All sliced and diced)

 (Spent about an hour at the ironing board pressing all the seams)

Putting the quilt together:

 (Version No. 1. Notice that each hourglass block is paired up with the same fabrics)

 (Version No. 2: All mixed up)

Which option did I choose? 

 

(All mixed up! I think it spaced out the blues and yellow tones better and I love how it turned out!)

 (Blocks are all sewed together, pressed, and cut to 9.25 inches x 9.25 inches)

 (Piecing the quilt top together)

 (All pieced together! A complete quilt top)

(Getting ready to baste)

That is where I left off with this quilt. I am having trouble finding the right backing. Oh how I wish Anna Maria had solid flannels because these Joann flannels are not even a close substitute. A Hobby Lobby just opened down the street from my house, so I plan on taking a trip down there to try and find the perfect backing and binding. Wish me luck!

xoxo

Hourglass Christmas Stocking (Progress)

I have been working on the first Christmas stocking and I have determined something.... I am SLOW.

I followed an hourglass block tutorial found on Rita's blog over @ Red Pepper Quilts.
The tutorial was VERY easy to follow. It was my first time piecing hourglass blocks and it was fun!

First, I cut up some of the fabrics from my last post into 3.5 inch squares:

Then, I also cut 3.5 inch squares out of white fabric and started following the tutorial:
 

 (Getting ready to sew the hourglass blocks together)

 (Getting ready to iron)

 (All pressed)

And that is the progress made so far! It took WAY longer than I thought it would. The most time consuming part was the pressing and then squaring up all 30 of these little blocks to about 2.5 inch squares. That took FOREVER. 


Hopefully I will have a completed stocking tomorrow.


xoxo

Christmas Stockings?

I have been playing around with fabrics to make Christmas stockings for Hubster and I. My goal was to have them match (or at least coordinate) with the tree skirt I made and posted about in my last post. 

I can't seem to nail down a good color scheme/pattern though. Here are pictures of the fabrics and fabric combos I am working with:

 (Reds! Apparently I don't have many bright reds in my stash.)

 (Some greens. A few more modern prints here)

 (I think that I like this color arrangement the best. I like the green and gold combo!)

(All the fabric)

I am very unsure as to the final product I am going to make. I have some ideas though:

• I want to incorporate white fabric or maybe Kona Snow into the arrangement to brighten it up a bit
• I don't think that I am going to use the DARK GREEN (almost black) pin dot fabric
• Maybe the stocking part of the stocking (ie. not the cuff) can be made of a combination of red/white and green/white hourglass blocks. Then, the cuff can be a combo of the gold/white hourglass blocks. 
• Maybe a combination of gold/red/white/green patchwork squares throughout
• Maybe red/white/green candy cane-style striped 
• Maybe one of each? Technically, I need 4. One for Chris, me, our "Boys" (2 boy cats, Gob & Tobias) and one for our "Girls" (2 girl guinea pigs, Daria & Delilah).

I have so many ideas floating around. Can someone just tell me what to do? 

xoxo