Awkword

My 10 year old son has written a book.  It is a collection of poems and short stories that he wrote all on his own.  He also decided that he would donate a portion of his book sales to the Los Angeles Public Library.  He feels that having access to so many books through the public library inspired him to write.  He also feels that it is important to encourage children to read and to use the public library. 

His book premiered at an event at his school called PJ's and Books.   This is an event where authors come in and read to the students and the students have the chance to ask questions.  There were three authors at the event and Dylan was the only child.

We self published his book using createspace.com.  This is a great self publishing tool that was totally free and very easy to use.  His book is now available on Amazon.  Please consider getting a copy.  You will not only be supporting my son's college fund but also the public library.  If you liked the book please leave a comment to share.

Link to book on Amazon

Shelter Quilts

I love shelter pets.  This is our Teddy.  He is our second adopted pet.  We got him from a family that was about to put him into a shelter.  He has been a great dog for our family despite his constant need to chew everything in site.  So when I saw a contest that involved making quilts for shelter animals I jumped right in.  I made these two quilts to donate to shelter animals.  Teddy is sitting on the one that has a dog panel.  And the one with a cat panel is in front of him.  Dog are not the best models so it almost took longer to get this photo then it did to make the quilts.  The contest is to win a new sewing machine.  If you would like to join the contest head over here.  If you would like to help me win the contest please head over here and vote for my photo.  Thanks and love to all adoptive and shelter pets.

Giant Star Quilt

At the last minute I decided to make a baby quilt for a friend. I had three days to do it.  And I did it. This star quilt goes together quickly and was super fun to make.  I got the idea from Diary of Quilter. She has links on her site to other styles of the star quilt.  I played around with the colors a bit and the number of colors and came up with this.

The back is a sweet pink striping.  Thanks to my quilt model who holds all my quilts for me when I photograph them I got some great pictures.  Next up I plan to finish my farm quilt and start a barn and silo quilt.

Rainbow Hearts

My son wanted a new quilt.  He went into my Pinterest page and picked out one from this site.  There were no patterns. So as I told you before I had to do math. Lots of it. And fractions. But the end result was this beautiful creation that he and the dog love.

Pinwheels

The Pinwheel baby quilt is done.  I tried a couple of new things on this quilt. I put mini pinwheels in the corner.  That was rough.  When the quilt was all put together I took a picture to send to someone and when I looked at the photo I saw that one of the corner pinwheels was wrong.  I had to take it apart while it was already attached to the quilt.  Fun.

Next I tried my hand at stenciling a border.  I used a washable pen. I don't think I will be using this technique again.  My stitching was not that equal on both sides. I think to the untrained eye it will look find but I noticed all the flaws.

I stitched in the ditch and added a border. Fortunately those worked out and the baby quilt is ready for gifting. I like to think that the new mama can teach her baby about colors and shapes with this quilt.  Happy quilting.

I am participating in the Pillow Case Challenge 24 Hour Sew-A-Thon. More information can be found here http://www.allpeoplequilt.com/sewathon. This is a great event that will make pillow cases for many different charities.  I am making mine for foster youth. You can join a sew-a-thon near you, host a virtual one, or plan one in your own home.  It is a great way to give back and lot's of fun as well.  Join in!  And if you do please post photos of your pillow cases in the comments section so we can all see them.

Sample Blocks

I don't sew small things.  It hurts my hands to cut them out and they never come out neat and straight. So I always sew large things.  Then I came across the blog of Lori Holt at Bee in My Bonnet.  She makes sewing small things easy.  Her techniques are easy to follow and her pictures are very helpful. She not only showed me I could sew small pieces she also opened up my eyes to a whole new way to use my scraps.  You need to read her post on this.  Pow! Mind blowing.  So I had this quilt which I haven't finished yet.  It is Suburbs from Cluck Cluck Sew.  Another great blog.  I haven't put the backing on yet but I had tons of scraps left over.

I started making sample blocks from Bee in My Bonnet.  And I made 15 of them before I knew it.  I absolutely loved it.  Look at those adorable blocks that are going to make an even more adorable quilt.  I keep spreading them out and looking at them.

But there's more.  I still had triangles left over from the Suburbs quilt. I started sewing a few at a time when I finished with a block. Sort of using them to start and end the next block.  Pretty soon I had a pinwheel quilt.  All from scraps.  This picture shows it pinned and ready for quilting.  And I have to tell you I don't like pinwheels.  I would not ordinarily set out to make them.  But this quilt was done in two days.  TWO DAYS!  I work full time - nothing gets done in two days.

I can't wait to get my copy of Farm Girl Vintage by Lori Holt so I can make tons of more blocks. I love it when I find something that gets me excited about quilting all over again.