More surprises for Carissa

What is more fun than surprises? I brought a few quilt tops home from Carissa's unbeknownst to her and decided to finish them up to surprise her.
I love this quilt! It is so fun and cheerful and full of Heather Bailey's prints. I quilted each block with a big flower.

Luckily she had given me her scraps to make me a quilt top so I had them to piece together a back. Loved how it turned out!

Tyler had picked this fabric out so I found a yummy micro fleece throw at Walmart for $5.00 for the back. I used regular batting so it is nice and puffy - but it was a total pain to stipple because of bulk.

And of course I had to make something for the youngest munchkin so Meili got a doll quilt out of some scraps. I finished everything up and shipped it off to Carissa with the hope she would receive it on "one of those days" and I think today fit that bill exactly. Enjoy Cris!

Great Quote

This quote comes from the book "The Christmas Sweater" by Glenn Beck. This is great wisdom that comes from a little boy's grandfather and the story teaches about gratitude and the real value of a gift. I loved this quote and think it would be a great sentiment to go along with a special handmade project you might be giving someone this Christmas.

We pulled off a really great SURPRISE

Two weeks ago Grandma, Mom and Sister showed up in Omaha to surprise Carissa. We were afraid she had got wind of us coming but nope, she was surprised. We had the best "Girl's Night Out" for 4 whole days. We checked out all the antique stores (Carissa will have to post the darling quilt cupboard she bought once it is painted)
I can't just sit around so I had Carissa put me to work on some of her UFOs. She has even more quilt tops that need to be quilted than I do - Scary thought! I had seen a cute tree pillow on another blog (http://www.cluckclucksew.com/2009/10/tutorial-scrap-buster-fall-pillow.html) (thanks Lauren!) so I made one up for her to go with this . . .
This is Carissa's favorite quilt ever. It is Camille Roskelly's pint sized Wild Thing pattern. It was one of her UFOs so I quilted it.I haven't done a small stipple for a long time but I must say it turned out pretty good and the quilt is darling.

There was not quite enough fabric for the back so I just added a strip of coordinating fabric. Cute, huh?

And when I put the quilt and the pillow together I realized they were from the same fabric. I know, it takes me awhile sometimes.

We visited the 2 quilt stores in Omaha.

I helped her with her "Dental Wives" quilt. All the wives of the dental students got together and made 24 of the same quilt block and then exchanged them so they had 24 different ones. This just needed to be quilted too.

We got her autumn table runners bound.

And we made a flannel chenille baby quilt. I'll have to get the pictures off the other camera to show you how easy it is. All in all, we had such a great time doing projects, shopping, staying up late, having her husband cook for us (what a nice guy to let us invade him and then he cooks for us!), playing with the grandkids, painting treasures found at antique stores and meeting all of her wonderful friends. Soooooo fun!

I finally finished this quilt and gave it to my friend and neighbor Karen. She lost her husband to cancer. She is such a sweet and loving person and was right there for me when my husband was going through radiation treatments for his cancer. She is a great example to me and I wanted to give her something to let her know that. I made this out of a jelly roll and loved the bright springy colors.

Good News!

My good friend Julie has been battling Inflammatory Breast Cancer for the past couple of years - not once but twice. She had her full body scan last week and was pronounced cancer free. YEAH!!! She is an amazing person who is so upbeat and positive all of the time. I made her this quilt for her chemo treatments and it's nice to see it just draped over a chair now instead of seeing it wrapped around a very sick Julie. Congrats friend!

ADORABLE Appliqued Quilt!

Well I can NOT take any credit for this masterpiece. My good friend did this- and it is so cute. She didn't even keep it for herself- she gave it away! But It is so cute I just had to share! I am very impressed! (you may know her.... Bonnie) Yes, This is HOURS of work! You go girl!

Our Fun Home Makeover

I told you about my favorite quilt (see below) and how my son wanted to do his living room around the quilt which you can see in the picture below. While they were away for a few hours we snuck in and transformed their living room from all beige to totally them.
I LOVE the picture shelf over their couch (which we copied from Carissa - see her picture below). Now they have pictures of them in their home.

I spray painted our old coffee table, recovered her black throw pillows and hung some luge memorabilia. We even hung curtains! What fun we had and now it looks so warm and cozy. You can see what one quilt can do for a room!

Halloween Quilts

Carissa got me in the mood to make a table runner so I pulled out my Halloween fat quarters and cut different width strips and sewed them all together. Fast and easy!
When I quilted it I made a spider web design which you can see above just to be a little different. I get tired of just stippling all the time.
And I've always wanted to make a Halloween quilt so I copied Carissa (again) and did a fast simple one. One piece of cute Moda Witches in the middle with 2 borders.

Then to be different (again) I quilted it in a zig zaggy design. I'm working on another very fast and easy project which I will post tomorrow.

Check back!

There is a fun quilt festival going on over at Park City Girl's blog that is right here: http://parkcitygirl.blogspot.com/2009/10/quilt-festival-fall-2009.html Check it out for fun ideas and to meet fellow quilters!

My Favorite Quilt

The year my husband was diagnosed with cancer was a stressful time for us and I spent many nights piecing quilts with one of my best friends (my sewing machine). I decided to make something lasting for each of my children since I had come to the realization that life might not last as long as we want it to. I did end up making a quilt for each of my children for Christmas that year but I especially loved this Buggy Barn pattern and all of the fun colors. This son was a member of the United States Luge Team at the time so it was appropriate. Since then he has married and is in the process of decorating his first living room. Guess what he and his wife are using for their inspiration? Yep, this quilt. He will also display his medals and other memorabilia from his days traveling the world. I'm so happy he loves it as much as I do. ***By the way, my husband is doing great now.

Busy . . . Busy

I found this quilt top that my mom had made for my oldest daughter years ago. It was hidden away in my cedar chest. I think the plan was for me to hand quilt it when she got married but I don't have time for that so I decided to machine quilt it. It was a really huge quilt so I cut it down a little and put a few squares on the back.

Since it was pieced many years ago, I just used the scraps I had left and pieced them together for the back along with a few squares that were supposed to cover the bed pillows. I think it turned out kind of fun for a back and was a great way to use up the scraps.

I also quilted this heart quilt that I made up the pattern for. It is a "Buggy Barn" style stack and whack that was really easy.

I just love Conference because I can sit around in my pajamas and get all of my hand sewing done. I finally got this baby quilt bound. I just used scraps but I LOVE it! And I even got it done before the baby turns 8 or 9 years old - just kidding!

I also got this cute little quilt top quilted. Carissa made it for one of our friends who also had a baby. She did the top and I quilted it and bound it. It actually matches her car seat that I recovered for her.

I even got a friend's quilt stippled for her. This is her very first quilt and she made it for her granddaughter who is having a birthday this Friday so she didn't want to try to quilt it herself. I love the pinks and browns!

TIME to pull out the HALLOWEEN

Switch up your decor with a different quilt hanging over your couch! This was a Halloween quilt I did. And LOVE. That pattern is really fun. Just a solid piece in the middle with a stop border and a crazy wack border. (very easy, leave a comment if you want the instructions). You can do any holiday quilt like this. In fact my mom has done a Christmas/snowman one that is adorable too!

The quilting on this one is fun, it is not curvy and loopy but, straight and jagged. (spooky)!

A quilt on every corner!

What to do on a BLUSTERY, COLD DAY???

1. Vacuum, Mop, and fold 3 baskets of laundry?- NOPE

2. Go outside in the freezing, windy, rainy weather? NOPE--- unless you need more fabric....

3. Eat pumpkin bread, and burn Williams Sonoma mulling spice? Yes.... but while you also....

4. Stay in your PJ's and SEW fall/halloween projects!!!!

5. Don't forget the Mountain DEW!

I decided to start a NEW project- surprise, surprise! But I am doing some table runners for people. I love the fall so why not spread some FALL cheer!

(semi finished!) now to quilting 10 table runners....... They may get done for NEXT halloween